I agree with you. The 10:1 number is at best an educated guess, and frankly I don't have enough confidence in them for that. Regardless of what they say, no, they can not track how many copies of the book were downloaded. For that matter, I wouldn't give them enough credit to get an accurate tally of how many copies were legally purchased through sanctioned venues.
That said, my personal suspicion is that they're lowballing it.
As an aside, there's no such thing as a 'fair use download.' It is illegal to download from anywhere other than an authorized retailer from whom you have purchased the book. Period.
Well, Canadian Copyright law would include Fair-Use-Download. Canadian copyright law allows you to download digital copies of anything you have purchased legitimately. You buy a dvd, you can download a rip, and legally have it. You buy a book, you can legally download a copy online. It makes sense. Of course, sharing those downloads with other people is still illegal, because they may or may not have legit copies. You could legally give a copy to a friend who had a legit copy though.
As many have pointed out, 10:1 is still alot better than X:0. The pirating isn't going to stop, or even slow down. However, the legit copies did. I suppose the difference will be release dates for new titles. it won't be available online on release day anymore unless it's leaked. people will have to wait 1-3 days before they get their bootlegs.
pdfs are rritating as hell to play from though. takes too long to flip through a pdf, and im not going to pass my laptop around for other people to see. I have pdfs of all my legit books, and I didn't pay for them. as I pointed out though, that's not piracy here, it is a Fair-Use-Download. I use the pdfs when im planning a session for OCR search abilities and for an extra screen (otherwise its a pain to search through a dozen books at once, so hardcover + pc = less clutter too), and I use the books when im actually playing. I buy legit scans of books I don't own though if theyre available.
This decision only annoys me because i have to hunt down either pirated pdfs of 2e books if i want them, or find them on ebay, as opposed to just going to rpgnow. WOTC lost their new release profits from me when I played 4e on release day and hated it. I still buy some other wotc products, but they just ensured that now none of the profits go to them. they dont make money off ebay, and i cant buy their pdfs anymore for the books I want (which are all out of print). lol.
I got sick of running D&D though so lately I play stuff using the mechanics from Storyteller (White Wolf) - which are much more streamlined, and tend to have more original characters in the games. Wouldnt work great for standard fantasy, but you put it in a more modern setting, or dont have vast physical differences between the races and it's the way to go. Of course, where 4e has no equivalent to LA or racial levels, that kindof just shoved it off completely. 4e may have kept me for FR, but new FR seems too dumb to me, so i took a pass on that too.
Not surprised about the decision, and I see the reason behind it, but they aren't helping themselves, just losing profit they would have gotten.
