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WotC puts a stop to online sales of PDFs
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<blockquote data-quote="jasonbostwick" data-source="post: 4745386" data-attributes="member: 34924"><p>The note about Pathfinder is of interest here.</p><p></p><p>The .pdfs of 4E D&D books (and DDI subscription content) have had their watermarks removed within an hour or so of the book releases on RPGNow and been up on torrents and rapidshare for distribution. </p><p></p><p>For the first year or so of Pathfinder (and for Dungeon/Dragon before that) this was pretty much the case with Paizo's .pdfs as well. About half a year ago (I think after the the release of Pathfinder beta, but I'm not really positive as this is second-hand information and I don't play Pathfinder) in one fell swoop, Paizo banned the accounts and credit cards of a number of users they had determined were pirating their material, <strong>and</strong> changed their watermarking system.</p><p></p><p>Since that time there have been no (to my knowledge) 'releases' of any Paizo products to the pirating community. The new system can't be cracked by the old methods, and it requires too many seperately purchased copies of a product to do a side-by-side comparison and ensure that all of the watermarks and identifying features have been removed.</p><p></p><p>To add to that, Paizo has been fairly quick about issuing Cease and Desist orders to the uploaders of .torrents of their products, keeping those .pdfs released before the watermarking change out of easy distribution.</p><p></p><p>Now, Pathfinder is a bit of a niche product, so it may be that the pirating community isn't devoting as much attention to cracking Paizo's protection. </p><p></p><p>Accepting that caveat, though, Pathfinder has managed to be successful in preventing the piracy of their products, <strong>without</strong> stopping sales of their .pdf or filing any lawsuits.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="jasonbostwick, post: 4745386, member: 34924"] The note about Pathfinder is of interest here. The .pdfs of 4E D&D books (and DDI subscription content) have had their watermarks removed within an hour or so of the book releases on RPGNow and been up on torrents and rapidshare for distribution. For the first year or so of Pathfinder (and for Dungeon/Dragon before that) this was pretty much the case with Paizo's .pdfs as well. About half a year ago (I think after the the release of Pathfinder beta, but I'm not really positive as this is second-hand information and I don't play Pathfinder) in one fell swoop, Paizo banned the accounts and credit cards of a number of users they had determined were pirating their material, [B]and[/B] changed their watermarking system. Since that time there have been no (to my knowledge) 'releases' of any Paizo products to the pirating community. The new system can't be cracked by the old methods, and it requires too many seperately purchased copies of a product to do a side-by-side comparison and ensure that all of the watermarks and identifying features have been removed. To add to that, Paizo has been fairly quick about issuing Cease and Desist orders to the uploaders of .torrents of their products, keeping those .pdfs released before the watermarking change out of easy distribution. Now, Pathfinder is a bit of a niche product, so it may be that the pirating community isn't devoting as much attention to cracking Paizo's protection. Accepting that caveat, though, Pathfinder has managed to be successful in preventing the piracy of their products, [B]without[/B] stopping sales of their .pdf or filing any lawsuits. [/QUOTE]
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