Update: Malhavoc PDFs no longer available at RPGnow (merged)

[Tsyr]

See, Patrick, I have a problem with this whole "They are just showing that they are at least trying to protect their product, even though they know it won't work."

So, in otherwords, the show of effort is to treat us all like potential thieves because you can't actually stop the real ones?

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

Since they are only supporting Windows users I don't see how I could support them. I'm using 2000 at home, but since I am not going to pay a couple hundred bucks for Longhorn I'll be going to Red Hat Linux next, It's already on my old gaming laptop.

 

[Goddess FallenAngel]

Why are they using DRM, it is so easy to crack by pirates anyway?
Many print publishers feel that they have to show they are making an effort to defend their copyrighted material. If an ordinary .pdf ends up on Kazaa or some other P2P network, the originator can say, “Damn, really sorry man, I just was sharing some files with people at work (friends, or whatever) and I didn’t realize I marked that folder as “public.” No publisher wants to look like the big ugly, mean, nasty when they send a letter to an internet provider/host trying to shut someone down, or when threatening to sue (something I doubt most publishers would ever bother with). A .pdf or other electronic file that has some sort of protection is a bit different. Someone has to deliberately crack it before freely giving it away. This shows intent. It is hard to make someone believe that you have enough computer knowledge to crack a file, yet open a file to a P2P network by “mistake.” The publisher is going to feel a lot more justified in sending threatening letters to ISPs and individuals in such a case. They also have a stronger case in court, if anything were ever to go to court, because they can say they took deliberate steps to safeguard their material.

Hmm... I didn't realize that the PDFs now track what computers they are on.

Really, I am quite interested in this: who do you sue/shut down? The person who downloaded the cracked version of the PDF, the person who cracked it, or both? And how do you determine who those people are?

Seriously, I would like to know.

 

[BryonD]

Forcing DRM down people’s throats?!
Hey, we aren’t. If you don’t want it, don’t buy it. We can’t please everyone all of the time. Will adjustments be made? Considering the company and releases are not even a week old yet, I am sure that you’ll see price adjustments as well as other adjustments. Bill Webb at Necromancer Games has had emails from people in countries like Saudi Arabia (where it is REALLY difficult to get gaming material) as well as a few other places where import costs and availability were onerous. Necro views the electronic releases as a way to reach some customers we couldn’t reach before. From our view, we are allowing more customers access to our products now, even though some people are complaining about it. We aren’t taking anything away from you, in
fact we have added to product availability, if you don’t want it, don’t buy it.

Not clear on how you get from DRM to foreign countries. Non-DRM products can reach foreign countries. And DRM isn't particularly meaningful, in places where US copyright does not apply.

Remember, this message board has a sub-group of the internet using gamers that happens to be very computer literate and devoted to electronic products and tools. The majority of people that the DTRPG releases are aimed at aren’t going to be inconvenienced by DRM. Are some, yes. Will we lose that sale? Yes, probably. But, then again, we never had a chance at that sale before anyway because we aren’t a .pdf publisher and, until a few days ago, didn’t have any electronic releases (barring free downloads of course). Personally, I think it is harder to copy/paste and print on different computers with our print products than it is with a DRM electronic file but maybe I am wrong.

First, the internet literate types greatly disproportionately represent the pdf consumer base.

You are giving up 5 birds in the hand for one in the bush.

Second, I think you greatly underestimate who will be inconvenieced. People not familair with DRM will buy at first. And as soon as they have trouble moving it, or backing it up, or whatever, they will stop buying.

While I don’t personally like DRM, I don’t think you are going to see it go away.

I've heard statements like this before.



EDIT: Removed a comment because someone else's reply was much better than mine.

 

[Psion]

Wow, so much vitriol it is hard to know what to say. Apparently any publisher that is associated with DTRPG is evil, and, equally apparent, anyone associated with such a publisher is also evil (though in some cases only slightly evil, or just stupid).

Uh, no.

Very few people have passed moral judgement on you, and those people should not be taken as representative.

What is widespread is the beleif that the format you have chosen to distribute your products in causes unnaceptable inconvenience and to some, begs an IP slippery slope they find repugnant. Others beleive the price is out of line.

But I am not seeing this thread as vitriol, and find such claims as attempts to position yourself as a victim. Your company chose the route they are going. They didn't get forced into it.

If you don’t want it, don’t buy it. We can’t please everyone all of the time. Will adjustments be made? Considering the company and releases are not even a week old yet, I am sure that you’ll see price adjustments as well as other adjustments. Bill Webb at Necromancer Games has had emails from people in countries like Saudi Arabia (where it is REALLY difficult to get gaming material) as well as a few other places where import costs and availability were onerous. Necro views the electronic releases as a way to reach some customers we couldn’t reach before. From our view, we are allowing more customers access to our products now, even though some people are complaining about it. We aren’t taking anything away from you, in fact we have added to product availability, if you don’t want it, don’t buy it.

That's fine. You are 100% correct. The previously print only publishers are not taking away anything.

Just be aware that your current pricing will not appeal to what many typical PDF buyers shop for. Many of us seek commonly used apps in electronic format in addition to printed format because it allows additional utility in terms of copy and pasting to game notes, printing out individual pages, and less weight if you need to go to a game elsewhere and don't want to take a hand truck with you to cart your crates of books. Priced at 50% or less of print MSRP, that's what many established PDF buyers do.

If you are only marketing to those who can't get the print books and really want them, your pricing will meet that need but little more. If you do that consciously, I don't see that anyone can begrudge you that.

While I don’t personally like DRM, I don’t think you are going to see it go away. If you want to see .pdfs for print products that are made directly from the layouts sent to the printer, you are going to have to deal with copy protection of some type. Right now, that appears to be DRM.

Ah, but that's two different things. Some form of copy protection, perhaps. But DRM is not, IMO, currently a customer friendly solution. It's riddled with problems. I predict (<--- mark words) that if it is not improved significantly, it will be replaced by a protection that won't piss off customers.

Even then, I am not so certain. Someone else linked to an article by a software company that deliberately does not include intrusive software protection. I think that if publishers are really concerned about making things work in an electronic world, they should pay heed to those who have already been down that route.

 

[Brown Jenkin]

Forcing DRM down people?s throats?!
Hey, we aren?t. If you don?t want it, don?t buy it.

You know you realy shouldn't temp people like that. The last time I remember seeing coments like that was the Dungeon/Poly incident. Dungeon readers complained bitterly and loudly and were told if we don't like it don't buy it. Guess what we didn't buy it and a year latter it is anounced that due to falling subscriber numbers thay are going back to what the customers said they wanted.

Sure for White Wolf and Necromancer any sales are more than the no sales you had before, but for people like Malhavoc who did fine before there will almost certainly be a sales hit from this.

While I don?t personally like DRM, I don?t think you are going to see it go away.

All I can say is see DIVIX.

 

[d20Dwarf]

Wow, so much vitriol it is hard to know what to say. Apparently any publisher that is associated with DTRPG is evil, and, equally apparent, anyone associated with such a publisher is also evil (though in some cases only slightly evil, or just stupid). Here are a few thoughts from an apparently evil person.

If DTRPG's boosters would stop classifying all opposition as vitriol, they might start seeing the 90% of messages that contain valid complaints. They might see that Adobe customer service directly contradicts what they say can be done with DRM files. Is that vitriol?

They took pre-print layout files and turned them into downloadable pdfs. This is not something that is trivial

It's pretty trivial to make pdfs, all you need is Adobe Acrobat and maybe 10 minutes of training.

Seriously, though, aren't the differences between DTRPG's claims and Adobe's claims significant to you as a publisher? Who's right? Do you even know what's being done to your files, or in what form they are being distributed?

 

[Goddess FallenAngel]

<snip> Someone else linked to an article by a software company that deliberately does include intrusive software protection. I think that if publishers are really concerned about making things work in an electronic world, they should pay heed to those who have already been down that route.

I snagged it and placed the link in my sig, just in case any of those publishers out there wish to read it. I think they should. I purchase from companies I respect, even if I do happen to have a pirated copy of their work - I would purchase from that one.

And for the record, you don't need to give away all your products to earn respect - you are in the business to make money, we understand that. (Or at least the more mature ones of us do, and we're the ones spending the money.) What we do expect is that a company respect us, the customers. The current DRM, with its host of problems, is not respect. Copy-protection, fine. I'm all for that. But find a customer-friendly way to do it. I had to download the Exalted book three times last night before I could get Adobe and DriveThruRPG to recognize that I did have Adobe 6, and that I did have rights to view the PDF. Considering that was one of the free books on the site, I hate to think what might happen should I purchase one.

 

[PetriWessman]

Wow, so much vitriol it is hard to know what to say. Apparently any publisher that is associated with DTRPG is evil, and, equally apparent, anyone associated with such a publisher is also evil (though in some cases only slightly evil, or just stupid). Here are a few thoughts from an apparently evil person.

Everyone defending DTRPG seems intent to paint the flood of complaints here are baseless vitriol, whining and noise, and also painting themselves as innocent victims. Get off that horse while it's still standing, please.

Practically nobody is is saying DTRPG is evil as such. What they (and I) *are* saying is that the current form of DRM used is stupid, counterproductive and ethically questionable. Why? Everyone has their own reasons, but the most common complaints are:

* The DRM exists purely to add an illusion of security to the sellers, it has absolutely no good sides (and plenty) bad to the actual byers. In addition, there is no indication that it hinders real piracy in any form and plenty that it does not (I personally suspect it actually increases piracy).

* The DRM plain does not work for a lot of people (due to OS or whatever)

* There is no guarantee that the DRM'ed file will still be usable in, say 5 years time (companies fold, computers get upgraded, etc etc).

* Many common use cases (print shop use, non-conneced gaming computers, etc) become hard, expensive or impossible.

* You are locked to viewing the document with one specific program, not the N+1 possible viewers that normal PDFs can be used with.

* Many believe that once you've bought something, the company has no right to track your usage of it or retroactively change the terms of use. With the DTRPG model, you're no actually bying the product, you're kinda-sorta leasing it - while paying full price. People want to own stuff, not lease it.

These are all valid reasons. While you may not agree with them, they are very real to a large group of people and stop them from doing business from DTRPG. Labeling these (potential) customer complaints are noise and whining is deeply stupid, since this group of people is also the group that is most likely to buy the product, were the terms different.

Note that even though the prices are very very high in many cases, the complaints against that form a smaller group. A high price is a *secondary* factor to a lot of people. I'm not in marketing (soul still intact, thankyouverymuch), but I'd imagine the fact that something besides price is a huge buy-or-not factor to be important.

In short, people aren't saying DTRPG is evil. People are saying the business model is stupid, short-sighted, probably based on little-to-none market research, and will probably/hopefully fail. But not evil as such.

...though I must wonder what the business model actually is, since some of the parties involved have stated that their prices are artifically high so they won't compete with the print product (apparently under the illusion that the print product and the PDF somehow the same thing, I guess).

Me? Give me a site to has the catalog that DTRPG has, sells PDFs (or some equivalent standard document type) that I can view with standard tools on my Linux box with no hassle, and put the price point at max 50% of the printed book cost, and that site will gain a regular customer. As is, I'll continue shopping at rpgnow and other sites that give me value for $$$, and drive right on past DTRPG.

 

[Conaill]

I found something interesting in the welcome letter from my account at DriveThruRPG:

Note: This email address was given to us by one of our customers. If you did not signup to be a member, please send an email to DTRPGCustomerService@DriveThruRPG.com so that we can remove the account.

Umm... Does this mean that they are collecting email addresses and automatically creating accounts for people?...

That's just a standard, boiler-plate email verification message. No need to be paranoid. At least assuming you *did* actually sign up for an account and gave your email address.

It allows the company to verify that you gave a valid email address, and it provides *you* some protection from anyone who might want to sign up with your email address.

The could have phrased it a little more clearly though, especially if they do want to go for the less computer savvy audience. Typically it says something like "you or someone else openened an account", rather than "one of our customers" (which implies a 3rd person).