RPG Illegal File Sharing Hurts the Hobby

[Jim Hague]

And what about those people who only borrow a friend's book with no intention of getting a copy himself?

That's 1 person, and it's still a fairly crappy thing to do. Whereas when a scan or PDF hits p2p, that's dozens, if not hundreds or thousands, of skinflints who should be paying for a product and aren't. Plus, borrowing implies that the original owner could take it back at any time. False analogy.

 

[Jim Hague]

Bookstores as we know them are becoming outdated anyway - theres some new technology on the market that can print an entire hardcover book, including the color cover, in under five minutes. Once this gets into stores there is going to be much less of a bottleneck - this is going to change the market far more than piracy - theoretically books would never go out of print, and all be equally accessable.

Uh huh. And what, pray tell, is this? How much does it cost? I bet it's quite a bit more than buying the book at the local B&N or off Amazon. Then there's quality. And binding...unless, of course, you think books magically bind themselves. Color me skeptical at your claims, sirrah.

 

[PetriWessman]

I'd like to believe this. Honestly, I would. But I think iTunes success lies with a)ease of use, b) trendy product and c)lack of consequences for dowloading. Joe Average sees that the RIAA levels lawsuits of tens of thousands of dollars, gasps, and realizes that downloading (or, more likely getting Joe Junior to) might get them in real trouble. Off they go to iTunes to fill their iPod with the latest and greatest.

Then we have the folks parasitizing a niche market, where creators can't sue for lost profits, where there's almost no consequences for their actions. So yes, people so inclined get for free what they might pay for, zero consequences. While your friends might be exceptions (and bully for them), the majority of nameless, faceless p2p PDF pirates (despite being alliterative) don't buy...because they don't have to. Check out the innumerable threads where gamers want mechanics by Tynes, art by Michelangelo, and a price tag by Dollar General - quite a few fellow gamers want it perfect, all-color, cheap and NOW. And p2p feeds that.

Yeah, I honestly don't know. I also hope that there's vastly more honest people out there than not, but you're right in saying that Apple has a lot going for them that your normal small-press (or large) RGP publisher doesn't. Also, comparing books and music is always hazardous, since a PDF is quite different from a dead tree book while there's a lot less difference between a physical CD and the associated sound data.

That last difference does work out as a good thing for print publishers, since at least for now printed books are vastly nicer to read than PDF, so there's a huge quality gap. A lot of people will buy the book simply because it offers the best quality. When tech catches up to the point where you can curl up on the sofa with some reader that's as convenient as a paper book, then we'll be where music is now.

Looking at iTunes gives me some hope (and other online music stores that seem to be successful, try http://www.magnatune.com for an interesting experiment on this that has been profitable so far). But... yeah. The PDF rpg market is a fairly new and evolving one, and it's pretty hard to say where the chips will fall. I really hope thing turn out well for the artists and publishers, I love the current situation where I can buy some stuff as PDF which would not be profitable enough to publish in paper form -- it keeps smaller game lines alive.

Actually, Magnatune kind of supports my "people don't always choose the cheapest option" viewpoint. Over there, you choose how much you want to play for an album, in the range $5 - $18 (if I recall correctly). Artist gets half that money, half goes to Magnatune. Now, you'd think that the average person would pay the minimum $5... and you'd be wrong. I think the average amount that customers pay is a bit over $8 (last I checked), and a lot of people pay $12-$14 per album -- just because they like the album and want to support the artist. I know that I usually pay $10-$12 per album there, because that's what the music is worth to me.

They also let you give a free copy of any album you buy to up to 3 friends, and there is no DRM involved (the music is cd-quality sound files). According to the owner, they are making steady profit selling music.

Food for thought.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

That's 1 person, and it's still a fairly crappy thing to do. Whereas when a scan or PDF hits p2p, that's dozens, if not hundreds or thousands, of skinflints who should be paying for a product and aren't. Plus, borrowing implies that the original owner could take it back at any time. False analogy.

Wait a second. Explain this one if you don't mind.

My buddy buys a game book for a new game...and I borrow it to read from cover or to run it since he isn't going to be using it. That is a "crappy thing to do"? I just can't wrap my head around that one. So loaning a friend a book that was paid for is now robbing you too? :\

 

[Jim Hague]

Wait a second. Explain this one if you don't mind.

My buddy buys a game book for a new game...and I borrow it to read from cover or to run it since he isn't going to be using it. That is a "crappy thing to do"? I just can't wrap my head around that one. So loaning a friend a book that was paid for is now robbing you too? :\

Expanding here - if he borrows it for the purpose of playing, never intending to buy...yeah, that's crappy, IMO, if you've got multiple folks trying to use it. In the above case, there's no need for an extra book, since the buyer's not using it. Yes, I'm advocating 1 book per user/purchaser in an ideal world. Can that be enforced? Hardly. YMMV.

 

[Mallus]

I'm advocating 1 book per user/purchaser in an ideal world.

So your ideal world would be one without libraries? Or are RPG materials some kind of special case that shouldn't be shared or loaned?

Aren't you following this line of thinking just a wee bit too far?

 

[Jim Hague]

So your ideal world would be one without libraries? Or are RPG materials some kind of special case that shouldn't be shared or loaned?

Aren't you following this line of thinking just a wee bit too far?

That's called ad absurdum, what you're doing there. Libraries are outside the commercial system - the books are checked out, then returned. A library isn't a store - you're comparing apples and oranges to support a shaky point.

I consider taking a library book, copying it on the local copy machine, then sticking it back on the shelf (likely with spine damage after the bout with the copier) as much theft as some jerk pirating off a p2p netowrk; a little worse, in fact, since you've likely damaged the book's spine, reducing its material value.

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

What about copying sections of it? I know they allow that at the libraries around here, and I assume everywhere.

 

[Belen]

Expanding here - if he borrows it for the purpose of playing, never intending to buy...yeah, that's crappy, IMO, if you've got multiple folks trying to use it. In the above case, there's no need for an extra book, since the buyer's not using it. Yes, I'm advocating 1 book per user/purchaser in an ideal world. Can that be enforced? Hardly. YMMV.

Now you're fighting the time honored RPG tradition of having friends borrow books to use. Growing up, my first group was lucky if everyone had a PHB.

 

[Mallus]

That's called ad absurdum, what you're doing there.

No, that's called addressing a specific statement you made; to wit, the idea that its somehow wrong for a gaming group to purchase a single physical copy of a book and share it among the players. 1 user/purchaser per book, you wrote. Do you believe that or not? And if you do, why doesn't that apply to any case where an item is purchased by one user and loaned to another?

At no point did I equate libraries with P2P networks, nor did I mean to suggest that P2P was as legitimate as a library system.

I say a lot of stupid things, but at least show me the courtesy of waiting until I do so...