No CD Petition

[alva]

You were saying something reasonable?

[LzPrst]

I too think that all copyprotection should disappear. away with it. people will buy stuff they really like.

[Akaoz]

Originally posted by Shivan
bah. there's no excellent answer

QFT

[rjwoer]

Two words: intellectual property.

It really doesn't matter what we think; it only matters what the owners of the intellectual property think. The rest is just noise.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by rjwoer
Two words: intellectual property.

It really doesn't matter what we think; it only matters what the owners of the intellectual property think. The rest is just noise.

First, my obligatory objection to the term "intellectual property."

As it was said else where, people who use the term are either confused or are trying to confuse others intentionally. In the United States the term covers four vastly different things: copyrights, patents, trademarks, and trade secrets. Each of these is very different from the rest, so lumping them all together will serve only to confuse.

More importantly, consumers can speak with their wallets. Write to the game developers or publishers indicating your dislike of "copy protection," and don't buy any games that comes with it.

[armchairknight]

Originally posted by rjwoer
Two words: intellectual property.

It really doesn't matter what we think; it only matters what the owners of the intellectual property think. The rest is just noise.

Yeah, but it's our noise. Doesn't that matter?

[armchairknight]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


First, my obligatory objection to the term "intellectual property."

As it was said else where, people who use the term are either confused or are trying to confuse others intentionally. In the United States the term covers four vastly different things: copyrights, patents, trademarks, and trade secrets. Each of these is very different from the rest, so lumping them all together will serve only to confuse.

More importantly, consumers can speak with their wallets. Write to the game developers or publishers indicating your dislike of "copy protection," and don't buy any games that comes with it.

Like the outcry that erupted from the StarForce debacle? I agree. Our money is our voice.

[padillah]

OK, before this gets closed for being INSANELY off topic:

@nbarclay: I believe I am reading your posts carefully enough, I don't think I'm explaining myself well enough, I'm sorry for that.

My issue stems from the fact that you seem to believe that you have the right to determine how much worth a person can demand for their works. Whereas I believe that a person owns the work they produce.

That clash is most obvious in the music industry, where the industry expects poor college students to pay a bunch of money to help record companies and multimillionaire singers get even richer than they already are.

Unless I am misunderstanding you would have a "salary cap" on artists. So Stevie Wonder, one of the greatest singer/songwriters ever shouldn't make any more money simply because a review board decided he's "made enough"? Sorry, but that is decidedly anti-capitalist.

This is not a question of how much the originator of the product has made, it's a question of how much the product is worth to you.

For example: Star Wars, was that worth $8 to see in the theatres? To many people, it was. And so revenue was generated based on that.

Gili, was that worth $8 to see in the theatres? To many, many people, it wasn't. And it failed to make sufficient revenue.

I program computers for a living. People pay me a decent amount to do so. Yes, I could work for less but, to me, my time, effort, intelligence, and skill are worth what I am asking (and, indeed, getting). Why should an actor or singer or artists not have the same privledge?

Your suggestions have far wider implications than simple copyright refinement. The suggestions I've seen here are tantamount to Communism, the bad kind. Certain people should only be allowed to earn a limited amount of money.

As for the example you sited, it's obviously false or skewed because, as the system exists now bands are doing fine and you'd be hard pressed to find a 15 year-old that has starved to death because they spent their last $15 on a CD. Which only points back to personal worth, if they are looking at their last $15 and they can buy food or a CD and they buy the CD you want to blame the band and the record label? How about blaming the parents for not instilling some friggin' sense into these kids.

A lot of people on this board are saying "Speak with your wallet", yet few realise they are doing just that, every time they make a purchase. You want to revamp the economic system in this country let's start with the values system and go from there. As soon as people start valuing life more than a pair of tennis shoes then we can get to the more etheric values like is Civ4 worth $30 or $50.

Tom P.

[LordShiva]

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by padillah
Your suggestions have far wider implications than simple copyright refinement. The suggestions I've seen here are tantamount to Communism, the bad kind. Certain people should only be allowed to earn a limited amount of money.

FWIW, Jefferson originally refused to vote for the copyright law in the US. Only later did Madison managed to convince him that copyright was an incentive for artists to create more works instead of some sort of reward scheme.

The original intent seems to have all but remembered, as the Sonny-Bono Extension Act increased the copyright duration to 90 years (originally 17 years or a similar duration) after the death of the creator, just in time to save Mickey Mouse from falling into the public domain. Wouldn't that be a shame?

[rjwoer]

This is interesting. I've enjoyed reading the posts since mine. I like this kind of noise; good points all around.

[KingSpartanPete]

Sorry but alot of this is sooo wrong.

Sure if a game is good then its loyal fans like member of this board will buy it, but if you think the masses will still buy it when they could copy or download a game without any protection at all, then you are deluded.

And a games company can not excist for years on a project based on just its loyal fans sales.

[Adagio]

Originally posted by KingSpartanPete
Sure if a game is good then its loyal fans like member of this board will buy it, but if you think the masses will still buy it when they could copy or download a game without any protection at all, then you are deluded.

AFAIK GalCiv2 doesn't have any copy protection at all, but still it's one of the best selling games (or at least that's what the creator of the game said in an interview back when it was just released
The only "copy protection" the game has, is it's unique cd-key, which you need to use to download updates

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by KingSpartanPete
Sure if a game is good then its loyal fans like member of this board will buy it, but if you think the masses will still buy it when they could copy or download a game without any protection at all, then you are deluded.

Your assertion is no match against Brad Wardell's actual experience.

[gunkulator]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


Your assertion is no match against Brad Wardell's actual experience.

Don't know the particulars of this one but I'd say that simple human nature disagrees with you. For example: nobody likes Walmart and all the trouble it brings to towns and cities. People, especially online, bemoan the loss of local stores, mom and pops, and plead for the masses to boycott Walmart. Most of us agree and proclaim our undying promise to avoid that evil place. Now, what happens in RL of course is that most folks end up going there because, son of a gun, it's cheaper. And hey, everyone else is doing it too so I'm no worse than the next guy

I'm sure you can produce an anecdote or two that is contrary, but just like with pollution, energy conservation and charity, we're all hoping that the other guy will do the right thing so that we can secretly still get away with being dirty, wasteful and cheap.

Tragedy of the Commons.