Either way the funds raised from the bundle should be a big help to THQ, right?

And so we see the danger of using overheated analogies and comparisons in the first place - they tend to distract from everything else. Unless you're still maintaining that this was a viable analogy in the first place. In that case, I'd LOVE to see you hop a plane to somewhere like Liberia, kneel before a kid working in a mud pit mine under watch by men with assault weapons and pat him on the head while telling him "I know your pain kid. I've been there, too. The Humble Bundle released an all Steam bundle pack."

As to the discussion, I never will see the big deal. It's one bundle. One bundle does not represent a shift of an entire brand. Can it? Sure. Is it likely? Seeing as they've released single publisher bundles and one game 'bundles' and music bundles that had no games in them, yet still returned to their usual format...not so much. Certainly not likely enough to elicit the sort of "The sky is falling!" madness from a couple of people in this thread.

DRM is not unethical. Quite the contrary. If a creator wants to protect his work, it is his right. As long as he is open about it and the customer can choose to buy it or not everything is well in order.

DRM kills black people in Africa - that's new! :D

Also, calling a slavery "unethical business practice" - made my day :D

This line is so golden!

Well if the thread wasn't bonkers before, it is now. :)

Not really, their running cost are probably too high for this to matter even if there would not be this "all to charity" mentality going around. On the other hand, a DRM-free THQ bundle could have, if not increase the average by much as more people with existing Steam copies would be interested to get them DRM-free for cheap, bring a lot more Linux, Mac and DRM-free users and therefore money that actually is mostly directed to them in hopes of getting more true humble bundles from them in the future.

Because removing the DRM and porting the game to Linux and Mac does not cost anything at all ...

There are a few problems with a DRM-free, cross-platform THQ bundle tho. Most of what has been un-DRMified for the bundles so far were indie games - I don't want to say small, but in comparison with what THQ is offering right now... Yeah. My point? They're a company which is going down. I don't really think they could afford the resources to go cross-platform, hell, their games don't even work on wine for the most part (not properly) - they're very dependent on Microsoft technologies. And DRM-free? Isn't THQ bound by a contract to Steam exclusivity?

Then review history better. Slavery was quite a widespread business practice back in the day. Which didn't make it any less unethical and evil. That's the point. The fact that something is widespread doesn't make it good. Same story with DRM.

Nope, as their games are sold everywhere. And the Steamworks games use Steamworks for MP. You could remove that, but that would also remove MP. (Which is big in five of the seven games).

I'm pretty sure THQ punched in the numbers if the added work in porting those games or removing Steamworks would pay off. With seven games of that scope (not to mention the bonus games to come) they probably came to the conclusion it wouldn't pay of.

This bundle doesn't cost THQ anything. Even if they only get 500K out of it, that is pure profit.

I like raven-haired vixens, what can I say.

All the more reason to not diminish the Humble Bundle as a yet another shop channeling Steam games. They could have picked older, not so tied to Steam games to the bundle and either way, I am not loosing any sleep over any publisher going down for making bad decisions especially if those decisions prevented me from supporting them.

Ironically I seem to recall THQ being the only publisher to put an "Online Activation Required" label on the front of their DVD-cases, so if that was contributing to their demise, then we can see what happens when not all publishers are required to clearly state their DRM-methods instead of hiding them in small cryptic letters at the back were they suspiciously often get covered by an antitheft-tag.

Some typos removed...

While I agree with the sentiment in general these comparisons are always a little silly because you could literally use them to justify putting up with almost anything.

I just wanted to say you won Exaggeration of the year and Euphemism of the year prize at the same time ;-D