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You can't have enough DRM. Assassin's Creed 2
bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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dario ff said:

Not this discussion again please. It's hard to compare piracy against theft. Not every pirated download is a lost sale. If you're talking about copyright, I wouldn't compare it to theft.

You're stealing work instead of material. What's the difference? It's equivalent to hiring somebody to do a service (i.e., wash your car) and then not paying them. You haven't physically stolen anything from them, but you have effectively "stolen" their time and effort. Regardless of terminology, you've cheated them out of money.

Billybob said:

Freelance hackers are always smarter than employed engineers. Odd, but typically true. People and companies have tried what you propose ... it did not turn out too well. Why, precisely? Well, for one, most people just sort by most seeds on torrents. Fake torrents have few to no seeders. The people who download the fake torrents find out and don't seed. The good torrents get seeded.

You don't think it would be worthwhile to set up spoof networks with dynamic IPs to actually seed the downloads? It's certainly possible to mimic the "wild" in every way possible. The actual hackers might be able to figure out the difference, but the average pirate wouldn't. This could even be a third party service somebody could provide. Both produce the very real looking (yet very destructive) fakes and also seed them in a realistic way.

Neil Black
Member #7,867
October 2006
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dario ff said:

Not this discussion again please. It's hard to compare piracy against theft. Not every pirated download is a lost sale. If you're talking about copyright, I wouldn't compare it to theft.

You are acquiring a product (in this case software) without paying the provider of that product, and without the permission of the provider of that product. How is that anything but theft?

Billybob
Member #3,136
January 2003

bamccaig said:

This could even be a third party service somebody could provide

Yes, those companies exist already. Yes, they do fail. Horribly.

Quote:

You don't think it would be worthwhile to set up spoof networks with dynamic IPs to actually seed the downloads?

No, I honestly don't think that will work. Everything you've thought of has been tried by the anti-torrent companies already. Everything that's legal, of course.

Dario ff
Member #10,065
August 2008
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bamccaig said:

You're stealing work instead of material. What's the difference? It's equivalent to hiring somebody to do a service (i.e., wash your car) and then not paying them. You haven't physically stolen anything from them, but you have "stolen" their time and effort.

I meant it's hard to compare morally.

I don't mean to put piracy in the same example of the washed car. But if the person that washed your car did a bad job and just made the car's windows look worse with dirt? You agreed to pay him before a sum of money, and he washed your car. You just won't notice the bad job after some hours. Is it morally correct to hand over your money to someone when he did a bad job and just screwed you over?

Again, please don't put piracy in the same example, it can't be boiled down to a simple example.

EDIT: Wow, I'm slow for replying :P

EDIT2: That said, I'm not going to push this discussion any further. Put piracy in two situations. It's wrong legally. Whether it's wrong morally or not is too complex to simplify it comparing it to theft or such activities. Morality is really different from one person to another, and you just can't force someone to see the situation the same like you. I used to pirate games when I was younger. Mainly because it was and still is so radicated here that some people might even think it's legit. I'm not interested too much anymore in the 'new' generation of games, since they all tend to be recreations of classics because it seems they can't come up with new ideas, and hardly buy any games now. All I'm glad for is that the games I got legit, are great and were worth my time. Not the propaganda that is being sold these days.

Oh, and bamccaig, please put EDIT or something when you edit your posts. You tend to edit some your older posts, and then I get lost as hell of what did you say. :-/

EDIT3: Shit, I'm really slow, I won't put another reply for the matter :P

TranslatorHack 2010, a human translation chain in a.cc.
My games: [GiftCraft] - [Blocky Rhythm[SH2011]] - [Elven Revolution] - [Dune Smasher!]

Neil Black
Member #7,867
October 2006
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dario ff said:

But if the person that washed your car did a bad job and just made the car's windows look worse with dirt? You agreed to pay him before a sum of money, and he washed your car. You just won't notice the bad job after some hours. Is it morally correct to hand over your money to someone when he did a bad job and just screwed you over?

Are you saying that it is ok to pirate games, so long as they're bad games?

Arthur Kalliokoski
Second in Command
February 2005
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I think he means the DRM is irritating, even if it doesn't trash your computer or brick your DVD recorder.

Slightly related:

{"name":"GxzeV.jpg","src":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/3\/8\/380fa7832565bfdd1905b8e356e87297.jpg","w":800,"h":825,"tn":"\/\/djungxnpq2nug.cloudfront.net\/image\/cache\/3\/8\/380fa7832565bfdd1905b8e356e87297"}GxzeV.jpg

They all watch too much MSNBC... they get ideas.

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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Billybob said:

Everything you've thought of has been tried by the anti-torrent companies already.

As you hinted to earlier, there are a lot of incompetent people in the world, many of them in software. :-X That doesn't mean it isn't possible. It just means you need knowledgeable people to do their homework and get it right. People that have the technical knowledge and experience and bother to actually analyze what things make people prefer one download to another as well as what a sufficient approach will require hardware-wise.

dario ff said:

I don't mean to put piracy in the same example of the washed car. But if the person that washed your car did a bad job and just made the car's windows look worse with dirt? You agreed to pay him before a sum of money, and he washed your car. You just won't notice the bad job after some hours. Is it morally correct to hand over your money to someone when he did a bad job and just screwed you over?

If you simply agreed to pay them to wash your car without defining the quality you expect then you would be expected to pay them. Obviously, if they didn't even attempt to wash the car then it wouldn't be fair and that would be a moral judgment of your own (or tort court, if it came to that), but ultimately if you want to be sure you don't get screwed over then you need to be specific.

When it comes to games, there is no guarantee of quality from the game developer. In fact, almost all software explicitly states this in their license agreement. They've met this argument before. They don't guarantee that you'll enjoy the game or be satisfied with it. It is essentially a risk that you have to take (albeit, there is often enough of a taste to get an idea and the cost is pretty negligible[1]). Almost every purchase is a risk, material or intellectual. So don't take the risk if you don't want to. That doesn't entitle you to pirate the software (as it doesn't entitle you to steal a car). It entitles you to go without.

References

  1. $60 should not determine whether you can get by or not. If it does then games are the least of your concern.
Dario ff
Member #10,065
August 2008
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I replied above. I won't write again since I ain't that used to writing in english and a copy+paste would look horrible.

@Arthur: Yep, that's what I meant. Even when renting movies it's really annoying, you've got to wait all those "You are a mean pirate if you do this" ads and then the hyped trailers. And those fading menus are surely annoying.

EDIT: Also, you could compare it with the dirt example. It won't break your car(unless he really does a bad job), but you've got to lose time fixing the problem(and fixing could be waiting for or fast forwarding those ads, or in the case of games, crappy DRM like Ubisoft is releasing).

TranslatorHack 2010, a human translation chain in a.cc.
My games: [GiftCraft] - [Blocky Rhythm[SH2011]] - [Elven Revolution] - [Dune Smasher!]

Neil Black
Member #7,867
October 2006
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dario ff said:

Whether it's wrong morally or not is too complex to simplify it comparing it to theft or such activities.

I'm not comparing software piracy to theft. I'm saying it is theft. If you think it isn't theft then justify that stance (which you haven't done yet). Don't just tell me that it isn't theft, tell me why it isn't theft.

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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dario ff said:

Oh, and bamccaig, please put EDIT or something when you edit your posts. You tend to edit some your older posts, and then I get lost as hell of what did you say. :-/

I tend to only mark edits that significantly alter what I was saying or when someone has already replied to it in a way that my edit conflicts with. It's not intended to be malicious or devious. It's merely an attempt to clarify without wasting another 5 posts. And "Edit-ladders" tend to be messy and harder to follow. I'm also a self-diagnosed obsessive-compulsive (actually, OCPD sounds like it fits better than OCD) and sometimes I find edit-disclaimers "imperfect".

dario ff said:

Yep, that's what I meant. Even when renting movies it's really annoying, you've got to wait all those "You are a mean pirate if you do this" ads and then the hyped trailers. And those fading menus are surely annoying.

EVERY movie does this. And the production company has every right do to it with their own intellectual property and DVDs. If you don't like it, stop watching movies. Most people are willing to put up with it and it probably does benefit the production companies' businesses. Unfortunately, they aren't our slaves whose lives revolve around our happiness. I agree it's annoying and sometimes it can be damn offputting, but there's ultimately nothing you can do about it aside from show them in business terms why producing more user-friendly discs would be better for their bottom-line. If you can't then you've got nothing worth saying to them. Blame the sheep that do more business because of it. Some people never willing watch previews, but will if you force them. I personally like to watch all of the previews from start to finish (I'll even restart DVDs that don't let me rewind previews that I've missed seconds of[1]). That said, after I've seen them I don't care to see them again, so it can be frustrating when you're watching a DVD again. I'm specifying DVD only because I haven't seen enough BDs to say for certain that they are all the same, though I don't expect anything different.

References

  1. Again, obsessive-compulsive ish.
Hard Rock
Member #1,547
September 2001
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dario ff said:

"Ooooh, that's smart!!!". I think it's already been done before in other games, but I can't come up with a good example.

Titan Quest? http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2008/03/thq-blames-pira/
<edit>
I know there are a lot more, this one is just interesting, because of what they have to say about piracy and the effect the drm had.

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Hard Rock
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Arthur Kalliokoski
Second in Command
February 2005
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bamccaig said:

stop watching movies

I have. Last time I was in a theater in 1991 was only because the very few cars outside hinted that it would be possible to actually hear the movie instead of a bunch of wise guys. The last DVD I bought wouldn't play with the DVD burner I had in my computer at the time, a new DVD player would play it, but how long will that last?

They all watch too much MSNBC... they get ideas.

Dario ff
Member #10,065
August 2008
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Don't just tell me that it isn't theft, tell me why it isn't theft.

I never said it isn't theft. If you think it's theft morally, consider it like that. Look down on other people that don't have the same morality. After all, we're humans, we tend to think less of other people. I don't like such Black and White morality sometimes, so I tend to pick a neutral position sometimes.

What's my stance about piracy? It has changed over the years. At first, I bought only legitimate games, since I loved the feel of those big boxes, with manuals full of explanations of the game's content. Some years ago I bought some games legit that had outrageous prices(mainly because of the difference in the currency with the economic instability in my country). I was terribly disappointed with them(crappy plastic uninspired boxes, bad game content), and decided to try future games online. I wanted to act like "Try before buy", but I couldn't resist at that sensation of greediness and delight of not buying it. Again I got disappointed with these games after a while, and erased them.

Now I'm trying to correct myself and don't buy any games at all mainly because I've already been disappointed too much with the actual games industry. Of course, there've been exceptions for some good titles. And I'm actually looking forward to buying Fallout: New Vegas as soon as it's released, mainly because it's being developed by part of the original team of the series, and not those Bethestards.

It even disappoints me more that what I now think it's correct(buying legit), is being hindered with faulty DRM. So yeah, my morality has turned into a mess lately.

So, it might be theft legally. I can't say it isn't theft morally, because I'm the one who feels that's been robbed with their faulty products these years, but that's just my opinion.

TranslatorHack 2010, a human translation chain in a.cc.
My games: [GiftCraft] - [Blocky Rhythm[SH2011]] - [Elven Revolution] - [Dune Smasher!]

Neil Black
Member #7,867
October 2006
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dario ff said:

I never said it isn't theft. If you think it's theft morally, consider it like that.

You said several times that it is difficult to compare piracy to theft. I got the impression that you were saying it isn't theft.

I never said that piracy is theft morally. I said that it is theft. Morally, legally, whatever words you want to append are unimportant. Piracy is taking property from another person without that person's permission. I don't see how you can see it as anything else.

SiegeLord
Member #7,827
October 2006
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bamccaig said:

It's OK already if you do it safely and remain in control of your vehicle. As myself and others have told you in the past, speed limits are not some physical limitation of the vehicles or humans. It's an average to account for a certain amount of incompetence in some most operators. Those that are actually adept at driving and care about it can drive much faster completely safely. They're not allowed to because it's infeasible to enforce who is and isn't competent, but that doesn't make it wrong to do it. It just means the law can't account for it and needs to treat the competent like all others.

What? The law is the law, it must be obeyed no matter how much you think it does not apply to you. And you completely ignored my point about it being unfair to other (even competent) drivers who follow the law and suffer for it. It's never OK to break the law from a legal standpoint! Breaking laws is illegal. Moreover, breaking laws almost by definition treats all other people unfairly who are following the laws, no matter what the law.

And if any law covered some physical limitation of humans and vehicles, it wouldn't be a law in the first place because it would be unnecessary. It's like disallowing moving faster than the speed of light!

You are using some weird explanation to excuse your breaking the speed laws, and forbidding others for making a no less weird excuse for copyright infringement. That's hypocritical.

Quote:

And I didn't even need anyone's God to tell me. :o

Who said anything about God?

Quote:

In order to legally use the work, you are therefore required to license it at a price projected to maximize return.

I thought you didn't care about legality. Be consistent!

Quote:

Those that don't license it are not contributing to the industry that produced it, which is both unfair to the developers and publishers, but also to the paying customers that do license it

Oh, but now unfairness is an okay reason to criticize pirates? Why isn't it the same the case for the speeding drivers? Be consistent!

Quote:

More God talk

Who said anything about God?

bamccaig said:

You haven't physically stolen anything from them, but you have effectively "stolen" their time and effort.

You do not steal time when you pirate. If you disagree, tell me how much "time" I steal when I pirate a copy of a game. Time it has taken to develop? The only one piracy event per game would be possible, as all other subsequent piracies would go into the negatives. Some smaller number? How small? How much money do you steal? The price of the game? What if I pirated a game 1000 times that costs $20 per unit but cost $10000 to develop? Are the developers $10000 in the red?

When you do a service your time is spent, you cannot use that time again and again to rake in profit. When you make a game, you can use that time again and again to rake in profit, because the first is stealing and the second is copyright infringement.

If you think it isn't theft then justify that stance (which you haven't done yet). Don't just tell me that it isn't theft, tell me why it isn't theft.

Firstly, because the LAW says so. Those are two different crimes. But also, see the above paragraph and a whole slew of helpful images courtesy of Google.
http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&source=hp&q=piracy+is+not+theft

"For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increases knowledge increases sorrow."-Ecclesiastes 1:18
[SiegeLord's Abode][Codes]:[DAllegro5]:[RustAllegro]

Arthur Kalliokoski
Second in Command
February 2005
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Insurance companies often pressure DOT to reduce speed limits "to increase safety". The real reason often is that ridiculously low speed limits cause people to ignore them and drive at a reasonable speed, which earns them tickets, which increases their car insurance premiums by hundreds of dollars a year each.

They all watch too much MSNBC... they get ideas.

SiegeLord
Member #7,827
October 2006
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Insurance companies often pressure DOT to reduce speed limits "to increase safety". The real reason often is that ridiculously low speed limits cause people to ignore them and drive at a reasonable speed, which earns them tickets, which increases their car insurance premiums by hundreds of dollars a year each.

So... break the law to screw the system? Hey, that's what I do by pirating!

"For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increases knowledge increases sorrow."-Ecclesiastes 1:18
[SiegeLord's Abode][Codes]:[DAllegro5]:[RustAllegro]

Arthur Kalliokoski
Second in Command
February 2005
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You seem to think laws are always paragons of justice and virtue. They're bought and sold like any other commodity. An honest congresscritter is one that stays bought. And laws were made for men, not the other way around.

They all watch too much MSNBC... they get ideas.

SiegeLord
Member #7,827
October 2006
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I know right? That's why I pirate!

"For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increases knowledge increases sorrow."-Ecclesiastes 1:18
[SiegeLord's Abode][Codes]:[DAllegro5]:[RustAllegro]

Neil Black
Member #7,867
October 2006
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SiegeLord said:

Firstly, because the LAW says so. Those are two different crimes.

And?

You seem to think laws are always paragons of justice and virtue. They're bought and sold like any other commodity.

^This

I don't say that piracy is theft because some faceless lawmaker tells me so. Even if the law did say piracy is theft, that wouldn't be enough to convince me it is true. I say that piracy is theft because it fits the definition of theft: taking a person's property without that person's permission.

Mokkan
Member #4,355
February 2004
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There's more ways to look at the issue than in terms of morality. Logically, for example. Software companies aren't going to write software if nobody is going to buy it (or "buy licenses to use it" or whatever terminology you prefer). Many software companies write software I enjoy using, and I want them to continue writing software for me to enjoy. Therefore, it makes sense to support them monetarily.

Arthur Kalliokoski
Second in Command
February 2005
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OK, buy the game, set the shrink wrapped POS on the shelf, pirate something that works (you DID pay for it after all) and play it. No problem.

They all watch too much MSNBC... they get ideas.

SiegeLord
Member #7,827
October 2006
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I say that piracy is theft because it fits the definition of theft: taking a person's property without that person's permission.

How is it making a copy of someone's property without permission the same as taking that person's property without permission? What definition of 'take' are you using?

take
1 : to get into one's hands or into one's possession, power, or control:

Do you obtain possession, power or control over the original intellectual property when you make a copy of it? The last time I checked, the games were still sold even when pirated, the owners retained the original possession, power and control.

OK, buy the game, set the shrink wrapped POS on the shelf, pirate something that works (you DID pay for it after all) and play it. No problem.

Why? The laws are made by congresscritters! Be consistent!

EDIT:

Mokkan said:

Logically, for example. Software companies aren't going to write software if nobody is going to buy it (or "buy licenses to use it" or whatever terminology you prefer). Many software companies write software I enjoy using, and I want them to continue writing software for me to enjoy. Therefore, it makes sense to support them monetarily.

Precisely! I pirate games to drive those companies out of existence, by not supporting them monetarily.

"For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increases knowledge increases sorrow."-Ecclesiastes 1:18
[SiegeLord's Abode][Codes]:[DAllegro5]:[RustAllegro]

bamccaig
Member #7,536
July 2006
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SiegeLord said:

Moreover, breaking laws almost by definition treats all other people unfairly who are following the laws, no matter what the law.

I don't have to agree with the laws of a nation. I have to abide by them or else face the consequences. If I'm OK with paying fines when I get caught then so be it. Similarly, if pirates are OK with paying fines when they get caught, then go for it. Except they aren't. They whine and bitch about the law when they are caught, as if they think they can break the law and not get punished for it. It's one thing to dispute a law (there are channels to go through for that), but it's another to blatantly break them expecting to be above them.

SiegeLord said:

And if any law covered some physical limitation of humans and vehicles, it wouldn't be a law in the first place because it would be unnecessary. It's like disallowing moving faster than the speed of light!

There is a point for both man and machine where they can no longer reliably function. This point is different for each man and each machine. Under certain conditions, a car cannot be controlled by a human. Under certain conditions, a human cannot control a car. Both can be pushed beyond those points, however. I think the law is there, at least in part, to deter this from happening. Many people are unaware of their own limitations (let alone the limitations of their cars) and push past unless boundaries are set to guide them. At the same time, others are aware of the limitations involved and safely walk the line.

SiegeLord said:

Who said anything about God?

God goes along with the discussion of morals and ethics and right and wrong. Also, IIRC, you are a religious man, so it was somewhat of a cheap shot. I've in the past found it amusing how religious friends don't seem to have a moral compass. Their ideals for right and wrong were told to them. When it comes to thinking for themselves, they're lost or blatantly immoral. IMO, of course.

Trezker
Member #1,739
December 2001
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SiegeLord said:

Precisely! I pirate games to drive those companies out of existence, by not supporting them monetarily.

I think that's bad too. When you pirate a game and proceed talking about it with friends and on forums etc.. you're promoting that game and make more people buy it.

So if you really want to drive a company out of existence you shouldn't use their products in any way, shape or form. You need to completely deny that they exist at all.



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