SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) / Is this for real?

[cidbahamut]

Re: SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) / Is this for real?

What do you mean "upgrade"? I still have my VHS tapes of Star Wars and a VCR to play them on.

[Yygdrasil]

Re: SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) / Is this for real?

What do you mean "upgrade"? I still have my VHS tapes of Star Wars and a VCR to play them on.

As your friend... we need to talk.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) / Is this for real?

As your friend... we need to talk.

In Cid's defense, Han still shoots first in those versions and whiny bitch Ankin isn't subbed into the celebration in Return of the Jedi.

[Raydeus]

Re: SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) / Is this for real?

Don't bullshit. What do all these websites have in common: Suprnova, Mininova, Pirate Bay, Torrent Bay, MegaUpload, and Rapidshare? They're all dedicated to circumventing a fair exchange, or what people like to call piracy. The whole point is getting something for nothing, be it video games, music, anime, Photoshop, or whatever else you want. Do people want free stuff? I don't know if I'd say they do, because if they did we'd all be getting a lot more hugs, but this is definitely about people getting free stuff.

Now, I'm not entirely against piracy. I believe it's a necessary evil that will, hopefully, promote change. But defending it as something other than getting what you want for free is a joke.

I'm not saying there aren't people out there who simply don't want to pay for the stuff no matter what you do. However the problem I'm talking about here is trying to label everyone as a thief who will take any chance they have to avoid paying for things. If that was the case you wouldn't even have a job right now because no one would've paid for Skyrim. After all it's just one click away isn't it? It is that same train of thought that makes illogical regional and DRM restrictions possible. The moment you start treating your costumers as the enemy without understanding the what's going on is the moment you start doing stupid things to try and "control" the situation. Which usually ends up making things worse.

And believe it or not there are plenty of people using sites like Megaupload for legit stuff (I did for a time not that long ago.) You've just never heard about them because you've never looked for that type of files. Why would you? Not to mention they are usually hidden.

Now let's make no mistake here, piracy is bad. But except for the cases where people do it for the sole purpose of skipping out on the tab even though they can pay for it, piracy is usually a symptom of another issue.

Example

Here in Mexico (and Latin America really) we've had some of the worse cases of rampant piracy.

Why? Because publishers never even bother distributing here, and when they do we are subjected to prices 30-50% higher than those in the US. Now, if you know anything about this place you know people here earn in pesos, and that for all intents and purposes people here lives with 1/10th of the money as people in the US and Canada. So, if you see a guy like Mal complaining about game prices in Canada... what would you expect from someone earning 1/10th of that income while having to pay 50% more for a game? Even worse, importing directly is actually cheaper than buying games from Official distributors here.

And that's if they even bother bringing the game here. Most of the times there's no way for someone to get a game but buying it from pirates, as they are the only ones who actually bring all the games here. All this using very efficient means of production and for a much lower price. I can afford importing, but there are just way too many who can't.

So publishers have 2 choices, sulk and whine about piracy in Latin America and give up, or they can look for sales models that will allow them to profit from Latin American markets. And those models point out to Digital Distribution and local distributors able to reproduce disks while requiring some sort of account to play the games Steam style. You know, simply taking a page from the pirate's book and profit from your properties.

Will it be a lower income than in 1st world countries? Probably so. Does it matter? Extra money from your IP is extra money from your IP, not to mention money you wouldn't have otherwise. So unless you are allergic to additional profits or are just too lazy to look into ways to make a profit there's no reason at all not to do it.

Fortunately Steam has been able to get some more attention here, PC gamers who have found out about it have joined and never looked back. But the console market is pretty much SOL at this point.

But whatever you do you develop and plan FOR YOUR PAYING COSTUMERS. Not for the pirates, nor for the possibility of pirates. If you do all you will accomplish is affecting your paying or potential costumers. Because the pirates who are really there for a free meal have already disabled your "security" long ago. Leaving only your paying costumers to suffer through it.

[Raydeus]

Re: SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) / Is this for real?

About Copyright.

[Yygdrasil]

Re: SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) / Is this for real?

LMAO @ VGCats

[Malacite]

Re: SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) / Is this for real?

He hardly ever updates anymore anyway >_>

[cidbahamut]

Re: SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) / Is this for real?

Wait...VG Cats updates? Since when?

[Raydeus]

Re: SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) / Is this for real?

/facepalm