Dissapointed with TH's attitude about game piracy

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"When go to see a movie, are you going to ask your money back when the movie sucks? I don't think so.. If you read a good book from the library, you're going to buy it afterwards to support GOOD books? I don't think so..."

I have gotten up and walked to the front and asked for my money back on a crappy movie. Sometimes I get a voucher for the next time I come but it still adds up. The movie theater then removes my purchase from that movie and thus total sales go down. If you wait till the movie is down and then want a refund though...
Gates of Fire was a recent book I read from the Library and then bought the book. I've done that with a few books.

 


piracy - Show Spelled Pronunciation[pahy-ruh-see]
1. practice of a pirate; robbery or illegal violence at sea.
2. the unauthorized reproduction or use of a copyrighted book, recording, television program, patented invention, trademarked product, etc.: The record industry is beset with piracy.

steal - Show Spelled Pronunciation[steel]

1. to take (the property of another or others) without permission or right, esp. secretly or by force: A pickpocket stole his watch.
2. to appropriate (ideas, credit, words, etc.) without right or acknowledgment.

Not only that if you wanted to get religious that would also be a Sin to pirate a game, but we won't go there.
Piracy is a crime, it is stealing, it is not murder. It's that simple, no if and's or but's about it.
 
I just hate those ISPs that block you from P2P networks and etc. when your downloading things like Linux or your friends (not the TV show this time) drawings (700MB) and they can't afford a server. I don't wanna hassle the Linux servers in America (slow in Australia) and I can't wait for the mail deliveries (by the time its delivered its a new release version).

I mean like not all P2P is illegal, right? I get permission to download my friend's pictures and yet the aggrogant Australian Goverment and ISPs slowing this down, but why?
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But here we have the classic case of "because of the bad people the good have to suffer as well"
 
Piracy of games should be illegal thats with out a doubt true. But look at the prices we need to deal with. The software market should be based on massive production and sales rather then small and exp amounts.

If Crysis was aroudn 10-20$ I doubt any1 would go through the trouble of pirating it (although there might be some).

I don't condone piracy but I'm sorry if I don't want to spend 50$ plus tax on a game that is over in a couple of hours.

Look at adobe's software, its 300$ for a simple dreamweaver program, where other web design sites offer it for a simple fee. yes I kno its a complex program but commong 300$ thats hardware money!

my motto is never spend money on a program that is more than a mainstream Video card (which today's standards is 100-150$)

I pay for antiviruses, because those guys are alert 24/7, I pay for windows because with out it we wouldn't have much choices in every day oses, I pay for games that bring their game to the table (Hl2, unreal, COD4) The people I see that actually offer really good deals would have to be valve.

But look Crysis, horriblly linear, other than graphics has nothing to put on the table, mild Multiplayer...not worht 50$ I'd rather spend that money on a HDD.

I'll say again, Although Piracy is taking food away from developer's mouths and families, if the companies marketed them better or offered more for our money (like a 30 day satisfaction gauranteed or 2 days or w.e) our thoughts wouldn't be on how to get it free as much.

If Crysis goes down to 10$ I'll go buy it even if I don't like it, its a good benchmarker.

Either way, prices are outrageous.
 
Again, we have the argument of people believing they actually have a choice of stealing, yes it still is considered stealing, based on the value the product gives them. No matter how you cut the cake it's stealing even if the game/software ended up being a big steaming pile of crap(Hellgate London comes to mind). If people don't think its worth the listed price, wait for it then buy it at the price you believe is right(Which is exactly what I am doing for DoW SoulStorm, sorry, not paying $40 for an expansion that adds a similar old campaign and 2 new races), don't steal it and say it was garbage. Because at that point beggars/theif's can't be choosers. However I don't see anything wrong with demo'ing the full software from a bitorrent but there is a certain threshold when you know you should remove the non-legit copy and replace it with a real copy. Which I have done with music and games. The problem with pirating is that it's ludicrous on how easy it is to do and there's really nothing being done about it other than companies vain attempts with copy protection software, which I think is a waste of money. In reality 'they' believe it will deter the hackers/pirates, while whats true is quite the opposite. It wouldn't take me more than 5 minutes to find a no-cd crack that bypasses copy protection for just about any game. And just like that the thousands of dollars spent on the protection is busted, because it gave some guy somewhere a challenge to beat and share with the world.
 



Erm, those descriptions are completely different. At no point is a pirate taking anything from anyone. If it was theft or stealing, it would be enforced by the police as it would be a criminal offence. However, the police will not arrest you for it, as it is not.

Piracy isn't theft, its piracy. Just as Manslaughter isn't Murder, Indecent exposure isn't Rape, Slander isn't murder, Driving without insurance isn't Taking without consent.

As for religion? Meh. Its also a sin to wear a condom according to the catholic church. In fact, didn't they publish a new list of "deadly sins" recently to include stem cell research and pollution? Anyone that [strike]drives a car[/strike] breathes is emitting CO2 and therefore polluting and therefore going to hell anyway.

darkstar782, you've already stated in previous posts that you agree that piracy is wrong. What is there to gain here in this particular discussion as to how wrong it is and what exactly is wrong?
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If its irrelevant "how wrong" things are, then we should start punishing all crimes and misdemeanors equally. The death penalty should be issued for everything from Murder to Littering. Yay for Judge Dread!!



Finally,

Stealing a game from a shop will get you arrested. This is because stealing is a criminal offence.

Copying a game will get you sued by the game's author, but NOT arrested. This is because piracy is a civil offence, and not stealing.
 
While i think the Darstar goes too far, I have to agree with bildo.

If i buy a game that doesnt work on my pc, im certainly not going to go out and buy the original. Developers should put less money into DRM, and more into ensuring their product actually works - or at the very least at least installs (The Witcher and MoH Airborne come to mind.

Also, for every good game, theres hundreds of bad ones. The Industry at this stage is as bad as the music industry, just churning out overhyped junk, then blaming piracy when people dont fall for their marketing.
 


Ok lets take it from a non technical standpoint.
Option 1) Buy game
Option 2) Pirate game

Results from option 1) Dev's make money to possible release another great game
Results from option 2)Dev's make no money and go under (Can anyone say TITAN QUEST?)

In simple terms. It doesn't take much more than common sense to know that pirating in the end harms the development of new games from a company. It doesn't matter what you call it the end result is always the same. It decreases profits from that game for the dev's.
 


Ok lets take it from a non technical standpoint.
Option 1) Buy game
Option 2) Pirate game

Results from option 1) Dev's make money to possible release another game
Results from option 2)Dev's make no money and go under (Can anyone say TITAN QUEST?)

In simple terms. It doesn't take much more than common sense to know that pirating in the end harms the development of new games from a company. It doesn't matter what you call it the end result is always the same. It decreases profits from that game for the dev's.
 
since play games i never buyed anything software and i saved alot of money i saved some thousands of $ for this money i can buy a very good pc i love piracy :)
 


Go back to your bridge, troll - you have no powers here.
 


Karma's a "alternate naming for a female dog" :sol:
 
lol its so funny that in usa forums everyone are shocked by people who download software in my country forums everyone shocked by somone who buy software
 


So what do they live from in your country?
 


Shocked? No. There's a whole swarm of people, probably more here in the US that pirate everything from games/movies/ to Radio Heads "practically" free album.
 


I guess that figures, that you don't understand I mean.

If you don't buy the game and noone else buys the game, then people that made it cannot make a living. If that is normal in your country: not paying for stuf you use that others put work in to make, then how do they make a living?
 


Simple, they don't :kaola: But then they kick and whine about America being #1. "How do they do it!" *said in that infamous infomercial voice*
 
At no point is a pirate taking anything from anyone. If it was theft or stealing, it would be enforced by the police as it would be a criminal offence. However, the police will not arrest you for it, as it is not.
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So no one has ever been arrested, fined, or imprisoned for software piracy?

Look at adobe's software, its 300$ for a simple dreamweaver program, where other web design sites offer it for a simple fee. yes I kno its a complex program but commong 300$ thats hardware money!

my motto is never spend money on a program that is more than a mainstream Video card (which today's standards is 100-150$)
Click to expand...
$300, that's all? When I got DW from Macromedia it was $400. Sorry I see nothing wrong with the pricing of professional software. If someone thinks they actually need professional software to do whatever it is they're doing, they should expect to pay professional prices. For the amount of money a productive designer/artist can make with say Photoshop, the initial price of the software is a drop in the bucket. Sorry, no sympathy points for that.

 
I think Liquids argument is on the money.....

I do recall when VHS tapes were being sold for $70+ and yep, everyone was copying them and sharing them with their friends. EVENTUALLY someone woke up, dropped the price to $19.99 and the copying of VHS tapes mostly disappeared.

Well we have the same situation today. $50 for a game is much too high for many of these games. So publishers try to prevent someone copying a crappy game with DRM.

To make this complicated the DRM companies have strong sales staff telling the publishers how effective they are at preventing copying. They have a very strong interest in DRM continuing.

And you all do know that the RIAA/id1ot clones do employ staff to troll various boards and vigorously defend their position. You do know that right?

I would like to see this DRM crap dropped, and that neutered Crysis sell for $25 (or less).

And secondly, how hard is it to do a little central key validation in order to do multiplayer?

Drop the price and this copying will go away.

Only RIAA staff call copying piracy....
 
a price drop and a close look at system requirements would result in less piracy. It is pretty much that simple. I think $30 would be reasonable for most new games. Collector's editions for $40 or $50 would be fair.

Maybe also take a look at release quality levels. If you need a 0 day patch then you released it too early. If you need a stability patch within the first week you released it too early. Patches should add content and rebalance/tweak, not be used almost exclusively for bug fixes as they are now.
 
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