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> but it certainly isn't natural. So what? Nothing about software development is 'natural'. I don't even know what definition of 'natural' you're using here.

by kaibee 8y ago

> but it certainly isn't natural. So what? Nothing about software development is 'natural'. I don't even know what definition of 'natural' you're using here. > It's a phony concept that exists to support an unnatural business model. It's a social construct that we've adopted in society because it allows for things we like. > The real business model should be players paying you directly to develop and update the game they want to play for as long as they want to play it. This is a valid business model for some games, but there are many games that would not exist without such a model. I'd prefer that those games exist instead of insisting that reality should be the way that fits nicely with my arbitrary mental models.

renox 8y ago
> Nothing about software development is 'natural' Why do you say so? > I don't even know what definition of 'natural' you're using here I think that he's talking about the ease of copying software: it's quite hard to make people pay for something so easy to duplicate..
- afarrell 8y ago
  > > Nothing about software development is 'natural' > Why do you say so? Because building even the simplest computers requires large-scale industrial processes. All of this is based on a social/economic system that required the intelligent design of many many people and organizations.
- malloryerik 8y ago
  "You cannot go against nature Because when you do Go against Nature It's part of nature too." -- Love and Rockets, "No New Tale to Tell" In the scientific sense, everything is natural. Truly "unnatural" things are like supernatural things -- stuff that exists only in fairy tales or horror stories or some metaphysical religions. Saying that something is unnatural is typically a value judgement meaning that it is unhelpful, damaging, or against a goal considered inherent in some area of life, and so on. Otherwise, a more valid if unfortunate use of the word "unnatural" is as the common short-hand for "human-made" or "artificial", similar to the way that "animal" is used as a short-hand for "animal that isn't human". Of course propulsion labs, parliaments, and property laws are absolutely as natural as mushrooms, mollusks, and manatees, but in addition to being natural the former are also human-made. In this truest and widest sense, everything that is artificial is also natural. Other uses of the words "natural", "unnatural", and "nature" should be informed by this broadest and truest one, especially when making judgements about laws or norms or behavior. This might sound pedantic, didactic or even obvious at first, but with some consideration it may reveal itself as a surprisingly useful and clarifying point to keep in mind. Rather than proclaiming copyright laws unnatural -- a value judgment masquerading as an objective fact (perhaps unintentionally) -- it would be more fruitful to ask questions such as, "How does copyright differ from other property laws?", "How are property rights justified?", "What are the differences and similarities between physical things and ideas?", and so on. Yes, it's nearly free to copy digital works, which therefore lack the same level of scarcity that we experience in the rest of our lives. Yet the creators and consumers of intellectual and digital works have little choice but to create and consume those works in the broader context of the world of physical scarcity in which society is embedded. It's sad, but you can't stop burning calories and taking up space just because you are consuming digital media.
matheusmoreira 8y ago
>I don't even know what definition of 'natural' you're using here. Copying data is a fundamental operation that all computers are able to perform and it costs nothing. Therefore, data is naturally easy to copy. Software doesn't need to be manufactured like physical goods do: the software construction step is fully automated by compilers and build systems. The cost of all this is approximately $0. Networks aren't free because of bandwidth costs, but they still make it really easy and cheap to copy data to a lot of computers. Since games are software and software is data, it is rather easy to distribute them to an unbounded number of machines. Even if you come up with some complicated copy protection scheme, people only need to crack it once and produce a DRM-free version of the game that will work everywhere and won't do stupid things such as require an internet connection. Even cryptographically secure platforms such as the PS4 eventually got cracked and the first thing people did is enable the execution of unsigned software. >insisting that reality should be the way that fits nicely with my arbitrary mental models That's exactly what copyright does.
- Torwald 8y ago
  > Copying data is a fundamental operation that all computers are able to perform and it costs nothing. That is not true. Running, maintaining, etc the IT infrastructure is costing money, electricity etc. It doesn't come for free.
  - matheusmoreira 8y ago
    Suppose that a copy takes 1 second to complete and the computer's power supply unit draws 400 W of power during that 1 second. How much does it cost to complete that copy? Hawaii has the most expensive electricity¹ in the United States, averaging at 29.23 cents / kW * h. Let's use 30 cents / kW * h. If we have 400 W sustained for one second, that equals 0.000111111111 kW * h. (400 Watt * second) * (30 cents / kWh) = 3.33333333 × 10^-5 U.S. dollars. In Hawaii, that one copy would cost $0.0000333333. If one were to make 100 000 copies of that same data, it would cost $3.33333333. ¹ https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/ https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/
antris 8y ago
> So what? Nothing about software development is 'natural'. I don't even know what definition of 'natural' you're using here. I'm quite sure they're referring to artificial scarcity. Making copies is very easy, making games is very hard. Therefore it makes much more sense to charge for the development of the game rather than the copies. Making abundant resources artificially scarce is either frowned upon or flat-out illegal in pretty much every other industry. > there are many games that would not exist without such a model How do you know?
- TimJYoung 8y ago
  Okay, so I'm going to charge for my development time - how exactly am I going to divide that up among the customers, many of which don't exist yet, without over-charging anyone and how are you going to make sure I don't do so in a way that doesn't "illegally institute artificial scarcity" ? The issue here is that there seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding of how markets work. Toro could choose to cut production of their lawnmowers by half and double the price, and this would cause "artificial scarcity". However, it would also be perfectly legal and downright stupid of Toro because the competitive lawnmower market would punish them dearly for it.
  - antris 8y ago
    > Okay, so I'm going to charge for my development time - how exactly am I going to divide that up among the customers, many of which don't exist yet, without over-charging anyone and how are you going to make sure I don't do so in a way that doesn't "illegally institute artificial scarcity" ? It's not my job to invent business models for other people, but all Kickstarter-type funded software is a good example of one possible way. Another is maintaining and updating a gaming server and charging for access to it, like World of Warcraft does. > The issue here is that there seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding of how markets work. Toro could choose to cut production of their lawnmowers by half and double the price, and this would cause "artificial scarcity". However, it would also be perfectly legal and downright stupid of Toro because the competitive lawnmower market would punish them dearly for it. If you had a device to copy lawnmowers, but the lawnmower industry fought back to make copying lawnmowers illegal, then you'd have a working comparison.

by kaibee 8y ago

renox 8y ago

> Nothing about software development is 'natural' Why do you say so? > I don't even know what definition of 'natural' you're using here I think that he's talking about the ease of copying software: it's quite hard to make people pay for something so easy to duplicate..

afarrell 8y ago
> > Nothing about software development is 'natural' > Why do you say so? Because building even the simplest computers requires large-scale industrial processes. All of this is based on a social/economic system that required the intelligent design of many many people and organizations.
malloryerik 8y ago
"You cannot go against nature Because when you do Go against Nature It's part of nature too." -- Love and Rockets, "No New Tale to Tell" In the scientific sense, everything is natural. Truly "unnatural" things are like supernatural things -- stuff that exists only in fairy tales or horror stories or some metaphysical religions. Saying that something is unnatural is typically a value judgement meaning that it is unhelpful, damaging, or against a goal considered inherent in some area of life, and so on. Otherwise, a more valid if unfortunate use of the word "unnatural" is as the common short-hand for "human-made" or "artificial", similar to the way that "animal" is used as a short-hand for "animal that isn't human". Of course propulsion labs, parliaments, and property laws are absolutely as natural as mushrooms, mollusks, and manatees, but in addition to being natural the former are also human-made. In this truest and widest sense, everything that is artificial is also natural. Other uses of the words "natural", "unnatural", and "nature" should be informed by this broadest and truest one, especially when making judgements about laws or norms or behavior. This might sound pedantic, didactic or even obvious at first, but with some consideration it may reveal itself as a surprisingly useful and clarifying point to keep in mind. Rather than proclaiming copyright laws unnatural -- a value judgment masquerading as an objective fact (perhaps unintentionally) -- it would be more fruitful to ask questions such as, "How does copyright differ from other property laws?", "How are property rights justified?", "What are the differences and similarities between physical things and ideas?", and so on. Yes, it's nearly free to copy digital works, which therefore lack the same level of scarcity that we experience in the rest of our lives. Yet the creators and consumers of intellectual and digital works have little choice but to create and consume those works in the broader context of the world of physical scarcity in which society is embedded. It's sad, but you can't stop burning calories and taking up space just because you are consuming digital media.

matheusmoreira 8y ago

>I don't even know what definition of 'natural' you're using here. Copying data is a fundamental operation that all computers are able to perform and it costs nothing. Therefore, data is naturally easy to copy. Software doesn't need to be manufactured like physical goods do: the software construction step is fully automated by compilers and build systems. The cost of all this is approximately $0. Networks aren't free because of bandwidth costs, but they still make it really easy and cheap to copy data to a lot of computers. Since games are software and software is data, it is rather easy to distribute them to an unbounded number of machines. Even if you come up with some complicated copy protection scheme, people only need to crack it once and produce a DRM-free version of the game that will work everywhere and won't do stupid things such as require an internet connection. Even cryptographically secure platforms such as the PS4 eventually got cracked and the first thing people did is enable the execution of unsigned software. >insisting that reality should be the way that fits nicely with my arbitrary mental models That's exactly what copyright does.

Torwald 8y ago
> Copying data is a fundamental operation that all computers are able to perform and it costs nothing. That is not true. Running, maintaining, etc the IT infrastructure is costing money, electricity etc. It doesn't come for free.
- matheusmoreira 8y ago
  Suppose that a copy takes 1 second to complete and the computer's power supply unit draws 400 W of power during that 1 second. How much does it cost to complete that copy? Hawaii has the most expensive electricity¹ in the United States, averaging at 29.23 cents / kW * h. Let's use 30 cents / kW * h. If we have 400 W sustained for one second, that equals 0.000111111111 kW * h. (400 Watt * second) * (30 cents / kWh) = 3.33333333 × 10^-5 U.S. dollars. In Hawaii, that one copy would cost $0.0000333333. If one were to make 100 000 copies of that same data, it would cost $3.33333333. ¹ https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/ https://www.electricchoice.com/electricity-prices-by-state/

antris 8y ago

> So what? Nothing about software development is 'natural'. I don't even know what definition of 'natural' you're using here. I'm quite sure they're referring to artificial scarcity. Making copies is very easy, making games is very hard. Therefore it makes much more sense to charge for the development of the game rather than the copies. Making abundant resources artificially scarce is either frowned upon or flat-out illegal in pretty much every other industry. > there are many games that would not exist without such a model How do you know?

TimJYoung 8y ago
Okay, so I'm going to charge for my development time - how exactly am I going to divide that up among the customers, many of which don't exist yet, without over-charging anyone and how are you going to make sure I don't do so in a way that doesn't "illegally institute artificial scarcity" ? The issue here is that there seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding of how markets work. Toro could choose to cut production of their lawnmowers by half and double the price, and this would cause "artificial scarcity". However, it would also be perfectly legal and downright stupid of Toro because the competitive lawnmower market would punish them dearly for it.
- antris 8y ago
  > Okay, so I'm going to charge for my development time - how exactly am I going to divide that up among the customers, many of which don't exist yet, without over-charging anyone and how are you going to make sure I don't do so in a way that doesn't "illegally institute artificial scarcity" ? It's not my job to invent business models for other people, but all Kickstarter-type funded software is a good example of one possible way. Another is maintaining and updating a gaming server and charging for access to it, like World of Warcraft does. > The issue here is that there seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding of how markets work. Toro could choose to cut production of their lawnmowers by half and double the price, and this would cause "artificial scarcity". However, it would also be perfectly legal and downright stupid of Toro because the competitive lawnmower market would punish them dearly for it. If you had a device to copy lawnmowers, but the lawnmower industry fought back to make copying lawnmowers illegal, then you'd have a working comparison.