One of the biggest arguments on the side of the pirates. Is that a person downloading an illegal copy is “trying before they buy!” Is seems perfectly acceptable to use the full product and then have the right not to pay afterwards! Only for Software and with some magical justification, this is supposed to be alright? Would this be an acceptable excuse for any other situation…?
A wife walks in to her bedroom to find her husband of 25 years, cheating with a younger woman. “Honey, it’s not what it looks like…” He stammers. “I was only thinking of cheating with this woman, but I’d thought I would try and see if it was suitable first!”
A Young Man steps before the judge. “Before I sentence you, do you have anything to say?” The young man thinks about it and then speaks. “I was only borrowing the car, I am taking my driving test in a few months and I am trying out the car I’d like to buy!”
It seems like the lamest excuse in the world, and that’s what they are, just excuses! There is no product in the real world you can use for its lifetime, and then decide to buy. It would be like wearing a pair of shoes, for 10 years of normal use, until the soles had fallen off, and then having the nerve to take it back.
Even if you paid for the shoes, that’s not the way things are done. You buy them, then if you don’t like it you complain about it! That is every consumer’s right! Everything has a natural order, and for good reason.
Why should you be able to take liberties with software? You are probably thinking of “Try Before You Buy!” Granted there are lots of real world products that offer these deals. But then again, so do software products, they are called Trial Versions or Demo Games!
We are already starting to see the demise of PC software. This is what people mean when we say the “death of!” We don’t mean that no one will ever make PC software ever again! Just that it will be so awkward with so many strings attached, that no one will want to use it.
Always Online Checks.
Restrictive DRMs.
6 months delay between Console and PC Games.
Cloud Computing.
Suing Customers.
…And many, many more!
These are all in response to Piracy of PC Games… now I am not saying that in certain situations perhaps game publishers didn’t deserve it. What I am saying is there is a balance, but it is so far in favour of the illegal downloaders that something drastic is bound to happen! Illegal downloaders have been taking liberties, and they should be able to admit it.
When parents see their children grow to a certain age, becoming young adults themselves. That feeling to kick them out begins to occupy parent’s thoughts. As the kids lounge around, making a mess, and enjoying their youth, it’s only a matter of time before the parents feel taken advantage of…
Game publishers are the parents! They have been tolerant and they have asked nicely! They have changed the locks! They have threatened to kick you out! But now they have just plain had enough! Something drastic is about to happen!
As an avid gamer, I know… this won’t be good..!
It’s time to grow up; it’s time to leave the nest. WarFace will kick the Pirates out, but we will always love you as if you were our children. That is the WarFace way, to start a change, that is better, for everyone, not just Gamers or Publishers, but everyone!
Monday, August 30, 2010
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
And yet another typical view on game Piracy!
This post has been dissected from http://blog.wolfire.com/2010/05/Another-view-of-game-piracy, while I have tried to preserve the file formatting, WordPress would not allow it! Still the text is here, the wolfire blog is indented twice and in Dark Red, and my reply not indented and in black!
There is no ill will towards David, and I hope he takes none! But still this is a pretty common argument on the internet. One that I all too often see from many others like David, this is supposed to be serious and almost a justification for piracy. Here I have tried to debunk claims with some sensible arguments, and I hope I have shown this!
In fact people who always use this claim, “That one illegal copy doesn’t equal one legal sale” are illegal downloaders or Pro-Torrents. While I do agree that most pirates are gluttons. That some even download vast amounts because they can, and not because they have the intention to steal or even buy. However, if I had to bet, I would say that pirates would buy “like an average consumer” if they stopped downloading PC Games.
Let’s be honest, if you used this excuse, your mom would clip your ear and tell you to “Stop acting so childish!” And it’s true, if we continue to illegally download, and it’s gotten to record numbers, what can we expect from PC Publishers? Why would you want to start a business where you product will be taken off you, and you have no control over it?
Hey in the graph, where you got the figure for USA: 5%, it clearly says China is 38%! So how can you say “The highest estimate I've seen is that 10% of worldwide iPhones are jailbroken.”
It all comes back to the percentage figure again, saying 10% - 50% - 90%, really means nothing until you match a unit figure. Such as the number of devices that are jailbroken, stated in the report you have referenced, but forgotten to mention, so I’ll just remind you:
“To date, Pinch Analytics has received data from approximately 4.0 million jailbroken devices. About 38%, or around a million and a half of those, have used a pirated application.”
http://www.pinchmedia.com/blog/piracy-in-the-app-store-from-360idev/
While I do agree, that pirates probably consume more than the average gamer, what I fear is the rate of growth! Let’s take torrents as an example; the technical ability of downloading is fairly simple, after that, it becomes very easy. Now everyone is at it, and soon no one will buy a PC game. (Or at least I fear one day this might become a possibility?)
You probably seen the torrentfreak top 10 most downloaded on bittorrent:
But what you have to really see is the increase between the spots. Across the top 5 figures you can see the downloads have increased dramatically. Nearly 250% for each case, which means that the numbers of pirates are growing...! It will be interesting to see this year’s figures in December 2010!
It’s strange that you haven’t referenced any data in that paragraph. You taken previous assumptions and other guesses and mashed it together as a “word problem” which you advise people to skip? This is exactly what you accused the Game publishers of doing, making assumptions!
The average “lite” to paid conversion is approximately 7.4%. In other words, about 1 in 14 people who try a free ‘lite’ application go on to purchase the paid version.
If application pirates are purchasing applications in order to try before they buy, we would expect to see a similar conversion ratio. In fact, pirated-to-legitimate conversions are approximately 0.43%. About 1 in 233 installations of a pirated application eventually become a legitimate purchase.
Average gamer buys 3 games a year!
10 million gamers worldwide!
20% are pirates, so out of 10 million, 2 million are pirates!
2 million pirates buy 0 games a year, but download 500 games a year!
So at worst publishers are losing out on 2 million average users who would have bought 3 games a year, but now they are pirates that download 500 games a year, but buy nothing!
I would also suspect that the average pirate is not an average gamer, so they would buy a whole lot more!
2 million customers x 3 games = roughly 6 million units.
An average PC game sells at $50 (?) which means 6 million x $50 = $300,000,000
There you go again just with the statistics 4% of what?
Elephants, giraffes, 10, 100 ...? How many are we talking about?
http://www.next-gen.biz/news/npd-four-per-cent-of-us-gamers-admit-to-piracy
“the four per cent piracy rate represents over six million consumers when the data from 8,000 online survey respondents is weighted and projected to be representative of the US population.”
6 million average games buy 3 games a year, at $50 per game = Do you see where I am going with this word puzzle?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8354166.stm
“Online reports suggest that as many as 600,000 gamers may have been affected.
Microsoft confirmed that it had banned a "small percentage" of the 20 million Xbox Live users worldwide. “
Forget about using other poor countries to justify a rich countries need to download pirated material. They have a legitimate claim, nobody can say that they don’t, and I too believe it is outlandish the prices charged for software!
Another million dollar question! When Reflexive Games tries to block pirate copies, how many sales does it generate? Of course this is a tough question to answer, but when you look at the games want value, in this case I think we all know that classic game Ricochet Infinity?
This is the nature of the crackers, as they can pretty much crack software on the go. If you use SecuROM (as 90% of game publishers are claimed), any updates afterwards are so easy removed. The company is wasting their money going with a DRM in the first place!
Would anyone care to have a guess if Modern Warfare 2 couldn’t be cracked! A game that was highly desired? What the unit sales would have been for the PC?
Only we aren’t talking about an item of necessity, we are talking about an item of luxury! Let’s put this into perspective, we are tarring all pirates as poor, but entitled to be able to download games for free! That they have nothing better to do other than play 500 games a year. But not poor enough to have a fast PC machine, to run said games. Or a fast internet service to download these games.
That games designed for the console, Ported, are not fun to play with keyboard and mouse! These are really weak arguments and it almost beggars belief!
Ports: All games are designed on the PC and are just compiled for their respected console or on the PC Platform. It is very easy for developers to do this; there really are no more ports these days!
There are plenty of games that play well on the PC, over the console version. RTS, MMO, Puzzle Games, and even FPS. Is that all of them? I don’t know of any games that fill the criteria “are not fun to play with a mouse and keyboard, and don't work well on PC hardware”!
If you have something they wanted, do you think that you would be treated any differently?
While over a million and a half in sales is a very respectable number, you should be very proud of yourself. I wonder how you would feel if you had done this on a larger scale and to see your effort goto waste!
Good Luck in your endeavours!
Having been to your site and seen what you are about, I must admit you deserve it. You have done well, and there is no animosity to you in anyway! Just as you are passionate about anti-DRM, I am the same about anti-piracy!
I particularly love your YouTube vid!
James
There is no ill will towards David, and I hope he takes none! But still this is a pretty common argument on the internet. One that I all too often see from many others like David, this is supposed to be serious and almost a justification for piracy. Here I have tried to debunk claims with some sensible arguments, and I hope I have shown this!
Another view of game piracy
201 comments By David Rosen on May 6th, 2010
We've been hearing a lot about game piracy recently, with big developers inflicting draconian online-only DRM systems on their users, and blaming their declining PC game sales entirely on piracy. I'm not questioning that piracy is common, since even honest, DRM-free, indie developers like 2DBoy[1] report a 90% piracy rate. I am, however, questioning what this means. How much revenue are developers actually losing to piracy?
It’s not about the declining PC sales; it’s that the profit margins are so small that it doesn’t make sense to release to the PC markets. This is the cause of piracy, to reduce a small market even further, to the point where publishers no longer see it as a viable option! Remember all companies are businesses first and PC gaming publishers second! That’s how they make their money, and it’s all about money!The common industry assumption is that developers are losing 90% of their revenue. That is, pirates would have bought every single game that they downloaded. From personal experience, I know this is not possible -- most pirates that I've met have downloaded enough software to exceed their entire lifetime income, were they to have paid for it all. A more plausible (but still overly optimistic) guess is that if piracy was stopped the average pirate would behave like an average consumer.
No, this isn’t a common assumption, and you have taken the 90% from one estimate and applied it across the board! Like saying 90% of Toyotas never break down, so 90% of Fords never break down either.In fact people who always use this claim, “That one illegal copy doesn’t equal one legal sale” are illegal downloaders or Pro-Torrents. While I do agree that most pirates are gluttons. That some even download vast amounts because they can, and not because they have the intention to steal or even buy. However, if I had to bet, I would say that pirates would buy “like an average consumer” if they stopped downloading PC Games.
Let’s be honest, if you used this excuse, your mom would clip your ear and tell you to “Stop acting so childish!” And it’s true, if we continue to illegally download, and it’s gotten to record numbers, what can we expect from PC Publishers? Why would you want to start a business where you product will be taken off you, and you have no control over it?
This means that to calculate the worst-case scenario of how much money is lost to piracy, we just need to figure out what percentage of the target market consists of pirates. For example, if 50% of the market is pirates, that means that it's possible that you've lost 50% of your revenue to piracy. So how do we calculate what percentage of the market consists of pirates? Do we just go with 90%?
Hang on a second; a moment ago you were just saying that it was wrong for publishers to go assuming that 90% was wrong! Now you’re assuming that it could be 50%! No you have to rewrite that, and this time try a level headed attitude! Something like: “We have no idea what the actual piracy levels are! Could be 50, 90, it’s anyone’s guess!”iPhone piracy
iPhone game developers have also found that around 80% of their users are running pirated copies of their game (using jailbroken phones) [2] This immediately struck me as odd -- I suspected that most iPhone users had never even heard of 'jailbreaking'. I did a bit more research and found that my intuition was correct -- only 5% of iPhones in the US are jailbroken. [3] World-wide, the jailbreak statistics are highest in poor countries -- but, unsurprisingly, iPhones are also much less common there. The highest estimate I've seen is that 10% of worldwide iPhones are jailbroken. Given that there are so few jailbroken phones, how can we explain that 80% of game copies are pirated?
Hey in the graph, where you got the figure for USA: 5%, it clearly says China is 38%! So how can you say “The highest estimate I've seen is that 10% of worldwide iPhones are jailbroken.”
It all comes back to the percentage figure again, saying 10% - 50% - 90%, really means nothing until you match a unit figure. Such as the number of devices that are jailbroken, stated in the report you have referenced, but forgotten to mention, so I’ll just remind you:
“To date, Pinch Analytics has received data from approximately 4.0 million jailbroken devices. About 38%, or around a million and a half of those, have used a pirated application.”
http://www.pinchmedia.com/blog/piracy-in-the-app-store-from-360idev/
The answer is simple -- the average pirate downloads a lot more games than the average customer buys. This means that even though games see that 80% of their copies are pirated, only 10% of their potential customers are pirates, which means they are losing at most 10% of their sales. If you'd like to see an example with math, read the following paragraph. If word problems make your eyes glaze over, then I advise you to skip it.
Simple! One minute you’re saying not to make assumptions, next you’re telling us that the answer is simple!While I do agree, that pirates probably consume more than the average gamer, what I fear is the rate of growth! Let’s take torrents as an example; the technical ability of downloading is fairly simple, after that, it becomes very easy. Now everyone is at it, and soon no one will buy a PC game. (Or at least I fear one day this might become a possibility?)
You probably seen the torrentfreak top 10 most downloaded on bittorrent:
| Spot Number | 2008 | 2009 | Increase of |
| 1 | 1,700,000 | 4,100,000 | 241% |
| 2 | 1,070,000 | 3,200,000 | 299% |
| 3 | 940,000 | 2,350,000 | 250% |
| 4 | 860,000 | 2,100,000 | 244% |
| 5 | 830,000 | 1,850,000 | 223% |
But what you have to really see is the increase between the spots. Across the top 5 figures you can see the downloads have increased dramatically. Nearly 250% for each case, which means that the numbers of pirates are growing...! It will be interesting to see this year’s figures in December 2010!
Let's consider the following scenario. Because game pirates can get apps for free, they download a couple new games every day -- or about 500 games in a year. On the other hand, normal gamers tend to play the same game for a longer time -- buying an average of 5 games per year. If this seems low to you, then consider that you are also reading a post on an indie game developer blog. You are probably more hardcore than the average gamer. Anyway, given these statistics, if the market consists of 10 million gamers, then there are 500 million pirated game copies, and 90 million purchased game copies, From the perspective of every individual game, 80% of its users are using pirated copies. However, only 10% of the market consists of pirates.
Why are you comparing the piracy of iPhones to the piracy of the PC Platform? Why don’t you compare something on a similar par, Say the piracy levels of an Xbox 360 Console against the PC! Surely that would make more sense?It’s strange that you haven’t referenced any data in that paragraph. You taken previous assumptions and other guesses and mashed it together as a “word problem” which you advise people to skip? This is exactly what you accused the Game publishers of doing, making assumptions!
All is based on assumptions you believe to be true!? There is no real evidence here, just what looks to be right! “I watched Superman once, and you can clearly see that Lois is flying, holding up superman.”
The average “lite” to paid conversion is approximately 7.4%. In other words, about 1 in 14 people who try a free ‘lite’ application go on to purchase the paid version.
If application pirates are purchasing applications in order to try before they buy, we would expect to see a similar conversion ratio. In fact, pirated-to-legitimate conversions are approximately 0.43%. About 1 in 233 installations of a pirated application eventually become a legitimate purchase.
PC game piracy
Does this also apply to PC (Windows/Mac/Linux) gamers? Many PC game developers find that about 90% of their users are running pirated copies -- does this mean that piracy is killing PC games? Let's try our alternative explanation, and see if these statistics are possible even if only 20% of worldwide PC gamers are pirates. The average PC gamer worldwide only buys about three games a year, and plays them for a long time [4]. I buy many more than that, and you probably do too, but again, we are not average gamers! On the other hand, game pirates might download a new game every few days, for a total of about 125 games a year. Given these numbers, games would see 90% piracy rates even though only 20% of gamers are pirates.
No, you are missing the point from the business side, and to take your figures here:Average gamer buys 3 games a year!
10 million gamers worldwide!
20% are pirates, so out of 10 million, 2 million are pirates!
2 million pirates buy 0 games a year, but download 500 games a year!
So at worst publishers are losing out on 2 million average users who would have bought 3 games a year, but now they are pirates that download 500 games a year, but buy nothing!
I would also suspect that the average pirate is not an average gamer, so they would buy a whole lot more!
2 million customers x 3 games = roughly 6 million units.
An average PC game sells at $50 (?) which means 6 million x $50 = $300,000,000
Are these numbers accurate? The NPD recently conducted an anonymous survey showing that only 4% of PC gamers in the US admit to pirating games [5], a number that is comparable to XBox 360 piracy statistics [6] . However, since piracy is inversely proportionate to per-capita GDP, we can expect piracy rates to increase dramatically in places like Russia, China and India, driving up the world-wide average. Let's say to 20%.
This means that if all pirates would otherwise buy as many games as the average consumer, then game developers would be losing 20% of their revenue to piracy.There you go again just with the statistics 4% of what?
Elephants, giraffes, 10, 100 ...? How many are we talking about?
http://www.next-gen.biz/news/npd-four-per-cent-of-us-gamers-admit-to-piracy
“the four per cent piracy rate represents over six million consumers when the data from 8,000 online survey respondents is weighted and projected to be representative of the US population.”
6 million average games buy 3 games a year, at $50 per game = Do you see where I am going with this word puzzle?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8354166.stm
“Online reports suggest that as many as 600,000 gamers may have been affected.
Microsoft confirmed that it had banned a "small percentage" of the 20 million Xbox Live users worldwide. “
“4% of PC gamers in the US admit to pirating games, a number that is comparable to XBox 360 piracy statistics”
( 600,000 / 20,000,000 ) x 100 = 0.3%
How can 0.3% be compared to 4%, and in real terms, how is 6 million+ compared to 600,000 gamers!“Game developers would be losing 20% of their revenue to piracy.”
$300,000,000 (PerYear)! The bloody cheek of Game Publishers, for complaining, chump change!But would pirates really buy games?
Anecdotally and from studies by companies like the BSA, it's clear that pirates for the most part have very little income. They are unemployed students, or live in countries with very low per-capita GDP, where the price of a $60 game is more like $1000 (in terms of purchasing power parity and income percentage). When Reflexive games performed a series of experiments with anti-piracy measures, they found that they only made one extra sale for every 1000 pirated copies they blocked [7]. This implies that their 90% piracy statistic caused them to lose less than 1% of their sales.
That is the million dollar question! But your use of the word anecdotal is laughable, when you consider the liberal brush you used here!Forget about using other poor countries to justify a rich countries need to download pirated material. They have a legitimate claim, nobody can say that they don’t, and I too believe it is outlandish the prices charged for software!
Another million dollar question! When Reflexive Games tries to block pirate copies, how many sales does it generate? Of course this is a tough question to answer, but when you look at the games want value, in this case I think we all know that classic game Ricochet Infinity?
This is the nature of the crackers, as they can pretty much crack software on the go. If you use SecuROM (as 90% of game publishers are claimed), any updates afterwards are so easy removed. The company is wasting their money going with a DRM in the first place!
Would anyone care to have a guess if Modern Warfare 2 couldn’t be cracked! A game that was highly desired? What the unit sales would have been for the PC?
Why are PC games really losing sales?
While many game developers blame piracy for their decreasing PC game sales, it is clear that this is not the problem -- relatively few gamers are pirates, and those that are would mostly not be able to afford games anyway.
Yeah when a homeless man steals a loaf of bread ... it’s the shopkeepers fault! He should have given it to him!Only we aren’t talking about an item of necessity, we are talking about an item of luxury! Let’s put this into perspective, we are tarring all pirates as poor, but entitled to be able to download games for free! That they have nothing better to do other than play 500 games a year. But not poor enough to have a fast PC machine, to run said games. Or a fast internet service to download these games.
However, it's easier for these developers to point their fingers at pirates than to face the real problem: that their games are not fun on PC. The games in question are usually designed for consoles, with the desktop port as an afterthought. This means they are not fun to play with a mouse and keyboard, and don't work well on PC hardware. Their field of view is designed to be viewed from a distant couch instead of a nearby monitor, and their gameplay is simplified to compensate for this tunnel vision.
What about the good, bad and the ugly? Because this paragraph suggests that only bad “Not Fun!” PC games are pirated. That the good ones are not pirated as much?That games designed for the console, Ported, are not fun to play with keyboard and mouse! These are really weak arguments and it almost beggars belief!
Ports: All games are designed on the PC and are just compiled for their respected console or on the PC Platform. It is very easy for developers to do this; there really are no more ports these days!
There are plenty of games that play well on the PC, over the console version. RTS, MMO, Puzzle Games, and even FPS. Is that all of them? I don’t know of any games that fill the criteria “are not fun to play with a mouse and keyboard, and don't work well on PC hardware”!
Blizzard is one of the most successful game developers in the world, and it develops exclusively for desktop computers. Why do they succeed where everyone else fails? They create games that are designed from the beginning to work well with the mouse and keyboard, and with all kinds of desktop hardware. If developers spent more time improving their PC gaming experience, and less time complaining about piracy, we might see more successful PC games.
Blizzard, the makers of World of Warcraft, I must admit you choose well! Out of all the companies you chose the one where the game is actually online. Where the DRM is to be able to play on their server, so there is no way to circumvent this! So if you do something illegal or against the rules they have the power to kick you out! Making this unique compared to a single player game, where once it has left the factory, the developers have no control over it!With the Humble Indie Bundle promotion we've seen that when we treat gamers as real people instead of criminals, they seem to respond in kind. Anyone can get all five DRM-free games for a single penny, and pirate them as much as they want -- we have no way to find out or stop it. However, in just the first two days, we have over 40,000 contributions with an average of $8 each! Would we have seen this much support if the games were console ports that only worked when connected to a secure online DRM server? We'll never know for sure, but somehow I doubt it.
The question is: Will pirates treat you with respect?If you have something they wanted, do you think that you would be treated any differently?
While over a million and a half in sales is a very respectable number, you should be very proud of yourself. I wonder how you would feel if you had done this on a larger scale and to see your effort goto waste!
Good Luck in your endeavours!
Having been to your site and seen what you are about, I must admit you deserve it. You have done well, and there is no animosity to you in anyway! Just as you are passionate about anti-DRM, I am the same about anti-piracy!
I particularly love your YouTube vid!
James
Thursday, August 19, 2010
The saviour of the Game Publishers... And the destroyer of Gamers Dreams!
Imagine a really fast sports car that costs €300,000, it does 0-60 in 3 seconds and looks real cool. Then imagine the car salesman forgetting to mention that you can never drive it on the road. What they’ll do instead is to keep it locked up for you. When you want to drive it, it can only be on their test track! Afterwards they pack it up, storing it back in the garage until you come to them next time!
Why would you want to do that?!?
OnLive recently released all across America (June 2010). It isn’t the first or the last, with many competitors such as StreamMyGame, OTOY, and Gaikai. It promises numerous benefits; just unfortunately none of them are for the PC gamers. Onlive uses Cloud computing, the idea is, a high power computer, will send you a video stream, of your game as you play it! The technology is great, but my head is full of alarm bells, and it’s time to wake up.
So the benefits (Taken from OnLive Presentation!)
• Video Games on Demand, No High End machine required.
• Available on any device (TV ,PC ,MAC).
• Next Gen Platform, Unprecedented performance, Never needs upgrading.
• Runs on home broadband connections (SDTV: 1.5 Mbps, HDTV: 5 Mbps).
All seems good and strong benefits for the gamer. But once you look at the angle of practicality, things start to look very shaky. I am impressed with the development and technology of Cloud Computing. I also don’t want to debunk any claims that these services won’t be able to deliver, I am sure they can. But as a gamer, my biggest grievance lies in the fact that ...
• You don’t physically own the game: Sure you can buy it, but it will never be yours, you’ll never hold it in your hands!
• Video Games on Demand: is a great idea! Only for people who just enjoy gaming, but not having to buy a powerful machine. That is until you factor in your likely cost!
• IF OnLive goes Bankrupt: They will not send you a copy of your game, and even less likely to send you your money back!
• Latency becomes a huge issue: Any lag in the middle mile, the area of the internet between you and the website you are trying to connect to, will be detrimental. One of the main reasons why ISP won’t promise speeds, because they can’t guarantee what other networks might be running at.
True: OnLive has setup huge Data Centres, and you have to be within 1000 miles (1600km)! But if you read their support page (http://www.onlive.com/support/performance) you’ll find there are many things that can cause problems!
• Currently the internet can’t handle that kind of bandwidth: ISP companies have been furiously rolling out fibre lines trying to keep up! Can the internet keep up with this kind of demand? And how will it affect the service?
• OnLive Source “Improving Performance on the Internet”: (Which you can read here: http://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2009/2/19323-improving-performance-on-the-internet/fulltext) Paints a hard picture of the increasing nature of the internet. Highlighting tonnes of issues that have to be overcome. (Fat File Paradox, Demand and orders of magnitude, latency of the Middle mile, Data Centers hit the “architecture scalability” wall). Onlive will suffer from all of these problems because it is a High bandwidth concern.
• The Internet is based on old architecture and protocols: These increase latency and cause other problems to internet services that require high bandwidth like video streaming. These don’t have simple answers, and the answer we do have for them require time and lots of hard work updating the structures involved.
• DoS: We have seen it many times, denial of service attacks. Most recently the attacks on UbiDRM, which cut out legal users from the service. Luckily the number affected was minimal. But then again the bandwidth connection was a small keep-alive signal. OnLive plan to send video streams, by comparison to a small stream feeding an ocean, this would be the planet underwater!
• You can’t use Wifi Routers: so you can’t play on your laptop, you have to be plugged into the wall at all times.
• Download Quota: some people have a limit per month, sometimes as low as 5 GB p/m, and if they go over that then they have to pay the extra at quite a premium.
• 55 Minutes of Gaming! So at the lowest bandwidth (Standard TV at 1.5 Mbps) this means that you’ll hit that limit in under an hour! Formula: (5000Mb / 1.5Mb) / 60 seconds = Time until Limit. For the sake of OnLive, I hope they don’t use the full 1.5 Mb per second!
• 18 GB an Hour: Forget about SDTV, if you opt for the HD service, your line had better be able to pull down 18 GBs of data for an hour’s gaming!
• Nobody cares about upload: often ISP will tell you the download speed, and will boast about it. This means that the upload speed could be severely restrictive.
• One Game is SDTV 32.4GB or HDTV 108GB: Let’s say you are a fast gamer and able to complete the latest shooter in 6 hours, this equates to a huge amount of data that has to be downloaded to your home!
• Bandwidth cap (Fair Access policy): Users can be kicked off the network by their ISP for over usage of their internet connection. Downloading 5 or 18 GBs per hour is likely to draw attention to you and upset your ISP. This will particularly affect users who subscribe to Satellite and Cable providers. Constant over use of the network can be dealt by imposing restrictive limits on your speed and even banning you from the network. This may result in you having to go to another Internet Service Provider.
• Most ISP can only provide burst speeds: This means that a connection speed is only deliverable for about the time it takes to download a webpage or a YouTube clip, for a few minutes at most. A constant draw on the bandwidth can mean restrictions, which your ISP may impose but not inform you about!
• Only Child: Remember if anyone else is using the home connection this will double the pressure on your broadband connection. If you’re a child you better hope that your sibling isn’t a subscriber or doesn’t like watching streaming videos.
• Contention Ratio: Broadband companies should state your connection speed, and tell you your contention ratio. At peak times, on a ratio of 24:1, it means there could be 24 people on the same 1.5Mbps connection, though this is highly unlikely.
• No Promises from your Broadband Company: they will not guarantee a 100% connection speed! Just from a technical point, this is almost impossible!
• Low Current Settings: Onlive only supports one setting at the moment, which is the HD version of this gaming system, at a very low resolution of 1280x720. (When compare to a capable PC processing power!)
• Available on any device: Currently only available on PC and Intel MAC’s. Most PCs and Macs, that belong to gamers, the people likely to play OnLive system, will be able to play these games anyhow.
• PC gamers have enjoyed a relatively low cost: compared to the console versions. But now, OnLive will be charging console prices for PC Gamers.
• Offering gaming at a very low resolution: Granted PC, and MAC’s aren’t cheap, but with gaming on demand, you’re trading one set of problems for another. But offering Standard TV resolutions will only mean blurry images!
• Your monitor has to be design for Video: One of the main problems of computer screens are the video playback problem effects.
• You may have to resize your screen: Depending on your screen size, this could lead to poor quality video. Or even having to window your game!
• HDTV at 720p: this means a resolution of 1280×720, progressive scan. And if you are playing powerful games, such as Crysis, this is a huge benefit. For all other games, the benefits aren’t as tangible, and your PC could probably play them anyway!
• 720p TVs are slowing being phased out: This requires more information to be sent, to upgrade to the next HDTV size 1080!
• However, the fact that you’ll never have to upgrade the box is a cool idea: While that won’t be completely true, as there will always be something that will probably require some upgrade. For the main part, the system is behind the scenes, and most of the upgrading will be there, and therefore not seen!
• Brag Clips: Yeah those are cool!
• Playing on Mobile Devices: Very cool but comes with some problems too! They require Wifi access, and not a normal link, but a high speed connection!
I think cloud computing is a great idea; but it should aid the PC, rather than taking over completely. The PC is the driving force of the technology boom; all modern miracles owe something to the PC. Even if it’s just a secretary of the firm working on the PC, just to write that one letter more productively.
As for cloud computing, it’s a nice dream for Game Publishers, but the end of my dreams as an avid gamer! Oh and my apologies for picking on Onlive; I don’t hate them at all, I just think the method is flawed!
Why would you want to do that?!?
OnLive recently released all across America (June 2010). It isn’t the first or the last, with many competitors such as StreamMyGame, OTOY, and Gaikai. It promises numerous benefits; just unfortunately none of them are for the PC gamers. Onlive uses Cloud computing, the idea is, a high power computer, will send you a video stream, of your game as you play it! The technology is great, but my head is full of alarm bells, and it’s time to wake up.
So the benefits (Taken from OnLive Presentation!)
• Video Games on Demand, No High End machine required.
• Available on any device (TV ,PC ,MAC).
• Next Gen Platform, Unprecedented performance, Never needs upgrading.
• Runs on home broadband connections (SDTV: 1.5 Mbps, HDTV: 5 Mbps).
All seems good and strong benefits for the gamer. But once you look at the angle of practicality, things start to look very shaky. I am impressed with the development and technology of Cloud Computing. I also don’t want to debunk any claims that these services won’t be able to deliver, I am sure they can. But as a gamer, my biggest grievance lies in the fact that ...
• You don’t physically own the game: Sure you can buy it, but it will never be yours, you’ll never hold it in your hands!
• Video Games on Demand: is a great idea! Only for people who just enjoy gaming, but not having to buy a powerful machine. That is until you factor in your likely cost!
• IF OnLive goes Bankrupt: They will not send you a copy of your game, and even less likely to send you your money back!
• Latency becomes a huge issue: Any lag in the middle mile, the area of the internet between you and the website you are trying to connect to, will be detrimental. One of the main reasons why ISP won’t promise speeds, because they can’t guarantee what other networks might be running at.
True: OnLive has setup huge Data Centres, and you have to be within 1000 miles (1600km)! But if you read their support page (http://www.onlive.com/support/performance) you’ll find there are many things that can cause problems!
• Currently the internet can’t handle that kind of bandwidth: ISP companies have been furiously rolling out fibre lines trying to keep up! Can the internet keep up with this kind of demand? And how will it affect the service?
• OnLive Source “Improving Performance on the Internet”: (Which you can read here: http://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2009/2/19323-improving-performance-on-the-internet/fulltext) Paints a hard picture of the increasing nature of the internet. Highlighting tonnes of issues that have to be overcome. (Fat File Paradox, Demand and orders of magnitude, latency of the Middle mile, Data Centers hit the “architecture scalability” wall). Onlive will suffer from all of these problems because it is a High bandwidth concern.
• The Internet is based on old architecture and protocols: These increase latency and cause other problems to internet services that require high bandwidth like video streaming. These don’t have simple answers, and the answer we do have for them require time and lots of hard work updating the structures involved.
• DoS: We have seen it many times, denial of service attacks. Most recently the attacks on UbiDRM, which cut out legal users from the service. Luckily the number affected was minimal. But then again the bandwidth connection was a small keep-alive signal. OnLive plan to send video streams, by comparison to a small stream feeding an ocean, this would be the planet underwater!
• You can’t use Wifi Routers: so you can’t play on your laptop, you have to be plugged into the wall at all times.
• Download Quota: some people have a limit per month, sometimes as low as 5 GB p/m, and if they go over that then they have to pay the extra at quite a premium.
• 55 Minutes of Gaming! So at the lowest bandwidth (Standard TV at 1.5 Mbps) this means that you’ll hit that limit in under an hour! Formula: (5000Mb / 1.5Mb) / 60 seconds = Time until Limit. For the sake of OnLive, I hope they don’t use the full 1.5 Mb per second!
• 18 GB an Hour: Forget about SDTV, if you opt for the HD service, your line had better be able to pull down 18 GBs of data for an hour’s gaming!
• Nobody cares about upload: often ISP will tell you the download speed, and will boast about it. This means that the upload speed could be severely restrictive.
• One Game is SDTV 32.4GB or HDTV 108GB: Let’s say you are a fast gamer and able to complete the latest shooter in 6 hours, this equates to a huge amount of data that has to be downloaded to your home!
• Bandwidth cap (Fair Access policy): Users can be kicked off the network by their ISP for over usage of their internet connection. Downloading 5 or 18 GBs per hour is likely to draw attention to you and upset your ISP. This will particularly affect users who subscribe to Satellite and Cable providers. Constant over use of the network can be dealt by imposing restrictive limits on your speed and even banning you from the network. This may result in you having to go to another Internet Service Provider.
• Most ISP can only provide burst speeds: This means that a connection speed is only deliverable for about the time it takes to download a webpage or a YouTube clip, for a few minutes at most. A constant draw on the bandwidth can mean restrictions, which your ISP may impose but not inform you about!
• Only Child: Remember if anyone else is using the home connection this will double the pressure on your broadband connection. If you’re a child you better hope that your sibling isn’t a subscriber or doesn’t like watching streaming videos.
• Contention Ratio: Broadband companies should state your connection speed, and tell you your contention ratio. At peak times, on a ratio of 24:1, it means there could be 24 people on the same 1.5Mbps connection, though this is highly unlikely.
• No Promises from your Broadband Company: they will not guarantee a 100% connection speed! Just from a technical point, this is almost impossible!
• Low Current Settings: Onlive only supports one setting at the moment, which is the HD version of this gaming system, at a very low resolution of 1280x720. (When compare to a capable PC processing power!)
• Available on any device: Currently only available on PC and Intel MAC’s. Most PCs and Macs, that belong to gamers, the people likely to play OnLive system, will be able to play these games anyhow.
• PC gamers have enjoyed a relatively low cost: compared to the console versions. But now, OnLive will be charging console prices for PC Gamers.
• Offering gaming at a very low resolution: Granted PC, and MAC’s aren’t cheap, but with gaming on demand, you’re trading one set of problems for another. But offering Standard TV resolutions will only mean blurry images!
• Your monitor has to be design for Video: One of the main problems of computer screens are the video playback problem effects.
• You may have to resize your screen: Depending on your screen size, this could lead to poor quality video. Or even having to window your game!
• HDTV at 720p: this means a resolution of 1280×720, progressive scan. And if you are playing powerful games, such as Crysis, this is a huge benefit. For all other games, the benefits aren’t as tangible, and your PC could probably play them anyway!
• 720p TVs are slowing being phased out: This requires more information to be sent, to upgrade to the next HDTV size 1080!
• However, the fact that you’ll never have to upgrade the box is a cool idea: While that won’t be completely true, as there will always be something that will probably require some upgrade. For the main part, the system is behind the scenes, and most of the upgrading will be there, and therefore not seen!
• Brag Clips: Yeah those are cool!
• Playing on Mobile Devices: Very cool but comes with some problems too! They require Wifi access, and not a normal link, but a high speed connection!
I think cloud computing is a great idea; but it should aid the PC, rather than taking over completely. The PC is the driving force of the technology boom; all modern miracles owe something to the PC. Even if it’s just a secretary of the firm working on the PC, just to write that one letter more productively.
As for cloud computing, it’s a nice dream for Game Publishers, but the end of my dreams as an avid gamer! Oh and my apologies for picking on Onlive; I don’t hate them at all, I just think the method is flawed!
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Piracy Stats for Modern Warfare 2
Piracy is bad? Isn’t it?
Yes of course, but what I am talking about here is how bad is it? This is one of the main problems with Piracy! Any figures or statistics are hard to measure, hard to quantify, and even harder to get. Anyone looking into Piracy will know about the game "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2". Not because it was the most pirated, or that it was one of the best selling game of 2009. But because of all the attention, people have actually gathered some piracy and sales statistics for it. So when people talk about the scale of PC Game piracy, people always refer back to Modern Warfare 2.
The Game itself had as much praise as it did criticism. Some people loved it, and some thought it was not as good as the last, however good or bad people still kept talking. The story for this game doesn’t end just with its piracy story. However if you would like more information I suggest reading it from this very informative site. (http://www.modernwarfail2.com/)
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
Modern Warfare 2 is a first person shooter developed by Infinity Ward, and published by Activision. This game was highly anticipated, because it was the sequel to the bestselling Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. During the release months it received much critical acclaim and lots of TV advertising. You can read more here at Wiki.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_of_Duty:_Modern_Warfare_2)
What does that mean? Is piracy a big problem?
Yes, but it is not a clear cut answer! One of the main ways game publishers can tell if a copy is pirated is through support. For example, as cheeky as it is, even people who download the game illegally will sometimes require tech support. From this, and the suspicious questions asked, Publishers can guess as to the number of illegal copies that exist in the market.
The best way to see the problem is to compare the sales and piracy pattern. When Modern Warfare 2 for the PC is matched against the XBox 360 version, we find an almost trend reversal. That the sales for the Xbox matches the piracy level for the PC; and the Xbox piracy figures matches the sales for the PC. Of course the scale is different, but it does give an insight into the sales that should have been for the PC, if Piracy wasn't a problem.
So there is a problem?!?But no one is sure how big the problem is! Most pro-torrent sites will point out that an illegal copy won’t mean a direct sale. Also arguing illegal copies are people speaking out about the restrictive DRMs bundled with the software. Claiming that if Game Publishing companies removed the DRMs, resulting sales would go up. There is no evidence to support this, and even evidence to support the opposite.
The PC Game “World of Goo” suffered a 90% piracy rate at the hands of illegal downloaders. The fact is even more shameful as this was the first release from a small independent games company. The game itself was released without a DRM protecting its media, and also received critical praise as being one of the best puzzle games of 2008. Did resulting sales increase? No, a shame, but a lesson learned!
DRMs aren’t too restrictive, are they?But the customers have a point ... DRMs ARE restrictive! They generally only annoy the customer, but the illegal downloaders rarely experience any DRM issues.
In 2008, Assassin's Creed was released for the PC. What is significant, is the game's DRM, which was badly cracked, and thousands of illegal downloaders got their hands on this game. DRMs have security features that if someone attempts to remove the security protection, the game will fail. In this case, this is exactly what happened; the resulting bug was called the Jerusalem bug. (Referring to the place "Jerusalem" that when entered into during the game, would cause it to crash! Not the actual living insect, yes there is one!) But of course this wasn't discovered until much later and Ubisoft received the full brunt of blame, not the people who tried to remove the DRM.
Is it right that DRM’s are on the game in the first place? No.
Is it wrong that companies use DRMs? Again the answer has to be No!
So there is nothing the Publishers can do?
Two horrible words, Cloud Computing! For many reasons, this is the worst thing to hit the PC gaming industry since the ... DRM. Don’t get me wrong the technology is very clever and has much potential, just like the ...DRM. But honesty I can’t blame the Gaming Publishers for wanting to protect their products. What is really troubling is that OnLive beta across America in June 2010, and I feel that this is too early.
Cloud computing, for gaming, the game sits on a server and is streamed by video to the user. There are a hundred and one benefits to the game publishers, and nearly none for the customer. But what I don’t like about this the most, is you will never own your game in any way.
What’s the Answer then?!?!
We have it, and we want to tell you all about it! We have all the benefits:
• Not an intrusive DRM!
• A complete Piracy Solution, a Strategy!
• Benefits for Customers and Game Publishers!
• New Markets!
• New Control over your products!
• Low Costs, High Returns, Larger Profit Margins!
Come find out what we are talking about!
Information Sources:
Wikipedia Review of "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2"
Modernwarfail2.com: Sales flop in the UK!
Gamespot.com: Five-day sales hit $550 million
TorrentFreak.com: Most Pirated Game of 2009!
Arstechnica.com: A Crying Shame, World of Goo piracy rate near 90%
Picture taken from PCFormat, Issue 239, May 2010, Article: A World of Piracy, by: Tamsin Oxford.
Yes of course, but what I am talking about here is how bad is it? This is one of the main problems with Piracy! Any figures or statistics are hard to measure, hard to quantify, and even harder to get. Anyone looking into Piracy will know about the game "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2". Not because it was the most pirated, or that it was one of the best selling game of 2009. But because of all the attention, people have actually gathered some piracy and sales statistics for it. So when people talk about the scale of PC Game piracy, people always refer back to Modern Warfare 2.
The Game itself had as much praise as it did criticism. Some people loved it, and some thought it was not as good as the last, however good or bad people still kept talking. The story for this game doesn’t end just with its piracy story. However if you would like more information I suggest reading it from this very informative site. (http://www.modernwarfail2.com/)
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
Modern Warfare 2 is a first person shooter developed by Infinity Ward, and published by Activision. This game was highly anticipated, because it was the sequel to the bestselling Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. During the release months it received much critical acclaim and lots of TV advertising. You can read more here at Wiki.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Call_of_Duty:_Modern_Warfare_2)
What does that mean? Is piracy a big problem?
Yes, but it is not a clear cut answer! One of the main ways game publishers can tell if a copy is pirated is through support. For example, as cheeky as it is, even people who download the game illegally will sometimes require tech support. From this, and the suspicious questions asked, Publishers can guess as to the number of illegal copies that exist in the market.
The best way to see the problem is to compare the sales and piracy pattern. When Modern Warfare 2 for the PC is matched against the XBox 360 version, we find an almost trend reversal. That the sales for the Xbox matches the piracy level for the PC; and the Xbox piracy figures matches the sales for the PC. Of course the scale is different, but it does give an insight into the sales that should have been for the PC, if Piracy wasn't a problem.
So there is a problem?!?But no one is sure how big the problem is! Most pro-torrent sites will point out that an illegal copy won’t mean a direct sale. Also arguing illegal copies are people speaking out about the restrictive DRMs bundled with the software. Claiming that if Game Publishing companies removed the DRMs, resulting sales would go up. There is no evidence to support this, and even evidence to support the opposite.
The PC Game “World of Goo” suffered a 90% piracy rate at the hands of illegal downloaders. The fact is even more shameful as this was the first release from a small independent games company. The game itself was released without a DRM protecting its media, and also received critical praise as being one of the best puzzle games of 2008. Did resulting sales increase? No, a shame, but a lesson learned!
DRMs aren’t too restrictive, are they?But the customers have a point ... DRMs ARE restrictive! They generally only annoy the customer, but the illegal downloaders rarely experience any DRM issues.
In 2008, Assassin's Creed was released for the PC. What is significant, is the game's DRM, which was badly cracked, and thousands of illegal downloaders got their hands on this game. DRMs have security features that if someone attempts to remove the security protection, the game will fail. In this case, this is exactly what happened; the resulting bug was called the Jerusalem bug. (Referring to the place "Jerusalem" that when entered into during the game, would cause it to crash! Not the actual living insect, yes there is one!) But of course this wasn't discovered until much later and Ubisoft received the full brunt of blame, not the people who tried to remove the DRM.
Is it right that DRM’s are on the game in the first place? No.
Is it wrong that companies use DRMs? Again the answer has to be No!
So there is nothing the Publishers can do?
Two horrible words, Cloud Computing! For many reasons, this is the worst thing to hit the PC gaming industry since the ... DRM. Don’t get me wrong the technology is very clever and has much potential, just like the ...DRM. But honesty I can’t blame the Gaming Publishers for wanting to protect their products. What is really troubling is that OnLive beta across America in June 2010, and I feel that this is too early.
Cloud computing, for gaming, the game sits on a server and is streamed by video to the user. There are a hundred and one benefits to the game publishers, and nearly none for the customer. But what I don’t like about this the most, is you will never own your game in any way.
What’s the Answer then?!?!
We have it, and we want to tell you all about it! We have all the benefits:
• Not an intrusive DRM!
• A complete Piracy Solution, a Strategy!
• Benefits for Customers and Game Publishers!
• New Markets!
• New Control over your products!
• Low Costs, High Returns, Larger Profit Margins!
Come find out what we are talking about!
Information Sources:
Wikipedia Review of "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2"
Modernwarfail2.com: Sales flop in the UK!
Gamespot.com: Five-day sales hit $550 million
TorrentFreak.com: Most Pirated Game of 2009!
Arstechnica.com: A Crying Shame, World of Goo piracy rate near 90%
Picture taken from PCFormat, Issue 239, May 2010, Article: A World of Piracy, by: Tamsin Oxford.
When I think of Pirates…?
Of course the two main replies you’ll get are Somalia and Jonny Depp!
It’s funny really, because the people trying to stop Piracy, such as ESA, are also trying to change the name! Wanting to call it “Intellectual Property” Theft, this way we don’t belittle how serious this crime is. They know that when you mention the word “Pirate”; stealing online digital media is not the first thing you think about…
So when I say IP what is the first thing you think of?
Internet Provider, IP Address, Internet Protocol, International Patent … Interior Painting … Interesting People!
Well done, way to clear up the word for Online Piracy!
Who are the ESA?
Who are the PCGA?
Who are the BSA?
Who are the IRMA?
Who are the IDC?
And why do they reduce everything to letters? To be honest I know of these companies, but what do they do? And after approaching these companies, looking for some contacts and information, time after time, we have been point blank ignored!
If you consider these anti-piracy companies are constantly talking about piracy and what a worldwide problem it is. That they need everyone’s help, and that we all have to fight piracy! Ignoring people is plain rude and just going to side the average person with the pirates. Another thing, if you post a comment in the pirate’s forum, you get a reply in five minutes!
Being a good anti-piracy company is about doing one thing very well, and something the WarFace strategy does exceptionally well. WarFace is friends of everyone, we don’t want to get rid of anything, we just want to see the industry grow and flourish again! A fair days wage for a fair days work!
Drop us an email, visit our site, say hello! Unlike the pirates mentioned in this post, we aren’t rude enough to ignore you!
It’s funny really, because the people trying to stop Piracy, such as ESA, are also trying to change the name! Wanting to call it “Intellectual Property” Theft, this way we don’t belittle how serious this crime is. They know that when you mention the word “Pirate”; stealing online digital media is not the first thing you think about…
So when I say IP what is the first thing you think of?
Internet Provider, IP Address, Internet Protocol, International Patent … Interior Painting … Interesting People!
Well done, way to clear up the word for Online Piracy!
Who are the ESA?
Who are the PCGA?
Who are the BSA?
Who are the IRMA?
Who are the IDC?
And why do they reduce everything to letters? To be honest I know of these companies, but what do they do? And after approaching these companies, looking for some contacts and information, time after time, we have been point blank ignored!
If you consider these anti-piracy companies are constantly talking about piracy and what a worldwide problem it is. That they need everyone’s help, and that we all have to fight piracy! Ignoring people is plain rude and just going to side the average person with the pirates. Another thing, if you post a comment in the pirate’s forum, you get a reply in five minutes!
Being a good anti-piracy company is about doing one thing very well, and something the WarFace strategy does exceptionally well. WarFace is friends of everyone, we don’t want to get rid of anything, we just want to see the industry grow and flourish again! A fair days wage for a fair days work!
Drop us an email, visit our site, say hello! Unlike the pirates mentioned in this post, we aren’t rude enough to ignore you!
“I am an Expert!”
When I was a young man, a friend once described his definition of an expert. He said, if you think of a leaking pipe, that’s a spurt! Now to stop that pipe from leaking you need to wrap it tightly and put it under pressure. “So an Expert is a spurt under pressure!”
This blog all started when I was talking to a Consultant, Gerry Cahill (www.gerry-cahill.com). A fantastically clever man, and well worthy of the title “Mentor”!
He said to me: “James you are an Expert, and do you know what you should do…? Start a Blog!”
To which I threw back a quizzical look, ‘A blog! Who reads blogs these days?’
He smiled. “Look James, a Blog is a pain in the ass, as you have to constantly update it! If you don’t people get bored and no one will come back, but it helps with promotion of you and your business!”
A drawn and blank stare confronted him. “Yeah, but I am not an Expert?”
Another warm comforting smile beamed out. “Well yes you are, we’ve been sitting here for about an hour and you brought me up to date on piracy in a very short time! You also been able to explain your idea and why it will work, you certainly know more about it than me, or many others!”
Then there was a small pause. “Look at it this way, start the blog, and maybe one day someone will ask you to come speak as a Piracy Expert at some seminar or trade show!”
I have to admit that thought was nice, and yet at the same time terrifying. Yes I do know lots about piracy, and even from many different angles. But what do you have do, in order to qualify as an expert?
Am I an Expert?
The truth is I don’t know everything there is to know about piracy…!
But if you are willing to listen then I am willing to tell what I know!
This blog all started when I was talking to a Consultant, Gerry Cahill (www.gerry-cahill.com). A fantastically clever man, and well worthy of the title “Mentor”!
He said to me: “James you are an Expert, and do you know what you should do…? Start a Blog!”
To which I threw back a quizzical look, ‘A blog! Who reads blogs these days?’
He smiled. “Look James, a Blog is a pain in the ass, as you have to constantly update it! If you don’t people get bored and no one will come back, but it helps with promotion of you and your business!”
A drawn and blank stare confronted him. “Yeah, but I am not an Expert?”
Another warm comforting smile beamed out. “Well yes you are, we’ve been sitting here for about an hour and you brought me up to date on piracy in a very short time! You also been able to explain your idea and why it will work, you certainly know more about it than me, or many others!”
Then there was a small pause. “Look at it this way, start the blog, and maybe one day someone will ask you to come speak as a Piracy Expert at some seminar or trade show!”
I have to admit that thought was nice, and yet at the same time terrifying. Yes I do know lots about piracy, and even from many different angles. But what do you have do, in order to qualify as an expert?
Am I an Expert?
The truth is I don’t know everything there is to know about piracy…!
But if you are willing to listen then I am willing to tell what I know!
Why do I hate piracy so much…?
I suppose I should start with the elephant in the room!
Why do I hate piracy so much…?
Well to tell the truth, I don’t hate piracy… I am reminded of the old adage; if you can’t beat them… join them! Instead of constantly fighting piracy, wasting our time, we should use it to encourage growth, as in fund it! This unorthodox view is the best solution, as none of the orthodox views come close. This is what WarFace is all about, solving problems and getting results.
I was born in Hong Kong, and let me tell you, out in Asia piracy is huge. As a young man I remember Hong Kong was all about streets. If I wanted to buy a pet bird, I’d walk down bird street. If I wanted a snake, it would be snake street. For piracy, everyone headed to the place that specialised in selling of illegal software… The Golden Arcade!
This was a very out in the open affair, and much like today is still not seen as a crime. Though times are changing! I think Dr Pepper said it best … but now PC gamers are finding out the worst can always sink that little bit further into the pits.
But the strange thing, there are no mutual grounds; it is still very much about knee jerk reactions and imposing restrictions on those who do not deserve it. Illegal downloaders still copy games, the PC gaming industry fights back with more restrictive DRMs for customers. These DRMs don’t work and the pirates laugh. If a DRM does work*, the pirates go on a hate campaign and force the company to withdraw the protection system.
* By “Work”! I mean the constant/consistent protection of a digital media, i.e. not allowing the illegal copying of the product, for more than 10 days. If you compare this to any other product in the world, this is setting the bar very low.
How can WarFace, an Anti-Piracy company, say that we should join piracy, and not beat them? Because realistically there is no way to beat the P2P networks or even the File sharing servers. It would be a waste of resources to do this, but maybe there is a way to benefit everyone…
…And there is!
…Do I hate piracy so much? … No!
…WarFace is embracing it!
Why do I hate piracy so much…?
Well to tell the truth, I don’t hate piracy… I am reminded of the old adage; if you can’t beat them… join them! Instead of constantly fighting piracy, wasting our time, we should use it to encourage growth, as in fund it! This unorthodox view is the best solution, as none of the orthodox views come close. This is what WarFace is all about, solving problems and getting results.
I was born in Hong Kong, and let me tell you, out in Asia piracy is huge. As a young man I remember Hong Kong was all about streets. If I wanted to buy a pet bird, I’d walk down bird street. If I wanted a snake, it would be snake street. For piracy, everyone headed to the place that specialised in selling of illegal software… The Golden Arcade!
This was a very out in the open affair, and much like today is still not seen as a crime. Though times are changing! I think Dr Pepper said it best … but now PC gamers are finding out the worst can always sink that little bit further into the pits.
But the strange thing, there are no mutual grounds; it is still very much about knee jerk reactions and imposing restrictions on those who do not deserve it. Illegal downloaders still copy games, the PC gaming industry fights back with more restrictive DRMs for customers. These DRMs don’t work and the pirates laugh. If a DRM does work*, the pirates go on a hate campaign and force the company to withdraw the protection system.
* By “Work”! I mean the constant/consistent protection of a digital media, i.e. not allowing the illegal copying of the product, for more than 10 days. If you compare this to any other product in the world, this is setting the bar very low.
How can WarFace, an Anti-Piracy company, say that we should join piracy, and not beat them? Because realistically there is no way to beat the P2P networks or even the File sharing servers. It would be a waste of resources to do this, but maybe there is a way to benefit everyone…
…And there is!
…Do I hate piracy so much? … No!
…WarFace is embracing it!
This was my Idea..?
I am PC and Windows 7 was my idea…!
Ever since I was a young boy, I have been an avid fan of the PC Platform. Yes… I am a PC gamer, and I have been proud to say that… since Mac brought out their Windows 84.
And in those days, gaming was great, and like a fine wine has only got better over the years. However great gaming has highlighted one serious problem of the PC. Something that is also the PC’s greatest success; the modular nature of the whole platform.
Yes, copying games maybe fun, and may even get you friends. But will also cause a whiplash in the balance. But it seems no matter what Game Publishers do, they never win! But things will always change… and that’s what scares me…
The next DRM has just been launched and it’s bad! I am of course referring to Cloud Computing, and the first company to use this for Gaming is OnLive, released all across America on June 2010.
But what choices did the game publishers have? They lose millions with the release of the PC version. If I look from their eyes, in business terms, I find it very hard to blame them. The many have spoiled it for a few, and it seems that this time we have pushed to far…
I am here to protect my PC and WarFace was my idea!
Ever since I was a young boy, I have been an avid fan of the PC Platform. Yes… I am a PC gamer, and I have been proud to say that… since Mac brought out their Windows 84.
And in those days, gaming was great, and like a fine wine has only got better over the years. However great gaming has highlighted one serious problem of the PC. Something that is also the PC’s greatest success; the modular nature of the whole platform.
Yes, copying games maybe fun, and may even get you friends. But will also cause a whiplash in the balance. But it seems no matter what Game Publishers do, they never win! But things will always change… and that’s what scares me…
The next DRM has just been launched and it’s bad! I am of course referring to Cloud Computing, and the first company to use this for Gaming is OnLive, released all across America on June 2010.
But what choices did the game publishers have? They lose millions with the release of the PC version. If I look from their eyes, in business terms, I find it very hard to blame them. The many have spoiled it for a few, and it seems that this time we have pushed to far…
I am here to protect my PC and WarFace was my idea!
The Wonderful World of WarFace
Hi, My name is James Grimshaw and I am the founder of WarFace. This is my first blog site, which I have done for a number of reasons. Of course the biggest being that I want to promote what we are doing and find support! But on a more personal level I just want to show people why?
Why it is bad to illegally download?
And why I care so much?
Anyhow, if you haven’t guessed, what does WarFace do?
We protect PC Games from illegal downloading!
Piracy is a huge problem for all digital media products; Music, movies, and PC Software. With Broadband speeds increasing and the pure openness and ease of the PC platform, piracy has nestled in a perfect breeding ground. But Warface has the best solution, not only increasing revenue from piracy losses, but protecting it from illegal mass distribution!
So please I hope you’ll keep tuning in as I tackle more piracy issues…
Why it is bad to illegally download?
And why I care so much?
Anyhow, if you haven’t guessed, what does WarFace do?
We protect PC Games from illegal downloading!
Piracy is a huge problem for all digital media products; Music, movies, and PC Software. With Broadband speeds increasing and the pure openness and ease of the PC platform, piracy has nestled in a perfect breeding ground. But Warface has the best solution, not only increasing revenue from piracy losses, but protecting it from illegal mass distribution!
So please I hope you’ll keep tuning in as I tackle more piracy issues…
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