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My impression is (based on what I've seen with music plugins and heard from plugin developers, which tend to be also produced by small shops) that piracy data d

My impression is (based on what I've seen with music plugins and heard from plugin developers, which tend to be also produced by small shops) that piracy data does matter a fair bit if you don't do anything about it. Nonetheless, several plugin companies do seem to be able to nicely balance the ability to protect their software, while avoiding arduous copy protection methods. The method I think seems to work best is a combination "honey pot + time bomb" type method, where you provide an "easy" method for the pirates to "crack" and get on the usual sites, while also including a more difficult to reverse engineer that activates at some point later. (This kind of nudges those who kind of use piracy to "try and buy" but sometimes, er, need a bit of motivation to actually purchase the product. Even people who can afford the software and make a pretty decent living with the product have been caught with pirated plugins in interviews (https://torrentfreak.com/avicii-and-other-djs-produce-hits-using-pirated-software-150223/) https://torrentfreak.com/avicii-and-other-djs-produce-hits-u...). You definitely don't need to include malware to protect your product.

AnthonyMouse 9y ago
> My impression is (based on what I've seen with music plugins and heard from plugin developers, which tend to be also produced by small shops) that piracy data does matter a fair bit if you don't do anything about it. The problem is nobody really knows that because it's nearly impossible to do a controlled experiment for this. What happens in practice is that a company's first product is unprofitable. So they go back and make significant improvements, spend five times as much on marketing, and add anti-piracy code. Then the new version is more profitable. The people who want the solution to have been the anti-piracy code credit it with the improvement, but there is no way to know if it was that or the product improvements, or the marketing, or more favorable market conditions at the time of the second launch, or the fact that the same marketing effort now produces 50% more customers because there is now an existing user base (including the pirates) who are easier to convert because they're familiar with the previous version, etc. To actually know the answer you would need a statistically valid sample of product launches where the determination of whether anti-piracy measures are taken is made at random. But as far as I'm aware no one has ever attempted this, and the choice to use anti-piracy measures has to be randomized or you could trivially be measuring the wrong thing, e.g. larger products with more resources are both more successful and more often include anti-piracy measures but the causation is reversed. So nobody really knows the answer and it's all just wild speculation.
- soundwave106 9y ago
  What I've heard developers notice is a sharp drop in sales the instant a product is put on the torrent sites (eg, there's a clear "before" and "after" pattern). I also know that there's one plugin developer (u-He) who has posted that the "time bomb" method he uses does drive sales the instant those "time bombs" go off. (https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5762973#p5763060 https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5762973#p5763...). Of course, I only know little bits I hear from developers here and there -- the small shops are the ones that probably have the nitty gritty data details. The impression I get is that coding some degree of protection is worth it, as long as the protection does not impact the user experience that much (and judging from what I see, this is quite possible). There's no excuse however for emulating the warez guys and bundling malware with your software... there's smarter ways to protect products.
  - AnthonyMouse 9y ago
    > What I've heard developers notice is a sharp drop in sales the instant a product is put on the torrent sites (eg, there's a clear "before" and "after" pattern). That still doesn't really tell you the answer though. The hypothesis is that pirates can be converted to users, but that doesn't necessarily happen immediately. Suppose the product hits the piracy sites and 100,000 people download it. 5000 of them would have bought it, so you "lost" 5000 sales right away and you have your dip. But then over the course of the next year or two 7000 of those pirates realize they like the product and go on to buy it. That's definitely a thing that happens, the question is what the real numbers are and whether they balance. > I also know that there's one plugin developer (u-He) who has posted that the "time bomb" method he uses does drive sales the instant those "time bombs" go off. Same problem here. Obviously you're going to get an uptick when the timer expires. But suppose you timebomb 100,000 people and as a result you immediately get 4000 sales, but then 96,000 people stop using your software. If 7000 of the 100,000 would eventually have paid you anyway, now you've just kicked 3000 of them out.
    - soundwave106 9y ago
      Mmm... that sort of hypothesis can't really be quantified, unfortunately, without surveying all your customers whether they bought their software due to a previous pirated copy (and getting honest answers). I don't think the number is zero, as seen in this thread. But overall I don't think humans are that altruistic. :) This is probably particularly true for user-oriented niche software (like the software in question, premium flight sim DLC). Some software in the past (eg Adobe Photoshop) that was marketed primarily for businesses possibly benefited a little from consumers pirating it, but again, that "benefit" is hard to quantify as well. The reason I like the "time bomb" approach though is that I think it gives a bit of a "push" to anyone who is actually using your product extensively. If they aren't using your product enough to care to pay for it, it's probably not a big deal if they stop using your software. If the "time bomb" is at a reasonable period, I have serious doubts that they'd suddenly decide n months later (with no time bomb) that it's all of a sudden worth it to pay for software the have for "free". I don't think niche products unfortunately can do what mass market products are doing these days... which is switching business models towards ones where piracy can be controlled a bit more or is less of a big deal. (Freemium / DLC, cloud-based, subscription-based, etc.) In fact the only alternative model I see for niche is the Kickstarter one where the consumers themselves front the initial business costs (which can work out for consumers sometimes, and not work out other times).
usrusr 9y ago
On the threshold to professionality, there is a big difference in general "computer knowledge" between makers of audio plugins and makers of flight sim add-ons. For every former demoscener working on DSP plugins you will find a former model plane collector in the flight sim space, with a skillset only marginally updated. I've been on the fringe of both scenes at different points in my life and it does not surprise me at all that one of them is so much better at picking the right battles with piracy than the other.

AnthonyMouse 9y ago

> My impression is (based on what I've seen with music plugins and heard from plugin developers, which tend to be also produced by small shops) that piracy data does matter a fair bit if you don't do anything about it. The problem is nobody really knows that because it's nearly impossible to do a controlled experiment for this. What happens in practice is that a company's first product is unprofitable. So they go back and make significant improvements, spend five times as much on marketing, and add anti-piracy code. Then the new version is more profitable. The people who want the solution to have been the anti-piracy code credit it with the improvement, but there is no way to know if it was that or the product improvements, or the marketing, or more favorable market conditions at the time of the second launch, or the fact that the same marketing effort now produces 50% more customers because there is now an existing user base (including the pirates) who are easier to convert because they're familiar with the previous version, etc. To actually know the answer you would need a statistically valid sample of product launches where the determination of whether anti-piracy measures are taken is made at random. But as far as I'm aware no one has ever attempted this, and the choice to use anti-piracy measures has to be randomized or you could trivially be measuring the wrong thing, e.g. larger products with more resources are both more successful and more often include anti-piracy measures but the causation is reversed. So nobody really knows the answer and it's all just wild speculation.

soundwave106 9y ago
What I've heard developers notice is a sharp drop in sales the instant a product is put on the torrent sites (eg, there's a clear "before" and "after" pattern). I also know that there's one plugin developer (u-He) who has posted that the "time bomb" method he uses does drive sales the instant those "time bombs" go off. (https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5762973#p5763060 https://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5762973#p5763...). Of course, I only know little bits I hear from developers here and there -- the small shops are the ones that probably have the nitty gritty data details. The impression I get is that coding some degree of protection is worth it, as long as the protection does not impact the user experience that much (and judging from what I see, this is quite possible). There's no excuse however for emulating the warez guys and bundling malware with your software... there's smarter ways to protect products.
- AnthonyMouse 9y ago
  > What I've heard developers notice is a sharp drop in sales the instant a product is put on the torrent sites (eg, there's a clear "before" and "after" pattern). That still doesn't really tell you the answer though. The hypothesis is that pirates can be converted to users, but that doesn't necessarily happen immediately. Suppose the product hits the piracy sites and 100,000 people download it. 5000 of them would have bought it, so you "lost" 5000 sales right away and you have your dip. But then over the course of the next year or two 7000 of those pirates realize they like the product and go on to buy it. That's definitely a thing that happens, the question is what the real numbers are and whether they balance. > I also know that there's one plugin developer (u-He) who has posted that the "time bomb" method he uses does drive sales the instant those "time bombs" go off. Same problem here. Obviously you're going to get an uptick when the timer expires. But suppose you timebomb 100,000 people and as a result you immediately get 4000 sales, but then 96,000 people stop using your software. If 7000 of the 100,000 would eventually have paid you anyway, now you've just kicked 3000 of them out.
  - soundwave106 9y ago
    Mmm... that sort of hypothesis can't really be quantified, unfortunately, without surveying all your customers whether they bought their software due to a previous pirated copy (and getting honest answers). I don't think the number is zero, as seen in this thread. But overall I don't think humans are that altruistic. :) This is probably particularly true for user-oriented niche software (like the software in question, premium flight sim DLC). Some software in the past (eg Adobe Photoshop) that was marketed primarily for businesses possibly benefited a little from consumers pirating it, but again, that "benefit" is hard to quantify as well. The reason I like the "time bomb" approach though is that I think it gives a bit of a "push" to anyone who is actually using your product extensively. If they aren't using your product enough to care to pay for it, it's probably not a big deal if they stop using your software. If the "time bomb" is at a reasonable period, I have serious doubts that they'd suddenly decide n months later (with no time bomb) that it's all of a sudden worth it to pay for software the have for "free". I don't think niche products unfortunately can do what mass market products are doing these days... which is switching business models towards ones where piracy can be controlled a bit more or is less of a big deal. (Freemium / DLC, cloud-based, subscription-based, etc.) In fact the only alternative model I see for niche is the Kickstarter one where the consumers themselves front the initial business costs (which can work out for consumers sometimes, and not work out other times).

usrusr 9y ago

On the threshold to professionality, there is a big difference in general "computer knowledge" between makers of audio plugins and makers of flight sim add-ons. For every former demoscener working on DSP plugins you will find a former model plane collector in the flight sim space, with a skillset only marginally updated. I've been on the fringe of both scenes at different points in my life and it does not surprise me at all that one of them is so much better at picking the right battles with piracy than the other.