This is why I hate watching TV or news reports about technology. Because most people are incapable of even setting a timer on a VCR, and the executives try to have their cake and eat it too.
It would be nice to have a channel that truly catered to geek tastes, but that's why it's television and not the Internet. Because the average moron can't be bothered to meet their entertainment halfway. They only want to sit back and be spoonfed. How the fuck else do you explain reality TV?
So stick with chatrooms and sites like slashdot if you want any kind of serious tech discussion. Because while you might get some decent informational value from the Internet, the TV medium is geared to the lowest common denominator, the kind of person who buys products based on the ad. The kind of person who watches MTV, or buys an Ipod because "hay 50 cent had one in a video!!1"
TV's primary audience is DURRR HAY MORGAN WEBB IS HAWT AND THEY'RE TAWLKIN BOUT GTA AND DAT GAME IS SOOO FUCKEN HAWT OMG!!!1 Real nerds know all about GTA, and don't need Snoop Dogg's approval before they can justify the purchase to themselves. Real nerds don't give a fuck that Morgan is hot, because they're BT'ing pr0n at 200kb/s off of empornium.
Nerds should never want their "culture" to be hijacked by the general public.
Equilibrium and Underworld were both multimillion dollar productions by pro studios. They both had big name stars. They each had a theatrical release, though Underworld's was a lot more widespread than Equilibrium.
Until the CG tech REALLY drops in price, and the average filmmaker can convince Christian Bale or Kate Beckinsale to be in their little short, the public isn't going to take interest - one or two "big" names (even if they aren't really all that big) really helps the process of getting a distributor. It worked for Saw! (Danny Glover, anyone?)
The closest thing I can think of is Cabin Fever. The thing was made on 1.5 million, and most of that money obviously went to hiring the four B-list'rs who played the roles. Still, how many filmmakers have 1.5m laying around, and do you think a movie like Cabin Fever - great as it was - would have seen the light of a theater's projector if it had been "Joe Actor" and "Jill Actress" instead of Jordan Ladd and the guy from Boy Meets World? Maybe... but probably not.
Breach of contract suits usually do not target massive fraud by one of America's most "legislator friendly" industries. Sue for breach of contract, and the Hollywood system will blacklist you faster than the "reds" back in the day.
The only union for writers I am aware of is the WGA... and they have more than a healthy working relationship with the bigwigs.
Because they have this naieve idea that if a movie that they wrote and created does well and makes countless millions for studios, they'll see what they are promised in a contract. Instead of this, they see nothing.
No, nobody forces them into it. But how this excuses the massive fraud by the movie studios evades me.
Do you really believe this MPAA company line? If 80 percent of films LOST MONEY, even the 1 in 5 film that was a monster hit wouldn't be able to pick up the slack.
Don't think I'm being a spin doctor file sharer, either. Like the RIAA, these people have no qualms about spinning the books to make it LOOK like they're bleeding money when they're really racking it in.
They do this primarily for two reasons: 1) tax breaks, 2) to keep the royalty money away from those who only see them once the movie "evens." Writers get FUCKED out of their minds all the time because of this sort of thing. An average new writer will write a script for about 50-60k after taxes, but with a royalty rate of about 3-5 percent of the net. OK, groovy. Think of having a just a piece of Spider Man's pie.
Then, think about this: do you know that by Hollywood's "math," Spider Man actually LOST money? Yeah, it amazes me they get away with it too. Hollywood isn't run by Jews, it's run by former Enron lackeys.
First off, I am a semi-pro game reviewer, so take this for what it is worth.
Half Life 2 reminded me a lot of the Matrix series - the first one was just so gosh darn good, they had to grasp at straws for the sequel.
The first three chapters almost feel like a fanfic made by a kid who really liked the Matrix, to a point where he thought "HAY, THE MATRIX WOULD BE COOL MIXED WITH HALF LIFE."
Even the opening cinema amounts to "WAKE UP NEO...ERM...GORDON!" You spend the first three levels running from agent...er, I mean, Combine and Manhacks. You've got a pistol and crowbar, but there are so many enemies that it's easier to run.
After the thousand yard dash, you are thrown into a hoverboat for a terrible, lengthy vehicle sequence.
I'm currently on the fifth level, which seems to be more of the same. I hear it really picks up after Ravenholm, and I'll stick with it. But man, the first third of the game has been pretty unimpressive thus far.
Assuming the parent isn't a complete troll, you're being cruel. If suicide is goddamned cheap, why don't you try it? It will spare the Internet of one more fleeting asshole who thinks his/her words can have no effect because they are "digital."
I don't care if it is just "t3h intarweb!11", you don't fucking make comments like that.
Re:It's like a free ride when you've already paid.
on
GTA: San Andreas Leaked
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· Score: 1, Interesting
Newsflash - game industry profits *exceeded* the movie industry's a long time ago.
EA threatened by piracy? Sony? Rockstar? Microsoft? No. Doom 3, Halo 2, GTA, and Half Life will all be huge sellers regardless of a few thousand kids with mod chips d/ling them.
The amount of piracy in proportion to the total installed base of consoles is so microscopic as to be negligible.(sp)
PC devs might have a better argument, but again, this is what happens when you gouge the consumer - 80 bucks for HL 2 with CS source? No thanks, assholes.
Once again, thanks for your reply and I hope that you can understand my view better.
No, thank YOU for not being the typical/. IP apologetic. It's nice to have the explanation go beyond "it's illegal, so therefore, it's immoral."
And yes, I used to copy games as well and buy them if I liked them so I am hypocritical... call me on that if you want. But my original argument wasn't against that... it was against people downloading a leaked copy and playing it before the game is publicly released.
No, I don't think it makes you hypocritical. I think it makes you intellectually honest. Even most of the people making excuses for draconian IP statutes have downloaded at least one mp3 or movie, just because it was so "shiny and new."
While I don't see myself giving any cash to BB anytime soon, I do have a Gamefly subscription, and I will say that it makes pirating every crap game I have any remote interest in quite counter productive. I'd rather fill my queue and save the bandwidth. I'm "into" games enough to the point where 21 bucks a month ends up being more than worth it.
Isn't this a wonderful example GF has set? Making it so convienient and/or inexpensive to buy the product, that "stealing" it is a waste of time.
I like the Valve/Steam concept, but as is to be expected, Vivendi is being dragged, kicking and screaming into the new business model. Because of legal nasties, Valve is going to release HL2 for the same price on Steam as it costs retail... thereby defeating the purpose.
I understand about consoles - is it really 10 gigs at this point?! I've seen my HDD loader go as high as 6, but that was pretty high end. I thought much of the DVD format was unused or filled with dummy data.
I was thinking more of IP as a whole in terms of the p2p systems - would it be so hard for the RIAA companies to pool their resources to offer every song, ever, in their vaults for 20-25 cents a piece, with 4.99 albums? Would it be so hard to offer in-theater films for 2-3 dollars? I'd imagine that would be quite profitible, since there's very little overhead (server farms would be about it) and the consumer is actually subsidising the bandwidth.
I will probably end up D/Ling it. I will then purchase the game's special edition come release day.
I do not see what you, as a developer, lose from me plunking down 50 bucks for your game on a pre-order with EBgames.com, then deciding to play it a little earlier if that opportunity becomes avalible to me. This was the exactly the case with Doom 3, and I ended up with TWO legit copies when everything was said and done. Did ID lose money because I did this? Or was it more of an "emotional rape" kind of thing where they felt their collective penis shrink 2 inches because they didn't control the day and the date of my install?
I can understand if I seed or distribute once my download is done, you might have a case, because not everyone uses my honor system. But if you get paid, and I get the game, what does it matter to you if I play it a few days... or even a month... early?
If I download a game and buy it after giving it a trial run, how is that any different from renting, aside from cutting Blockbuster's 6 dollar late fees out of the picture?
Again, I realize most game pirates do it because they can. But I'll be honest with you - if I pirate a game, and I like it, I tend to buy the game retail. Especially when it has multiplayer. I may never actually USE the multiplayer, but knowing that I'm without it makes me feel like I'm missing half the game.
On the other hand, if I make a copy of a game, and it doesn't really draw me in, then it doesn't get any more play, and it just stays buried in a pile of garbage. These, I call coasters. Because that's all crappy games are good for.
So I don't mean to sound smug, I really don't. I'm trying to understand what you lose from folks like me doing what we do. If I did, perhaps I wouldn't do it.
I agree with you on the movie analogy - 50 dollars for a game like Halo 2 or GTA is a much better value than 2 hours for 25 bucks (with concessions factored in.) That's why I'm more likely to pirate a movie than a game - because the game industry hasn't gouged the consumer on a regular basis, just because they can... yet.
Finally, it needs to be said, and again, I'm not trying to be "omg well I deserve it for free" here - asking eager gamers with the means and the hardware to get Halo 2 early is like asking someone who finds a million bucks on the street to not spend it out of respect for the US Mint.
It's sweet, it's a cute lesson that ought to be in a citizenship/ethics textbook, but in real world terms, it just doesn't happen.
I must ask - why is it so frustrating and disappointing to see your game pirated? Did you expect anything else? You had to know this before going into production. The more popular a title is, the more widely avalible it is on p2p networks. If I were you, I'd be more worried if the pirates IGNORED your work.
I wish more companies would use p2p networks to build a new content distrubution platform. I'm not talking about things like iTunes, where an old business model is dragged kicking and screaming into cyberspace.
I'm talking about a model that takes advantage of the benefits of the medium, and passes those costs along to the consumer. Of course, that's a dirty no-no: even if there is no packaging cost, we must still charge the consumer for it... because we can.
I wonder if it has ever occured to anyone that the media could by all rights be free. Imagine the ad revenue from putting a Mountain Dew ad in the loading screen of Halo 2, and being able to get the game for 5 bucks or less. Imagine being able to walk into a theater for free if you get there in time to watch ads. This is where the future is heading, I think.
I meant in terms of approval, though even that seems to be waning.
Yes, I agree it's a pointless war. Afghanistan was one thing, but they're using 9/11 as a blank check to force American elitist BS on anyone they so choose... including non-elite Americans.
Something I didn't think of before, but really illustrates my point:
These "IP" laws have really become like the speed laws. Your driver instructor tells you that yes, you can get fined, etc. for going 5 over the speed limit, or for putting the hood of your car over the white stop bar at traffic lights. But in reality, how much does this happen? (and spare me your "I live in a hick town where the one cop in town has a vendetta against my family so yes it happens" tales.)
Likewise, who ever gets sued for downloading a single mp3? How long will it take them to sue everyone? How long will it take them to sue enough folks to make anyone care? Will anyone care? The way I see it, I have about 8000 songs on my PC. Assuming I were a dirty pirate, and assuming they were all illegally aquired, if the RIAA came after me and demanded a 5000 dolalr settlement, I'd actually view myself as getting a pretty cheap deal, as opposed as to if I had gone through iTunes, etc.
They can't slap casual swappers with the "max fines" they advertise (250k per work,) because it would cause outrage. They're damned if they do, damned if they don't. I don't envy the RIAA at this point!
And unlike drugs and terror, the politicians will never get the support they need from the masses to continue their latest favor crusade to the big cartels.
The war on terror is working because the majority of McWalmart Americans are convinced that them dirty a-rabs are just tootin' to bring their hoity toity core-anne over here and shove it down our capitalist lovin', god-fearin' country's throat.
The war on drugs worked because well-to-do soccer moms were and are scared that their Harvard-bound princesses will end up giving blowjobs for coke, or that their sons will end up slanging yayo in the hood.
What's going to be the hook for Joe Sixpack to endorse the "War on Piracy?" The fact that CD prices may rise even more? That Regal and AMC might up the price from 8.50 to 9 bucks?
Unlike the terror and drug "wars," the middle class constituents that these piggish fucks in DC need to support their endeavors will not see the importance of "waging war" on something that they do not percieve as a threat. They will not see the justice in their sons and daughters becoming someone's bitch in a maximum security prison for what amounts to petty "theft" (and yes, I know it's not really theft. But we must keep it simple for the simpletons, both on/, and in the real world).
The 60 million people who file swap "illegally" in this country cannot all be put in prison. If they try, they'll be met with protest and the backlash from the public. Becausse file swapping is such a part of our culture now that all the laws in the world won't make any difference. They've lost, rightly or wrongly.
Your argument just hung itself. Quite ironic that you're discussing "social contracts."
The "social contract" of copyright suggests that these megacorps will be able to make money on the condition that the time of their monopoly is both limited and reasonable.
While the copyright terms are still technically limited, in the "infinity minus one" sense, they are not reasonable. And while reasonable is certainly one of those subjective words that keep lawyers in business, I doubt there's much room in calling a timeframe that will prevent any new work from passing into the domain in a person's lifetime as "reasonable."
And by the way, I don't know about your country, but in America, the "live by the rules of the system" clause is only valid so long as the system hasn't become rotten. When it has, we have a duty to break it down and rebuild. The copyright laws have become rotten. Time to redesign them.
I fail to see what this has to do with a contract - EULAs are not contracts, regardless of what the bought-and-paid-for courts say. Are you telling me I can now be held to some bullshit contract by refraining from purchasing something?
What about the contract they broke with the public? The one where they get their millions of dollars and lear jets and 37 bottles of a specific brand of water backstage at any given concert as long as they nurture the public domain?
They fucked us, broke the contract, why should I feel bad about fucking them right back in the ass? Because Orrin Hatch says so? Fuck him.
You know what? That's a damn fine script idea. You ought to write the screenplay and try and sell it on spec. Just put a different name on it.
I can, however, tell you why Doom and all other licensed properties never get the perfect treatment they deserve.
1. Ego
The film industry has always, and will always, feel that they are artistically superior as a medium to video games. Despite the fact that Doom 3 probably made more in one day than their Chronicles of Riddick made in its entire run, they still view "their" ideas as being better than Carmack's.
When Max Payne - a game with enough built in material for 2 films - hits the screen, you can be assured there will be only a passing resemblance to the game. Ms. Valkyr will probably end up being played by Jessica Simpson, and Payne will most likely be played by Vin Diesel. Also, in an attempt to get a PG-13 rating, Valkyr will become Valka-Cola.
2. The Fans Can Do Better, But They Don't Know The Right People
I'm sure the industry elitists will flame me for this, but the simple fact is that there are probably 20 different scripts for any given conversion that are better than what was actually put on the screen. A dedicated group of fans could have done better with AvP and Street Fighter. They took a classic franchise for geeks and turned it into a teen flick. I'm sure it will be the same with Doom. Remember the Lost in Space update (which I liked)? I can see the Doom movie being something like that, but with zombies instead of spiders.
3. The Game's Audience Is Generally Smarter Than The Movie's Audience
Continuing the "It's not what you know..." situation, Resident Evil will always suck in my mind because they threw away a godsend based on petty Hollywood politics.
You know who was originally signed to write and direct the film? George Romero, the man who all but invented the modern zombie film. Capcom then fired him because his script "wasn't good enough," then turned around and hired the man behind Mortal Kombat.
What Capcom really means is that Romero's script stuck too close to the game, and that would have alienated people who couldn't follow an intelligent plot - otherwise known as 75 percent of the moviegoing public. What they needed was a shallow, plotless movie with lots of EXPLOSIONS and EYE CANDY and HOT CHICKS, not a well-written film that stuck to the source material.
It's different, Mr. E-toughguy.
If your property is 2 acres, chances are that someone would have to be on your property to look in. This is indeed trespassing.
Now then, if you lived in a typical neighborhood, and you left the windows open as you changed clothes, tell me - would you "blow my fucking head off" if I was looking from my own property? What about out in the public street? If so, I'd like to see you explain that one to the judge in your trial for a little thing we call "murder."
And instead of taking such drastic measures as "blowing someones head off," why don't you try just, say, closing the fucking blinds? Oh yeah, I forgot... because you're an E-TOUGHGUY!!!1111
But thats my choice. I think most content creators SHOULD put their works into the public domain, and I think works should have to be reregistered by the original owner after X amount of years to remain copyrighted, but past that, I think the laws are fair.
This isn't a damn thing in Copyright that is to the public's good that couldn't be reproduced in another format without stealing the original authors work that would save a single life out there or contribute to the pubic good. How is keep Mickey Mouse or Donald Duck out of the public domain hurting anyone. I don't see it. Then again, I also believe people need to be less consuming and more creating.
You just don't get it, do you? It's not "your choice." As a general rule, the successful "content creators" do not own their own work today. To get anywhere on a national level with it in this day of bottlenecked media exposure, they've got to have a corporate sugar daddy that will rape them with unfair contract terms. Why? Because they can. How does this protect the sacred "creators' rights" again?
And, I hate to shatter your world, but the only reason the copyright laws exist in the first place is to FURTHER THE PUBLIC DOMAIN. By being forced to pay for things for a limited basis, we ensure that creators have reason to continue to create.
But the key word there (and in the Constitution, which you seem to think is subservient to such laws as the Bono Act) is "limited." I understand that both the corps and the courts have come out in favor of the "infinity -1 is legal" argument, but then again, it's in their interests to do so! Shed your ego for a moment, and consider this - even for someone born TODAY, no current or recent works will pass into the PD in their lifetime. Does that sound like a "limited" time in the spirit of the law?
The simple fact is that under the Constitution, you elitists have NO RIGHT to an infinite chokehold over your own work. Lucky for you, we live in a nation that all but ignores that document.
Nearly all the music on my PC is pirated, and guess what? I don't give a fuck.
You know what? I'll even call a spade a spade - I don't have any intention of using iTunes at 99 cents. The record companies dropped the ball, and I am now used to getting for free what I had previously paid 18 bucks a pop for. Do I feel bad? Not in the least.
They dropped the ball when they made huge scenes at press conferences with Lars and Hilary standing side by side to fight the evil p2p'ers. They dropped the ball when they refused to work towards some mutually beneficial pricing scheme that would *gasp* give both artists and consumers a fair shake! Instead, they charge 1.00 a song, which can run you into paying MORE than you would had you just bought the CD.
Meanwhile, I can get the same thing for free. I provide the bandwidth, they have no packaging costs, why should I pay MORE than I would for the physical media? Because they say so? Fuck them. I know the IP apologists on/. won't like this, but they'll have to accept the fact that we're quietly moving into an era where the consumer - the person that both the creator and the corps rely on - is being returned to his rightful place of power.
What's that? You want to "license" me your content and sign my rights away with a clickthrough EULA? That's so cute... fuck you. In case you haven't noticed yet, you are on the losing end of a battle that has been going on for almost 5 years now. The only way you'll win is to make it easier to buy your shit than it is to steal it. That means *gasp* reduced profit margins for the corps, and *2x gasp!* no more bullshit rockstar lifestyles for the golden idols!
This means that the creation of music, movies, etc. would become...*shudders*...ANOTHER NORMAL JOB that you would actually have to be GOOD at and keep IMPROVING on to keep your position! Holy shit, we can't have that now, can we?!
This isn't Avril sucks/Avril r0x. It's not about her. I only used her as an example. If they hadn't picked her out of nothingness to elevate to golden calf status, it would have been someone else. That's the problem with the media system as it is - it's less about having the best content rise to the top, and more about having an almost random lottery to pick people from the "great unwashed" to become "superstars."
If you don't see how that kills culture, I don't know how to get through to you. I certainly will not resort to your level - for someone calling me "junior" and "little boy," you sure have a lot of childish insults up your sleeve that are in no way relevant to the discussion.
But who will clip their wings? The government? Good luck with THAT. The consumers? Not when there's a deeply-rooted fixation on the machine and the product it produces.
This isn't some anti-capitalist rant. It's about saving our culture, and fixing the current system, where the keys to artistic speech are kept in the hands of a select few. I do not mean "the government should subsidize my 100 million dollar movie," I'm talking about a world where our public airwaves are avalible for anyone to use at a reasonable fee.
People like the crap the RIAA puts out. But the fact is that most people are sheep, and will like what you tell them to like, if you repeat it enough. Yes, this does make my tastes more correct than their own - because I formed my opinion on my own, not by listening to what MTV and the corps tell me to like.
Define quality. The RIAA does not produce "quality" music. They turn shitty looking, shitty sounding people into golden idols to be worshipped by the masses. Have you ever heard an Avril Lavigne live performance? I saw a clip once, and it was the most horrendous thing I have ever seen or heard. The girl couldn't carry a tune to save her life, her voice was cracking, and the pounds of makeup on her face were dripping like she was the wicked witch, melting under the burning lights. It's not about "quality" music, it's about smoke and mirrors to create a God/Goddess for the masses to "tithe" to.
Another thing, who says we need the radio, MTV, cross promotions with Pepsi, 2 million dollar ads on the Superbowl to get any kind of message across? The internet pretty much makes all that irrelevant, or at least reduced in importance. It's cheaper to advertise on the net, and easier to target a specific demographic. Fuck the RIAA, fuck the MPAA, and fuck this outdated Matrix-like system where the big advertising corps are "holding all the keys."
Slashdot Mirror
It would be nice to have a channel that truly catered to geek tastes, but that's why it's television and not the Internet. Because the average moron can't be bothered to meet their entertainment halfway. They only want to sit back and be spoonfed. How the fuck else do you explain reality TV?
So stick with chatrooms and sites like slashdot if you want any kind of serious tech discussion. Because while you might get some decent informational value from the Internet, the TV medium is geared to the lowest common denominator, the kind of person who buys products based on the ad. The kind of person who watches MTV, or buys an Ipod because "hay 50 cent had one in a video!!1"
TV's primary audience is DURRR HAY MORGAN WEBB IS HAWT AND THEY'RE TAWLKIN BOUT GTA AND DAT GAME IS SOOO FUCKEN HAWT OMG!!!1 Real nerds know all about GTA, and don't need Snoop Dogg's approval before they can justify the purchase to themselves. Real nerds don't give a fuck that Morgan is hot, because they're BT'ing pr0n at 200kb/s off of empornium.
Nerds should never want their "culture" to be hijacked by the general public.
Until the CG tech REALLY drops in price, and the average filmmaker can convince Christian Bale or Kate Beckinsale to be in their little short, the public isn't going to take interest - one or two "big" names (even if they aren't really all that big) really helps the process of getting a distributor. It worked for Saw! (Danny Glover, anyone?)
The closest thing I can think of is Cabin Fever. The thing was made on 1.5 million, and most of that money obviously went to hiring the four B-list'rs who played the roles. Still, how many filmmakers have 1.5m laying around, and do you think a movie like Cabin Fever - great as it was - would have seen the light of a theater's projector if it had been "Joe Actor" and "Jill Actress" instead of Jordan Ladd and the guy from Boy Meets World? Maybe... but probably not.
The only union for writers I am aware of is the WGA... and they have more than a healthy working relationship with the bigwigs.
No, nobody forces them into it. But how this excuses the massive fraud by the movie studios evades me.
Do you really believe this MPAA company line? If 80 percent of films LOST MONEY, even the 1 in 5 film that was a monster hit wouldn't be able to pick up the slack. Don't think I'm being a spin doctor file sharer, either. Like the RIAA, these people have no qualms about spinning the books to make it LOOK like they're bleeding money when they're really racking it in. They do this primarily for two reasons: 1) tax breaks, 2) to keep the royalty money away from those who only see them once the movie "evens." Writers get FUCKED out of their minds all the time because of this sort of thing. An average new writer will write a script for about 50-60k after taxes, but with a royalty rate of about 3-5 percent of the net. OK, groovy. Think of having a just a piece of Spider Man's pie. Then, think about this: do you know that by Hollywood's "math," Spider Man actually LOST money? Yeah, it amazes me they get away with it too. Hollywood isn't run by Jews, it's run by former Enron lackeys.
First off, I am a semi-pro game reviewer, so take this for what it is worth.
Half Life 2 reminded me a lot of the Matrix series - the first one was just so gosh darn good, they had to grasp at straws for the sequel.
The first three chapters almost feel like a fanfic made by a kid who really liked the Matrix, to a point where he thought "HAY, THE MATRIX WOULD BE COOL MIXED WITH HALF LIFE."
Even the opening cinema amounts to "WAKE UP NEO...ERM...GORDON!" You spend the first three levels running from agent...er, I mean, Combine and Manhacks. You've got a pistol and crowbar, but there are so many enemies that it's easier to run.
After the thousand yard dash, you are thrown into a hoverboat for a terrible, lengthy vehicle sequence.
I'm currently on the fifth level, which seems to be more of the same. I hear it really picks up after Ravenholm, and I'll stick with it. But man, the first third of the game has been pretty unimpressive thus far.
You forgot:
8 - Go bankrupt after our prisons and court system are filled with millions of people who are guilty of nothing more than using a computer.
Assuming the parent isn't a complete troll, you're being cruel. If suicide is goddamned cheap, why don't you try it? It will spare the Internet of one more fleeting asshole who thinks his/her words can have no effect because they are "digital." I don't care if it is just "t3h intarweb!11", you don't fucking make comments like that.
Newsflash - game industry profits *exceeded* the movie industry's a long time ago.
EA threatened by piracy? Sony? Rockstar? Microsoft? No. Doom 3, Halo 2, GTA, and Half Life will all be huge sellers regardless of a few thousand kids with mod chips d/ling them.
The amount of piracy in proportion to the total installed base of consoles is so microscopic as to be negligible.(sp)
PC devs might have a better argument, but again, this is what happens when you gouge the consumer - 80 bucks for HL 2 with CS source? No thanks, assholes.
Once again, thanks for your reply and I hope that you can understand my view better.
/. IP apologetic. It's nice to have the explanation go beyond "it's illegal, so therefore, it's immoral."
No, thank YOU for not being the typical
And yes, I used to copy games as well and buy them if I liked them so I am hypocritical... call me on that if you want. But my original argument wasn't against that... it was against people downloading a leaked copy and playing it before the game is publicly released.
No, I don't think it makes you hypocritical. I think it makes you intellectually honest. Even most of the people making excuses for draconian IP statutes have downloaded at least one mp3 or movie, just because it was so "shiny and new."
While I don't see myself giving any cash to BB anytime soon, I do have a Gamefly subscription, and I will say that it makes pirating every crap game I have any remote interest in quite counter productive. I'd rather fill my queue and save the bandwidth. I'm "into" games enough to the point where 21 bucks a month ends up being more than worth it.
Isn't this a wonderful example GF has set? Making it so convienient and/or inexpensive to buy the product, that "stealing" it is a waste of time.
I like the Valve/Steam concept, but as is to be expected, Vivendi is being dragged, kicking and screaming into the new business model. Because of legal nasties, Valve is going to release HL2 for the same price on Steam as it costs retail... thereby defeating the purpose.
I understand about consoles - is it really 10 gigs at this point?! I've seen my HDD loader go as high as 6, but that was pretty high end. I thought much of the DVD format was unused or filled with dummy data.
I was thinking more of IP as a whole in terms of the p2p systems - would it be so hard for the RIAA companies to pool their resources to offer every song, ever, in their vaults for 20-25 cents a piece, with 4.99 albums? Would it be so hard to offer in-theater films for 2-3 dollars? I'd imagine that would be quite profitible, since there's very little overhead (server farms would be about it) and the consumer is actually subsidising the bandwidth.
No, see... what I will do is this.
I will probably end up D/Ling it. I will then purchase the game's special edition come release day.
I do not see what you, as a developer, lose from me plunking down 50 bucks for your game on a pre-order with EBgames.com, then deciding to play it a little earlier if that opportunity becomes avalible to me. This was the exactly the case with Doom 3, and I ended up with TWO legit copies when everything was said and done. Did ID lose money because I did this? Or was it more of an "emotional rape" kind of thing where they felt their collective penis shrink 2 inches because they didn't control the day and the date of my install?
I can understand if I seed or distribute once my download is done, you might have a case, because not everyone uses my honor system. But if you get paid, and I get the game, what does it matter to you if I play it a few days... or even a month... early?
If I download a game and buy it after giving it a trial run, how is that any different from renting, aside from cutting Blockbuster's 6 dollar late fees out of the picture?
Again, I realize most game pirates do it because they can. But I'll be honest with you - if I pirate a game, and I like it, I tend to buy the game retail. Especially when it has multiplayer. I may never actually USE the multiplayer, but knowing that I'm without it makes me feel like I'm missing half the game.
On the other hand, if I make a copy of a game, and it doesn't really draw me in, then it doesn't get any more play, and it just stays buried in a pile of garbage. These, I call coasters. Because that's all crappy games are good for.
So I don't mean to sound smug, I really don't. I'm trying to understand what you lose from folks like me doing what we do. If I did, perhaps I wouldn't do it.
I agree with you on the movie analogy - 50 dollars for a game like Halo 2 or GTA is a much better value than 2 hours for 25 bucks (with concessions factored in.) That's why I'm more likely to pirate a movie than a game - because the game industry hasn't gouged the consumer on a regular basis, just because they can... yet.
Finally, it needs to be said, and again, I'm not trying to be "omg well I deserve it for free" here - asking eager gamers with the means and the hardware to get Halo 2 early is like asking someone who finds a million bucks on the street to not spend it out of respect for the US Mint.
It's sweet, it's a cute lesson that ought to be in a citizenship/ethics textbook, but in real world terms, it just doesn't happen.
I must ask - why is it so frustrating and disappointing to see your game pirated? Did you expect anything else? You had to know this before going into production. The more popular a title is, the more widely avalible it is on p2p networks. If I were you, I'd be more worried if the pirates IGNORED your work.
I wish more companies would use p2p networks to build a new content distrubution platform. I'm not talking about things like iTunes, where an old business model is dragged kicking and screaming into cyberspace.
I'm talking about a model that takes advantage of the benefits of the medium, and passes those costs along to the consumer. Of course, that's a dirty no-no: even if there is no packaging cost, we must still charge the consumer for it... because we can.
I wonder if it has ever occured to anyone that the media could by all rights be free. Imagine the ad revenue from putting a Mountain Dew ad in the loading screen of Halo 2, and being able to get the game for 5 bucks or less. Imagine being able to walk into a theater for free if you get there in time to watch ads. This is where the future is heading, I think.
I meant in terms of approval, though even that seems to be waning.
Yes, I agree it's a pointless war. Afghanistan was one thing, but they're using 9/11 as a blank check to force American elitist BS on anyone they so choose... including non-elite Americans.
I submitted this something like five minutes before that IP story showed up. Then, I had that same thought.
/. within like ten minutes of being put on GS.
Weird how stuff like that works.
Honestly, I had thought this would have been on
Something I didn't think of before, but really illustrates my point:
These "IP" laws have really become like the speed laws. Your driver instructor tells you that yes, you can get fined, etc. for going 5 over the speed limit, or for putting the hood of your car over the white stop bar at traffic lights. But in reality, how much does this happen? (and spare me your "I live in a hick town where the one cop in town has a vendetta against my family so yes it happens" tales.)
Likewise, who ever gets sued for downloading a single mp3? How long will it take them to sue everyone? How long will it take them to sue enough folks to make anyone care? Will anyone care? The way I see it, I have about 8000 songs on my PC. Assuming I were a dirty pirate, and assuming they were all illegally aquired, if the RIAA came after me and demanded a 5000 dolalr settlement, I'd actually view myself as getting a pretty cheap deal, as opposed as to if I had gone through iTunes, etc.
They can't slap casual swappers with the "max fines" they advertise (250k per work,) because it would cause outrage. They're damned if they do, damned if they don't. I don't envy the RIAA at this point!
And like drugs and terror, you'll never stop it.
/, and in the real world).
And unlike drugs and terror, the politicians will never get the support they need from the masses to continue their latest favor crusade to the big cartels.
The war on terror is working because the majority of McWalmart Americans are convinced that them dirty a-rabs are just tootin' to bring their hoity toity core-anne over here and shove it down our capitalist lovin', god-fearin' country's throat.
The war on drugs worked because well-to-do soccer moms were and are scared that their Harvard-bound princesses will end up giving blowjobs for coke, or that their sons will end up slanging yayo in the hood.
What's going to be the hook for Joe Sixpack to endorse the "War on Piracy?" The fact that CD prices may rise even more? That Regal and AMC might up the price from 8.50 to 9 bucks?
Unlike the terror and drug "wars," the middle class constituents that these piggish fucks in DC need to support their endeavors will not see the importance of "waging war" on something that they do not percieve as a threat. They will not see the justice in their sons and daughters becoming someone's bitch in a maximum security prison for what amounts to petty "theft" (and yes, I know it's not really theft. But we must keep it simple for the simpletons, both on
The 60 million people who file swap "illegally" in this country cannot all be put in prison. If they try, they'll be met with protest and the backlash from the public. Becausse file swapping is such a part of our culture now that all the laws in the world won't make any difference. They've lost, rightly or wrongly.
Your argument just hung itself. Quite ironic that you're discussing "social contracts." The "social contract" of copyright suggests that these megacorps will be able to make money on the condition that the time of their monopoly is both limited and reasonable. While the copyright terms are still technically limited, in the "infinity minus one" sense, they are not reasonable. And while reasonable is certainly one of those subjective words that keep lawyers in business, I doubt there's much room in calling a timeframe that will prevent any new work from passing into the domain in a person's lifetime as "reasonable." And by the way, I don't know about your country, but in America, the "live by the rules of the system" clause is only valid so long as the system hasn't become rotten. When it has, we have a duty to break it down and rebuild. The copyright laws have become rotten. Time to redesign them.
I fail to see what this has to do with a contract - EULAs are not contracts, regardless of what the bought-and-paid-for courts say. Are you telling me I can now be held to some bullshit contract by refraining from purchasing something?
What about the contract they broke with the public? The one where they get their millions of dollars and lear jets and 37 bottles of a specific brand of water backstage at any given concert as long as they nurture the public domain?
They fucked us, broke the contract, why should I feel bad about fucking them right back in the ass? Because Orrin Hatch says so? Fuck him.
You know what? That's a damn fine script idea. You ought to write the screenplay and try and sell it on spec. Just put a different name on it.
I can, however, tell you why Doom and all other licensed properties never get the perfect treatment they deserve.
1. Ego
The film industry has always, and will always, feel that they are artistically superior as a medium to video games. Despite the fact that Doom 3 probably made more in one day than their Chronicles of Riddick made in its entire run, they still view "their" ideas as being better than Carmack's.
When Max Payne - a game with enough built in material for 2 films - hits the screen, you can be assured there will be only a passing resemblance to the game. Ms. Valkyr will probably end up being played by Jessica Simpson, and Payne will most likely be played by Vin Diesel. Also, in an attempt to get a PG-13 rating, Valkyr will become Valka-Cola.
2. The Fans Can Do Better, But They Don't Know The Right People
I'm sure the industry elitists will flame me for this, but the simple fact is that there are probably 20 different scripts for any given conversion that are better than what was actually put on the screen. A dedicated group of fans could have done better with AvP and Street Fighter. They took a classic franchise for geeks and turned it into a teen flick. I'm sure it will be the same with Doom. Remember the Lost in Space update (which I liked)? I can see the Doom movie being something like that, but with zombies instead of spiders.
3. The Game's Audience Is Generally Smarter Than The Movie's Audience
Continuing the "It's not what you know..." situation, Resident Evil will always suck in my mind because they threw away a godsend based on petty Hollywood politics.
You know who was originally signed to write and direct the film? George Romero, the man who all but invented the modern zombie film. Capcom then fired him because his script "wasn't good enough," then turned around and hired the man behind Mortal Kombat.
What Capcom really means is that Romero's script stuck too close to the game, and that would have alienated people who couldn't follow an intelligent plot - otherwise known as 75 percent of the moviegoing public. What they needed was a shallow, plotless movie with lots of EXPLOSIONS and EYE CANDY and HOT CHICKS, not a well-written film that stuck to the source material.
It's different, Mr. E-toughguy. If your property is 2 acres, chances are that someone would have to be on your property to look in. This is indeed trespassing. Now then, if you lived in a typical neighborhood, and you left the windows open as you changed clothes, tell me - would you "blow my fucking head off" if I was looking from my own property? What about out in the public street? If so, I'd like to see you explain that one to the judge in your trial for a little thing we call "murder." And instead of taking such drastic measures as "blowing someones head off," why don't you try just, say, closing the fucking blinds? Oh yeah, I forgot... because you're an E-TOUGHGUY!!!1111
This isn't a damn thing in Copyright that is to the public's good that couldn't be reproduced in another format without stealing the original authors work that would save a single life out there or contribute to the pubic good. How is keep Mickey Mouse or Donald Duck out of the public domain hurting anyone. I don't see it. Then again, I also believe people need to be less consuming and more creating.
You just don't get it, do you? It's not "your choice." As a general rule, the successful "content creators" do not own their own work today. To get anywhere on a national level with it in this day of bottlenecked media exposure, they've got to have a corporate sugar daddy that will rape them with unfair contract terms. Why? Because they can. How does this protect the sacred "creators' rights" again?
And, I hate to shatter your world, but the only reason the copyright laws exist in the first place is to FURTHER THE PUBLIC DOMAIN. By being forced to pay for things for a limited basis, we ensure that creators have reason to continue to create.
But the key word there (and in the Constitution, which you seem to think is subservient to such laws as the Bono Act) is "limited." I understand that both the corps and the courts have come out in favor of the "infinity -1 is legal" argument, but then again, it's in their interests to do so! Shed your ego for a moment, and consider this - even for someone born TODAY, no current or recent works will pass into the PD in their lifetime. Does that sound like a "limited" time in the spirit of the law?
The simple fact is that under the Constitution, you elitists have NO RIGHT to an infinite chokehold over your own work. Lucky for you, we live in a nation that all but ignores that document.
You know what? I'll even call a spade a spade - I don't have any intention of using iTunes at 99 cents. The record companies dropped the ball, and I am now used to getting for free what I had previously paid 18 bucks a pop for. Do I feel bad? Not in the least.
/. won't like this, but they'll have to accept the fact that we're quietly moving into an era where the consumer - the person that both the creator and the corps rely on - is being returned to his rightful place of power.
They dropped the ball when they made huge scenes at press conferences with Lars and Hilary standing side by side to fight the evil p2p'ers. They dropped the ball when they refused to work towards some mutually beneficial pricing scheme that would *gasp* give both artists and consumers a fair shake! Instead, they charge 1.00 a song, which can run you into paying MORE than you would had you just bought the CD.
Meanwhile, I can get the same thing for free. I provide the bandwidth, they have no packaging costs, why should I pay MORE than I would for the physical media? Because they say so? Fuck them. I know the IP apologists on
What's that? You want to "license" me your content and sign my rights away with a clickthrough EULA? That's so cute... fuck you. In case you haven't noticed yet, you are on the losing end of a battle that has been going on for almost 5 years now. The only way you'll win is to make it easier to buy your shit than it is to steal it. That means *gasp* reduced profit margins for the corps, and *2x gasp!* no more bullshit rockstar lifestyles for the golden idols!
This means that the creation of music, movies, etc. would become...*shudders*...ANOTHER NORMAL JOB that you would actually have to be GOOD at and keep IMPROVING on to keep your position! Holy shit, we can't have that now, can we?!
Kiss my ass. Mod me down. Go ahead, I've got the karma to burn.
This isn't Avril sucks/Avril r0x. It's not about her. I only used her as an example. If they hadn't picked her out of nothingness to elevate to golden calf status, it would have been someone else. That's the problem with the media system as it is - it's less about having the best content rise to the top, and more about having an almost random lottery to pick people from the "great unwashed" to become "superstars."
If you don't see how that kills culture, I don't know how to get through to you. I certainly will not resort to your level - for someone calling me "junior" and "little boy," you sure have a lot of childish insults up your sleeve that are in no way relevant to the discussion.
This isn't some anti-capitalist rant. It's about saving our culture, and fixing the current system, where the keys to artistic speech are kept in the hands of a select few. I do not mean "the government should subsidize my 100 million dollar movie," I'm talking about a world where our public airwaves are avalible for anyone to use at a reasonable fee.
People like the crap the RIAA puts out. But the fact is that most people are sheep, and will like what you tell them to like, if you repeat it enough. Yes, this does make my tastes more correct than their own - because I formed my opinion on my own, not by listening to what MTV and the corps tell me to like.
Another thing, who says we need the radio, MTV, cross promotions with Pepsi, 2 million dollar ads on the Superbowl to get any kind of message across? The internet pretty much makes all that irrelevant, or at least reduced in importance. It's cheaper to advertise on the net, and easier to target a specific demographic. Fuck the RIAA, fuck the MPAA, and fuck this outdated Matrix-like system where the big advertising corps are "holding all the keys."