Piracy has hit a new low....

[Forbin]

I'm not getting into a flame war over something so stupid. You need to chill out.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Oh dear.

Probably want to edit that beginning bit, SG... And maybe you want to end that patronizing bit at the end of your message, Forbin. Inbetween the insults is an interesting discussion trying to get out. I think you're both right, really.

[Lu]

It's a shame you two decided to get so personal. You both made some good points, I thought.

[syntheticgerbil]

I don't know, I guess it's because this is the internet so no one has ever really referred to me as a little man before, not being a person of small stature and all. I'll edit though, if it makes any difference.

[Snooglebum]

I don't know, I guess it's because this is the internet so no one has ever really referred to me as a little man before, not being a person of small stature and all. I'll edit though, if it makes any difference.

Little man? That's like an Arnold Schwarzenegger moment.

"YOU LEETLE MAAHN!"

[Forbin]

Yeah I'm not taking it personally, especially anything to do with my arguments.

Another interesting point of view on piracy is Brad Warwell's (Stardock). His basic outlook is that people need to stop developing games targeted at people who aren't interested in paying for them. Certain demographics are less likely to pirate a game, and even though they may not be the largest markets, if you budget and scope according to their scale you're less likely to be burned by rampant piracy.

[DanJW]

A think the Valve stance is more about pragmatism than higher ethics. You can cry about theft and whine and litigate, but it won't increase your bottom line. Valve's underserved customer approach sees the problem as an opportunity and they come out of it with more sales.

Hmm, the older I get, the more of an ethical pragmatist I think I'm becoming.

[gdf]

There will always be a percentage of piracy. The Humble Indie Bundle is readily available for as cheaply as you wish, so in this case I don't even think it was the money. If someone wasn't going to give the developers or charities much money at all, they'd probably see it as more hassle to go through that process. It's laziness, really. If I have no sense of duty to pay the devs/charities, it'll be easier for me to click on a link than arse around with PayPal.

Valve's position is one they're able to take, right? They own the closest thing to a unified PC platform there is, it's available all over the place, has no intrusive or terribly restrictive DRM and many of the games they sell are cheap. I don't think there's "no excuse" for not serving a certain market; I don't really know what factors are involved, but you can be sure it's not as simple as they'd let on, though they're probably still right to an extent.

What I'm saying is that however easy and cheap it is to download a game to own, there will still be a number of people ready to pirate it. Ideological opposition to DRM is probably still an incentive for some, but was probably used as cover for others. Why do you pirate? "Oh, I hate dat DRM". As more companies realise that punishing legitimate customers while the pirates easily crack their systems and play for free is utterly disingenuous, the excuse will lose legitimacy.

As for indie games and others that don't operate any intrusive DRM, piracy has been pretty much indefensible for some time unless you've got some kind of Valve-identified loophole. That's why, though, most pirates probably don't defend it. I like eating meat. I know it's probably morally wrong in a Western capitalist society with the availability of other, less harmful sources of nutrition. However, I'm not going to stop because meat is awesome. Selfish, yes, but I don't really care, and I'm guessing this is the stance of most game pirates.

For the record, I'm not a pirate. I've spent a silly amount on video games, I use Steam a lot and I paid $20 for the Humble Bundle. I watch the occasional episode of Family Guy online, but I pay for all my music etc. etc. Hopefully DRM dies out. It makes games a little easier to share, but in the end probably does good for the profit margins. Don't know how to finish this off so

[syntheticgerbil]

It's laziness, really. If I have no sense of duty to pay the devs/charities, it'll be easier for me to click on a link than arse around with PayPal.

While it may be for some, I think it's really oversimplifying people's motives to put it down as just someone's laziness. It could be ignorance just as well. Not everyone feels like they have to pay for something as ephemeral as a video game also. I don't think even then that makes them lazy or ignorant even then. It becomes a whole different factor after that. You could steal food for many reasons and they all might completely different from the reasons for stealing a Ferrari. A video game is probably somewhere inbetween those in terms of reason.

Valve's position is one they're able to take, right? They own the closest thing to a unified PC platform there is, it's available all over the place, has no intrusive or terribly restrictive DRM and many of the games they sell are cheap.

I suppose, but Valve isn't perfect, and as I said before, neither of the solutions they gave for their "underserved customer" argument would make any impact whatsoever on the pirated games in this topic, being a pay anything you want download in a centralized location only on the internet. Sure they can easily do things to reduce pirating, such as the no-brainer of making your games available in as many regions as you can and premiering them all at the same time, but people are still going to pirate. I still don't think the pirating percentage for The Humble Indie Bundle is really that bad, all things considered.

I don't think there's "no excuse" for not serving a certain market; I don't really know what factors are involved, but you can be sure it's not as simple as they'd let on, though they're probably still right to an extent.

I'm glad you said that, because there's also the market disparity involved between big and small developers or publishers. Valve are big guys. I know they can release a statement condemning DRM and promoting their foresight to release in all regions, for cheap, same days, etc., but the fact of the matter is, not everyone has the money or means to start a marketing and publishing campaign in Russia like them.

Basically Valve's end ideas are cover the whole world, same day, at affordable prices for each and every company. Just quickly looking at Steam's wikipedia article says they have failed at all of that to an extent. Do I expect them to be completely successful though? Of course not. No one can do that. What Valve is saying is nothing new or innovative by any extent, it does help reduce piracy or stolen products in almost any case, not just video games. The problem I have is that it's still one sided, placing all responsibility on the developer and publisher to fight pirates. It's basically playing the Valve Card, pitting the angelic developers and Steam givers against all other arguments.

I do, however, think everything Valve said is much better than just saying, "We need better DRM."

Personally, I believe everyone should feel guilt for enjoying someone's creation that they didn't pay for, even if there's a fat chance of that happening. I have a few close friends who pirate many games, not exactly sure the motive (lack of money or demoing comes up), but I don't go on some kind of preachy rant against them or presume why. So that's kind of where I stand. I think the best way to look at it is, marketing and availability aside, is if you did a damn good job if your creation caused a regular pirate to have some kind of moral epiphany and decide they like what you did so much that they need to pay you.

Edited May 21, 2010 by syntheticgerbil

[ThunderPeel2001]

For the record, I'm not a pirate... I watch the occasional episode of Family Guy online.

I bet in the eyes of the owners of Family Guy you're a pirate I bet nobody here is really actually entitled to cast the first stone.

[Wrestlevania]

Dragging the conversation back a few pages, I double-dipped on the bundle copy of Samarost2. But with good reason...

I habitually download, install and then instantly delete stuff upon setup finishing -- bit of a virtual tidy freak. But in this instance I didn't mean to and wanted to keep a complete local backup of the bundle on a spare 1GB memory stick. So I downloaded Samarost2 for a second time.

However, if the distributors are counting double- and triple-dipping as illegitimate that's a very tenuous link to "piracy" in my opinion. Stealing stuff via being let in through the front door seems too bare-faced to me, but then maybe I'm assuming too much of your average pirate..?

Anyway, I was searching Thumbs for tips/comments on Penumbra when I found this thread (it's not running quite right on my machine). Regardless, I didn't pay very much for the Humble Bundle, but I'm still very glad I did; all the games have been in my Must Play backlog since reading about them at places like TIG Source and so on.

Aquaria is wonderful in its aural and visual composition and, even though it's glitching slightly, Penumbra's already scared the shit out of me in the first 10 minutes of play. Looking forward to trying Gish and World of Goo as well, and my wife was intrigued by the unusual style of Samarost2 in the couple of minutes I fired it up for a brief look.

The only game I'm not sold on is Lugaru, which has sounded a bit odd and looked kind of clunky right from the beginning to me. Still, Wolfire seem like a talented lot, so I'm not passing judgement until I've fired it up and played it proper myself. Anyone up for a knock about some time?

Edited May 23, 2010 by Wrestlevania