Not exactly. The difference in the instance you cite is that the companies in question can write off a tax loss at the end of the year ($5, after all, isn't covering the cost for them to produce that item). For pirated software, they get to write off nothing.
I'd be surprised if any of these companies actually wanted their software pirated, even if a unintended (and unproven) side effect of piracy is to boost office sales of a product. As the CEO of Coke said regarding the way the failed introduction of New Coke boosted sales of Classic Coke:
"We're not that stupid, but we're not that smart, either."
While there are a lot of things going on in Copywriteland that I'm worried about, this isn't one of them. While it's true that consumers often adopt technologies that only serve to benefit the manufacturer of the particular technology, they only do so through laziness. Most people don't have the time or energy to boycott a product that they are 90% happy with because of one or two usage-limiting "features" that they will never see even if in theory they don't like them.
In this case, however, laziness plays the exact opposite role. While pirates are going to step up to the plate and see this as a challenge (perhaps even a welcome one), your average consumer simply won't buy a product that doesn't work in the way they believe it should (in this case, CDs that, well, actually play). It might take a while since public knowledge of this scheme is still very low, but all it's going to take for your average person is one such incident as cited in the article, and you can bet they'll stop buying cd's with those new-fangled operating instructions on the artwork.
In a couple years these ridiculous, half-assed protection schemes are going to be chalked up as a lesson in business failure in some MBA textbook, and beyond that will only be history.
In Soviet Russia, the KGB makes unauthorized copies of you.
...because I love computer games, but I haven't owned a cutting-edge video card in about five years, and if anything my gaming experience has *improved.*
Why? Because ninety percent of the time games that are written to use the features of brand-spankin'-new video cards are so intent on milking the most out of the card's technology that they fail to concentrate on the most important aspect - gameplay. If a game is actually innovative, challenging, and involving, then it's still going to be enjoyable two years from now despite the fact that its graphics aren't quite up to par with the latest offerings.
Because I've got a wimpy 10Mb video card, all of the games I can play on my machine are a year or two old. Sure, this means that I miss out on a lot of the online gaming experience - a lot of the multiplayer servers for a game are dead by the time I get around to playing it. But if those servers have disappeared inside of eighteen months, then how good was the game in the first place? Half-Life is pushing five years now, and there are still tons of places to play it.
$450 for a freakin' video card? Sheesh. Give me a break. I'll wait until they're $100, by which time all the mediocre games will have disappeared into a much-deserved oblivion while I'll just be ready to tackle the top ten of the bunch. Sure, a year and a half is like an eon in computer gaming, but the ones that last the eons are the best anyway.
Chess, anyone?
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I'd be surprised if any of these companies actually wanted their software pirated, even if a unintended (and unproven) side effect of piracy is to boost office sales of a product. As the CEO of Coke said regarding the way the failed introduction of New Coke boosted sales of Classic Coke:
"We're not that stupid, but we're not that smart, either."
In this case, however, laziness plays the exact opposite role. While pirates are going to step up to the plate and see this as a challenge (perhaps even a welcome one), your average consumer simply won't buy a product that doesn't work in the way they believe it should (in this case, CDs that, well, actually play). It might take a while since public knowledge of this scheme is still very low, but all it's going to take for your average person is one such incident as cited in the article, and you can bet they'll stop buying cd's with those new-fangled operating instructions on the artwork.
In a couple years these ridiculous, half-assed protection schemes are going to be chalked up as a lesson in business failure in some MBA textbook, and beyond that will only be history. In Soviet Russia, the KGB makes unauthorized copies of you.
...because I love computer games, but I haven't owned a cutting-edge video card in about five years, and if anything my gaming experience has *improved.* Why? Because ninety percent of the time games that are written to use the features of brand-spankin'-new video cards are so intent on milking the most out of the card's technology that they fail to concentrate on the most important aspect - gameplay. If a game is actually innovative, challenging, and involving, then it's still going to be enjoyable two years from now despite the fact that its graphics aren't quite up to par with the latest offerings. Because I've got a wimpy 10Mb video card, all of the games I can play on my machine are a year or two old. Sure, this means that I miss out on a lot of the online gaming experience - a lot of the multiplayer servers for a game are dead by the time I get around to playing it. But if those servers have disappeared inside of eighteen months, then how good was the game in the first place? Half-Life is pushing five years now, and there are still tons of places to play it. $450 for a freakin' video card? Sheesh. Give me a break. I'll wait until they're $100, by which time all the mediocre games will have disappeared into a much-deserved oblivion while I'll just be ready to tackle the top ten of the bunch. Sure, a year and a half is like an eon in computer gaming, but the ones that last the eons are the best anyway. Chess, anyone?