$125,000 in fines for D&D pirates? Help me do the math...

[Hadrian the Builder]

Not according to Congress. In fact, the $100,000 settlement is far less than Congress thought the upper range for this sort of thing should be.

That's the point of my quibble. I understand what the law allows currently. I want to see a change.

I want creators to be paid for their materials. I want pirates to stop freeloading. I want creators to be able to sue pirates for damages when they get caught. But, specifically for file-sharing activities, I disagree with the details of the damages, as I described earlier.

 

[Storm Raven]

That's the point of my quibble. I understand what the law allows currently. I want to see a change.

I want creators to be paid for their materials. I want pirates to stop freeloading. I want creators to be able to sue pirates for damages when they get caught. But, specifically for file-sharing activities, I disagree with the details of the damages, as I described earlier.

I guess I just disagree here. I don't think the damages are particularly disproportionate, especially since the range of damages was not kept a secret before these guys decided to break the law. If the damages were not painful, then they wouldn't really serve their purpose, would they?

 

[ProfessorCirno]

Sure you could. What is stopping you? Could one factor possibly be that you'd run the risk of being liable for many thousands of dollars in damages?

...Uh, nope. That doesn't come into the equation at all.

I don't care about "being caught" if I were to engage in piracy, just as I don't try playing the lotto.

I don't do it because piracy sucks and I don't play 4e.

 

[kenmarable]

... sort of. Its also possible to reach an equilibrium in which the current business model is used, the general reticience people hold towards violating the law combined with the occasional high profile lawsuit against infringers operates to keep infringement at a manageable level, and things just keep on grinding along.

That leads to certain inequities- there is a certain unfairness to a system in which everyone engages in low grade piracy and people who rise above a certain unwritten level are occasionally subjected to significant penalties that are perhaps proportionate to the offense but not to the margin of the difference between the prosecuted and unprosecuted offenses.

But we have a lot of systems like that, and its rare that anything is ever done about them.

A clear example of this is speed limits (at least here in Michigan). It's commonly accepted that you can drive 5mph over the limit without ever getting ticketed. 10mph over is ok on the highways. But 15-20mph over and you could be ticketed for the full 15-20mph over, not the amount over the commonly accepted limit.

And your explanation of the equilibrium looks to be the best option for the near future at least, especially for larger publishers. I think small publishers might actually be better served by working with filesharing rather than against them and/or some sort of new business model (since obscurity is probably a bigger problem than piracy for the small companies), BUT that's their decision to make, not mine, of course. For larger companies, the equilibrium of suing just enough to minimize the impact of piracy is what WotC appears to be doing, and I agree with them.

 

[delericho]

delericho - You can't have it both ways though. You claimed that WOTC's pdf's were overpriced and don't sell. That's not true. They were the best selling pdf's. Now, the pdf market is miniscule, I agree, but, that has nothing to do with WOTC's pricing policies.

Hmm. Yes, you're right.

 

[Storm Raven]

...Uh, nope. That doesn't come into the equation at all.

I don't care about "being caught" if I were to engage in piracy, just as I don't try playing the lotto.

Interesting, so you are saying that if you were going to pirate, then the fact that you could get smacked with a $100,000+ judgment against you for doing so wouldn't factor into your thinking at all? You must have lots of disposable cash lying around.

 

[Xris Robin]

Interesting, so you are saying that if you were going to pirate, then the fact that you could get smacked with a $100,000+ judgment against you for doing so wouldn't factor into your thinking at all? You must have lots of disposable cash lying around.

Actually, it's more like saying you aren't afraid of getting struck by lightning while outside in the rain.

 

[Storm Raven]

Actually, it's more like saying you aren't afraid of getting struck by lightning while outside in the rain.

The odds of being struck by lightning are 576,000 to 1. The odds of being tagged with a judgment for uploading copyrighted materials appears to be considerably less favorable.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

One final peep here, since I forgot to address one thing before.

The assertion that being fined for lost profits in a piracy case on the grounds that some of those downloads "would not have been sales" is a non-starter.

The law is pretty clear: if you take property of another- even if you wouldn't have bought it- lost value or profits are a valid remedy. The form of the property is immaterial in the eyes of the law, and applies to physical or digital property equally.

This, FWIW, goes back to the Tort of Conversion which derived from the ooooold action called Trover.

 

[Aus_Snow]

The odds of being struck by lightning are 576,000 to 1. The odds of being tagged with a judgment for uploading copyrighted materials appears to be considerably less favorable.

Rubbish.

How many copies of how many 4e PDFs were shared online before WotC decided 'out of the blue' to 'do something' about this particular instance? Oh, and how many are being shared *right now*?

Indeed. In fact, 576000 to 1 is woefully inaccurate. . . just not in the way you apparently assume(d).