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GTA: San Andreas Leaked
Anonymous Coward cuts-and-pastes: "Less than a week after a pirated version of Halo 2 began appearing on the Web, another of the year's most sought after games has been stolen. Ironically, it also happens to be a game titled after a larcenous act itself. That's right. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas has become the latest victim of piracy, with illegal copies of the game, its manual, and its cover appearing on various Web sites." Update: 10/21 13:54 GMT by Z : Rockstar adds some details to what we know about the crime in a press release covered by CVG.
"Downloading, possession and distribution of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, including making the game available on the internet, is theft." Then came this warning from the company: "We take the theft of our intellectual property very seriously and we are and will continue to diligently and aggressively pursue this matter."
I take the virtual theft of guns, money, sex with hookers, cars, and other people's lives very seriously and I will continue to diligently and aggressively pursue this matter once I get my hands on the game.
Yet another news article that continues the bombardment of the uninformed public trying to change the definition of words to fit their needs.
This is a another example, as the bbc explain in the article:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3745484.stm
But what Garcia Maruez did finally is he modified the final chapter of the book so the book in the street does not have the same ending than the published book. Quick reaction and probably a very good publicity campaign for boths, the pirate version and the published version
Please post bittorrent links.... thanks!
Meh.
Another dupe.. and a day late also..
But on another note why is this making news.. Every single xbox,pc,gc,ps2 etc etc game is cracked/released, and normally before retail dates.
Just because they big name games does it actually matter.. This has been going on since the days of the zx81 (and prob before).
This happens with every single game that comes out. Why all of a sudden is this huge news? Back in the days of doom and quake games were pirated days and weeks before their release. Granted, lately it's been sometimes the day of or a day after the game has been released to retail that a game gets pirated, but this isn't news people. It's been happening for 10+ years. One thing that has changed, is how easy it is for people not involved in the "scene" to get these releases. Before you used to have to know the right people, nowadays all you need to do is load up the latest p2p app and anyone can find it.
A thieving opportunist has stolen a van of my latest publication hot off the press! But that SPANKED-up idiot has left the rear doors open and now my, artistically violent, tastefully desctructive video game is being dropped all over the Internet. Persue that trail of illegal copies diligently and aggressively collecting evidence as you go. When you've followed the trail to that thieving SPANK-head, waste him.
Look, I know a guy who's working on it, a really decent man. He has a wife, a child, and another on the way. If you copy this instead of buying it, you're contributing to putting him out of a job just when he needs one the most.
This isn't a theoretical issue. Rockstar aren't some faceless cartel. Please. Do the right thing this time.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Prepare for a "If a tree falls in the woods and no one is around" question...
So, hypothetically, if Half-Life 2 were to be pirated, I download the game, and I already have it paid for via Steam, is it illegal?
Bryan R.
The price of freedom is eternal vigilance, or $12.50 as seen on eBay.....
The only viable copy protection is similar to that used in Quake III, where you're banned from any Internet servers if you use a duplicate key. There's no killer solution for software that doesn't require the Internet to run (even Q3 would always work in single-player mode).
But hey, look at how many people downloaded the warezed copy of Doom 3, and Activision still sold a metric shedload of CDs. I wouldn't cry too much - piracy is going to hurt the publishers of weak games worst, 'cos everyone can find out that it sucks before it goes on sale ;-)
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
By me copying and downloading and then spreading their product I haven't denied them of anything.
Amazingly ignorant comment. You are denying them the profit they have a right to. No one has a right to possess a copy of the game if they have not received it through legit means. This whole theft/copyright infringment argument is tiring, because the end result is that people are breaking the law. Theft is not the wrong word to use, it's just that the definition of the word is dated. Good luck trying to bring webster's dictionary into court to try and protect yourself.
Grow up. Piracy is wrong and it does cost the industry jobs and a lot of money (although not as much as they claim).
I've just signed legislation that'll outlaw Russia forever. We'll begin bombing in five minutes.
In order to steal the game, you have to beat up enough cops and hookers in your town, and run over a few pedestrians on your way to work, and then you will be approached by a mysterious stranger who will send you on a mission that will result in your getting a bootleg copy of GTA:SA.
the profit they have a right to
A word of advice, steer clear of flawed statements like this. Nobody has a "right" to profit.
However, by infringing their copyrights (getting the game without paying for it), you have obtained their game _illegally_, and if you are participating in mass copyright infringement, it's a _criminal_ offence in the UK.
Theft _is_ the wrong word to use. Theft is a completely different crime from copyright infringement. You will not be prosecuted for theft. If you go to court, they won't say "theft" or "stolen" once. They'll prosecute you for "copyright infringement", and they'll use phrases like "massively infringed" and "duplicated without authorisation".
Copyright infringement is a much better phrase than "theft" or "piracy", because it also works for Free Software. Only copyright law stops people from taking free code and making it non-free. If we tried to say they "stole" our code, they'd retort "hah! how can you steal something that's free?". As you can see, "steal" is an extremely poor word choice for copyright infringement.
If you were to actually steal GTA, you'd do that by going into the shops when it is released and physically stealing the box from the shelf or the game discs from the stock drawers.