Two things I'd like to apologize for, first that it took me so long to respond to this, I didn't get a quote mail so I figured the topic had died. Second for dicing your post into bite-sized pieces and responding to them, I know its annoying to see that but you make a lot of points and I'd rather not garble up my responses.
Savagezion said:
Um, the pirates do. I wouldn't say "no one".
I meant that no one has the right to do that (I'll go over why I think that is below), not that no one actually does it.
Savagezion said:
Piracy is impossible to stop.
Fact.
However, DRM isn't even about stopping piracy, its about slowing piracy down and limiting it to as small a group as possible. Why did every game back in the day use disc checks? Any sufficiently clever person knew how to get around them, and anyone with even some moderate experience in IT knew how to do away with them entirely. So why put them on there at all?
To stop someone from saying to their "Oh hey I got this game, its totally awesome! Oh don't bother buying it, here's my CD!" Now some companies choose to put no DRM on their titles and that is their business (like GOG.com), as long as the DRM is disclosed before-hand people have the right to choose not to purchase that item because they don't like the DRM. If the gaming community as a whole didn't put up with DRM (like we didn't put up with it for the PC edition of AC2), then companies will see it is costing them far more money than it is making them and act accordingly. Or if they refuse to follow the consumer trend, they'd go out of business and other companies would not follow their example.
Savagezion said:
~snipped anecdotal evidence on potential benefits of piracy~
And hey, game companies are allowed to release their products free of charge and ask for donations from users if they thought it was worth the price of admission. I don't know how viable a business model that is but anyone is free to try it.
Now, do I think your cousin is automatically a bad person for breaking copyright law and taking something to which he has no right? Not really. Should he be punished for circumventing one of the major parts that keeps the world economy spinning, both to prevent him from doing it again and as a warning to others? Yes. Not like on the level of those wackos who work for the music industry who sue for like 30,000$ a song, but yes he should be punished.
Savagezion said:
I am the type of business man who likes to evaluate my purchase before buying instead of relying on hype and a pretty cd case.
And now we get to the heart of it all.
We are not entitled to
anything except what the company says we get beforehand. People have no right to try things before they buy them. If the company chooses to put out pre-release info on game mechanics or story or a demo or the whole damn thing, that is up to them. Just as it is up to you and me whether what they release beforehand sounds like something we would wish to purchase.
If you don't think that is right or fair, take it up with your congressman or heck, you can run yourself and change the laws. But then, maybe most people don't care or realize this would put undue burden on the company that the consumers can already decide for themselves and no one would vote for you
Savagezion said:
Customers wanting to see if this purchase is right for them is not a bad thing.
Fact again. Doesn't give anyone the right to take someone else's property without their permission. Either their sales pitch is enough for you or it isn't.
Savagezion said:
That crap about the downloads is playing the victim for publicity for the most part. These companies deal with millions of dollars every day on every half decent title. The key to that whole sentence is bolded. No one knows that dollar amount because it is speculation and speculation doesn't hold water.
Major companies and governments base pretty much everything they do looking forward off of speculation. Figuring out market trends the past few years and their own sales to figure out how much money think they can spend on projects this year. Then next year they find out if they're right or not.
Savagezion said:
CEOs are greedy people, it has to do with raising stock returns. The gamer crowd is just making it out to be more than it is because a million dollars to them sounds like a LOT of money.
A million dollars isn't chump change to anyone. Rich people get rich because they don't do stupid things with their money. Usually.
Also, accusing them of being greedy and divining their supposed motivations for crying how much piracy is hurting looks an awful lot like you're trying to paint them as the vicious tyrant who oppress us poor gamers, why, whatever can we do to fight those evil powers? Pirate!
If the 'gamer' market at large REALLY had a problem with not having demos for most games or the demos just not being representative enough of the actual game, people would stop purchasing those products and companies would realize that their consumers just aren't going to take that crap. Since it hasn't happened yet..
