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General discussion (archive)McPixel developer: “deeming Piracy as theft is wrong.”(177 posts)(177 posts)
(177 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted September 11, 2012
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F4LL0UT: The really funny thing is that you will kick the bucket before you will be able to finish reading all these books. And this example perfectly demonstrates what's wrong here. That you own such a collection can only be explained through a crazy form of greed which is IMHO a major problem in today's society.
Pirates are greedy. They want to download every game ever release on launch day, but they won't even play it past the first few levels or matches. That's exactly the problem. One of the most common excuses to piracy is that "games are too expensive", and that "U$60 is too much". While i do agree that the launch price is a bit high, we all know that prices will go down eventually. The problem is that pirates can't wait, they're self entitled, they want their games now. If they don't have the money to afford the latest COD title on release day they prefer to pirate it rather than wait for an inevitable sale or price drop. I currently have 477 games on my Steam account. I would NEVER be able to afford all these games if i had to buy all of them at regular price. But i could when they went on sale.

I personally know many people who have plenty of terabytes of pirated games. Do you really think they play them? Unless they stayed home every fucking day without a job or anything, they will never play most of these games. Heck, it happens even to us, paying consumers. With all those crazy sales and indie bundles we have huge backlogs with games that we will probably never play.
Post edited September 11, 2012 by Neobr10
Posted September 11, 2012
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Neobr10: Do you really think they play them? Unless they stayed home every fucking day without a job or anything, they will never play most of these games. Heck, it happens even to us, paying consumers.
I guess we should all spend more time playing games and less time talking about playing games, huh ;P ?
Posted September 11, 2012
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Vestin: I guess we should all spend more time playing games and less time talking about playing games, huh ;P ?
Not necessarily but yes.

:P
Posted September 12, 2012
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F4LL0UT: You will definitely only read a fraction of these books but you won't pay for any of them (not even the ones you read) with your argument being "because I can't afford my whole collection". It's quite probable though that you could afford all the ones you actually read, especially considering that you don't read them at once but over a long timespan. So really, you think you have a valid argument here?
No. That was a rebuttal to a lost sales accusation. Since not every download is a lost sale, and simple unavailability of a nonscarce good as an unauthorized download has never motivated me to make a purchase (you'll have to trust me on this), the argument that all or at least some of my downloads are lost sales doesn't work.

(Ebooks are a particularly bad example, because ebook sellers have been consistently found guilty of fixing prices, and an otherwise incorrect and unethical Robin Hood argument leads to perfectly ethical behavior in the case of ebooks.)

My actual copyright stance is that I do not support what other people ITT consider self-evident, namely, the rights of the creator to do whatever the hell they want with their creation. Not "yes, the creator has all the rights, but I demand exceptions because I'm cute and fluffy". Creator's right is not self-evident, much like "parents own their children" and "a woman owns her body" are not self-evident, and for me to support it I need some evidence that it is in fact beneficial.

The only right I fully support is mandatory attribution (with opt-in anonymity), because people and organizations should know where to find more, what to avoid, and where to send donations|salary. I'm on the fence about the logistics of extracting financial benefits - namely, should only the creator be allowed to collect money for the creation (and delegate that right to others), or will attribution by itself ensure an optimal distribution of the benefits.

*in before Kantians go "how would you like if you are not paid for your work" - no, I won't like it at all, because copyright or no copyright, this is still a breach of contract law; and there's ample evidence of the benefits of contract law.

*in before Randroids go "a lack of intellectual property laws will kill innovations" - no, it won't. Recent history shows that innovators fail, imitators succeed. Absence of intellectual property laws will open the market for competing imitators, which is good.

In other news,
- a person expressing an anti-pirate sentiment in this thread admitted to pirating Windows in another recent thread.
- a person expressing an anti-pirate sentiment in this thread had recommended me a torrent tracker by PM in April of this year (note: all downloads on that particular tracker are illegal since 2008 even if they are in the public domain).
Posted September 12, 2012
Starmaker, you should be careful. Vestin may send an anti-pirate operative and deal with you another way..

:P

I must say you put forth your arguments very clearly, I like your posts, regardless of your stance on piracy.
Posted September 12, 2012
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Nirth_90: Starmaker, you should be careful. Vestin may send an anti-pirate operative and deal with you another way..
Nah, I'm not utilitarian ;P. Even if I figured that murdering him would be beneficial to society (based on research data conclusively showing that the total gains would outweigh the suffe... disadvantageous effects), I would still claim that, you know, it's morally wrong.
Then again - I'm glad that we're dealing with a somewhat sophisticated stance, even if I consider it a wrong one.
Posted September 12, 2012
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Starmaker: Creator's right is not self-evident, much like "parents own their children" and "a woman owns her body" are not self-evident, and for me to support it I need some evidence that it is in fact beneficial.
???
Posted September 12, 2012
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Vestin: Then again - I'm glad that we're dealing with a somewhat sophisticated stance, even if I consider it a wrong one.
Or, as I prefer to think of it, "Though this be madness, yet there is method in't."
Posted September 12, 2012
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Starmaker: *in before Randroids go "a lack of intellectual property laws will kill innovations" - no, it won't. Recent history shows that innovators fail, imitators succeed. Absence of intellectual property laws will open the market for competing imitators, which is good.
Interesting statement with such a vague message that it can mean anything you want. Can you express it in a more clear manner? Or provide statistics etc. for this?

And also: I'm quite sure that the imitators who DO bring progress are almost always acting legally. You know, there is a difference between plagiarism and imitations or homages. These days you actually have to copy and paste content created by others to be deemed a criminal and that definitely does not result in progress. Analyzing and improving on other people's ideas is a good thing but the law does accept this kind of behaviour (and the people who have the intellectual capabilities and means to actually create something "better" usually have no problem respecting IP rights). So really, I don't see the problem. In my opinion at least in culture the copyright does work the way it should - it does not stand in the way of progress but it does make sure that creative work is (or at least can be) lucrative for the creators. And it's quite important that people can expect benefits for their creative effort, isn't it. If it's just natural to assume that you have to pay regular workers to keep them working, then how is it that so many people deny that this is also necessary for creative efforts?

Also, how does piracy have anything to do with all this? Piracy does not create stuff, it's just about spreading stuff that is already there and making creative work less lucrative for the people who did it. It's just funny to assume that the piracy movement represents any kind of progress in the direction you're describing. I even joined the forums of the German Pirate Party to find out what their views and propositions on this are and I was amazed by the fact that they have absolutely NO idea about creative processes and cultural progress. Ultimately every argument I encountered had its roots in "we don't like paying for stuff" (which translates to "we are just a bunch of greedy bastards"). It's just funny how pirates completely fail to recognize the potentially destructive results of their ideas. Some of them literally reminded me of totalitarian systems - and yeah, we all know how totalitarianism supports cultural progress.
Post edited September 12, 2012 by F4LL0UT
Posted September 12, 2012
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F4LL0UT: . It's just funny how pirates completely fail to recognize the potentially destructive results of their ideas. Some of them literally reminded me of totalitarian systems - and yeah, we all know how totalitarianism supports cultural progress
I've heard many pirates hide behind half assed, incomplete political/social theory, and even at times philosophy. I don't know if they are really so naive/stupid or just intentionally bullshitting. They emphasise the positive side of their argument, while not even considering the negative consequences. Just to clarify, this is not aimed at you, Starmaker, you've clearly at least given thought to your argument.

But on the matter of destructive effects, there has been a lot of talk over creative people getting rewarded for their work. Perhaps not enough talk of the retail industry and digital distributors. Jobs, livelihoods etc. Not to mention other service industries that are arguably affected.
Posted September 12, 2012
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Neobr10: Pirates are greedy. They want to download every game ever release on launch day, but they won't even play it past the first few levels or matches. That's exactly the problem. One of the most common excuses to piracy is that "games are too expensive", and that "U$60 is too much". ... I would NEVER be able to afford all these games if i had to buy all of them at regular price. But i could when they went on sale.
But if we forget the "legal" aspect, is it really that much better than pirating ? If Pirates are greedy because they want to play games without paying 60$ for them, aren't those who want to play the same games but only paying 5$ or less for them greedy too ?

That's the good old "sales" debates; if the majority of a game money is made during the first X weeks after release, aren't the ones refusing to buy the game full price to instead wait for the sales, hurting the devs/publishers/whatever nearly as bad as the pirates does.
Post edited September 12, 2012 by Gersen
Posted September 12, 2012
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Gersen: aren't those who want to play the same games but only paying 5$ or less for them greedy too ?
Lol, no. They pay just as much as the right owner's wants them to. I hope you understand what's different here.
Posted September 12, 2012
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keeveek: Lol, no. They pay just as much as the right owner's wants them to. I hope you understand what's different here.
Nope, the right owner wanted them to pay 60$ for it when the game was released; not 10$, 5$ or less 6 months- one year after release.
Posted September 12, 2012
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Gersen: Nope, the right owner wanted them to pay 60$ for it when the game was released; not 10$, 5$ or less 6 months- one year after release.
I think you don't know how the business works...

Goods cost less with time because they are worth less. People patient enough to wait until the goods' value drops are not greedy, they just save money.

Right owner's not selling his goods for $60 after 6 months, because he knows he's not gonna sell anything for that price after that time (sales potential is now around zero). But he's free to stay with his riddiculously high price forever, like Blizzard with Starcraft 2.

God, I never thought I gonna need to explain things this basic.
Post edited September 12, 2012 by keeveek
Posted September 12, 2012
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Neobr10: Pirates are greedy. They want to download every game ever release on launch day, but they won't even play it past the first few levels or matches. That's exactly the problem. One of the most common excuses to piracy is that "games are too expensive", and that "U$60 is too much". ... I would NEVER be able to afford all these games if i had to buy all of them at regular price. But i could when they went on sale.
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Gersen: But if we forget the "legal" aspect, is it really that much better than pirating ? If Pirates are greedy because they want to play games without paying 60$ for them, aren't those who want to play the same games but only paying 5$ or less for them greedy too ?

That's the good old "sales" debates; if the majority of a game money is made during the first X weeks after release, aren't the ones refusing to buy the game full price to instead wait for the sales, hurting the devs/publishers/whatever nearly as bad as the pirates does.
hm. It is interesting about release money and later sales. One of the reasons (forget about recouping costs of physical copies at the moment and only look at digital sales) that the cost is high is that the company have used a lot of money (mostly on workforce) to get the game released. At this moment the company would need to gain back a large amount fairly quickly to remain afloat and be able to pay of the expanses (rents and wages mostly). If the company manage to survive this, then it no longer need the instant high influx of cash and can therefore profit from a longer sales period where the aim is sustainability (for which it makes sense to have more but cheaper sales) then the quick cash injection from day 1 sales. This is putting it very much on the point and a bit wrong, but hope the principle is coming out. It is basically a bit of a gamble.

Bottom line is that as long as the company survives the first months after a release then sales makes it more sustainable, and at this point there is no ethical problems buying off sales (at least as long as you buy it...). In the first months, then it is a matter of creating the right price points to reach the critical mass needed. If you feel it is not worth the asking price and would like to wait for a sale, then the company did not make a good enough product for you, and if this is the feelings of the majority then it is partly their own fault if they priced themselves out of the critical mass needed, or misjudged the audience they made it for (If it makes any sense). It is a bit of Darwinism going on here....
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General discussion (archive)McPixel developer: “deeming Piracy as theft is wrong.”(177 posts)(177 posts)
(177 posts)