Is piracy a serious issue for game developers?

[Psionicist]

See how that works? (fear of punishment)

I bet most people reading this have similar driving habits. If you know there are cops around, you make sure you don’t speed, right.)

That's a weird assertion. Just because there are laws against murder doesn't mean everyone will start killing people if the law and punishment disappear. If people drive faster than the speed limit that's because the speed limit is too low and should be raised.

 

[Wormwood]

That's a weird assertion. Just because there are laws against murder doesn't mean everyone will start killing people if the law and punishment disappear.

Howe about stealing?

 

[Shadowslayer]

Artists in the music industry have a revenue stream from live performances; the music-publishing end of what they do is, in many cases, a relatively small part of their income. In our file-sharing era, artists can afford to give up income from unauthorized sharing of their recordings, and treat it as advertising for their concerts.

Well, there's a helluva lot more people behind the production of music than just the artist. Its the record companies losing money with file sharing. But I guess the idea of taking food out of the record company's mouth feels more tasteful than taking it out of the artist's mouth. Even though, either way, its the same thing...food's getting taken from someone.

Anyway, I'd say piracy IS an issue for game develpers. Your hard work is getting circulated around for free when you should be getting paid for it. I'm sorry, how is that right? I've written a small book myself (non RPG) and I know if some scanned my work and started handing it out for free to anyone that wanted it, I'd want him strung up. I don't know how anyone can defend this as being right in any way, shape or form.

 

[Psionicist]

Howe about stealing?

That's not something 10%+ of the population do on a regular basis (even higher for speeding).

 

[Christoph the Magus]

Nah, you forgot the side-tangential semantics arguers: the "It's not technically theft because nobody loses anything" people vs. the "It is theft, whatever the legal term may be" people. They crop up and have their own little argument alongside the actual argument, but nobody else cares.

Ahhh! You're right! How silly of me to forget that one!

 

[Psionicist]

Anyway, I'd say piracy IS an issue for game develpers. Your hard work is getting circulated around for free when you should be getting paid for it. I'm sorry, how is that right? I've written a small book myself (non RPG) and I know if some scanned my work and started handing it out for free to anyone that wanted it, I'd want him strung up. I don't know how anyone can defend this as being right in any way, shape or form.

You don't have an inborn right to get paid for anything. I have (soon) a degree in computer science, where's my inborn right to get a job? More importantly, where's my right to get the job someone without a degree can get without paying a dime for education? There is no such right, even if you think it would be cool if that were the case.

You _do_ have the right to control your work though, but the two are not the same thing.

 

[Feathercircle]

I

So I'm dubious about two arguments:
1) People download on a "try then buy" basis. I don't think they have time to "try" out this stuff.
2) Lost sales. Like I said, I don't think many of these jokers have time to read and play, so why would they buy it.

I really think most of the people with 10s or 100s of gigs of illegal RPG stuff are actually just packrats. I really don't think they use it. They just keep buying bigger drives, blank DVDs, and LTO drives to back up there collection, never having the chance to use 1% of it. Guess the joke is on them.

As I said, I know I'm atypical- I've got maybe a dozen .pdfs, plus .rtfs of selected bits of the SRD. If anyone has any solution to the "try before you buy" problem my middle-of-nowhere location gives me that doesn't require me to rely on my friend with the huge .pdf hoard, I'd be glad to hear it. Anyway, I should probably stay the hell off of this topic from this point on, as I'm rather averse to getting caught in the crossfire that this kind of thread can generate.

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

I don't know how anyone can defend this as being right in any way, shape or form.

That's a very serious limitation. You don't have to agree with someone's arguments in order to understand them.

I think the main argument for justifying copyright infringement (as opposed to legal filesharing) is based on the idea that information and ideas are not things that a person or an organization can own. You don't lose information when you give it to someone else, and the more people who have a certain piece of information, the more useful that information is-- especially if it's cultural information like fiction or games.

Since the most natural thing to do with information is to disseminate it, and since it becomes more useful the more people are exposed to it, then helping people to find information and providing it to them at no charge is the most moral and justifiable thing to do with that information.

I'm not taking sides in this argument, because I'm personally torn; while I believe whole-heartedly in the above statements, I also know that authors and designers both need and deserve to be paid for their efforts. I don't know how to reconcile these conflicting values.

The only reason I'm posting this at all is to remind people that there are two sides to this issue, no matter how much we believe that our side is correct. There is no such thing as a one-sided issue.

 

[Bloodstone Press]

That's a weird assertion. Just because there are laws against murder doesn't mean everyone will start killing people if the law and punishment disappear. If people drive faster than the speed limit that's because the speed limit is too low and should be raised.

i've been waiting for someone to bring up murder. There's a reason I used speeding and not murder in my analogy. The psychology of killing is a whole seperate can of worms from what we are talking about. Indeed, its the subject of a new Chapter in my up-coming Book of Broken Dreams revision.

[shameless plug] Anyone who buys the antiquated, original version of the Book of Broken Dreams now (for only $5) will get a free copy of the revised version, which will include a new chapter on mobs, group dynamics and crowds as well as a new chapter on the psychology of killing. this revised version will sell for $7 (because of the two new Chapters)
so, buy now, save $2 and pick up a great gaming sourcebook, no matter what system you play.
[/shameless plug]

For now I'll refrain from an essay on the psychology of killing and say only that it is very different than what we are talking about here (for reasons cited in my post in the other thread). There are other things that keep you from killing besides laws and morals.

 

[Shadowslayer]

You don't have an inborn right to get paid for anything. I have (soon) a degree in computer science, where's my inborn right to get a job? More importantly, where's my right to get the job someone without a degree can get without paying a dime for education? There is no such right, even if you think it would be cool if that were the case.

You _do_ have the right to control your work though, but the two are not the same thing.

Inborn rights? Who's talking about that? I'm talking about control of my work. You summed it up yourself in the last sentence.

I reiterate: if some self righteous dork (hopefully this will pass the smiley filter) scanned my work and started handing it out for free to anyone that wanted it, I'd want him strung up.