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[Virex]

I suspect most pirates wouldn't buy the games even if they couldn't get them free, so in the end no amount of copy protection will help a game's sales by any significant amount, though it can certainty hurt them. Besides, almost everyone I know has pirated music, and the music industry sure seems to be doing well.

I dare to doubt that, or actualy, the significance of that. You see, even if 90% of the pirates wouldn't have bought the game if they couldn't get it for free, there's still 90% who would spend money on it. If we take the figures outlined in Jreengus post into account, we can see that if 10% of the pirates buys the game instead of pirating it, that would almost Double the sales figures of most games. Even if we go as low as 2% of the pirates buying the game if piracy is impossible, that's still roughly 1/5 more sales. The only moment you can say it's actualy not making a dent is when it drops below 1%, but I'd expect roughly 10%-20% of the pirates to buy a game if they couldn't get it free (assuming a decent to good game here), just because they are actualy prepare to spend money on it if they have to, but pirate it because it's easier and cheaper to boot.

[Phmcw]

Well, all those point consider the so called "intellectual property" as a valid concept.
I don't.
So I just call all this nonsense. I've never voted for software patent, DRM, and such.
Most poeple download, so it should be legal.
I respect piracy, but I don't use privateer (so called "proprietary") software, and just don't care for music as it's near impossible to listen to non mainstream groups without downloading. I still buy music in the form of concert and nice cd's (if the cover art is good looking, well tough,...).

[LegoLord]

Well, all those point consider the so called "intellectual property" as a valid concept.
I don't.

I am about to do something I almost never do:
Fuck that.
There.  You happy?

Does anyone here have any idea how many jobs rely on the validity of the concept of intellectual property?  Strike that down, and there would be massive unemployment - because guess what?  All those people just can't make money.  You'd essentially be chopping the arms and legs off of the country's job market.  And just about every company.  The only things that don't rely on intellectual property are insurance companies, construction companies, and a few manufactures of standardized goods - things you can't get copyright on now, essentially.  No incentives for innovation - it won't make you money (because everyone could steal the idea the moment it was published), so why bother spending money on it?

I sit right next to someone in Ceramics who has essentially put everything towards a career that relies on the concept of intellectual property for any kind of profit.  It's likely I'll go in such a direction as well.  Now think; if someone takes away intellectual property, the two of us, among countless others, will have essentially wasted our lives.  That doesn't sound like a very responsible thing to do just for your pleasure, does it?

[Areyar]

That might be,
can't help feeling the IP and patenting concepts are being ruthlessly exploited beyond it's intended purpose though.

[Cthulhu]

Well, all those point consider the so called "intellectual property" as a valid concept.
I don't.
So I just call all this nonsense. I've never voted for software patent, DRM, and such.
Most poeple download, so it should be legal.

Here is a great example of why your opinion is bad and you should feel bad.  If there's no IP/Copyright/Patenting, there is no way to sell an invention without it being stolen.  Right now, if someone steals your patented invention you can sue them.  Barring that, I guess you could just kill the guy, but that gets into other legal problems.

That might be,
can't help feeling the IP and patenting concepts are being ruthlessly exploited beyond it's intended purpose though.

Your feelings serve you well, Obi-Wan.  Don't let them cloud your judgment.  You need facts to back up claims like that.

[LegoLord]

That might be,
can't help feeling the IP and patenting concepts are being ruthlessly exploited beyond it's intended purpose though.

No questions there, but getting rid of copyright entirely is far from a good solution.

[Bauglir]

-snip-

[Jreengus]

I'll just pop in to point out that "intellectual property" is a phrase coined by copyrightists to obscure the real point of copyright. The point isn't to say that you own what you create but rather to ensure you get paid for creating it.

[Cthulhu]

Obscure?  Are you implying expecting to get paid for creating something people like is bad?

[sonerohi]

LegoLord, you make a good if not entirely correct point. All physically existing professions would still exist. Who is going to spend all the time perfectly recreating someone's vase, when they are for sure thinking that their own idea for one is better? Before copyright, things still got along very well because of this thing called a massive ego. Everyone has one.

[Blacken]

Currently the software I write doesn't have any DRM or other restrictive materials, but if I start seeing significant piracy of it, you can bet I'll be investigating ways that hamper (no, they won't prevent piracy, but it can make it more of a pain to undertake) pirates without unduly harming consumers.

Get back to us on that will you?  Serious.

Only thing I can think of is Serial Keys on CDs...

Steam. It's an excellent compromise. You can redownload your licensed program on as many computers as you want, though only one can be use at a time (I'd like it if you could have concurrent logins playing different licensed games, but that's not a huge deal to me). You can store an authorization certificate to play the games offline for up to a month (or more, I'm not certain). And you generally pay less to boot. Great stuff.

I'll just pop in to point out that "intellectual property" is a phrase coined by copyrightists to obscure the real point of copyright. The point isn't to say that you own what you create but rather to ensure you get paid for creating it.

Horseshit. It's a phrase designed as a catchall for copyrights, patents, and trade secrets. And we as a society have decided that, guess what? It is property. You not liking it does not mean "the copyrightists" are doing something misleading.

How dare they enforce their rights. So terrible of them!

Before copyright, things still got along very well because of this thing called a massive ego. Everyone has one.

Wrong. Intellectual piracy was rampant. Fuck, the industrial engine of the US overtook that of Great Britain because somebody came over from England with knowledge of how to build their textile-processing machines. Books were regularly pirated and reprinted on both sides of the Atlantic without the creator who did all the work seeing a red cent.

Learn what you're talking about before trying to make insane claims.

[Cheddarius]

Libraries are basically government-funded piracy.
This isn't a refutation or an argument or something, just sayin'.

[Cthulhu]

I would be willing to bet libraries pay royalties for the non-public domain books they carry.

[Agdune]

I'd just like to point out the logical fallacy of saying that people wouldn't be payed if copy protection wasn't enforced - people would still be selling and people would still be buying the unnamed product, the profits just wouldn't go to the original creator, it'd all go to whoever got their profit margins the lowest. Good show old bean, you can't expect to rest easy on you laurels forever in return for making a pretty pocket watch design!

*ahem*... That's not to say 'whoo whoo go piracy, free markets are great fun and everyone profits!'. (Doubly so for data, which has overheads of, y'know... electrical costs of keeping the HDD powered and keeping the internet connection running.) if you're looking from it from a purely theoretical point of view, there's a fine line between protecting those who are creating 'ideas' and smothering further creativity with protectionism. Regulated markets need to be carefully regulated or they end up just as stagnant as a totally free market. The examples just given of ye olde England and USA copyright laws being unenforced were, besides being totally irrelevant to digital piracy, good things imo.

Virex makes an excellent point, anyway. Finally an argument that isn't just one side or another bitching about the morality of piracy! also one that isn't just totally unrealistic, completely skewed "studies"! When put in that fashion, piracy is more of an issue than I had given it credit for... but I still don't care for the most part as I buy the games I feel are worth buying and don't really give a toss about the remainder. There are far worse things for me to worry about in regards to societal issues than a few companies going bust. I certanly wouldn't mourn for infinity ward if their games didn't sell enough copies to justify the companies' continued existance...

(pretty much irrelevant edit: Am I the only one who finds it difficult to take the arguments of hardline proponents of either side seriously? Blacken's pissyness over piracy only comes from the fact that it's something that affects him (or her) and his (or her) interests. I'd bet that, were we to get any passionate downloaders here they'd do the same thing for the opposite side of the argument. When you're that biased it's just transparent preservation of self-interests, not a discussion anymore. It's kinda funny.)

[Urist McOverlord]

Post from phone so I can keep track of this thread for the sake of putting an actual response up tomorrow when I'm actually semi-concious
 Sorry for interrupting the conversation, I swear I'll contribute the hell out of it tomorrow.