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[j0hnny_385]

mock if old.

This is, IMHO, the most down to earth, reasonable and accurate description of the "piracy issue" in this industry (and broadly speaking, in the digital industry).

Read, discuss, be nice to each other.

http://tommyrefenes.tumblr.com/post/45684087997/apathy-and-refunds-are-more-dangerous-than-piracy

edit: it's on Gamasutra, too: http://gamasutra.com/blogs/TommyRef...nd_refunds_are_more_dangerous_than_piracy.php

In the retail world your stock is worth money.In the digital world, you don’t have a set inventory. Your game is infinitely replicable at a negligible or zero cost (the cost bandwidth off your own site or nothing if you’re on a portal like Steam, eShop, etc). Digital inventory has no value. Your company isn’t worth an infinite amount because you have infinite copies of your game. As such, calculating worth and loss based on infinite inventory is impossible. If you have infinite stock, and someone steals one unit from that stock, you still have infinite stock. If you have infinite stock and someone steals 1 trillion units from that stock , you still have infinite stock. There is no loss of stock when you have an infinite amount.Because of this, in the digital world, there is no loss when someone steals a game because it isn’t one less copy you can sell, it is potentially one less sale but that is irrelevant.

Companies try to combat piracy of their software with DRM but if loss due to pirated software is not calculable to an accurate amount does the implementation of DRM provide a return on investment? It is impossible to say yes to this statement. Look at it as numbers spent in a set budget. You spend $X on research for your new DRM method that will prevent people from stealing your game. That $X is a line item in accounting that can be quantified. Can you then say “This $X we put into research for our DRM gained us back $Y in sales”? There is no way to calculate this because it is not possible to quantify the intentions of a person. Also, there’s no way of accurately determining which customers would have stolen the game had there not been DRM.

 

[Persona7]

Is the meat boy game available anywhere DRM free?

 

[Sigismundo]

Is the meat boy game available anywhere DRM free?

It was in a Humble Indie Bundle I believe. Quite a few maybe.

 

[Rhindle]

Sorry, but that's just stupid. One pirated copy obtained by one potential purchaser is one less copy sold.

 

[thetrin]

Sorry, but that's just stupid. One pirated copy obtained by one potential purchaser is one less copy sold.

His point is that a person who steals was never going to buy it anyway.

 

[JaseC]

His point is that a person who steals was never going to buy it anyway.

Not exactly: his point is that it's impossible to prove or otherwise be certain that a person who pirated a copy would have bought it if piracy was not an option or will not purchase it at a late date.

 

[Coxswain]

Sorry, but that's just stupid. One pirated copy obtained by one potential purchaser is one less copy sold.

Only if you ignore 1) Everyone who might buy the game after pirating it, and 2) Everyone who would never have bought the game anyway.

 

[Persona7]

It was in a Humble Indie Bundle I believe. Quite a few maybe.

So I currently can not buy a DRM free copy of Super Meat Boy?

 

[j0hnny_385]

His point is that a person who steals was never going to buy it anyway.

Exactly. I completely agree with all the points Tommy made in his article. The basis on which copyright holders crunch out "losses due to piracy" is downright wrong and doesn't hold up in accounting/financial practices.

It really boils down to service problem, like Gaben and others have said. If you make a good game and offer it to the consumer in a good, honest way, people will buy it, but some people will steal it nonetheless, it's just the way it is.
Piracy in large numbers can be damaging, I'm sure, but this: "X people pirated the game, so that means X loss sales" is just ludicrous and that mentality needs to go away and I think Tommy wrote an excellent article covering just that.

 

[JaseC]

So I currently can not buy a DRM free copy of Super Meat Boy?

The Steam version is DRM-free.

 

[Superflat]

I'll admit when I was a kid, I pirated things I couldn't afford when I had no income or anyone to buy it for me. When I got older and could afford to pay for software, the convenience far outweighed the time and know-how to get pirated copies of software to work. It's now a no-brainer with humble bundles and steam. I never feel tempted to pirate anymore.

If many pirates are similar to I was, I would guess that most pirated software are done so by those who never had the intent to pay whether it was available to pirate or not.

 

[Rhindle]

His point is that a person who steals was never going to buy it anyway.

That's not what he says:

You cannot prove even one lost sale because there is no evidence to state that any one person who pirated your game would have bought your game if piracy did not exist. From an accounting perspective it’s speculative and a company cannot accurately determine loss or gain based on speculative accounting.

So basically, because you cannot determine with certainty how many people would have bought your game, the number is zero? Yeah, no. "Speculative accounting" has nothing to do with it.

 

[davepoobond]

Exactly. I completely agree with all the points Tommy made in his article. The basis on which copyright holders crunch out "losses due to piracy" is downright wrong and doesn't hold up in accounting/financial practices.

it doesnt matter if it doesnt hold up. its conjecture to begin with.

however, i don't prescribe to the fact that allowing piracy to happen "just cause they won't get any sales from them" makes any sense either. Preventing ease of piracy would promote more sales, even if it was 1% of those that normally pirate games. not by a motivating factor, but just by attrition.


i suppose thats why free to play games are popular and they can make a lot of money. there is less inclination to pirate something that is already free.

 

[Sigismundo]

So I currently can not buy a DRM free copy of Super Meat Boy?

I believe the retail edition is DRM free. Not sure how much that helps.

The Steam version is DRM-free.

Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

 

[UrbanRats]

I wouldn't say his reasoning is flat out wrong, as much as it is incomplete.
Though maybe he was making a more specific point, comparing theft with piracy.

The problem is that although you can't count every pirated copy as a lost sale, some of them still are potential ones and even if that's irrelevant to the specific comparison he was making, it has to be taken into consideration.

Moreover, you can put a price on each copy based on time and money spent, producing that content, even though it's not a precise and exact value.
That at least should be rewarded simply to have a working "machine".

 

[Keslord]

His point is that a person who steals was never going to buy it anyway.

I've pirated plenty of games only to buy them shortly there after

I'd say that demos prevent piracy but after getting burnt by shit like Brutal Legend, I'm a pretty cautious consumer.

 

[Baloonatic]

The Steam version is DRM-free.

Hmm...

 

[Persona7]

The Steam version is DRM-free.

Yeah, I heard this before so I copied the folder from steam and put it on a different computer and it would not launch at all.

 

[water1111]

The Steam version is DRM-free.

Does not compute.

 

[j0hnny_385]

however, i don't prescribe to the fact that allowing piracy to happen "just cause they won't get any sales from them" makes any sense either. Preventing ease of piracy would promote more sales, even if it was 1% of those that normally pirate games. not by a motivating factor, but just by attrition.

True. The industry (maybe that's too broad of a term but you know what I mean) needs to find some sort of sweet-sport: I think Steam is close to being just that (ease of use with some sort of safety for the dev/pub). Agree?
By all means, don't be: "Oh, fuck piracy, we don't care..." but on the other end don't do draconian DRM and/or (unnecessary always-online bullshit).

 

[Visualante2]

The Steam version is DRM-free.

OT:

Spoiler

What about the leaderboards and achievements? Do they have DRM free implementations or are they just broken unless you use a Steam copy?

 

[mullet2000]

Only if you ignore 1) Everyone who might buy the game after pirating it, and 2) Everyone who would never have bought the game anyway.

Lets be honest, this one pretty much never happens outside of a couple rare exceptions.

As for "they wouldn't have bought it anyway," there's really no way to know that unless the game somehow wasn't available for pirates to download. Instead of a group of potential customers - some of who would buy the game if they had no pirating option and some who wouldn't - there's now a group of almost completely non-customers because the game is available to pirate.

Note: the group i'm referring to is people who pirate, not all customers/pirates/whatever before someone misconstrues what i'm saying.

 

[jambo]

Sorry, but that's just stupid. One pirated copy obtained by one potential purchaser is one less copy sold.

Problem is, you never know for sure that the person who pirate the game would've bought it if they had to.

Plus there are people who pirate and then purchase.

And it's not one less copy sold. It's one less potential sale. You don't start with 10 million sales and then move backwards with piracy haha

The Steam version is DRM-free.

Hmm...

 

[Keslord]

Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Hmm...

The fact that some people still don't think of Steam as DRM is amazing. Valve's got the wool pulled over their eyes REAL good.

 

[SteveWinwood]

I love how people still assume stuff on steam has to even be ran through steam thus making it a de facto drm.

Oh yeah definitely got that wool all over my eyes.

 

[LightofRohan]

He's right, everyone should get every game for free. That way, more games will be made and everyone will be happy or something like that...

I've pirated plenty of games only to buy them shortly there after

I'd say that demos prevent piracy but after getting burnt by shit like Brutal Legend, I'm a pretty cautious consumer.

Yea this is so true. Everyone I know just pirates games to give them a test run and then they go purchase the game full price. We live in such a trustful happy world.

 

[I should be doing hw]

His point is that a person who steals was never going to buy it anyway.

More than that: with digital copies the stolen object doesn't also become lost revenue as a physical object that exists, and cost money to be produced, but can never be sold for profit.

 

[Vexxan]

Infinite stock or not, one missed sale is still one missed sale. You didn't lose any money but you sure as hell didn't get any money either.

 

[UrbanRats]

Lets be honest, this one pretty much never happens outside of a couple rare exceptions.

I've seen that happen several times, especially for games people are unsure it will run on their machines (in the case of PCs).
But i don't have any data, it's all anecdotal.
Same with foreign TVShows, which a lot of people pirates as soon as they're out in another country and then buys/imports the blurays as soon as those are out.

One pirated copy = One lost sale, is a flawed concept, as is the opposite, of course.

 

[Keslord]

He's right, everyone should get every game for free. That way, more games will be made and everyone will be happy or something like that...



Yea this is so true. Everyone I know just pirates games to give them a test run and then they go purchase the game full price. We live in such a trustful happy world.

Notice how I said "I" and did not include others in my statement

 

[Azriell]

I wouldn't say his reasoning is flat out wrong, as much as it is incomplete.
Though maybe he was making a more specific point, comparing theft with piracy.

The problem is that although you can't count every pirated copy as a lost sale, some of them still are potential ones and even if that's irrelevant to the specific comparison he was making, it has to be taken into consideration.

Moreover, you can put a price on each copy based on time and money spent, producing that content, even though it's not a precise and exact value.
That at least should be rewarded simply to have a working "machine".

But it's also true that some pirates could be generating more sales via word of mouth. These things are impossible to quantify. It's likely that piracy causes more lost sales than extra sales but far from guaranteed.

 

[davepoobond]

True. The industry (maybe that's too broad of a term but you know what I mean) needs to find some sort of sweet-sport: I think Steam is close to being just that (ease of use with some sort of safety for the dev/pub). Agree?
By all means, don't be: "Oh, fuck piracy, we don't care..." but on the other end don't do draconian DRM and/or (unnecessary always-online bullshit).

it probably is the best example at the moment. but it isn't exactly netflix for games.

 

[SteveWinwood]

I've seen that happen several times, especially for games people are unsure it will run on their machines (in the case of PCs).
But i don't have any data, it's all anecdotal.
Same with foreign TVShows, which a lot of people pirates as soon as they're out in another country and then buys/imports the blurays as soon as those are out.

One pirated copy = One lost sale, is a flawed concept, as is the opposite, of course.

I don't know anyone who buys blu rays or dvds anymore, especially of tv shows. It's either netflix or straight to torrents or more likely never actually watch it anyway.

 

[Salsa]

Tommy's such a bro

 

[Feep]

I don't agree with his statement, per se...they're probably some approximate "ratio" out there, if you could actually obtain accurate data on it (you can't). Something like one pirated copy = 0.4 lost sales, or something.

I don't actually care, because I just love when people play my games. Even if someone ripped it off, I still gain something as a person...the feeling when people enjoy something you created. It can't pay the bills, but I haven't had too much trouble with that so far.

 

[UrbanRats]

But it's also true that some pirates could be generating more sales via word of mouth. These things are impossible to quantify. It's likely that piracy causes more lost sales than extra sales but far from guaranteed.

My reasoning doesn't discount that though, i'm simply saying that it is almost fact, that a (unknown) percentage of pirated copies would've been sales.
That is a problem to take into consideration.

I don't know anyone who buys blu rays or dvds anymore, especially of tv shows. It's either netflix or straight to torrents or more likely never actually watch it anyway.

Can't speak for the US (nor other countries outside of Italy) but there's no netflix here (nor any serious on-demand channel).
You either buy retail or you pay SKY (cable, or whatever is called) and hope they air it on there, sometime.
Besides, the quality you get on a bluray (if done properly) you can't get with a torrent, realistically.

I realize it's a very narrow example and that's why i'm saying it's completely anecdotal.

 

[King Tubby]

The true effect of piracy on sales is really hard to quantify for all the vague and contradictory factors it introduces. It's probably not a stretch to say that the overall impact is negative, but it isn't totally so. Greater exposure, people demoing a product and purchasing it afterwards (or purchasing the product to support the developer while sticking with the cracked version to avoid DRM hassle), people who wouldn't be able to buy the game anyway get to see it and may become fans of a developer they otherwise never would have seen, becoming potential customers down the road.

 

[Coxswain]

Lets be honest, this one pretty much never happens outside of a couple rare exceptions.

Do you know that? Are there any studies done on it? Or is it just a 'gut feeling' that you have?

Because if you don't have anything but a feeling to back that statement up, anecdotally it's just not true. The majority of people I've known in my life who regularly played pirated games also bought about as many games (after pirating them) than the people I've known who never or only rarely pirated games.

As for "they wouldn't have bought it anyway," there's really no way to know that unless the game somehow wasn't available for pirates to download. Instead of a group of potential customers - some of who would buy the game if they had no pirating option and some who wouldn't - there's now a group of almost completely non-customers because the game is available to pirate.

Note: the group i'm referring to is people who pirate, not all customers/pirates/whatever before someone misconstrues what i'm saying.

And no, there is a way to know it. There are a huge number of people - probably the majority, in terms of the sheer number of downloads - who seemingly pirate games just to have a pirated copy of them, and often never actually play/install them, instead just filling up hard drives and DVDs with a huge archive of pirated games, most of which are forgotten about immediately.

It's a pretty safe bet that if you pirate a dozen games every week and never play any of them, you were not realistically a 'potential customer' for any specific game.



I'm not saying that there's zero effect due to piracy, but 'every pirated copy is one potential sale lost' isn't really a more realistic opinion.

 

[Des0lar]

I believe the retail edition is DRM free. Not sure how much that helps.

Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Hmm...

Does not compute.

Problem is, you never know for sure that the person who pirate the game would've bought it if they had to.

Plus there are people who pirate and then purchase.

And it's not one less copy sold. It's one less potential sale. You don't start with 10 million sales and then move backwards with piracy haha



Hmm...

The fact that some people still don't think of Steam as DRM is amazing. Valve's got the wool pulled over their eyes REAL good.

What he means is that SMB can be launched from the Steam folder without Steam running. I cannot confirm this right now, but I know there are some games like that. But just continue your "hmmming" anf false accusations.

 

[Almighty]

Well I agree with him. It seems any DRM that goes any further then Steam is a waste of money in my opinion. Of course getting someone who just spent many millions on a game to agree with that is an up hill battle.

As someone watching from the sidelines most of the times it always seemed counter productive to introduce some kind of DRM that pisses off your paying customers, people who have proven that they will pay money for your product, to go after people who may or may not pay if piracy wasn't an option.

What he means is that SMB can be launched from the Steam folder without Steam running. I cannot confirm this right now, but I know there are some games like that. But just continue your "hmmming" anf false accusations.

For what it is worth I can confirm this at least, as I just did it.

 

[dwu8991]

I was really spoiled with Nintendo DS R4.
Pricey was so rampant and out of control that it did change my purchasing behaviour towards free.

 

[Palette Swap]

When I was a teen and in my early 20s, a lot of people my age pirated their games and honestly, they already spent their last dime on games.

Morally, I can see how this sense of hoarding and entitlement to play everything for free can be disquieting, though these are the very compulsions a lot of pubs rely on to sell more shit.

Economically, short of robbing a bank, these guys wouldn't have bought more games than they already did.

In the long run, that probably helped keep these guys gaming and eventually putting more money into it, rather than moving on to other hobbies.

This is all anecdotal and I'm not saying or thinking piracy is good or healthy by a long shot. I just think its effects are way harder to measure than most people on either side of the debate presume. IMO, from an industry standpoint, the first thing to do to curb it without hurting paying customers is to get off the theft high horse and look pragmatically at what this says about your market and how you can convert these guys. I'm under the impression Steam has converted a good number of these guys to bona fide DRM through smart pricing and ease of use.

 

[SteveWinwood]

I want to remind people that piracy and admitting to it are usually bannable offenses on this message board.

 

[Why would you do that?]

Very nice piece. It's kind of funny that this seems to be related to Sim City.

That game has created tooooons of discussion recently, which I like.

I believe the retail edition is DRM free. Not sure how much that helps.
Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Hmm...

Does not compute.

Hmm...

The fact that some people still don't think of Steam as DRM is amazing. Valve's got the wool pulled over their eyes REAL good.

Super Meat Boy seems to be one of those rare Steam games that can run without Steam. I just tried running it and it worked, even though most of my other Steam games didn't.

Weird, I haven't played Super Meat Boy since the day I bought it. I might play it more now...

 

[water1111]

What he means is that SMB can be launched from the Steam folder without Steam running. I cannot confirm this right now, but I know there are some games like that. But just continue your "hmmming" anf false accusations.

If you want to buy it and download you need steam, which is DRM. no you can't just download from GmG because you they don't give you downloader, they give a key which is DRM.

 

[Why would you do that?]

If you want to buy it and download you need steam, which is DRM. no you can't just download from GmG because you they don't give you downloader, they give a key which is DRM.

DRM isn't about the method of buying/updating the product. For example, Humble Bundle requires an Internet browser, but that doesn't make it DRM. DRM refers to something that's embedded in the purchased product. If you can easily use your legitimately purchased product when/where/however you want, then it has no DRM built in.

His write-up largely talks about very intrusive forms of DRM like what's built in to SimCity and how it makes legitimate users lose trust in a company due to their gameplay experience being negatively impacted. A normal Steam game has built-in DRM that requires the Steam client to be running, and Super Meat Boy seems to have absolutely no restrictions embedded into the game.

 

[GlamFM]

Wow, this really is some arrogant next level bullshit.

So it´s not stealing because nothing is missing afterwards?

I assume this also applies to somebody who downloads Halo 4 on some torrent network right?


This is so stupid that it´s hard to believe he was quoted right, or the millions he made with super meat boy blurred his view.

Oh and this:

His point is that a person who steals was never going to buy it anyway.

is absolutely not what he´s saying.

 

[HadesGigas]

You can buy a disc version without DRM (Though it also comes with a Steam key free).

http://www.amazon.com/Super-Meat-Boy-Ultra-Edition-Pc/dp/B004NS77OM

 

[JaseC]

I believe the retail edition is DRM free. Not sure how much that helps.

Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Hmm...

Does not compute.

Problem is, you never know for sure that the person who pirate the game would've bought it if they had to.

Plus there are people who pirate and then purchase.

And it's not one less copy sold. It's one less potential sale. You don't start with 10 million sales and then move backwards with piracy haha



Hmm...

The fact that some people still don't think of Steam as DRM is amazing. Valve's got the wool pulled over their eyes REAL good.

Unless you consider accounts DRM, Steam itself isn't inherently DRM, as I've pointed out before.

Yeah, I heard this before so I copied the folder from steam and put it on a different computer and it would not launch at all.

Yeah, it instantly crashes, strangely. I'm assuming CEG was patched out haphazardly, since this isn't the case for other such games.

OT:

Spoiler

What about the leaderboards and achievements? Do they have DRM free implementations or are they just broken unless you use a Steam copy?

Achievements won't run without the Steam client present as they use Steamworks. I've played very little of the game so I'm not sure where the leadboards fall.

If you want to buy it and download you need steam, which is DRM. no you can't just download from GmG because you they don't give you downloader, they give a key which is DRM.

What distinction is there to make between signing into GOG and downloading your game and signing into Steam and downloading your game? Following your logic here, the key I put into GOG.com to get my DRM-free version of The Witcher 2 isn't actually DRM-free, because I obtained it using a key.

 

[Haunted]

I do believe people are less likely to pirate your software if the software is easy to buy, easy to run, and does what is advertised. You can’t force a person to buy your software no more than you can prevent a person from stealing it. People have to WANT to buy your software, people have to WANT to support you. People need to care about your employees and your company’s well being. There is no better way to achieve that than making sure what you put out there is the best you can do and you treat your customers with respect.

Well said, Tommy.

Looping back around to the Sim City fiasco:

EA and Maxis are currently facing a bigger problem than piracy: A growing number of their customers no longer trust them and this has and will cost them money.

[...]

It’s only a negative experience. A negative frustrating experience for a customer should be considered more damaging than a torrent of your game.

[...]

Disappointment leads to apathy which is the swan song for any developer. If people don’t care about your game, why would people ever buy it? When MewGenics comes out, I doubt many Mac users are going to be excited about our launch. When EA/Maxis create their next new game how many people are going to be excited about it and talking positively about it? I imagine that the poison of their current SimCity launch is going to seep into potential customers thoughts and be a point of speculation as to “Is it going to be another SimCity launch?”.

I agree 100% and said as much in the various Sim City threads around.