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Feedback on "Goldhawk Interactive & Piracy"


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So you are saying it's better for the developer that I wait for a sale if I am unsure about a purchase instead of me pirating it and buying it at full price at launch? That's interesting because that means less money in the pocket for the developer in that case... Also my friends share this opinion thus it means nobody takes the "first step" to inform each other if it's a good game or not, unless someone makes an uninformed purchase.

Yes you can always wait but I would much rather know right away so I can play at launch (and pay launch price if the game is worth it) plus there is also the occasions where you are testing out a game in a new genre you are unsure of, just getting an opinion from someone else might not be enough to make you decide if you like it or not. Since I always buy games digitally now then used copies are never an option and they also deprive the developer of money because they don't gain anything from that copy at all thus you are hurting them more then if you were to just pirate it because you are out of money in your pocket (less to buy new games with) and that money didn't go to the developer.

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Depends on the game, sure for a game that's been out a while you will probably be able to find enough info to make a good decision but what about a new release that mostly has reviews from big sites that got the game sent to them early because they have good contact with the developer/publisher? Only option then is either to wait and hope there will be information quickly from a reliable source or pirate it to decide for yourself right away.

Do you need to have it as soon as it comes out? Is there some kind of games drought? Not interested enough in Free to Play games to keep you busy untill you can get enough information about a game?

Why not wait until it drops in price. For instance I bought ME3 a couple of days ago at 50% discount. That means I can own twice the amount of games as someone with the same economy as me, assuming he buys the games as soon as they are released... And if I would have been interested in reading other opinions about it I'm sure that I can find enough by now.

"Patience is a virtue"

PS. I'm trying to argue that piracy is wrong and should be done away with, not come up with a marketing scheme to make developers the most amount of money. That will presumably come naturally when piracy is abolished and DRMs are non existent.

Edited by Gorlom
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Since all y'all are consequentialists and unlikely to be dissuaded in an Internet forum, try looking, please, at the argument.

I have no objection to any of your post but the idea that stealing isn't stealing.

M1. Stealing is taking something that isn't yours, i.e. that you didn't pay for.

m1. By pirating a game, you take something that isn't yours, i.e. that you didn't pay for.

C1. Pirating is stealing.

M2. Stealing is wrong.

m2. Pirating is stealing.

C2. Pirating is wrong.

Where's the logical leap, or the ambiguous term? Under pain of being a filthy dishonest liar, you cannot disagree with the argument unless you refute a definition, a premise, or the logic.

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No you don't need it but the time directly after a release is usually extremely important for developers, not getting enough sales early enough (takes a while for games to drop to 50%) can break a developer for example and for me knowing if it's a game for me (and how much I think it's worth) as early as possible is important.

I'm being realistic here, piracy isn't going away and it's just going to keep growing as more and more people are entering the "generation of piracy" so I'm using the situation to make sure I support the industry in the way I think it should be, giving the right developers my money and not getting screwed over by marketing.

What I am trying to say is that yes piracy can cause very bad things but it's not ALWAYS bad, people can use it in a good way for the industry as long as they are aren't assholes.

To TheUbiquitous, from a legal standpoint it's copyright infringement and not stealing though. But yes you are copying something you didn't pay for against their permission so you are doing something that is considered wrong. However let's take this situation as an example, you are selling something (say a car) and I think I'm interested in buying this car but I'm not sure, I then use a fancy technology and clone your car without your knowledge and no effect on your car, I then try out that car for a while and decide I like it so I go back to you and buy it, after I bought the car they both merge together into a single car again. Would you be unhappy with me in this case if you were the person selling the car?

Now we can take this even further, same situation but after I copy the car I find out that the engine is completely busted and doesn't work after 2 hours so I then avoided buying this falsely marketed car, yes you would be pissed because I didn't fall for your little scheme but is it good that you have people falling for things like that in the car industry giving them a bad reputation as scammers?

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You seriously wanna keep doing this huh? I don't see the world in such a binary fashion that you seem to do. It's not incoherent because I trust and know myself that even if I do something that could be considered wrong I can make something good out of it.

We can go back to the whole speeding with your car, parking illegally or just beating a red light when you should have stopped, that's wrong too but people do it anyway and those people probably wouldn't go rob a bank so why is one more acceptable to do and not the other? Same with this, you use your judgement to make sure you do it in such a way that you don't cause damage to others.

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To TheUbiquitous, from a legal standpoint it's copyright infringement and not stealing though.

That's true for the group of people that cracks a game and puts their crack up for distribution, but is it true for the consumer that does not distribute?:confused: Police tend to go for the source, ie the leak or the distributor. I have not heard of any case where a download only pirate has been prosecuted (presumably because it's a low profile crime)

I realise I don't know enough about the particular legalities but it seems rather odd to me that it is not theft as you don't even have any use access to a copy to copy from, ie photocopying a library book or whatever.

But yes you are copying something you didn't pay for against their permission so you are doing something that is considered wrong. However let's take this situation as an example, you are selling something (say a car) and I think I'm interested in buying this car but I'm not sure, I then use a fancy technology and clone your car without your knowledge and no effect on your car, I then try out that car for a while and decide I like it so I go back to you and buy it, after I bought the car they both merge together into a single car again. Would you be unhappy with me in this case if you were the person selling the car?

Now we can take this even further, same situation but after I copy the car I find out that the engine is completely busted and doesn't work after 2 hours so I then avoided buying this falsely marketed car, yes you would be pissed because I didn't fall for your little scheme but is it good that you have people falling for things like that in the car industry giving them a bad reputation as scammers?

Yes I would be unhappy, because there is nothing (save for magic) in that premise that prevents you from keeping the copy instead of buying the real car.

You are relying on the consumers absolute honesty while at the same time doubting the sellers honesty in a very inconsistent way...

you use your judgement to make sure you do it in such a way that you don't cause damage to others.

Even if you are honest enough to use piracy in such a way that you don't directly do any damage to the industry (a slightly flawed premise imo but I won't argue that) You are INDIRECTLY doing damage to it since you contribute to the social acceptance of piracy and others that are not as honest as you will not pay for their games.

The chaos theory with the butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil and causing a hurricane in Tokyo (or where ever either happens) is often misquoted and in the wrong contexts. But either case it illustrates a fascinating phenomenon: you can't always predict every outcome of some action. Imo you are neglecting more indirect effects of your pirating.

From my point of view I see more negative effects from pirating then positive ones. Therefor I think it is wrong.

Edited by Gorlom
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That's true for the group of people that cracks a game and puts their crack up for distribution, but is it true for the consumer that does not distribute? Police tend to go for the source, ie the leak or the distributor. I have not heard of any case where a download only pirate has been prosecuted (presumably because it's a low profile crime)

Yes I would be unhappy, because there is nothing (save for magic) in that premise that prevents you from keeping the copy instead of buying the real car.

You are relying on the consumers absolute honesty while at the same time doubting the sellers honesty in a very inconsistent way...

I'm quite sure (but not 100%) that if you were prosecuted personally it would still be copyright infringement since you did in fact copy their product and didn't go into a store and take a retail copy from the shelf. But I'm not a lawyer so I can be mistaken but this is my understanding of it.

You wouldn't be unhappy with me personally then because I would not keep it in that case if I found it to be a good product that held up to it's promises since it would go against my ideals, you would be unhappy with the potential me that might have kept it to himself.

Yes you are relying on the fact that people support things they like (which they do time and time again as proven by DRM free products still selling) so make yourself more likable and you will be well rewarded but be a dick and watch as people take advantage of you. I would much rather have a world where likable people that make good products are rewarded then scumbags that do everything in their power to scam you out of your money get away with it and laugh all the way to the bank.

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Yes you are relying on the fact that people support things they like (which they do time and time again as proven by DRM free products still selling) so make yourself more likable and you will be well rewarded but be a dick and watch as people take advantage of you. I would much rather have a world where likable people that make good products are rewarded then scumbags that do everything in their power to scam you out of your money get away with it and laugh all the way to the bank.

Yes, that would be a pretty world. What you basically want is more consumer rights rather than a world were piracy is acceptable. I also think that you are a bit naive in hat other people do. Sure a lot support what they like but not as many as in an ideal world. That is why we have laws.

I think there are other means to accomplish what you want other than piracy.

Edited by Gorlom
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"Same with this, you use your judgement to make sure you do it in such a way that you don't cause damage to others."

That’s good to know. For a minute there I thought piracy deprived companies of revenue, put people out of work and had links with organised crime. Oh no wait, it does.

As for your attempts at justifying an illegal practice, please refer to my previous post relating to the rationalisation of fraud/ money laundering among other activities.

While you admit that it’s wrong, claiming that it’s because marketing can’t be trusted, you don’t want to wait for games, it’s not going to go away all fall neatly into that.

I’ve seen far too many businesses directly affected by piracy to have any respect for such arguments. As above, it’s just a shifting series of arguments to justify the fact that people have the opportunity to get things without paying for them.

While legally it is copyright infringement, it doesn’t detract from the fact that you are ripping them off. Ironically, this is exactly what pirates seem to feel is being done to them.

If you are in doubt about buying a game, don’t buy it. It's that simple, and presumably applies to every other area of your life where you can't rip things off for free. My apologies if you're sitting at home surrounded by all the goods you've “had” to buy from the supermarket because they sounded good in the advert.

Try Beta versions or you tube vids or testimonials or forums if you can’t trust the marketing or sites with vested interests. Find sites you can trust and promote/support them.

Send e-mails to the companies telling them of your concerns about their marketing and why you won’t buy their games.

If you’ve bought something from the in the past that was rubbish, share that information with them and others. Vote with your wallet. Don’t buy any more of their games.

By doing these, you are much closer to “a world where likeable people that make good products are rewarded then scumbags that do everything in their power to scam you out of your money get away with it and laugh all the way to the bank.” You didn’t have to steal anything or infringe anyone’s copyright to do it either.

I see Gorlom has picked up on the indirect aspects of this, so I’ll not go over similar territory in this post. But yes, they are there, they are frequently organised and they easily outweigh any shifting excuses for piracy that people fall back on.

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I see Gorlom has picked up on the indirect aspects of this, so I’ll not go over similar territory in this post. But yes, they are there, they are frequently organised and they easily outweigh any shifting excuses for piracy that people fall back on.

I added that part after he posted so he might have missed it.

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Yes, I don't think I have ever said that all forms of piracy is acceptable, in fact I have mentioned multiple times that piracy can cause a lot of problems but that it's not ALWAYS a bad thing. Piracy by a person doing it for the right reasons can be healthy for the industry and since there is no way piracy is going away anytime soon I think using it as a tool to help decide where your money is best spent is an okay thing to do regardless of how wrong people think it is.

I'm not naive though, I'm well aware that there are plenty of people that pirate for completely selfish reasons just because they can however these people are probably not very likely to buy the product if they had to pay for it in the first place so that narrows down the lost sales quite a bit. But yes there will be lost sales because of people that would have paid if they couldn't pirate however with the digital sales market improving as fast as it has and services becoming better and better those people are much more likely to be converted into paying customers as things improve.

I'm pretty fond of this quote by Gabe Newell (CEO of Valve):

"We think there is a fundamental misconception about piracy. Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem, If a pirate offers a product anywhere in the world, 24 x 7, purchasable from the convenience of your personal computer, and the legal provider says the product is region-locked, will come to your country 3 months after the US release, and can only be purchased at a brick and mortar store, then the pirate's service is more valuable."

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I think second hand sales do more damage to the games industry than piracy. At least with piracy, you aren't competing for the same space in stores that the copies that will make you money occupy.

Stores like Gamestop make the vast majority of their profit from reselling games that the developer receives not a single penny for. They do this because they can buy second hand games for pennies and re-sell them in their store alongside the brand new stock but make them $1 or two cheaper.

Pirates have already made the decision to download the game for free, so they were never likely to give you any money, but the people in the game store were there to spend money but end up giving all their money to the retailer and none of it goes to the developer.

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I think second hand sales do more damage to the games industry than piracy. At least with piracy, you aren't competing for the same space in stores that the copies that will make you money occupy.

Stores like Gamestop make the vast majority of their profit from reselling games that the developer receives not a single penny for. They do this because they can buy second hand games for pennies and re-sell them in their store alongside the brand new stock but make them $1 or two cheaper.

Pirates have already made the decision to download the game for free, so they were never likely to give you any money, but the people in the game store were there to spend money but end up giving all their money to the retailer and none of it goes to the developer.

This came as a shock to me as it at first glance seems to conflict with hat you informed me of earlier in this thread. Then looking back at those posts I realize you were just informing without condemning or approving of the issue.

Wrong is wrong, in and of itself.

I believe that sometimes you have to look at why it is so and reconsider.

But you need to do so without twisting it to suit your purposes. You need to consider EVERYTHING not just hat is convenient.

Edited by Gorlom
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