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As a result of this change, I'm a purchasing gog.com customer again. Thanks CDP.
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TheJoe: We had faith in CDP, John Walker didn't.

The moral of the story is: Take Rock, Paper, Shotgun out of your RSS feeds.
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Balazs: Meh, RPS is still one of the best gaming sites, I don't really know any better one.
That's a bit like saying it's the best pile of horse turds out there, that might be the case, but it's still a pile of horse turds.

Seriously, the "journalism" standards for gaming news is absurdly low and shows no signs of improving. Best you can do is some of the higher quality editorials.
I love CDP. Now I can download it without the fear of consequences.
Sharing is caring!
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pH7: If I'm stopped for a speeding violation, I get the option to accept a fine there and then. This fine is smaller than what I'll get if I refuse and it's taken to court. Is this extortion? Not at all, it's recognizing that no one (except lawyers) is really benefitting from flooding the legal system with minor transgressions, offering a quick and easy solution.
Slightly OT, but around here if you get a speeding ticket you can usually get the first one deferred and not have to pay it as long as you don't get another one during whatever period of time applies. It's not a one on one proceeding it's typically done with everybody else that is doing that procedure at once. Which is fine because you're not disputing the accuracy, you're essentially just filing a motion with the court and the courts are much more interested in having people drive safely than collecting that ticket money.

In the US, you can always get a court date it's a legal right. But, any attorney worth retaining is going to fight tooth and nail to keep the case from going to trial because the results are extremely unpredictable. I sat on a jury once and I didn't know what the results were going to be going for deliberation, the results were very different from what I was expecting.
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pH7: .. snip ..
Good points.

One thing that might make it seem like extortion is because the "small fine" (750 EUR?) is so much smaller than the compensation they would try to get in court (in the thousands?). From what I've read, the whole point of it being in the tens of thousands is to deter people from doing it in the first place. When you can pay a fine several orders of magnitude lower, the cost/risk ratio is much more favourable to the would-be pirate.

Then again, it might be that high just so they can pay the lawyers!
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PoSSeSSeDCoW: If there were a method for accurately identifying who torrented something (IP addresses aren't people, just ask the RIAA), it would have been revealed.
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hedwards: Not really, disclosing such things at this stage would only ensure that pirates had information about getting around it. Until at least one case makes it to trial there's no benefit to be had from disclosing their methodology. These people know whether or not they pirated the game and it's easy enough to determine that during the discovery.

And the RIAA had other issues, they failed to take the steps necessary to verify that the information was correct. I remember one case where they failed to verify that the username actually belonged to the person they named and it actually belonged to somebody completely different.

Also, as in the Jammie Thomas case, they failed to back off when it turned out that there was no original disk to examine because it had failed and been replaced prior to them notifying her of their allegations. Furthermore they went on to claim that she had destroyed the disk in response to a suit which she hadn't yet been served with.

The reality here is that if they're careful and maintain high standards there's no inevitability to getting it wrong and being unable to correct it. To date nobody has come forward to say that they hadn't infringed upon the game and those that have come forward to complain haven't provided any accurate information to lead us to conclude that there was something shady going on.
There was a news story a couple of weeks ago about how IP addresses, assigned to the RIAA, were used to torrent copyrighted materials. The RIAA later came out and said that the IP address was not in use by them, so someone else must have used their IP to torrent materials. I was just making fun of them using a defense that they actively argue against in court.
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PoSSeSSeDCoW: There was a news story a couple of weeks ago about how IP addresses, assigned to the RIAA, were used to torrent copyrighted materials. The RIAA later came out and said that the IP address was not in use by them, so someone else must have used their IP to torrent materials. I was just making fun of them using a defense that they actively argue against in court.
The RIAA had serious problems with credibility. I don't personally like this sort of enforcement, but CDPR doesn't have the history of abusing the process that the RIAA, MPAA and various other trade groups do.

I wasn't completely opposed to the RIAA enforcement at first, but it became very obvious, very quickly that they weren't at all concerned with the law. They were using unlicensed investigators and weren't bothering to investigate other possibilities once they had a name that seem to sort of match.

If CDPR had been doing that sort of thing, I would definitely be boycotting them as well, but up until now the only allegations I've seen are from pirates without any sort of documentation or corroborating evidence to suggest that there's anything shady going on with the enforcement. In fact I haven't even seen anybody who was willing to speak on the record about it other than from CDPR.
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Kezardin: The popping of champagne corks still doesn't excuse the actions of some individuals on these forums who specifically targeted GOG with posts that were at times abusive, irrational or fallacious.
And you'll never get them to apologize or even acknowledge the bile they spew because their ego's might get hurt. The GoG forums are still good, but the opinions voiced here have seen better days.


Onto the story, not a single innocent was affected, which was my principle in deciding to do business with CDP. After this statement, I'm a buyer again.
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Kezardin: The popping of champagne corks still doesn't excuse the actions of some individuals on these forums who specifically targeted GOG with posts that were at times abusive, irrational or fallacious.
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mushy101: And you'll never get them to apologize or even acknowledge the bile they spew because their ego's might get hurt. The GoG forums are still good, but the opinions voiced here have seen better days.


Onto the story, not a single innocent was affected, which was my principle in deciding to do business with CDP. After this statement, I'm a buyer again.
Also, some of us are kind of grumpy from these sorts of pro-piracy topics and aren't necessarily prone to a lot of pleasantries.
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mushy101: And you'll never get them to apologize or even acknowledge the bile they spew because their ego's might get hurt. The GoG forums are still good, but the opinions voiced here have seen better days.


Onto the story, not a single innocent was affected, which was my principle in deciding to do business with CDP. After this statement, I'm a buyer again.
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hedwards: Also, some of us are kind of grumpy from these sorts of pro-piracy topics and aren't necessarily prone to a lot of pleasantries.
Eh, that's acceptable since you weren't doing anything wrong. Going against a reprehensible act is always good, even if the people wishing to revel in it need a good reality check from time to time.

I'm mainly talking about the knee jerk idealists who swore to never buy anything thing off GoG or CDP again, then thought they had a right to insult them without bothering to find out the facts.
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mushy101: And you'll never get them to apologize or even acknowledge the bile they spew because their ego's might get hurt. The GoG forums are still good, but the opinions voiced here have seen better days.


Onto the story, not a single innocent was affected, which was my principle in deciding to do business with CDP. After this statement, I'm a buyer again.
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hedwards: Also, some of us are kind of grumpy from these sorts of pro-piracy topics and aren't necessarily prone to a lot of pleasantries.
The difference between being pro-piracy and being opposed to these lawsuits has been discussed extensively (and repeatedly) in each of those topics.
Post edited January 12, 2012 by etna87
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etna87: The difference between being pro-piracy and being opposed to these lawsuits have been discussed extensively (and repeatedly) in each of those topics.
Honestly, there isn't really any difference there. It reminds me of a sketch from The State where the guys are in prison and asked by the warden not to walk through that large open gate and to consider it "off limits." Well one of the guys does walk out because there's nothing to stop him from doing it.

This is really the same thing, giving lip service to not being pro-piracy, but arguing against the only enforcement possible is really a matter of semantics. At this point we have no reason to believe that CDPR was going beyond reasonable means to enforce its rights and that the list wasn't cleaned of people that hadn't done anything wrong.
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etna87: The difference between being pro-piracy and being opposed to these lawsuits have been discussed extensively (and repeatedly) in each of those topics.
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hedwards: Honestly, there isn't really any difference there. It reminds me of a sketch from The State where the guys are in prison and asked by the warden not to walk through that large open gate and to consider it "off limits." Well one of the guys does walk out because there's nothing to stop him from doing it.

This is really the same thing, giving lip service to not being pro-piracy, but arguing against the only enforcement possible is really a matter of semantics. At this point we have no reason to believe that CDPR was going beyond reasonable means to enforce its rights and that the list wasn't cleaned of people that hadn't done anything wrong.
Actually, at least one statement from CDPR admitted that they had targeted at least one innocent person. Given what we do know about potential piracy-tracking techniques, it's very reasonable to assume that other innocents were targeted also.

CDPR's "100% of people targeted are pirates" statements were bald-faced lies and contradicted by later statements. Now, they may have had a very high rate of people who paid up, but frankly if the average person gets a letter threatening them with a lawsuit, they're going to pay up. That's why this is compared to extortion. It's very different from being stopped by a policeman and given a ticket - the police have to have court-worthy evidence, provide you with a court date & a lot of specific information. Your accuser is there face-to-face with you, the fine in question is much, much lower and the proof is reliable. CDPR just sent out threatening letters and let the cash roll in.

This isn't the only possible enforcement measure - gimped games come to mind, releasing a free demo would knock out the try-before-buy segment. And isn't CDPR's whole position that enforcing against pirates is wasteful?
Post edited January 12, 2012 by HGiles
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HGiles: Actually, at least one statement from CDPR admitted that they had targeted at least one innocent person. Given what we do know about potential piracy-tracking techniques, it's very reasonable to assume that other innocents were targeted also.
As far i know that guy admitted to have pirated it, but legally bought one copy and all charges against him were dismissed.
Post edited January 12, 2012 by WBGhiro
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etna87: The difference between being pro-piracy and being opposed to these lawsuits have been discussed extensively (and repeatedly) in each of those topics.
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hedwards: Honestly, there isn't really any difference there. It reminds me of a sketch from The State where the guys are in prison and asked by the warden not to walk through that large open gate and to consider it "off limits." Well one of the guys does walk out because there's nothing to stop him from doing it.

This is really the same thing, giving lip service to not being pro-piracy, but arguing against the only enforcement possible is really a matter of semantics. At this point we have no reason to believe that CDPR was going beyond reasonable means to enforce its rights and that the list wasn't cleaned of people that hadn't done anything wrong.
I am relieved to hear that CDPR has ceased using ethically dubious methods to go after pirates. The whole process drifted far too close to the realm of blackmail to sit well with me.

I'm similarly not comfortable with being labelled pro-piracy for disapproving of CDPR's actions. But piracy and all that is associated with it are sticky enough issues that I understand how it could become an emotive matter. Still, it doesn't seem to further the debate much by doing so.