Is piracy a serious issue for game developers?

[Dannyalcatraz]

IMO a reasonable term of copyright protection for computer software would be 7 years.

Sorry, S'mon. Actually, I don't care a bit about the term of protection...PROVIDED it is sufficient for the IP holder to cover his costs. In D&D terms, I'm Lawful Neutral on that point.

For example, I'd see no problem with a variable term IP right (for copyright or patent) that read "Term of protection is from date of issuance until the copyright or patent holder has covered his development costs (as determined by independent auditor), plus 1 year."

However, that "short" protection period would have 2 major results:

Result 1: Valuable IP would be quickly disseminated into the public domain, but the garbage could potentially be protected for a century. Result 2: the dissapearance of extraordinary profits from IP would result in a sharp decline in (but not total dissapearance of) investment in the development of IP- investors go where there are profits to be made. While innovation would not dissapear, it WOULD slow significantly.

Me
Immaterial. Some are, but others, like Traveller, Space 1889 and Battletech, are released by people who bought the copyright holders rights, have a license, or are working with the original game designer. In any case, they are released by people who legally have the copyrights to the games they are publishing.

Korimyr
It is not immaterial, because the last quoted portion is not correct. If it's a game that plays like (or a lot like) the original but has a different (if similar) name, it is almost guaranteed that it was not released by the original company.

Yes it is immaterial who publishes it if they have a legal right to do so, regardless of the method of obtaining that right.

Notice, my statement ONLY covered those who DO have a legal right to publication. Essentially, its a tautology: Someone who has the right to legally publish X (for whatever reason) may legally publish X- it doesn't matter who they are.

In each of the specific cases I mentioned (Traveller, Space 1889, etc), the current publisher has the legal right to publish.

Also, if the original game designer has sold his rights to the game, why should he be allowed to take those rights back or to produce an identical game for another company?

If the contract doesn't guarantee exclusivity or non-competition, then no exclusivity or non-competition can be expected or enforced. Caveat Emptor!

In other words, if you buy the non-exclusive right to publish Game X, there is NOTHING stopping me from selling the same rights to someone else, or doing so myself.

If the contract we sign doesn't contain a covenant not to compete, there is little you can do to keep me from designing similar games.

BTW- such clauses usually have a time limit or an location limit: You are granted exclusive rights in a country or set of countries; the person cannot compete in the same industry for 5 years or produce a similar product within that industry for the same, etc.

No, but other people do stop buying them; stores even stop selling them.

Incorrect. In case you haven't noticed, you can walk into Best Buy and other stores and buy these little game controllers that plug directly into your TV that contain 5-10 classic console or arcade games at about $15-20/controller. The games are 20+ years old, unchanged in graphic content, and they're bundled with a controller, but they are still the same games that you claim are unsellable.

Are they selling as well as GTA? No. Are they selling? Yes. People are STILL buying these games.

And there is no reason to expect this trend to end. In 20 years, people may be buying all of the DOOM games bundled into a controller that plugs directly into a TV for $15-20 a pop.

In other words, the most popular "abandonware" is in all probability not even abandoned. And the pirate cannot know which is and which isn't.

That they don't choose to indicates that they have already made all of the profit off of them that they are going to, and that they're no longer attempting to make more.

No. As I pointed out, it would cost them more to prosecute the infringement cases against individuals than it would to ignore them.

Instead of going after the individuals, they are going after the sites that warehouse the old games. They have found THAT to be cost effective and actually effective.

And, as I point out above, they ARE trying to make more profit out of their old IP.

 

[The Grumpy Celt]

As a guy who has written a couple of published game books, and has a couple more on the way, I can say that my peg leg has never caused me any problems, but the hook has posed difficulties in writing and the eye-patch means the players can try to sneak up on me but the parrot warns me why they try it.

And I'll have me revenge on that scurvy devil Ranger Wicket for what he did to me booty.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Subtle!

 

[knightofround]

I have about 2 gigs of WotC books from p2p networks. I have a difficult time imagining that p2p file sharing hurts small publishers, because I haven't simply been able to find them. Reading the comments by publishers on this topic has been very interesting. It's quite possible that there's dedicated rings of pirates out there that distribute gaming material, but I don't think they are a threat to small publishers because they are too difficult for the average gamer to find.

Personally, I have stayed away from buying PDFs because I can't leaf through them. There's no "try before you buy". "Sample pages" do not help at all, because how do I know if those sample pages are comparable to the rest of the content in the book? It's like movie commercials on TV. They put all the movie's best moments into the commercial, to encourage you to watch the movie. But you don't get the product that were advertised; instead, you get the filler that connects the snapshots from the commercial.

To be candid with the publishers here, until I could review D20 books in PDF format, I never bought any published material beyond the core books. The price of the book + the risk of getting crap was too high, I'd just as soon go with homebrewed. D20 books are weak complements to the D20 game as a whole. But, thanks to p2p networks I can obtain better information about the products, and I have actually started buying hardcover books from them.

If I saw a lot of DMs substituting pirated books for hardbacked books, I'd agree that pirating is a major problem. But I don't. p2p pirates are simply gobbling up the producer surplus in the gaming community. I know that it hurts publishers to see their products that only sold 30 copies in the open market proliferate 150 copies in the black market, but how do you know if you could actually capture profits from those 150 copies?

I think the answer can be found in "streaming" software. I'm a happy owner of the music-streaming service Rhapsody. It has a managable subscription fee and a sizable library. Before Rhapsody, I did not listen to music. Mostly I read books from the public library, or I got a few singles that I liked off of p2p. BUT, because there's this service out there, I'm willing to pay for it and I've really become immersed in the music community since then. I don't p2p music anymore, even though Rhapsody doesn't have everything I'm looking for. The record companies have gone from getting $0 from me to $10/month.

Has anyone tried the "streaming" business model in the D20 community? Or the "ransom" business model?

 

[Wormwood]

I know that it hurts publishers to see their products that only sold 30 copies in the open market proliferate 150 copies in the black market, but how do you know if you could actually capture profits from those 150 copies?

Of course one could ask, what right do those 150 pirates have to access material —aka. labor—they have not paid for (or has not been expressly donated by the author)

 

[Wormwood]

I think the answer can be found in "streaming" software.

I think the answer can be found in aggressive prosecution.

 

[knightofround]

I think the answer can be found in aggressive prosecution.

Yeah, because aggressive prosecution has always beaten technological advancement.

How do you know that aggressive prosecution is worth the monetary cost? I highly doubt that prosecution would drive up sales. Look at what's happened to the movie/music industries.

 

[knightofround]

Of course one could ask, what right do those 150 pirates have to access material —aka. labor—they have not paid for (or has not been expressly donated by the author)

None, really. Same goes for people that share dice and books with their gaming buddies. Same goes for people that play music without headphones. Have you paid for your air today?

 

[Yair]

If I saw a lot of DMs substituting pirated books for hardbacked books, I'd agree that pirating is a major problem. But I don't. p2p pirates are simply gobbling up the producer surplus in the gaming community. I know that it hurts publishers to see their products that only sold 30 copies in the open market proliferate 150 copies in the black market, but how do you know if you could actually capture profits from those 150 copies?

I am on the pro-pirate side, but just wanted to comment that I do see such a trend. To be specific, I have, in the two parties I've played in, seen players use downloaded materials instead of buying the content, even when said content was digital. In fact, they don't understand why I insist on buying what we use.
And these include been-through-college and married men, these are not kids.

I personally do not believe people should be able to earn ideas, however lucrative these ideas may be, or restrict the right of another to speak or write what he wants, even if what he says may hurt them financially. In other words, I'm on the pro-pircay side.
But I also think the kind of anecdotal evidence you presented in this paragraph doesn't really mean anything; I've seen differently, and others have too, and none of this evidence shows much at all.

 

[ayrwind]

Assume i bought the DMG II hardcopy. but i want to read it at my workplace, and pdf is easier to hide from my boss. i wish the pdf to be portable also when i work at a cafe with my laptop. so, i download an illegal pdf from p2p.

now, i bought the book, so nobody lost any sales. the pdf isnt available at any online stores. am i doing something illegal? yes. am i wrong though?