D&D 4E Posssibility of 4E pdf's being leaked?

[Angellis_ater]

It would involve someone physically stealing the hardcopy from the company, then for some reason, scanning the ill-gotten gains into a computer and uploading it (possibly with a computer virus embedded).

Yes, because pirates always include viruses. Indeed.

 

[Sitara]

You know, with the news of the $5000/- developers kit: Wizards will probably mail the hardcopies of the 'kit' to the publishers who buy it. That could be another possible venue of leakage. (someone at the postoffice opens the package, scans it, and then re-packages and sends it off).

Or is the 'kit' going to be pdfs?

 

[JohnRTroy]

Well, that means that they're not inclined to do so. So you're speaking around my question. Not everyone on the intarwebs is Dudley Doright. So let's try this again: What's stopping some playtester of less-than-perfect-moral-fibre from transcribing the rules and uploading them somewhere?

From what I gather, you were specifically targeting the people who purchased the SRD. It's not within Clark Peterson's, Erik Mona's, or whomever else is interested in publishing product to go against the license. Despite their ability to pay, I'm sure the staff working on the adventures is really small and thus they could be trustworthy.

There are enough controls in place to prevent the piracy on this end. A $5000 fee, an NDA, print-only media, and the requirement of a business license--which means you must register as a company according to state and federal laws, which means providing real information, tax information, etc...basically preventing you from being anonymous.

If there are any "leaks", I happen to think it would more likely be a scan of the final books rather than any preview versions.

You know, with the news of the $5000/- developers kit: Wizards will probably mail the hardcopies of the 'kit' to the publishers who buy it. That could be another possible venue of leakage. (someone at the postoffice opens the package, scans it, and then re-packages and sends it off).

Post Office people have great benefits and are usually paid relatively well. Also, doing that is a serious Federal Crime, with penalties probably worse than those faced for Piracy. I'm not sure how UPS or FedEx handle that, but rest assured, any reputable courier has a lot of protections to prevent this kind of tampering. There are security cameras, for instance, auditing, etc.

On the odd chance that you are referring to the latest album by Radiohead

I was thinking more of this piece of news: http://www.livedaily.com/news/13446.html , as well as a blog from a while back http://nick.typepad.com/blog/2004/01/on_piracy.html

Yours is probably a common attitude. Fortunately, alternative means of fostering artistic work (or other intellectual property like software copyright or patents) do not usually rely on the grace of individuals. The fact of the matter is that copyright is simply an economic inefficiency.

It's become politically incorrect nowadays for people to praise copyright or the like, so I'm not sure how common my attitude is. Regardless, speaking from seeing other "revolutions" fizzle out, such as my own experiences as well as reviewing history, I doubt we will see an abolishment of copyright in this lifetime. You might see lesser restrictions but I doubt IP is going away, despite what fans of Stallman and Lessig think.

 

[Numion]

It would involve someone physically stealing the hardcopy from the company, then for some reason, scanning the ill-gotten gains into a computer and uploading it (possibly with a computer virus embedded).

The MO of those pirates who don't do it for the virtual pats on the back, is to usually RAR the file with password or encode it with custom codec. Getting the password / custom codec then requires you to give out your email address (for spam purposes or something more annoying), or installing adware/malware on your computer (in case of custom codecs).

But in my terabytes of DLing stuff I've rarely encountered a straight up virus. So if you keep your eyes open, DLing is much safer than, for example, putting a Sony CD from a couple of years back in to your drive.

In any case PDF leak wouldn't hurt 4E sales much, except if it just plainly sucks

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

From what I gather, you were specifically targeting the people who purchased the SRD.

No. I was specifically talking about people who were playtesting.

As Joe said, publisher documents won't be distributed as pdfs. I wouldn't be surprised if playtesters got physical, identifiable copies as well.

What's to stop them from transcribing those physical copies into an anonymous .txt file if they were inclined to do so?

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

The MO of those pirates who don't do it for the virtual pats on the back, is to usually RAR the file with password or encode it with custom codec. Getting the password / custom codec then requires you to give out your email address (for spam purposes or something more annoying), or installing adware/malware on your computer (in case of custom codecs).

I've been on the internet for going on 11 years now, and I've never seen a warez file, ripped mp3 or movie, or scanned book that had anything like this with the following exception: some places require a password that is identical to the url of the originating website, e.g. www.amusictorrenttracker.org, to make sure that anyone distributing it will also distribute the link to the site.

But in my terabytes of DLing stuff I've rarely encountered a straight up virus. So if you keep your eyes open, DLing is much safer than, for example, putting a Sony CD from a couple of years back in to your drive.

Truth. What ever made them believe they could get away with that crap?

 

[DonTadow]

There will be pirate pdfs, you can't get away from it, Security or otherwise. The problem is is that the format is universal, there are 20 to 50 different pdf readers and a little less than half of them observe adobe's security.

 

[Oldtimer]

I was thinking more of this piece of news: http://www.livedaily.com/news/13446.html

Ah, it's the Saul Williams album. Note that his previous album sold 33,897 copies after being marketed through the regular channels and this one, with no markting whatsoever, just sold online, sold 28,322 copies (so far). That's not bad at all. That the web servers registered 154,449 downloads does not tell us anything, since there is no information how many unique fans these represent. A lot of these could be people who first downloaded without paying, and them downloaded again paying for it since they liked it. There could also be people who paid for it and then downloaded it again from another computer. Nothing in those numbers tell us how many downloaded the album without paying at all.

Also, there was no option to pay more than $5 (or less). So it wasn't "pay what you think it's worth to you". Had he followed Radiohead's example, he might have gotten more dollars from this.

It's become politically incorrect nowadays for people to praise copyright or the like, so I'm not sure how common my attitude is. Regardless, speaking from seeing other "revolutions" fizzle out, such as my own experiences as well as reviewing history, I doubt we will see an abolishment of copyright in this lifetime. You might see lesser restrictions but I doubt IP is going away, despite what fans of Stallman and Lessig think.

It's not about political correctness, but the fact that current copyright laws simply don't serve their purpose well anymore. And it's not just "fans of Stallman and Lessig", but includes all kinds of people, even Nobel Prize Laurates (in Economics). Though there are many such "revolutions" that fizzled out, there are also many that changed the world.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

It's not about political correctness, but the fact that current copyright laws simply don't serve their purpose well anymore. And it's not just "fans of Stallman and Lessig", but includes all kinds of people, even Nobel Prize Laurates (in Economics). Though there are many such "revolutions" that fizzled out, there are also many that changed the world.

I also don't suppose that the millions of intelligent individuals who are fiscally invested in both sides of the debate will one day up and say, "Oh, we're all just tired of this whole copyright debate. The old ways are good enough for us, so let's not change a thing and never talk about this again."

The current situation does not function, so something has to give somewhere. The question is, what will it be, and how will artists, producers, and consumers arrange themselves in the aftermath? Eventually, it has to reach a stable state, and what's happening now is that people are trying to envision possible desirable stable states and advocating that we attempt to achieve them, before a less desirable one comes about by accident.

 

[JohnRTroy]

There will be pirate pdfs, you can't get away from it, Security or otherwise. The problem is is that the format is universal, there are 20 to 50 different pdf readers and a little less than half of them observe adobe's security.

Saying's its inevitable doesn't mean it will happen. We also work to control thing. It's like counterfitting, you "can't stop it", but that doesn't mean we shouldn't invest money and time preventing it from happening.

A lot of these could be people who first downloaded without paying, and them downloaded again paying for it since they liked it. There could also be people who paid for it and then downloaded it again from another computer. Nothing in those numbers tell us how many downloaded the album without paying at all.

Everybody who's into "free content" always makes the claim that there could be "more hidden pass-along" users out there. That doesn't really matter when talking about profitability.

I also don't suppose that the millions of intelligent individuals who are fiscally invested in both sides of the debate will one day up and say, "Oh, we're all just tired of this whole copyright debate. The old ways are good enough for us, so let's not change a thing and never talk about this again."

No, but you have to consider it will take an Act of Congress to change things in the US. The teen and 20 somethings part of this generation will have to wait about 20-30 years before any of them get elected. So any changes will come very slowly to the actual law. And you can bet Civil Disobedience alone won't work.