So why do you use "Buy now!" phrase on GOG.com?

Because that's exactly what GOG is about. Software, that you can make backup copies of at liberty (for your own use of course). You can re-download it at liberty and install it on every PC you have, without restrictions, worldwide. So if you move you don't loose your software 'licenses'. No region locking, no other DRM restrictions. So as long as GoG is around I don't need any other download platforms, legal or illegal, for the games they offer here.


However, if someone buys some region-locked AAA game and then moves to a region where the software he pays for does not work any more for stupid license reasons, I really can understand the temptation to resort to illegal methods. (where cracking DRM for software you paid for to make backups actually is not exactly illegal in Germany. Yet. Selling those backups or even giving them to someone else is illegal, sure, as is downloading proprietary software you didn't pay for, of course. But circumventing DRM to be able to use your own software is considered venial.)

You're buying a license. You own the license. DRM free just means you have full control over how to use that license.

Indeed, and this is the inherent problem with the wider industry.

The tone of many companies (Valve, EA, Activision) is highly conciliatory before the fact, using terms like "buy", "own", "pre-purchase", but turns very nasty after the fact, emphasising that we only "license" our games or have a "subscription" to them.

Many publishers seem to want to change the concept of owning our games, but they don't want to change how they are sold accordingly. I bet you that if Valve or EA were forced to use "Subscribe Now"" or "License Now" instead of "Buy Now", they wouldn't be so accommodating, and buyers wouldn't be so understanding.

They want to have their cake and eat it at the same time. Their business model is based on a lie - selling the concept that we own our games, but enforcing the concept that we only license them.

To be fair, the only difference between a pirate owning their game and a consumer who bought a no-DRM version of the game, is the license. Even here on GOG you're buying licenses to use the game. 'License Now' would apply to GOG as much as those others.

The difference is in the amount of after-purchase control that remains. That's separate from the licensing thing, and yes, obviously something that many people, especially here, don't like.

It could naturally use improvement, like better sharing systems (the Microsoft family sharing system for instance sounded pretty nice before they canned it when they dropped their DRM).

Oh, I agree that the matter applies to GOG as much as it does to Steam or Origin, and yes, I agree that the main difference lies in how the content is controlled after the fact. The difference is that Steam, Origin, PSN and LIVE all explicitly try to reserve the right to terminate these licences at any time and emphasise their perspective that these licences are only temporary - which is obviously bullshit and is where my main beef lies with them.

GOG's marketing makes a point of challenging this attempted paradigm shift, although I would argue that with the inability to trade, sell or buy 'used' GOG games does undermine this point of view somewhat, even though I do for my part understand and accept that there are issues of enforceability related to the resale of digitally distributed games (the main practical difference with GOG lies in the fact that the games can be 'lent' very easily, albeit with a certain bending of the rules and a certain amount of moral expectation to 'play fair')

The accepted social order has been that we own our copy of game X in the same way that we own a Rolex watch or designer D&G sunglasses. Likewise, our ownership of this object does not permit us to create 'counterfeit' copies of these items. We own the object, not the intellectual property used to create it.

And yes, I do feel that digital distribution does need to provide some of the relátive benefits of physical ownership, and I did feel that the Xbox One's family sharing functionality - for digitally purchased games - was a good idea. Where it went horribly wrong was in copying the Steam/Origin approach to broadening that concept to physical media.

If digital is to have a future, it needs to have its actual practical benefits leveraged, not simply be abused to serve commercial interests as is the case right now, thus making it an inferior option to physical ownership.

For actually DESTROYED industries there is of course no proof. But that piracy is causing damage is not deniable I think. As I said, in the case where people just want to play something they already paid for (so as a way to circumvent too restrictive DRM), cracks and their like are entirely OK. I also can kind of understand the argument of 'let's show them'. I.e. the 'fight against DRM' that many TPB users like to cite as justification for piracy. In the case where some company decides to make their own product basically unplayable, the temptation to say "Screw that, I'm gettin the playable version for free" is big. (The alternative would be not to play the game at all, but abstinence is something not many are willing to do).

But my peeve with TPB starts where games are concerned that are not DRM locked. All those arguments and justifications break down when people start pirating games that are available DRM free. Even while the first humble bundle was running, lots of people pirated the games, even though you could get them for a price of your own choosing, legally and DRM free. There is no justification whatsoever for such behaviour. That's just a childish 'I want everything and pay nothing' mental attitude.

Spot on! Damn good point and the best I've read on the subject for a long time.

I think piracy is a very important and necessary pressure consumers (gamers) can exert on developers and publishers. Because it means that always we have the ability to simply go to TPB or wherever and download a game. It might be controversial to say, but this pressures the developers and publishers of these games to actually PROVE to us gamers that the product is worthwhile to support by buying. The consumer can pirate the game, but by making a game that's good enough that the gamer WANTS to pay for an official, legal copy, so that the developer can make more good games.

Of course, most publishers do not think like this, they still harbor backward views on understanding why piracy exists and how to "combat" it. Offer good service and support, don't use DRM, and make products that are so good that gamers want to pay to see more like them.

Really, publishers wouldn't be pushing DRM/obnoxious marketing/no demos if they were really selling good products. They KNOW the average "cinematic" broshooter is shit and the only way they can sell it is with deception.

More often than not i see devs be okay with piracy than pubs. Publishers are the one who make cleansing rituals once they hear the word "piracy" mentioned, they will be the first to blame it for not getting more than the expected revenue and fight it till their last dying breath, storming "legit" customers with obnoxious DRM and shit.

All of this because they can't get their advertisement money couse torrent sites are just a form of free advertisement.

Labels and artists aren't exactly one and the same thing nor do they (seem to) have/ pursue exactly the same interests.

Just my two cents.

EDIT: made sure to reply to mrking58.

Amazon started lately AutoRip in germany, I believe it was already active in the USA: you get a digital copy of (most) the cds and lps you bought in the past from them but also for new bought cds/lps. You can download the music from their cloudl, drm-free but watermarked. I think that's very interesting, because it shows that thanks to the digital revolution the content itself gets more in the focus then the way how it's delivered. I wouldn't be surprised if the same will also happen especially for eBooks in the near future.

On the other hand we have a big revival of the lp, because often delivered with a code for downloadable mp3-files it has become more the collectors item also for new music as it already was for the oldies. In short, the way we handle and see old media like books and movies are also changing, with focus on the content then the medium. The old mediums will become more and more collectors items. That's maybe explains a little bit why so many believe they have also the right to use the digital content of their books or media.

This is what I meant too. We're living in the age when TPB actually puts up advertisements for indie games on the front-page, saying "If you like this game, please buy it". Indeed most people if they do pirate a game and like it, go buy it online anyway.

I got back into Vinyl for a few years, bought a new turn table, acrylic platter, ortofon stylus etc and yet at the end of the day found too many of the new vinyl releases had issues, pops crackles just bad pressings. When you spend a decent amount on an album you want it to sound good. I'm back to CD now or lossless FLAC when I can buy them. If a band / studio doesn't offer me those options (I'm looking at you itunes) then they don't get my business.

I have boxes of CDs I've ripped to FLAC for lossless playback and it would be great to clear the space but at the end of the day I wouldn't feel right selling off the discs and yet keeping the digital copies. Morally I shouldn't keep my rip if I give the disc to someone else or I'm potentially losing a sale of that music at a later stage with (even a miniscule amount going back to artists and a bit more to the companies that spend marketing dollars to get your attention to them in the first place).

I do use pirate bay, but only on the idea of try before I buy. If i like it I buy it, if I don't I delete the torrent, that is how I moralise the dodgy practice.
hold on, so if the new music is terrible in most cases how come from what you say you have digital copies that out number what you have bought. If you haven't bought it and don't like it why keep it?