3 ms·

I'm bothered by Jeff's attitude that a game made by a bigger company is somehow more deserving of piracy.

Herring 18y ago
Blame human psychology. Jeff knows it's harder to pirate from "the little guys" so he plays on guilt. I'm sure most pirates are open to rational arguments though.
derefr 18y ago
An interesting psychological effect: Diffusion of responsibility, in reverse. If, in a situation where individual contribution to an act is miniscule, no one is to "blame" for making something negative, then no one is also to reward if the result is positive. If a big company creates value, no one individually created that value in any meaningful way, so the value is psychologically "ownerless." Is this an actual effect? I feel like doing an experiment.
- froo 18y ago
  I wouldn't say its necessarily so, take Microsoft - its a corporation with thousands of employees that work on its products, but how many people hold Gates personally responsible for the failings of Windows? This example is a fairly mainstream idea... it made an appearance in the South Park movie.
ii 18y ago
It's very simple: for bigger company piracy is more like a form of advertising, but for a small one it can actually hurt and kill the small guys.
- khafra 18y ago
  Cory Doctorow is one of the most copyright reform-advocacy-minded people around, and he makes the opposite claim: [paraphrased] "the problem for independent artists isn't piracy, it's obscurity." If A is the set of people that've heard of your product sans piracy, and B is the people that've heard of it after piracy, then the gap between B' that pirates and B had better be smaller than the gap between A and B. That's likelier for a tiny producer than a huge one.
  - ii 18y ago
    I don't care, I make the claim I make: Big guys have free advertising from piracy, small guys are hurt from the same thing. Edit: I guess we mis-understand each other -- I didn't mean VERY small guys, who may suffer from obscurity.

Blame human psychology. Jeff knows it's harder to pirate from "the little guys" so he plays on guilt. I'm sure most pirates are open to rational arguments though.

derefr 18y ago

An interesting psychological effect: Diffusion of responsibility, in reverse. If, in a situation where individual contribution to an act is miniscule, no one is to "blame" for making something negative, then no one is also to reward if the result is positive. If a big company creates value, no one individually created that value in any meaningful way, so the value is psychologically "ownerless." Is this an actual effect? I feel like doing an experiment.

froo 18y ago
I wouldn't say its necessarily so, take Microsoft - its a corporation with thousands of employees that work on its products, but how many people hold Gates personally responsible for the failings of Windows? This example is a fairly mainstream idea... it made an appearance in the South Park movie.

ii 18y ago

It's very simple: for bigger company piracy is more like a form of advertising, but for a small one it can actually hurt and kill the small guys.

khafra 18y ago
Cory Doctorow is one of the most copyright reform-advocacy-minded people around, and he makes the opposite claim: [paraphrased] "the problem for independent artists isn't piracy, it's obscurity." If A is the set of people that've heard of your product sans piracy, and B is the people that've heard of it after piracy, then the gap between B' that pirates and B had better be smaller than the gap between A and B. That's likelier for a tiny producer than a huge one.
- ii 18y ago
  I don't care, I make the claim I make: Big guys have free advertising from piracy, small guys are hurt from the same thing. Edit: I guess we mis-understand each other -- I didn't mean VERY small guys, who may suffer from obscurity.