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[Mohreb el Yasim]

Yeah, that's me.  Music piracy drove around 75% of my music purchases before Pandora came to be.

Pandora isn't working since years ... but youtube still does, wierd ...
However i don't like piracy, but see it as reasonable resort if you have no other means to find something (limited edition, no more sold, don't trustfull distribution (only sold by online distributor how will monitor on my computer no thanks) country specific edition/distribution - this is what i hate the most ... it is against egality of people i find)
However if someone really likes something he will buy it anyway so i don't think it is a real issue...

[Jreengus]

Piracy != Theft
However piracy still = Bad (mmmkay)

Fixed that for you.

[Puck]

Fixed

I disagree on several levels.

[Mephisto]

Don't copy that floppy!

[Neonivek]

See now I HAD something to add... but that would just start a flamewar. (Dang Dictionary and your definitions)

Lets just keep this topic ENTIRELY based in one dirrection. (The dirrection is that Piracy isn't bad or stealing)

Which I know is tough but frankly I am tired of these Piracy Flamewars

[Puck]

Something that troubles me:

Many game publishers have little problems with fucking up our machines with whatever DRM measures they seem fit, whether we like it or not.

So, how should I react? I mean... let's assume I like a game, but I dont like the copy protection it comes with. I cannot buy it, because the publisher would think I agree with their decisions regarding the protection of their product. So what can I do? Pirate a cracked (one might say "virusfree") copy and send cookies and a little "thank you" letter to the devs/publishers?

Not playing the game isn't really an option, because a responsible gamer needs to send a message that they liked the design decisions. Under that light pirating might even be the best option, because you demonstrated what you think of the game AND the copy protection. And you can live consolidated by the thought that many great minds before you have been prosecuted for their beliefs. And later people were grateful for that. I mean, where would we be today without galileo or sokrates?

Just for the record.... I have been paying for my software up to early versions of starforce. Since then I only buy copy protection free bargain editions.

[Soulwynd]

Do what you want because a pirate is free.





*dances*

Piracy is the solution to most world crisis, including global warming:


Fact is, pirates are happy and free. Highly moralists who'd rather bend over to power should learn that having their guts nailed to a mast isn't fun at all.

Disclaimer: The above post is mostly a joke, carry on.

[Neonivek]

where would we be today without galileo or sokrates?

I've mistaken Galileo with Christopher Columbus Silly me.

In both cases however the answer would be "Not that much different". In fact in both cases there is evidence that their deaths were a lot less heroic and unjustified as what people say.

Also in both cases the true scope of their effect wasn't in public reaction to their death but rather someone telling their story later. There is a reason that most of what we know of Socrates is what Plato wrote.

[Virtz]

If you feel like you were cheated out of your money, why dont you read online reviews/the back of the case first? I hate pirating, so.

That might be the case once reviewers start reviewing on objective terms rather than how fun it was for them. Not to mention the bribery that goes on in the gaming industry. Game (p)reviews are simply not a reliable source.

it's fairly weird to think a MMO can be pirated

Ultima Online, Lineage, Counter-strike, half-life series, Warcraft, WoW, a lot of other examples.

Yes, great MMOs right there. :|

Concerning piracy, I question how much it actually impacts the industry. Everyone's been screaming about it since day one, and yet game development costs continue to needlessly grow, with money being spent on big name celebrities for voice actors (rather than, you know, real voice actors), increasing graphics whoredom, pointless gameplay gimmicks, etc.. The industry also more and more grows to think it's ok to screw over gamers, with clones of clones, shoddy ports, grand scale hype lies, "can you tell the difference?" sequels and most of all, no demos (often paired with bullshit like "It wouldn't serve the game justice"). Overall, I wouldn't mind if most of the industry, in its current form, would just crash and burn due to piracy. But I doubt it'll happen, yet it brings me joy to see dumbed down, hyped up crap like Spore get pirated up the arse. But cases where piracy is that rampant are rare, hence I doubt it could bring down the industry anytime soon, nor meaningfully affect a single game company. The gaming industry is more likely to bring itself down due to idiotic development costs.

The only area where I think piracy is unjustifiable is with indie game developers, who most often deliver on what they promise, provide proper demos/trials and do not necessarily strive to sell a generic game to a highest possible amount of customers, but rather go for niches and try to be innovative (although there are also those who just want to be EA's little sister).

[Jack_Bread]

Do what you want because a pirate is free.

Heh. I wish I could dig like that.

[Deon]

I've mistaken Galileo with Christopher Columbus

o_O How?

[Armok]

Soulwynd, that post was awesome! ^_^

My opinion of piracy can be summed up by:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Information wants to be FREEEEEE!!!
I basically believe that omniscience is a right or any sapient, and anything that anything that withholds or falsifies information is wrong. (Be it out of concern over security, profit, embarasment, or anything else. Private thoughts shuld be serchable on google and nothing hiden, if year olds wants to read their paren ts wet dreams or nuklear launch codes it's their right.) Evrything shuld be forced to be open source if I were in contorle.

     

Also:

[Granite26]

IMHO:

Developers and the Distributers they sell their souls to have absolute moral and legal authority over how thier works are distributed.

That said, DRM is a stupid idea that will continue only so long as it doesn't hurt thier profits too badly.

As an excellent example, consider the dancing wedding viral that's been making it's rounds.  The record label that owns the (Chris Brown?) song used hasn't slapped it down for copyright infringement, and in direct response to the video being allowed a place on YouTube, sales of the (year old) song have skyrocketed.

When I was younger (I.E. before I had a day job) I pirated the heck out of video games under the justification that I didn't have the money to pay for them and wouldn't be buying them anyway.  In that sense, the modern multiple thousands of dollars per instance fees are purely ludicrous.  On the other hand, catching pirates is such a pain in the butt that penalties NEED to be sky high in order to have an effect.  (Basic economics) So landing hard on pirates makes sense.

Now that I have a day job, and enough money to easily afford any games that come out that I want (at least in part due to less time to play fewer games), I make it a point to buy all my games even if offered illicit avenues of acquisition.  I do this to the point of harrassing friends who haven't started buying the games.


Posit:  Video Game Piracy is at least partially if not largely responsible for the current glut of casual games and deficit of deep games.  It's not just that there's not enough players of deep games, it's that the players of deep games are by and large computer savy and thus more likely to get the game illegally.  Additionally, fans of deep games are likely to have a lot of time to get into them, which is also a signal for not spending as much time doing things like a day job (and having time to play a lot of game ~ having a lot of time to find a cracked copy).

The rise of MMOs may have something to do with this, with the fact that high time has a better reward than deep games..

[SniHjen]

You know what I hate?

Movie(dvd)

If I get a pirated version, it will skip straight to the menu.

BUT if I buy it , I'm forced to sit trough a "don't copy that floppy" kind of ad!

I'm being punnished for buying it!

[Zai]

The "DON'T COPY THAT FLOPPY" video was counterproductive. Many people I know hadn't even thought of copying a floppy until they saw that little video.