Interesting article regarding piracy

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Just a personal anecdote..

I used to pirate heavily because my parents wouldn't spend money for every game I wanted and I didn't have a job.

Some of the games I played were excellent and some were rather poor. I ditched the poor ones and kept the good ones. The ones that were good I thought were worth my money, and after I got a job, one of the first things I did was start buying the games that I got a shit ton of enjoyment out of. Even if I wasn't playing them much anymore or at all, the fact that I got so much enjoyment out of them meant, for me, that those games were worth $15-$30.

Not every download is a lost sale. If I had decided not to bother, particularly with the games that I wasn't playing anymore, that would be a lost sale. The games I ended up not liking, I ditched fairly quickly and are not lost sales because there was no gain for me.

-Also, some of the games I got lots out of and bought, had DRM of some sort. It really doesn't matter if a game has DRM or not if it's actually enjoyable for me.
 
heatlesssun said:
All I know is that I pretty much done with reviews and opinions on tech like this when it comes to games with "draconinan" DRM. I HAVE to have a good Internet connections to make a living and while that doesn't cover down time for servers that's something I'm willing to live with if it's rare which thus fas with Conviction and AC2 not any problems on either end.

The thing is there's so much ink about the Ubi DRM and I would have NO idea that its even there without all the bitching.
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Holy balls. Really.

It isn't about having a stable internet connection to play a single player game. We all know by now that you have three stable hi-speed internet connections from home and your underground bat cave where you work. It is about what comes next. Uplay is cracked. The DRM is broken, so Ubisoft has two options. Remove the DRM or make another one. When does enough become enough. When will it become too draconian to say wow this really sucks and detracts from my enjoyment of gaming.

People are trying to take a stand now before it becomes worse. There are publishers out there who have made awesome PC games without restrictive DRM and they have sold well. Many publishers are rejecting the notion that restrictive DRM schemes help their sales. Valve, EA, Stardock, THQ, CD Projekt, and others have all had great success selling games without restrictive DRM.

My question still remains unanswered by you DRM sycophants. What is wrong or detrimental asking publishers to make games that use less restrictive forms of DRM and give incentives to legitimate owners of the game? Why do you fight against us asking for these changes?

Look at the success of Fallout 3, Mass Effect 2, Dragon's Age, Battlefield Bad Company 2, Metro 2033, Witcher, and the list can go on. Uplay could be an awesome service and Ubisoft has a lot of potential there, but the current marketing and scheme they are using is backwards. Like giving a badminton racket to a tennis player for a tennis match.

So again. In summary; Publishers who focus on in-depth stories, re-playability, challenging gameplay, with at least some semblance of an attempt to port the game to the PC market correctly and in a timely manner is what the majority of PC gamers are asking for.
 
phide said:
I don't mean to tell you your "job", but I would hope that a practicing law professional, as you're apparently claiming to be, would be able to correctly spell "criminally". Just sayin'.


Incorrect. It is copyright infringement. Why this must be restated so frequently is beyond my capacity to comprehend.


Again, this has nothing to do with software piracy or copyright infringement. These relate to intellectual property theft, of which piracy is only loosely related. An individual downloading games for personal use is not even remotely similar to what encompassed by IP theft.


Statute. It's not a sculpture of copyright infringement's likeness.
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correcting my spelling on a forum post does not make you correct, but i'm pretty sure arriagning someone on both copyright infringment and petit larceny on the same complaint and dockett in criminal court makes me correct, just sayin.

As I said for which you are having difficulty comprehended, it is the same thing, the difficulty is proving intent, and for the record, if anyone would admit in court that they only downloaded it for "personal use",, they need to fire their lawyer, because you have just handed the prosecution intent and your head on a silver platter.
 
doh said:
Don't delude yourself. The issue of a game's quality is a separate issue to the issue of piracy and theft. A poor quality game will not sell well but it will sell fewer copies when people don't pay for the copies they're using. Every pirated copy hurts sales figures because that is one more person playing the game that didn't otherwise pay for it before playing.

The premise goes something like this: To play our game you must pay for it ahead of time. It isn't a wild leap to get to the conclusion that people who are playing the game but didn't pay for it ahead of time have resulted in a lost sale.
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Thats not the right way to look at it. A lost sale is a sale that would have been otherwise gained if the option to pirate was no there. Don't fool yourself into believing that all pirates are potential customers. There are some lost sales, but you can't claim every single person who pirates a game would have otherwise bought it. Not every pirated copy hurts sales either. While 99% of the time I'd call it a bullshit excuse, there are a small group of pirates who do what they claim and do buy games they pirate if they enjoy them. Its not a large number, but its there. There are others who simply download something because its there, even though they have no interest in it.. Among other various little groups within the "community". There is this belief floating around the industry right now that all pirates could be potential customers and I simply don't buy that.
 
ikarinokami said:
correcting my spelling on a forum post does not make you correct, but i'm pretty sure arriagning someone on both copyright infringment and petit larceny on the same complaint and dockett in criminal court makes me correct, just sayin.

As I said for which you are having difficulty comprehended, it is the same thing, the difficulty is proving intent, and for the record, if anyone would admit in court that they only downloaded it for "personal use",, they need to fire their lawyer, because you have just handed the prosecution intent and your head on a silver platter.
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Please show me one case, just one case, of piracy for personal use where the person was indicted and convicted of larceny.

You are so wrong it makes any claims to be professionally involved in this laughable.

Larceny is a crime of possession, where the person committing the crime must have COMPLETE control over the item being taken.

http://www.lectlaw.com/def/l007.htm
 
phide said:
No, but it certainly works wonders at discrediting your claim of relevant professional authority.
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I will take that as a surrender that you admit defeat as you should.

for the others, another reason why there is very little criminal prosecution for this kind of theft, is that it would very difficult to get a warrant.

take this example, in my state we have two weapon possession statutes.
one criminalizes possession of certain knifes, for instance a butterfly knife as a per se matter.

we have a second statue that criminlizes possession a weapon with intent to harm.

it is much easier to justify probable cause to stop and arrest for the first crime because all the officer needs is a reasonable suspicion you have one of the enumerated knives.

the second statue requires that the officer see some intent or action on your part to use the lets say a kitchen knife in an illegal manner in order to stop or question you or arrest you.


The problem applies to video game piracy. Unlike say child porn it is not illegal to have mere possession of a downloaded, what is illegal is the use of downloaded game in such a way as to have deprive certian rights that the ip/cr owner has, usally use, distrubtion or profit from.

because merely downloading a copy of game is not enough to rise to probable cause to get a search warrant, because merely downloading a game is no real indiction that you itend to use, or disturbute or profit the, it becomes very difficult as a pratical matter to get enough evidence to charge much less prosecute.
 
ikarinokami, you seem to be very confused about what is illegal and what isn't. About what is civil and what is criminal. About what is theft and what is copyright infringment.

If you're a lawyer you're a pisspoor one. You're also going to find yourself in trouble because you've been making posts while claiming to be a lawyer that could easily be construed as legal advice. That opens a whole can of worms that you don't want to be involved with. A can that if you were a real lawyer you'd be well aware of.
 
bigdogchris said:
The law just needs to be updated.
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No. There's very good reasons why it is not and should not be theft. There's very good reasons why we need copyright as a seperate thing. There's very good reasons for copyrights to have an expiration. There's very good reasons for copyrights to have limits on the rights granted.

Personally I think that copyrights have evolved to become too strongly in favor of the copyright owners (see the 'disney' copyright extension amendment for one example). But that's a whole different discussion... and one that very few of y'all seem to have the background knowledge to have.

Instead, those of us who could be having an interesting discussion are too busy trying to beat the most basic of ideas through peoples heads; that copyright infringment is not theft. As it's impossible to have a meanigful discussion of what nuances of the law or even what should be and when you can't even agree on the basic realities of law as it exists.
 
Derangel said:
Thats not the right way to look at it. A lost sale is a sale that would have been otherwise gained if the option to pirate was no there. Don't fool yourself into believing that all pirates are potential customers. There are some lost sales, but you can't claim every single person who pirates a game would have otherwise bought it. Not every pirated copy hurts sales either. While 99% of the time I'd call it a bullshit excuse, there are a small group of pirates who do what they claim and do buy games they pirate if they enjoy them. Its not a large number, but its there. There are others who simply download something because its there, even though they have no interest in it.. Among other various little groups within the "community". There is this belief floating around the industry right now that all pirates could be potential customers and I simply don't buy that.
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No, Derangel, you and countless others don't seem to understand this: The people at Ubisoft DO NOT believe that every person who pirates a game is a lost sale.

Why can you and others not understand this?

Those guys who work for Ubisoft - guess what, they had to fight to get that job at that compnay. Have you been to University, Derangel? The people who make it into University are among the top 5% - and yes these people are bloody intelligent. I can pretty much assure you that virtually every person working at Ubisoft is a University graduate.

Do you actually believe that they're so stupid as to believe that every person who pirates a game is a person who would have bought the game otherwise? That's just plain ridiculous.
 
WabeWalker said:
No, Derangel, you and countless others don't seem to understand this: The people at Ubisoft DO NOT believe that every person who pirates a game is a lost sale.

Why can you and others not understand this?

Those guys who work for Ubisoft - guess what, they had to fight to get that job at that compnay. Have you been to University, Derangel? The people who make it into University are among the top 5% - and yes these people are bloody intelligent. I can pretty much assure you that virtually every person working at Ubisoft is a University graduate.

Do you actually believe that they're so stupid as to believe that every person who pirates a game is a person who would have bought the game otherwise? That's just plain ridiculous.
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Respond to something that has to do with the conversation you are responding to, not some other random crap. I was responding directly to what was said to me. If you can't follow that, fuck off! And do you really believe the shit you just spewed about the top 5% getting into university? This town I live on has three colleges and I can guarantee you almost every fucking person here is a total dumb ass. College's aren't for the "smart" people anymore. Its also for the jocks and the party types, and whoever the fuck else decides to fill the halls with their worthless existence.
 
ikarinokami said:
I will take that as a surrender that you admit defeat as you should.
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Hah! It would take more than the inane ramblings of someone posing as an attorney on a hardware forum to get me to do that, I'm afraid.

But, just for kicks, let's hear more about how you've been "arriagning" your clients. It'll be worth a few laughs, I'm sure.

Derangel said:
Respond to something that has to do with the conversation you are responding to, not some other random crap.
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When it comes to WabeWalker, that's akin to demanding that a tree stump play the violin. No matter how low much time you give it, it will never be able to hold the thing, let alone play it.

If you argue with him, you're only being trolled, and he wins at his little game. Simple as that.
 
Derangel said:
Respond to something that has to do with the conversation you are responding to, not some other random crap. I was responding directly to what was said to me. If you can't follow that, fuck off! And do you really believe the shit you just spewed about the top 5% getting into university? This town I live on has three colleges and I can guarantee you almost every fucking person here is a total dumb ass. College's aren't for the "smart" people anymore. Its also for the jocks and the party types, and whoever the fuck else decides to fill the halls with their worthless existence.
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I see. I didn't realize that 'dumb asses' are graduating from universities these days - but I can assure you that the people working at Ubisoft aren't 'dumb asses' and know damned well that not every person who pirates a game represents a lost sale.
 
WabeWalker said:
No, Derangel, you and countless others don't seem to understand this: The people at Ubisoft DO NOT believe that every person who pirates a game is a lost sale.

Why can you and others not understand this?

Those guys who work for Ubisoft - guess what, they had to fight to get that job at that compnay. Have you been to University, Derangel? The people who make it into University are among the top 5% - and yes these people are bloody intelligent. I can pretty much assure you that virtually every person working at Ubisoft is a University graduate.

Do you actually believe that they're so stupid as to believe that every person who pirates a game is a person who would have bought the game otherwise? That's just plain ridiculous.
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If you'd gone to unversity for any degree.... and to a certain extent especially in the computer science area you wouldn't be making the assertation that people in unversity are all really really smart people who know what they're doing.

You should also be aware that the ones making DRM decisions aren't the developers. It's management. And I doubt that it's management with a technical background. It's likely all business school grads.

And if you went to uni, you'd know what's said about who goes to the business school.
 
WabeWalker said:
I see. I didn't realize that 'dumb asses' are graduating from universities these days - but I can assure you that the people working at Ubisoft aren't 'dumb asses' and know damned well that not every person who pirates a game represents a lost sale.
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As I said, I was responding specifically to a post. It has nothing to do with our other conversation. Nor does it have anything at all to do with Ubisoft.
 
Khanmots said:
If you'd gone to unversity for any degree.... and to a certain extent especially in the computer science area you wouldn't be making the assertation that people in unversity are all really really smart people who know what they're doing.

You should also be aware that the ones making DRM decisions aren't the developers. It's management. And I doubt that it's management with a technical background. It's likely all business school grads.

And if you went to uni, you'd know what's said about who goes to the business school.
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Ah, I see. So the people working at Ubisoft are below average intelligence and can't comprehend what you guys can.

Interesting argument.

EDIT: My guess is that if you were to spend a day at Ubisoft, and actually meet these people face to face, and take a tour of the Ubisoft building, and actually talk to all the people working there, you would withdraw every remark you've made about them.
 
WabeWalker said:
I see. I didn't realize that 'dumb asses' are graduating from universities these days - but I can assure you that the people working at Ubisoft aren't 'dumb asses'
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Considering that I know that there's dumbasses working on missile programs and autonomous vehicles... I'd be willing to lay good money on there being dumbasses working at ubisoft.

When the dumbasses are technical folk, you work around them, give them dumb-simple jobs and review thier code especially hard. When they're management... well, you'd better hope your management is more politically adroit. When they're upper-level management... well you get to watch your company go down the drains.
 
Khanmots said:
Considering that I know that there's dumbasses working on missile programs and autonomous vehicles... I'd be willing to lay good money on there being dumbasses working at ubisoft.

When the dumbasses are technical folk, you work around them, give them dumb-simple jobs and review thier code especially hard. When they're management... well, you'd better hope your management is more politically adroit. When they're upper-level management... well you get to watch your company go down the drains.
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Examples: Interplay, Atarti (the original one, not Infograms), Squaresoft.
 
WabeWalker said:
Ah, I see. So the people working at Ubisoft are below average intelligence and can't comprehend what you guys can.

Interesting argument.
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If you've worked in the corporate world you'd know that management's decisions are only as good as the info they get. Ubisoft's behavior is that of a company whose management is only listening to consultants and vendors. They're not consulting thier in-house experts... i.e., the developers.

If thier management wasn't dumbasses they'd have a system in place for thier quality technical folk to be recognized and consulted by the upper-echolons. I.e., providing cross-program support and even provide sanity-checks and technical risk-assessments on proposed courses of action and strategic initatives.
 
Khanmots said:
If you've worked in the corporate world you'd know that management's decisions are only as good as the info they get. Ubisoft's behavior is that of a company whose management is only listening to consultants and vendors. They're not consulting thier in-house experts... i.e., the developers.

If thier management wasn't dumbasses they'd have a system in place for thier quality technical folk to be recognized and consulted by the upper-echolons. I.e., providing cross-program support and even provide sanity-checks and technical risk-assessments on proposed courses of action and strategic initatives.
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Huh?
 
Derangel said:
Respond to something that has to do with the conversation you are responding to, not some other random crap.
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Random crap is how they make their arguments. Anything that resembles fact is ignored or interpreted into something totally opposite of the point you were making. Still trying to figure out how this topic can still be going for almost 5 months now.
 
Climber said:
Random crap is how they make their arguments. Anything that resembles fact is ignored or interpreted into something totally opposite of the point you were making. Still trying to figure out how this topic can still be going for almost 5 months now.
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because certain people keep making straw man arguments and don't try to use anything resembling logic or critical thinking and cling to false beliefs and think we should all sit around a campfire singing "Kumbaya, If a game doesn't sell well, it's because of piracy, whether it's good or not has nothing to do with it's sales, KUMBAYA!!!"

"blame piracy, Kumbaya!!!"

DRM does not stop piracy, the only person hurt at the end of the day is the legitimate customer who has to jump through a bunch of hoops just to play their game.

Same way with movies, a pirate, all a pirate has to do is fire up the movie and it's playing, while the legitimate customer has to sit through 4 or 5 FBI and anti-piracy warning screens before even getting to the main menu of the movie, and then you see 1 or 2 more before your movie starts.

Who gets the better experience when there's DRM? pirates. Who gets the better experience when it comes to movies? pirates!

So, we can conclude that pirates have a better product in their hands than people who actually pay for the product do!

No kind of argument can circumvent those basic truths. Anyone trying to debate those is nothing more than a mental midget who might as well start paying dues to the RIAA and MPAA.
 
Climber said:
Random crap is how they make their arguments. Anything that resembles fact is ignored or interpreted into something totally opposite of the point you were making. Still trying to figure out how this topic can still be going for almost 5 months now.
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Hahaha, yeah. It's amazing how it turned into "Ubisoft has university graduates so therefore they must know better". Talk about being deluded.
 
AceCR42 said:
Hahaha, yeah. It's amazing how it turned into "Ubisoft has university graduates so therefore they must know better". Talk about being deluded.
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Just to throw it out there, but SoE also has university graduates. Look how SW:G, Planetside, and EQ2 turned out.

Mythic has University grads and look how DAoC: ToA turned out.

Daikatana had University graduates working on it. Look how it turned out.

Hellgate: London had University graduates working on it. Look how it turned out.

Shoot look at Ubisoft and Wabe's example of PoP 2008. The game sucked at every level. Don't think any of my friends even remotely enjoyed it. So what does that say for Ubisoft's University graduates?

Just because you're a University graduate doesn't mean a whole lot. It is a combination of taking the applied knowledge from school, experience, and guidance from the veterans in the industry with a solid game plan that helps give you and your team a good chance of success, but still doesn't guarantee you'll make it. Lots of promising games, studios, developers, and publishers all failed with a solid group of graduates behind it and a lot of them failed.

Some of the best Indie games, FPS maps, and levels have all been designed by gamers with little experience but just a huge heart and love for making something good for a game they enjoyed. I mean if all that is required to judge or develop a game is a degree from a University then I'm set. Working on my second Master's and have already started working on my doctoral dissertation. I must be a freaking genius.
 
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Yeah, Ubisoft had better start visiting this forum where they can hire some of you rocket scientists to guide them to glory.

Seriously, there's not one person here who would invest the type of money it takes to produce a triple-A title, and then just put it out there DRM-free.

"Hey, I've got a great idea! Let's spend $15 million on a game, and then release it without any DRM of any sort - the public will love us for it!"

Yes they will. They'll love you for spending $15 million of your own money so that they can play your game for free.
 
Just a thought, saying "piracy will never go away" is akin to saying that murder will never go away. Saying that "It's here to stay," while true, may lead some to think: "can't beat em, then join em." Piracy and murder can be reduced. But DRM is one of those things that will not help reduce it. Someone with power inside Ubisoft thought it might be a good idea, or it might spur investors, but I'm willing to bet that there are a LOT of workers within the Ubisoft ranks who don't like the DRM. 95% of Ubisoft could have brains, but as with many things, it's often the minority with money and power and bigger offices that rule. Speaking of university grads, whether you're conservative or liberal, I think anyone can agree that there are a LOT of idiots in powerful positions with huge degrees who may be good at asking donors for money, who are good at bartering exclusive "sweet" deals, but idiots at just about everything else. Look at Hollywood, many of those people are genius' when it comes to acting and drama, but if you hear them open their mouth on a topic outside their expertise.... well, you'll be sorely disappointed.

Khanmots said:
No. There's very good reasons why it is not and should not be theft. There's very good reasons why we need copyright as a seperate thing. There's very good reasons for copyrights to have an expiration. There's very good reasons for copyrights to have limits on the rights granted.

Personally I think that copyrights have evolved to become too strongly in favor of the copyright owners (see the 'disney' copyright extension amendment for one example). But that's a whole different discussion... and one that very few of y'all seem to have the background knowledge to have.

Instead, those of us who could be having an interesting discussion are too busy trying to beat the most basic of ideas through peoples heads; that copyright infringment is not theft. As it's impossible to have a meanigful discussion of what nuances of the law or even what should be and when you can't even agree on the basic realities of law as it exists.
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Hey man, you said this before. That our rights are eroding and big businesses are amassing too much copyright power. Telling us about how things are changing doesn't benefit us. "Mickey Mouse Protection Act" is one good example. I never heard of that one before. Let's hear more. I'm not challenging you. And I probably won't challenge anything you follow up on. But you said you've been studying up on how our rights are eroding. (I'm inclined to believe that it's happening too). Enlighten us.
 
WabeWalker said:
Yeah, Ubisoft had better start visiting this forum where they can hire some of you rocket scientists to guide them to glory.

Seriously, there's not one person here who would invest the type of money it takes to produce a triple-A title, and then just put it out there DRM-free.

"Hey, I've got a great idea! Let's spend $15 million on a game, and then release it without any DRM of any sort - the public will love us for it!"

Yes they will. They'll love you for spending $15 million of your own money so that they can play your game for free.
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Fallout 3 shipped without any DRM. Didn't even check for the DVD if you launched it from the .exe.

So, uh, /thread?

Also, the more you post, the more I'm convinced you're an elaborate troll.
 
WabeWalker said:
Yeah, Ubisoft had better start visiting this forum where they can hire some of you rocket scientists to guide them to glory.

Seriously, there's not one person here who would invest the type of money it takes to produce a triple-A title, and then just put it out there DRM-free.

"Hey, I've got a great idea! Let's spend $15 million on a game, and then release it without any DRM of any sort - the public will love us for it!"

Yes they will. They'll love you for spending $15 million of your own money so that they can play your game for free.
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Kindly pull your head out of your ass.
 
Parmenides said:
Hey man, you said this before. That our rights are eroding and big businesses are amassing too much copyright power. Telling us about how things are changing doesn't benefit us. "Mickey Mouse Protection Act" is one good example. I never heard of that one before. Let's hear more. I'm not challenging you. And I probably won't challenge anything you follow up on. But you said you've been studying up on how our rights are eroding. (I'm inclined to believe that it's happening too). Enlighten us.
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Mmm... there's not a lot of really large things that can be pointed to that've happened legislatively. The mickey mouse act is nice purely because it works as such a solid example.

Other than that... it's a lot of little things. The whole recent (past 2-3 years) mess with internet royalties on streaming music 'radio' stations. The ages-old move of software houses towards trying to enforce abusive EULAs post-sale (personally I'm thinking that we're going to eventually see legislation specifically aimed at removing or drastically limiting the scope of the things in the next decade or two). The software industry constantly trying to erode first-sale doctrine (non-transferable accounts, aforementioned EULAs, etc).

And when they're not eroding due to legislative or marketplace actions you have misinformation campaigns. There's a reason that the RIAA is pouring money into funding copyright-curriculum for schools... and it's not because they're wanting to tell consumers about thier rights. For a sample: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/09/back-to-school-with-riaa-funded-curriculum.ars

And for some historical perspective I'd suggest that y'all read the writings of Jefferson and Madison discussing how to write Article 1, Section 8 of the constitution... and if it should even be included. They both had serious concerns over the abuse of copyrights. They saw ideas as something that should be encouraged, but that should be free to spread to benefit all of society. Thus they were grudgingly in favor of limited copyrights in order to provide financial incentive to create them, but limited in order to allow society at large to eventually enjoy them unfettered.

I won't try to give you all their writings here, but I'll include a few of the more famous of the germane quotes

Jefferson said:
If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.

That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property.
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Maddison said:
Monoplies tho' in certain cases useful ought to be granted with caution, and guarded with strictness agst abuse. The Constitution of the U. S. has limited them to two cases, the authors of Books, and of useful inventions, in both which they are considered as a compensation for a benefit actually gained to the community as a purchase of property which the owner might otherwise withold from public use. There can be no just objection to a temporary monopoly in these cases: but it ought to be temporary, because under that limitation a sufficient recompence and encouragement may be given. The limitation is particularly proper in the case of inventions, because they grow so much out of preceding ones that there is the less merit in the authors: and because for the same reason, the discovery might be expected in a short time from other hands.

Monopolies have been granted in other Countries, and by some of the States in this, on another principle, that of supporting some useful undertaking until1 experience and success should render the monopoly unnecessary, & lead to a salutary competition. . . . But grants of this sort can be justified in very peculiar cases only, if at all; the danger being very great that the good resulting from the operation of the monopoly, will be overbalanced by the evil effect of the precedent; and it being not impossible that the monopoly itself, in its original operation, may produce more evil than good.

In all cases of monopoly, not excepting those specified in favor of authors & inventors, it would be well to reserve to the State, a right to terminate the monopoly by paying a specified and reasonable sum [to the holder.] This would guard against the public discontents resulting from the exorbitant gains of individuals, and from the inconvenient restrictions combined with them.
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Fail said:
Why am I not surprised you use no logic or critical thinking at all in threads about DRM?
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I'm not even gonna bother anymore. He ignores tons of well-constructed arguments and repeats the same shit over and over or goes off on ridiculous tangents, which is really the definition of a troll. Not surprised he was banned from the Steam forums.
 
PrincessFrosty said:
The law covers piracy with copyright infingement laws, specifically because theft laws do not apply.

Piracy isn't theft. I don't think I can make this any simpler I'm afraid.
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While I understand there are legal differences this attitude is a much bigger problem than DRM will ever be. Knowingly using something that you have not paid for and have no right to is theft. Why do people insist in looking ONLY at the physical loss aspect of this crime?

A person sees something they want, they take it without right or payment. Morally how is this different than someone taking my laptop? I'm not trying to spout morality here I'm simply saying that if you look at the behavior of a prirate, the basic actions that a person takes in perpetrating the crime, piracy is NO different than any other theft.

I've never seen a counter argument to this that didn't involve the lack of physical loss contention which to me is just rationalizing bad behavior.
 
AceCR42 said:
I'm not even gonna bother anymore. He ignores tons of well-constructed arguments and repeats the same shit over and over or goes off on ridiculous tangents, which is really the definition of a troll. Not surprised he was banned from the Steam forums.
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What does this have to do with the DRM debate?

Your personal attacks have nothing to do with the discussion at hand - nothing. And as far as your so-called 'well constructed arguments' are concerned - who made you the judge?

That's just sheer arrogance. You've decided all on your own to judge the debate. That's just hilarious. The arguments I've seen from the people on your side are just plain ludicrous. How amazing that you judge your own arguments to be 'well constructed'.

EDIT: And please don't bring other forums into this discussion. THIS forum is the Hardforum. You have no way of proving what goes on at any other forum - or who's even posting there. I'm pretty certain that the people running the HardForum don't want to be concerning themselves with what has or hasn't happened at The Steam forums.
 
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