Indeed. All viable options. Until you want to connect to a personal service (email, webserver, bank, TPB etc.) on an open and untrusted network. Then your anonymity can be compromised by any enterprising kiddie monitoring the network. It's not about being anonymous via connecting from a network other than the home account, it's about being anonymous by going into stealth-mode so it's hard to determine who you are and what you are up to regardless of where you are connecting from.
The question should be how slow is it compared to the speed experienced after the ISP shuts you off (or the authorities confiscate computing equipment) due to an accusation of illegal activity by the *IAA. The performance hit may seem painfully slow until compared to the slowness of 0 bps. In fact, such a system IMHO should have an easy to use toggle (desktop widget, browser plugin) so that "normal browsing" goes through the usual channels and only the limited periods of "private browsing" are experienced with full protection on. Blend in with the crowd by default and leave the security for when you really need it.
[...] now that mobile devices can play movies we'll go back to having your own DVD's, rip and carry your entertainment with you.
"Go back"? If you don't have a pathological need for "all new, right now", buying DVDs and CDs legitimately from the sale bins and pre-owned stores is a perfect way to feed your portable entertainment devices. Turns out the movies and music are just as good when they are not the latest buzz. And you can still pop the DVD in the player connected to the TV and enjoy higher quality video than the artifact-laden cable feeds or online streams. Sneakernet is the ultimate way to fly under the radar, avoiding both bandwidth caps and *IAA lawsuits.
What you describe is reminescent of what Java Webstart has been able to do for quite a few years, though the granularity is a bit finer. Instead of "latest version of application" as a monolithic whole, you get transparent updates to component libraries (in the form of jar files). Of course since the old + new libraries act as an integrated whole, the update does represent the "latest version of the application". If the patent consists of this it's entirely unremarkable.
I wonder how posting full price info, detailed descriptions of the home, exterior *and* interior photos is less revealing than driving down the street with a camera mounted on the car. I suppose the xenophobia response doesn't get triggered when it's members of the local community that engage in privacy-violating activities.
No, *you* didn't get it. The GP's post describes a scheme requiring a single instance at a time. You're describing an even more antiquated and braindead scheme from the days when laptops or telecommuting didn't exist. That's like requiring a book to be read in only one room because at the time of publication everyone lived in single-room log cabins.
And yeah, "if you don't like the license, don't buy the product" is exactly why these schemes died out for the most part. People didn't like them and they didn't buy, particularly if a competitive product was available.
Nope. It's just as damned inconvenient and braindead as other schemes that artificially induce limitations that aren't there to begin with. One instance at a time is just as stupid as any other limitation.
Example:
Limited software in question is installed on 3 computers: Workstation at the office, laptop and home workstation.
Scenario 1: Working on project at office workstation. Suddenly called to important meeting with important executive to deal with an important issue. Grab laptop, head off to meeting - no time to logoff, generate new key, whatever. Productive discussion ensues. Executive asks for a quick review of discussion concepts using expensive software he paid for. Activate laptop, start software. Bzzzt! Didn't generate stupid license key, so no efficient conclusion to discussion. Executive leaves meeting with mandate to find new tool ASAP without stupid licensing scheme.
Scenario 2: Good week at office. Project done, system deployed. Vacation next week. No need to generate key - won't need it. As vacation starts - emergency phone call to fix unforeseen issue. Bzzt! Sorry - can't use home system to fix problem. Long drive into office causes family to miss plane, vacation ruined, divorce ensues. Solemn vow never to use stupid software again.
Scenario 3: Good week at office. Project done, system deployed. Generate key for laptop just in case - not stupid like scenario 2 guy. Sunday morning - emergency call. No problem - just fire up laptop, install key, fix problem. Bzzzt! Hard drive failure - laptop won't boot. Home system can't use exclusive key made for laptop. Stupid licensing scheme cursed forever, new tool found.
The problem with schemes that impose limitations is that they are... limiting, and at some point those limitations will cause a problem that shouldn't have been one.
Only human beings would invent technology that removes limitations (like cost-free digital reproduction that sounded like Utopia in the sci-fi novels... and the marketing copy) then turn around and impose artificial limitations to nullify the benefit that the new tech offered.
Thank you for this post. I'm a child of an American soldier and a German mother. My German relatives were good people in every sense of the word. Wouldn't hurt a fly - literally (my great grandmother would catch flies and put them outside rather than kill them. She would sneak food to a russian soldier captured in the town because she felt sorry for him, despite the risk of the crime of treason). My grandfather fought in WWII on the german side and had lots of stories to tell.
I asked them all about WWII when I was a child and they said that honestly few people really knew what was going on with the concentration camps and such. It was as much a surprise to them as it was to the world at large when the story unfolded. I spent quite a few years conflicted because I thought they must be lying, until I decided the evidence available to me first-hand was superior to the much larger pool of second-hand evidence (ie. the popular media). They really didn't know what was going on, because they were just ordinary people living their lives as best they could.
This is why things like Gitmo really bother me. I never really understood how Nazi Germany could come about until I was able to witness the GWB administration first-hand. Consider that in the modern age we probably know more about Gitmo than the German populace knew about concentration camps in their day. We have a "secret prison", yet it has persisted for years and nobody has managed to shut it down for the outrage that it is.
This story really makes me wonder what the world would be like right now if it were not for the internet. Maybe all those apocalyptic sci-fi stories I read as a child would have been more prophetic than we thought at the time...
Despite being the exception to the rule, this will become another argument for justifying domestic surveillance and the erosion of civil liberties. Just wait.
It's closer to the real situation than "sneaking into a theater" or "eating a meal in a restaurant and not paying" or even "stealing a car".
And there are differences between a downloaded copy and a "real" purchased copy which have value. Physical things like packaging, a manual etc. Economic value like the ability to resell. Well, the latter has been neutered by no-return policys and the crusade against pre-owned media, but it's one reason to own a real, tangible good. Then there's the ability to actually provide proof of ownership. I've been advocating on GoG that they provide proof of ownership for those that request it. A real certificate, maybe, or a GPG-signed/validated digital certificate.
The point being that there might be ways to provide an incentive to "buy your own" which actually reflect economic reality as it applies to other goods. And maybe those ways ought to be explored and applied. If people only bought/sold things because they were forced to, economic systems wouldn't work. Fair exchange and payment are natural human tendencies. If that isn't being fostered then something is wrong and someone is missing something somewhere. In the case of infinitely replicable digital data, what seems to be missing is the benefit of purchase that exists for practially every other good in the world.
Bad examples. It's more like going to a friend's house to watch a movie, then deciding you like it enough to buy a copy for yourself. Or going to a library, reading a book and liking it enough to want a personal copy. Or borrowing a book.
The existence of ways to experience something without payment to the original creator doesn't preclude a purchase if someone wants a copy for themselves. The missing piece seems to be to give people enough of a reason to want a personal copy.
... I can't watch for too long or I risk exceeding my bandwidth limit. Chilling effect? I think so. Someday an alternative will present itself (FiOS hopefully) and I'll jump as fast as I can.
I agree with everything you say. The vast majority of wines are quite drinkable across the middle price range and most people can be perfectly happy drinking nothing else (myself included). The really good stuff is often deserving of the price, though. The key is to find an opportunity to taste the more expensive stuff alongside the run-of-the-mill good stuff rather than by itself. The tastings my wife and I attend at our local Taster's guild usually have about 80 wines that one can try, plus 4 or 5 bottles of the really good (and pricey) wines that the event sponsors will pour for you under controlled conditions (ie. sparingly so everyone gets to try some and some fool doesn't swill it all). After trying a bunch of decent stuff, the difference when one tries the high quality wine is readily apparent. That said, it's still often not worth the price unless you really like it.
Yeah, I've done that, and yes, there's a difference. Hell, just comparing the $8 5 liter jug of Livingston Merlot to the slightly more expensive Yellowtail (which most wine snobs turn up their noses at) is enough. It gets a little harder after that because there are a lot of wines that are quite drinkable across the price spectrum (and some expensive ones that are not). Good wine is harder to recognize for the novice because the things that define "good" have to be learned.
Strangely enough, it's a lot like code. Really bad code is universally recognized by most (apart from the coder responsible for the travesty). Decent code is easy enough to recognize and is the most common. After that it gets difficult, because recognizing elegant code requires not just an understanding of the language, but also the specifics of the problem, the details of the design etc.
The same thing is true with wine. It's not about snobbery, it's about experience and learning what elements define quality. Snobbery is a separate issue that says more about the (lack of) self esteem of the snob than his ability to recognize good wine. Finding a good tasting group where people are not full of themselves
In common usage "Business class" usually means better reliability (uptime guarantees), service (priority support) and features (static ip) rather than "used professionally" for "doing business". Kind of like the airlines - business class = better seats, better food etc. You can still do work back in coach.
I can't speak for everyone, but I do bioinformatics/computational biology and often telecommute when consulting or to continue the days work at home when deadlines are tight. Depending on the project or analysis task, having local copies of public scientific databases is very useful (eg. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Database/). These databases are rather large and are growing rapidly. Since terabyte drives have become affordable, it's become feasible to maintain up-to-date personal copies at home rather than accessing them via NFS at work or working with representative subsets.
Perfectly legal, legitimate and probably more useful to society than streaming HD content. This is the kind of stuff we used the internet for back before it hit the bigtime, so as legitimate a use of the internet as what people now consider "normal use" (web browsing, shopping, watching video, streaming music, and yes I do those too).
My apologies - I should have elaborated a bit on "trust", but I got tired of typing in this tiny little text box.
Trust involves more than "will not steal from me" - it's bigger than that. "I trust that this vendor will *reproducibly* give me the best overall purchasing experience" might be a better way to articulate the concept. Not that you or other independent developers can't do the same, but the risk that you won't is greater than with someone already trusted. I suppose size and scale might be an influence too, since I presume your core competency lies in making good games, not in making all aspects of the customer experience the best it can be. I'll start with a vaguely related (to games and online purchasing) anecdote and finish with something more specific.
I like Starbucks. My coffee purist friends ridicule this, pointing out that their coffee isn't as good as it could be, is more expensive and is sold by an evil multi-national corp. Small independent coffee shops are the best they say (if you can't roast your own beans and brew them fresh, that is). However, I've learned that I can walk into any Starbucks anywhere and the quality of my drink will always be what I expected without a lot of variation, and usually on the high side. Same with the overall experience in general. Local independent coffee shops, in contrast, are all over the map. Sometimes the coffee is great (better than Starbucks), more often it's not that good. The service is almost always worse (which I attribute to poor training on part of management who don't have enough experience to do it right usually). So what do I do when traveling and in a hurry? Starbucks. I trust them to reach and maintain a certain standard of quality that others can't.
Same thing with Amazon. Looking for stuff is easy. The reviews are helpful. Alternatives are easily found for comparison shopping. Ordering is a snap. Shipping works. I can save stuff for later, make a wish list, send gifts to others and so on. Works great every time. And here's the tie in to the middleman concept: I get all the benefits of the above even when purchasing from a 3rd party through Amazon. I can trust them to deliver the same positive experience and not rip me off too. My experience with small indepenent vendors? All over the map. So I go to the places I know I can trust first, because I know what I will get every time.
(No, I don't work for or own stock in the companies mentioned above).
I suspect the same kind of thing causes people to go back to Steam or other download services they like. In addition to the things I mentioned in my previous post, the middleman provides a level of consistency (both of quality and experience) that direct purchases can't always match, even if both the product and service can be better (because it can be much worse too).
So what can you do as an independent seller?
I think you're doing it. Publicity, marketing, adapting to the needs of existing and prospective customers, makeing quality products. You're on my radar screen for sure, and likely on others as well.
Also, maybe offering your games in a few places (like Amazon) for the exposure, assuming the costs aren't too huge. Even then, passing on some of the cost to the customer doesn't seem too awful. People can always choose to purchase direct once they are aware of you if the overhead is too much.
The thing is, you have to go where the people are, even if there is some overhead. If they never find you because they find enough of what they need elsewhere, your opportunities are fewer.
Independent sellers remind me a bit of the folks that set up booths at my local farmer's market. I buy their products when I'm there, but I still go to the supermarket more consistenly, so I'm more likely to buy a similar product while I'm there rather than driving out to someone's farm unless it's right on the way home.
Is there a reason why people are so keen to stick a middleman between them as gamers and the game creators?
How much effort is it to just remember who you bought the game from, in case of needing any tech support.
Overhead and trust are 2 reasons that come to mind.
Overhead: I've been online since before the internet became mainstream and have accumulated a sizable list of user accounts during that time. Security considerations compel me to maintain a different password for each. User ids vary as well, sometimes because the one I want is unavailable, sometimes because I wasn't sure about the vendor and chose a 'throwaway' alternate. It's become a major PITA to keep track of all this, and as a result, I actually avoid creating new accounts unless I really can't avoid it. Having a small number of accounts that let me purchase what I want is a huge benefit, both from the information management perspective and the security perspective. It may not be much effort to remember a single site that I bought a game from, but it's a big effort to remember a lot of different ones. I don't buy my groceries direct from the individual farmers/butchers/bakers either - the local supermarket is much more efficient.
Trust: Pretty simple in concept. I trust those who I have done business with for years and don't trust those I don't know or have come to trust. Unless I really want the product, my lack of trust (justified or not) will send me to the cancel button nearly every time when presented with a purchase option on an independent site. I can, however, trust my preferred middlemen (eg. Amazon, Newegg, Walmart, Target, my local comic shop etc.) most of the time.
So there exists a tension between the needs of the customer and the vendor when it comes to direct sales. Going direct is probably feasible and efficient up to a point, but doesn't scale well for the customer when the total pool of direct vendors in the marketplace grows beyond a certain point.
Finally. A nuanced, well reasoned argument we can all appreciate for it's beautiful elegance and demonstration of your considerable intellectual prowess. We appreciate your restraint in holding back up to this point to spare us the humiliation of feeling inferior.
as will boycotting the game (both legal and illegal copies) and only purchasing DRM-free games.
That will actually help. (I can't see how boycotting illegitimate copies helps in this case, but it's not a good thing to do for other reasons)
Boycotting (a.k.a. refusing to purchase) the retail version makes an economic statement.
Boycotting (a.k.a. refusing to acquire and play) the black market, non-retail, cracked, non-purchased version makes an ethical statement.
Demanding ethical behavior on the part of a company when it comes to arriving at a mutually acceptable exchange of value is difficult when behaving in a way that demonstrates lack of ethics.
Or to put it another way, boycotting illegitimate copies enhances the value and effectiveness of the economic boycott.
And to complete the scenario:
Purchasing the retail version then acquiring the illegitimate version to circumvent unacceptable properties of the retail version borders on the insane. It makes neither a positive economic statement or a positive ethical statement. It validates and perpetuates unethical behavior on both sides of the transaction.
I guess you meant "servers go OFFLINE". That's what the preview function is for.
Otherwise, great post. Speaking with your money is the only way to communicate with corporations, but what has been lacking is an attention-getting voice that explains why sales have been lost. As I mentioned above, an individual communicating directly to a company isn't sufficient to register as more than an outlier. Communicating to other potential purchasers in a respected venue such as Amazon's comments is a valid way to magnify one's impact, IMHO.
(And to deflect any sniping from the peanut gallery - yes I do consider Amazon's comments and reviews 'respected'. I've found them to be quite reliable for deciding whether to purchase an item. I've rarely regretted my purchases when I've taken the reviews seriously, and I've learned my lesson when I've ignored them. Perfect? No. But approached with the proper level of B.S. detection, they can give you a very good assessment of a particular product.)
Childish or not, it's attention getting, and sometimes that's what it takes to drive the message home.
I've tried carefully crafted and reasoned emails, and even 'traditional' letters using paper and a stamp. I've written about why I didn't purchase the game (DRM), why I would enjoy playing it, and how much I would enjoy giving them my money if a mutually acceptable transaction were possible. I've praised companies in writing for doing something I support (reasonable protection, Linux support) and crediting that for my purchase. I've explained how I've been buying computer games since buying King's Quest for my Tandy 1000 and have several large bookshelves full of game boxes I've accumulated over the years. I've explained why my purchase of new games suddenly dwindled to nearly nothing as a result of DRM and why I support companies such as Introversion who don't use draconian DRM. I've explained why I haven't stopped playing games because I passed out of the target demographic and how I have more liquid assets available now than when I was young and poor. I've tried it all, and it has all fallen on deaf ears.
I've been thanked for my thoughtful comments, but educated in the business realities that make my position untenable, though regrettable. I've been accused of being irrelevant, since I'm only one person and what does the loss of my $50 mean anyway - there are plenty of people who buy the game so who am I to question things. Hell, I've been accused of pirating just because I stated that I won't purchase a game due to DRM or other factors, since I must obviously be incapable of resisting the impulse of playing a hot game (eg. Bioshock) because no gamer would willing avoid playing (so if I didn't buy it, I must have pirated it).
In other words, the reasoned approach has fallen on deaf ears, at least based on the fact that DRM and such has become increasingly more draconian as sales continue to dwindle for PC games.
It's very difficult for even a motivated individual to have any impact because even statements like "I'll never buy one of your products again as long as you continue this undesirable practice" have no real meaning. What do I matter to the bottom line?
I've concluded that organized efforts are more likely to get attention because the potential impact is much greater.
Question the methods if you will, but I think people have figured out that organizing is the only way to get companies to listen.
Slashdot Mirror
Indeed. All viable options. Until you want to connect to a personal service (email, webserver, bank, TPB etc.) on an open and untrusted network. Then your anonymity can be compromised by any enterprising kiddie monitoring the network. It's not about being anonymous via connecting from a network other than the home account, it's about being anonymous by going into stealth-mode so it's hard to determine who you are and what you are up to regardless of where you are connecting from.
The question should be how slow is it compared to the speed experienced after the ISP shuts you off (or the authorities confiscate computing equipment) due to an accusation of illegal activity by the *IAA. The performance hit may seem painfully slow until compared to the slowness of 0 bps. In fact, such a system IMHO should have an easy to use toggle (desktop widget, browser plugin) so that "normal browsing" goes through the usual channels and only the limited periods of "private browsing" are experienced with full protection on. Blend in with the crowd by default and leave the security for when you really need it.
[...] now that mobile devices can play movies we'll go back to having your own DVD's, rip and carry your entertainment with you.
"Go back"? If you don't have a pathological need for "all new, right now", buying DVDs and CDs legitimately from the sale bins and pre-owned stores is a perfect way to feed your portable entertainment devices. Turns out the movies and music are just as good when they are not the latest buzz. And you can still pop the DVD in the player connected to the TV and enjoy higher quality video than the artifact-laden cable feeds or online streams. Sneakernet is the ultimate way to fly under the radar, avoiding both bandwidth caps and *IAA lawsuits.
What you describe is reminescent of what Java Webstart has been able to do for quite a few years, though the granularity is a bit finer. Instead of "latest version of application" as a monolithic whole, you get transparent updates to component libraries (in the form of jar files). Of course since the old + new libraries act as an integrated whole, the update does represent the "latest version of the application". If the patent consists of this it's entirely unremarkable.
They will be coming for you next for put stuff like the following online:
http://www.homes24.co.uk/property/search/?ps_type=1&loc=Aylesbury&prop_type=&min_price=0&max_price=0&min_bedrooms=0&keywords=&maxdist=0&age=-
I wonder how posting full price info, detailed descriptions of the home, exterior *and* interior photos is less revealing than driving down the street with a camera mounted on the car. I suppose the xenophobia response doesn't get triggered when it's members of the local community that engage in privacy-violating activities.
No, *you* didn't get it. The GP's post describes a scheme requiring a single instance at a time. You're describing an even more antiquated and braindead scheme from the days when laptops or telecommuting didn't exist. That's like requiring a book to be read in only one room because at the time of publication everyone lived in single-room log cabins.
And yeah, "if you don't like the license, don't buy the product" is exactly why these schemes died out for the most part. People didn't like them and they didn't buy, particularly if a competitive product was available.
Most people would find this reasonable.
Nope. It's just as damned inconvenient and braindead as other schemes that artificially induce limitations that aren't there to begin with. One instance at a time is just as stupid as any other limitation.
Example:
Limited software in question is installed on 3 computers: Workstation at the office, laptop and home workstation.
Scenario 1: Working on project at office workstation. Suddenly called to important meeting with important executive to deal with an important issue. Grab laptop, head off to meeting - no time to logoff, generate new key, whatever. Productive discussion ensues. Executive asks for a quick review of discussion concepts using expensive software he paid for. Activate laptop, start software. Bzzzt! Didn't generate stupid license key, so no efficient conclusion to discussion. Executive leaves meeting with mandate to find new tool ASAP without stupid licensing scheme.
Scenario 2: Good week at office. Project done, system deployed. Vacation next week. No need to generate key - won't need it. As vacation starts - emergency phone call to fix unforeseen issue. Bzzt! Sorry - can't use home system to fix problem. Long drive into office causes family to miss plane, vacation ruined, divorce ensues. Solemn vow never to use stupid software again.
Scenario 3: Good week at office. Project done, system deployed. Generate key for laptop just in case - not stupid like scenario 2 guy. Sunday morning - emergency call. No problem - just fire up laptop, install key, fix problem. Bzzzt! Hard drive failure - laptop won't boot. Home system can't use exclusive key made for laptop. Stupid licensing scheme cursed forever, new tool found.
The problem with schemes that impose limitations is that they are ... limiting, and at some point those limitations will cause a problem that shouldn't have been one.
Only human beings would invent technology that removes limitations (like cost-free digital reproduction that sounded like Utopia in the sci-fi novels ... and the marketing copy) then turn around and impose artificial limitations to nullify the benefit that the new tech offered.
Good one. It made me CaCl.
OMFG, YES!
Thank you for this post. I'm a child of an American soldier and a German mother. My German relatives were good people in every sense of the word. Wouldn't hurt a fly - literally (my great grandmother would catch flies and put them outside rather than kill them. She would sneak food to a russian soldier captured in the town because she felt sorry for him, despite the risk of the crime of treason). My grandfather fought in WWII on the german side and had lots of stories to tell.
I asked them all about WWII when I was a child and they said that honestly few people really knew what was going on with the concentration camps and such. It was as much a surprise to them as it was to the world at large when the story unfolded. I spent quite a few years conflicted because I thought they must be lying, until I decided the evidence available to me first-hand was superior to the much larger pool of second-hand evidence (ie. the popular media). They really didn't know what was going on, because they were just ordinary people living their lives as best they could.
This is why things like Gitmo really bother me. I never really understood how Nazi Germany could come about until I was able to witness the GWB administration first-hand. Consider that in the modern age we probably know more about Gitmo than the German populace knew about concentration camps in their day. We have a "secret prison", yet it has persisted for years and nobody has managed to shut it down for the outrage that it is.
This story really makes me wonder what the world would be like right now if it were not for the internet. Maybe all those apocalyptic sci-fi stories I read as a child would have been more prophetic than we thought at the time ...
Despite being the exception to the rule, this will become another argument for justifying domestic surveillance and the erosion of civil liberties. Just wait.
It's closer to the real situation than "sneaking into a theater" or "eating a meal in a restaurant and not paying" or even "stealing a car".
And there are differences between a downloaded copy and a "real" purchased copy which have value. Physical things like packaging, a manual etc. Economic value like the ability to resell. Well, the latter has been neutered by no-return policys and the crusade against pre-owned media, but it's one reason to own a real, tangible good. Then there's the ability to actually provide proof of ownership. I've been advocating on GoG that they provide proof of ownership for those that request it. A real certificate, maybe, or a GPG-signed/validated digital certificate.
The point being that there might be ways to provide an incentive to "buy your own" which actually reflect economic reality as it applies to other goods. And maybe those ways ought to be explored and applied. If people only bought/sold things because they were forced to, economic systems wouldn't work. Fair exchange and payment are natural human tendencies. If that isn't being fostered then something is wrong and someone is missing something somewhere. In the case of infinitely replicable digital data, what seems to be missing is the benefit of purchase that exists for practially every other good in the world.
Bad examples. It's more like going to a friend's house to watch a movie, then deciding you like it enough to buy a copy for yourself. Or going to a library, reading a book and liking it enough to want a personal copy. Or borrowing a book.
The existence of ways to experience something without payment to the original creator doesn't preclude a purchase if someone wants a copy for themselves. The missing piece seems to be to give people enough of a reason to want a personal copy.
... I can't watch for too long or I risk exceeding my bandwidth limit. Chilling effect? I think so. Someday an alternative will present itself (FiOS hopefully) and I'll jump as fast as I can.
I agree with everything you say. The vast majority of wines are quite drinkable across the middle price range and most people can be perfectly happy drinking nothing else (myself included). The really good stuff is often deserving of the price, though. The key is to find an opportunity to taste the more expensive stuff alongside the run-of-the-mill good stuff rather than by itself. The tastings my wife and I attend at our local Taster's guild usually have about 80 wines that one can try, plus 4 or 5 bottles of the really good (and pricey) wines that the event sponsors will pour for you under controlled conditions (ie. sparingly so everyone gets to try some and some fool doesn't swill it all). After trying a bunch of decent stuff, the difference when one tries the high quality wine is readily apparent. That said, it's still often not worth the price unless you really like it.
Yeah, I've done that, and yes, there's a difference. Hell, just comparing the $8 5 liter jug of Livingston Merlot to the slightly more expensive Yellowtail (which most wine snobs turn up their noses at) is enough. It gets a little harder after that because there are a lot of wines that are quite drinkable across the price spectrum (and some expensive ones that are not). Good wine is harder to recognize for the novice because the things that define "good" have to be learned.
Strangely enough, it's a lot like code. Really bad code is universally recognized by most (apart from the coder responsible for the travesty). Decent code is easy enough to recognize and is the most common. After that it gets difficult, because recognizing elegant code requires not just an understanding of the language, but also the specifics of the problem, the details of the design etc.
The same thing is true with wine. It's not about snobbery, it's about experience and learning what elements define quality. Snobbery is a separate issue that says more about the (lack of) self esteem of the snob than his ability to recognize good wine. Finding a good tasting group where people are not full of themselves
In common usage "Business class" usually means better reliability (uptime guarantees), service (priority support) and features (static ip) rather than "used professionally" for "doing business". Kind of like the airlines - business class = better seats, better food etc. You can still do work back in coach.
I can't speak for everyone, but I do bioinformatics/computational biology and often telecommute when consulting or to continue the days work at home when deadlines are tight. Depending on the project or analysis task, having local copies of public scientific databases is very useful (eg. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Database/). These databases are rather large and are growing rapidly. Since terabyte drives have become affordable, it's become feasible to maintain up-to-date personal copies at home rather than accessing them via NFS at work or working with representative subsets.
Perfectly legal, legitimate and probably more useful to society than streaming HD content. This is the kind of stuff we used the internet for back before it hit the bigtime, so as legitimate a use of the internet as what people now consider "normal use" (web browsing, shopping, watching video, streaming music, and yes I do those too).
My apologies - I should have elaborated a bit on "trust", but I got tired of typing in this tiny little text box.
Trust involves more than "will not steal from me" - it's bigger than that. "I trust that this vendor will *reproducibly* give me the best overall purchasing experience" might be a better way to articulate the concept. Not that you or other independent developers can't do the same, but the risk that you won't is greater than with someone already trusted. I suppose size and scale might be an influence too, since I presume your core competency lies in making good games, not in making all aspects of the customer experience the best it can be. I'll start with a vaguely related (to games and online purchasing) anecdote and finish with something more specific.
I like Starbucks. My coffee purist friends ridicule this, pointing out that their coffee isn't as good as it could be, is more expensive and is sold by an evil multi-national corp. Small independent coffee shops are the best they say (if you can't roast your own beans and brew them fresh, that is). However, I've learned that I can walk into any Starbucks anywhere and the quality of my drink will always be what I expected without a lot of variation, and usually on the high side. Same with the overall experience in general. Local independent coffee shops, in contrast, are all over the map. Sometimes the coffee is great (better than Starbucks), more often it's not that good. The service is almost always worse (which I attribute to poor training on part of management who don't have enough experience to do it right usually). So what do I do when traveling and in a hurry? Starbucks. I trust them to reach and maintain a certain standard of quality that others can't.
Same thing with Amazon. Looking for stuff is easy. The reviews are helpful. Alternatives are easily found for comparison shopping. Ordering is a snap. Shipping works. I can save stuff for later, make a wish list, send gifts to others and so on. Works great every time. And here's the tie in to the middleman concept: I get all the benefits of the above even when purchasing from a 3rd party through Amazon. I can trust them to deliver the same positive experience and not rip me off too. My experience with small indepenent vendors? All over the map. So I go to the places I know I can trust first, because I know what I will get every time.
(No, I don't work for or own stock in the companies mentioned above).
I suspect the same kind of thing causes people to go back to Steam or other download services they like. In addition to the things I mentioned in my previous post, the middleman provides a level of consistency (both of quality and experience) that direct purchases can't always match, even if both the product and service can be better (because it can be much worse too).
So what can you do as an independent seller?
I think you're doing it. Publicity, marketing, adapting to the needs of existing and prospective customers, makeing quality products. You're on my radar screen for sure, and likely on others as well.
Also, maybe offering your games in a few places (like Amazon) for the exposure, assuming the costs aren't too huge. Even then, passing on some of the cost to the customer doesn't seem too awful. People can always choose to purchase direct once they are aware of you if the overhead is too much.
The thing is, you have to go where the people are, even if there is some overhead. If they never find you because they find enough of what they need elsewhere, your opportunities are fewer.
Independent sellers remind me a bit of the folks that set up booths at my local farmer's market. I buy their products when I'm there, but I still go to the supermarket more consistenly, so I'm more likely to buy a similar product while I'm there rather than driving out to someone's farm unless it's right on the way home.
That's a happy dream, but the economics involved don't justify the effort of porting to Linux in most cases. But you probably knew that already.
Is there a reason why people are so keen to stick a middleman between them as gamers and the game creators?
How much effort is it to just remember who you bought the game from, in case of needing any tech support.
Overhead and trust are 2 reasons that come to mind.
Overhead: I've been online since before the internet became mainstream and have accumulated a sizable list of user accounts during that time. Security considerations compel me to maintain a different password for each. User ids vary as well, sometimes because the one I want is unavailable, sometimes because I wasn't sure about the vendor and chose a 'throwaway' alternate. It's become a major PITA to keep track of all this, and as a result, I actually avoid creating new accounts unless I really can't avoid it. Having a small number of accounts that let me purchase what I want is a huge benefit, both from the information management perspective and the security perspective. It may not be much effort to remember a single site that I bought a game from, but it's a big effort to remember a lot of different ones. I don't buy my groceries direct from the individual farmers/butchers/bakers either - the local supermarket is much more efficient.
Trust: Pretty simple in concept. I trust those who I have done business with for years and don't trust those I don't know or have come to trust. Unless I really want the product, my lack of trust (justified or not) will send me to the cancel button nearly every time when presented with a purchase option on an independent site. I can, however, trust my preferred middlemen (eg. Amazon, Newegg, Walmart, Target, my local comic shop etc.) most of the time.
So there exists a tension between the needs of the customer and the vendor when it comes to direct sales. Going direct is probably feasible and efficient up to a point, but doesn't scale well for the customer when the total pool of direct vendors in the marketplace grows beyond a certain point.
FUCK YOU!
Finally. A nuanced, well reasoned argument we can all appreciate for it's beautiful elegance and demonstration of your considerable intellectual prowess. We appreciate your restraint in holding back up to this point to spare us the humiliation of feeling inferior.
Bravo, sir. Bravo.
OMG, no.
as will boycotting the game (both legal and illegal copies) and only purchasing DRM-free games.
That will actually help. (I can't see how boycotting illegitimate copies helps in this case, but it's not a good thing to do for other reasons)
Boycotting (a.k.a. refusing to purchase) the retail version makes an economic statement.
Boycotting (a.k.a. refusing to acquire and play) the black market, non-retail, cracked, non-purchased version makes an ethical statement.
Demanding ethical behavior on the part of a company when it comes to arriving at a mutually acceptable exchange of value is difficult when behaving in a way that demonstrates lack of ethics.
Or to put it another way, boycotting illegitimate copies enhances the value and effectiveness of the economic boycott.
And to complete the scenario:
Purchasing the retail version then acquiring the illegitimate version to circumvent unacceptable properties of the retail version borders on the insane. It makes neither a positive economic statement or a positive ethical statement. It validates and perpetuates unethical behavior on both sides of the transaction.
I guess you meant "servers go OFFLINE". That's what the preview function is for.
Otherwise, great post. Speaking with your money is the only way to communicate with corporations, but what has been lacking is an attention-getting voice that explains why sales have been lost. As I mentioned above, an individual communicating directly to a company isn't sufficient to register as more than an outlier. Communicating to other potential purchasers in a respected venue such as Amazon's comments is a valid way to magnify one's impact, IMHO.
(And to deflect any sniping from the peanut gallery - yes I do consider Amazon's comments and reviews 'respected'. I've found them to be quite reliable for deciding whether to purchase an item. I've rarely regretted my purchases when I've taken the reviews seriously, and I've learned my lesson when I've ignored them. Perfect? No. But approached with the proper level of B.S. detection, they can give you a very good assessment of a particular product.)
Childish or not, it's attention getting, and sometimes that's what it takes to drive the message home.
I've tried carefully crafted and reasoned emails, and even 'traditional' letters using paper and a stamp. I've written about why I didn't purchase the game (DRM), why I would enjoy playing it, and how much I would enjoy giving them my money if a mutually acceptable transaction were possible. I've praised companies in writing for doing something I support (reasonable protection, Linux support) and crediting that for my purchase. I've explained how I've been buying computer games since buying King's Quest for my Tandy 1000 and have several large bookshelves full of game boxes I've accumulated over the years. I've explained why my purchase of new games suddenly dwindled to nearly nothing as a result of DRM and why I support companies such as Introversion who don't use draconian DRM. I've explained why I haven't stopped playing games because I passed out of the target demographic and how I have more liquid assets available now than when I was young and poor. I've tried it all, and it has all fallen on deaf ears.
I've been thanked for my thoughtful comments, but educated in the business realities that make my position untenable, though regrettable. I've been accused of being irrelevant, since I'm only one person and what does the loss of my $50 mean anyway - there are plenty of people who buy the game so who am I to question things. Hell, I've been accused of pirating just because I stated that I won't purchase a game due to DRM or other factors, since I must obviously be incapable of resisting the impulse of playing a hot game (eg. Bioshock) because no gamer would willing avoid playing (so if I didn't buy it, I must have pirated it).
In other words, the reasoned approach has fallen on deaf ears, at least based on the fact that DRM and such has become increasingly more draconian as sales continue to dwindle for PC games.
It's very difficult for even a motivated individual to have any impact because even statements like "I'll never buy one of your products again as long as you continue this undesirable practice" have no real meaning. What do I matter to the bottom line?
I've concluded that organized efforts are more likely to get attention because the potential impact is much greater.
Question the methods if you will, but I think people have figured out that organizing is the only way to get companies to listen.