I feel I have to judge the whole project, because demos lie to make you buy a product, this is not limited to games, it's the same with music and movies for me, or anything you can pirate that I might be interested in. If it's avaliable in the US, I'd generally buy something if I think it's good so I can support the people making them.

I think you're missing the key difference with music, films, games etc. vs books and traditional physical content which is why all those mediums have been so worried about piracy.

If I give you a loan of a book I no longer have it.  You do.  If I re-sell the book I give it up myself.  There is only ever one version of that book.

Piracy for books is illegally printing more copies and selling them.  Now we have copies.

With DVDs, CDS, and Games the issue is you can make a copy and keep it.  So now you could install a game onto your PC, give it to a friend but keep playing yourself.  That's always been the central issue.  Our current model for buying/selling revolves around the concept there is one item you buy and which you either keep or give up (either to loan or sell).  Digitial media destorys that concept.

Of course genuinely borrowing isn't an issue nor should it ever really be - but that's not what is being targeted - it's just collaterall damage (to use that phrase) in a battle against something else - which is passing on and keeping a copy, and this happening to the extent that the amout of freely gained copies vastly outweighs the original which was bought.  Most companies would rather hurt the ability to borrow if it stopped piracy than endure the piracy.

The danger, whatever the reasons behind it, is to kill the very medium being pirated.  The only reason games, films, etc. are still made, sold, etc. is because enough people buy fairly to provide a profit despite the pirates - if this ever crossed a tipping point you'd see drastic respones I'm sure (I mean way beyond DRM, etc. seen now).  Then you'd have an industry probably jointly deciding to go fully digitial with a great deal of DRM used to drastically hamper copying and with sysem locks and other measures used to punish caught offenders.

Look at Steam - great service, which I love, but carefully built on a model which looks to minimize copying of content.  It allows gifting, etc. (which was always a very smart move by Valve) and generally makes you feel you get a great service as a buying customer - the important point being buying customer.

Ultimately in a monetary society creators, be them producing a game, making a film or recording music need to be guaranteed a certain degree of income.  People tend to focus on the hugely successful creators and forget the majority of media can struggle already to make money in the face of current piracy levels.

Piracy is making illegal software copies, infringing upon copyright and licenses and selling them for a profit. Making a copy or a back up for your own personal use is not technically stealing/piracy.

I would argue you are being somewhat shortsighted however in your depiction of what would happen.

If I tipping point were reached, such works WOULDN'T disapear, instead they would simply go back an older system for such works.

Afterall demand would still be there.  Just not at the prices offered by the market, so either things would need to get cheaper or we would return to an age of patronage somewhat how early artists and playwriters worked. 

A good example is the first Mount & Blade which was created based on beta keys being sold.

Your point is accurate but I thought this discussion was about piracy - i.e. zero income to the creator - vs price points and different models to supply different demand bases?

There is a line where, no matter what the model, if piracy is rampant enough the creator of any work cannot hope to make money no matter how cheap the delivery model is - apart from full patronage of course, but I think that's pretty unlikely to happen.

If you need to make 100K to break even and piracy reduces your income to 40K you're doomed no matter whether the 40K income was from 100 units sold at a very high price or 10,000 units sold at a very low price.

A) Why would it be unlikely?  Afterall, if there is demand and something isn't being provided... no doubt such measures would come through.

B) Piracy isn't ever likely to be that rampant.  Since economic and social theory has shown time and time again, that given the choice between paying a fair price for something or getting it for free in a way te creator disaproves of, people will invariably pay for it.

People are socialized to consume.

Things hold greater value when we do so.

Sorry I have gone two years without pirating. I did try to get through DR on two movies because the package clearly stated Android support for the digital copy. I emailed the content creator and said hey I am trying to get this movie onto my Android device the package says I can can I? They replied saying the movie was comparable with Android and said I could. I decided to go around the DR because the digital copy was the whole reason I bought the film and both the package and the content creator said it was for Android.

The only other time I have thought about piracy is when Digital copy was new. The package would say Digital copy and no where did it give an expiration date. I would buy the movie just to find out the digital copy I paid for was expired. However I decided not to pirate. I was going to contact my Government to press the issue of false advertising but forgot. I really should do that.

But their is no excuse for piracy I admit the manufacturer saying the product works on Android but using DR that blocks it really pisses me off. But I was wrong to try and get around the DR their are legal channels to go through.

As for you paid for the movie and have the right to put it in any format you want. Sorry but that's like buying a Wii game and putting it on your PS3 because you don't want the Nintendo hardware. Companies pay good money to get exclusive content. Amazon pays a ton to get its Kindle content if you port it to another device you are cheating Amazon. Same goes for Apple they pay money and such to get the content on ITunes you have no right to take that iTunes product and put it on an Android. Yes I know Cloud and DLC is a total joke and rip off because you don't own the copy, simple answer stop using Cloud and by the physical copies. I rarely download content I want to own Tue product

As for Netflix and services like it, you do not own those movies you are renting them. At 8$ a month and almost every device supported their is absolutely no excuse to pirate any material on it.
As far as theaters are concerned. The movie theater makes a small fraction of the ticket price. I believe my theater told me a year ago that the theater itself made ten percent of the ticket price with twenty percent going to the franchise and 70% to the creators. So they sell ad space prior to the film to make some additional cash and sell popcorn and pop at ridiculously high prices to turn a profit. You are paying for the experience and that theater has every right to sell some ad space before your film. Its not like they are denying you service.

Product pricing is as low as it can get. Companies have huge overhead creating these movies and games. A movie costing 200 million dollars to make needs to retail at 27$ Bluesy the company needs to make its money back and turn a profit so they can produce another product. The more pirates the higher the cost has to go less demand means higher prices for the rest of us. Digital copies are that expensive due to retailers it would be horribly unfair to sell your product 60% cheaper on your online service and then expect a retailer to pay drastically more and make it impossible for the re

Sorry my damn phone keeps leaving the text box and I can't scroll to the bottom.

Lets just say their is no excuse for piracy. If you can afford the system or PC capable of playing the game or movie then you can afford the legitimate copy. If your dirt poor buy on sale I get new games 20$ off on a regular basis by watching sales. On boxing day and black Friday I can get even better deals. I buy so many movies brand new on Bluray for 9.99$.

Your body in where Malaysia ya that's a tough question. The answer unfortunately is if you can't afford it either take out a loan or don't buy it. He could also try importing it or finding the cheapest retailer. But their is a reason the price is so high. Companies are working to find solutions in the third world. I can understand his position but at the same time it is still theft.

The issue is that it's a matter of content distribution models. The future is bound to be a world of self-discriminating consumers, where people willingly pay different amounts to experience content in different ways, and the problem is that content providers only really think about serving the upper-ends of the self-discriminating spectrum (e.g. the kinds of people willing to buy DVDs, or hardcover books, or go in person to the movies, etc), and that content providers think narrowly and try to divide the market upon national boundary lines in what has become a fundamentally global world.

In making the mistake of neglecting low-revenue customers (i.e. people that aren't going to pay to see something, but who could watch it ad-supported on the internet, or who might pay for a service that allows them to view the thing), and in trying to region-lock (and here i'm really talking about region-locking content on the internet), they are essentially throwing out a group of people that are willing to consume the media, just not at the price levels offered, or who are barred from legitimate access for arbitrary reasons

Piracy will always triumph until companies embrace these low-revenue or out-of-market consumers. And when companies do so, they will find they lose relatively few of the self-discriminating high-paying customers, such that people who paid for DVDs before will still pay for the DVD even if the whole movie is available streaming on 20th Century Fox's website, but then Fox is getting the ad clicks instead of MediaFire