3 ms·

The trouble is you cannot make a business out of this. Imagine if Valve did this. I brought Half Life 3 for £30. I then launch a web store and sell it for £15.

by bobsy 14y ago

The trouble is you cannot make a business out of this. Imagine if Valve did this. I brought Half Life 3 for £30. I then launch a web store and sell it for £15. I make a few hundred thousand selling a half price copy of a full price uncopyrighted game. I think a lot of content owners are aware of piracy, copyright infringement and its benefits. The Game of Thrones director(?) was talking about the benefits of piracy recently. A lot of content owners don't enforce their copyright, don't send out the hounds and I think a lot of content owners actually benefit from this. I have seen software creators detect pirated installs and instead of shutting them down talk about their small studio and ask when you have the money to buy the software. For some companies this is far more effective than adding a kill switch. For others it really isn't.

nawitus 14y ago
You can make a business out of this, and there are plenty of examples of it. Just because some people would buy HL3 from your store, some other people would not. Just because people can already pirate games, doesn't mean everyone will. Just because someone downloads a game from a torrent site doesn't mean they won't buy the full copy. Why would people pay for content that is freely available? Pretty much all content nowadays can be downloaded freely, that doesn't mean there's no business around the production of such content. People still pay money to consume media. It doesn't matter why people do it, if one can show empirically that people pay for content. For example, I can download Cory Doctorow's books freely, but I choose to pay for the books. It doesn't matter why I do it, it just matters that I do. Just like thousands of other readers. There used to be a website where you could buy Red Hat Enterprise Linux (without the trademarks) for a lot of smaller price than the official version. That business didn't lasted long. A lot of people like to pay for a service. They want to pay for Spotify, for example. It's a good service and it's priced correctly. Significant portion of Spotify users could download the music using P2P networks, but they kinda like the service that they're provided. The same applies to Steam, and Amazon's ebook store and so on. Is it more difficult to create a business without copyright protection? Probably yes. Is it impossible? Certainly not. Copyright is a monopoly which grants exclusive right to make copies. Monopolies should always be balanced to benefit the public, not corporations who are trying to make a profit. It's pretty clear that current copyright law is too strict. The duration should be reduced to 5-10 years (which according to studies is the timeframe to bring in 90% of the profit for the work of art). I personally don't see a case for copyright laws at all, but we should start with 5-10 years.
- teraflop 14y ago
  The resounding success of Steam sales, the Humble Indie Bundle, etc. shows pretty convincingly that most gamers are quite price-sensitive. In general, the people who choose to pay for content out of the goodness of their heart, rather than because it's required or because it's less convenient to get it for free, are decidedly in the minority.
  - spacelizard 14y ago
    I don't think that's quite correct. I see "gamers" being more marketing-sensitive than they are price-sensitive. There are sales in many other places but for whatever reason they don't get as much public exposure as the Steam sales. Even though almost all of it can be acquired for free, people tend to contribute financially to what they think is the least fraudulent option because they certainly do see the service value in purchasing any kind of content. Unfortunately, when it comes to this content, most people also seem have no idea how the publishing business behind it works. Of course all the publishing companies want to keep it this way.
- damoncali 14y ago
  Back in the day, you could buy netscape for about $30. Or you could get it for free- legitimately. The paid offering did not last long. When you legitimise "piracy" (not a good word, but you know what I mean), you can bet the price will approach zero.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- zokier 14y ago
  > There used to be a website where you could buy Red Hat Enterprise Linux (without the trademarks) for a lot of smaller price than the official version. That business doesn't lasted long. I'm not sure what you mean? CentOS and Scientific Linux, the two main RHEL clones, are doing fine, as is RHEL itself.
  - nawitus 14y ago
leobabauta 14y ago
Believe it or not, I have a thriving business where all the products (books and courses) are uncopyrighted. People will still pay for uncopyrighted works. I'm only one of many examples.

by bobsy 14y ago

nawitus 14y ago

You can make a business out of this, and there are plenty of examples of it. Just because some people would buy HL3 from your store, some other people would not. Just because people can already pirate games, doesn't mean everyone will. Just because someone downloads a game from a torrent site doesn't mean they won't buy the full copy. Why would people pay for content that is freely available? Pretty much all content nowadays can be downloaded freely, that doesn't mean there's no business around the production of such content. People still pay money to consume media. It doesn't matter why people do it, if one can show empirically that people pay for content. For example, I can download Cory Doctorow's books freely, but I choose to pay for the books. It doesn't matter why I do it, it just matters that I do. Just like thousands of other readers. There used to be a website where you could buy Red Hat Enterprise Linux (without the trademarks) for a lot of smaller price than the official version. That business didn't lasted long. A lot of people like to pay for a service. They want to pay for Spotify, for example. It's a good service and it's priced correctly. Significant portion of Spotify users could download the music using P2P networks, but they kinda like the service that they're provided. The same applies to Steam, and Amazon's ebook store and so on. Is it more difficult to create a business without copyright protection? Probably yes. Is it impossible? Certainly not. Copyright is a monopoly which grants exclusive right to make copies. Monopolies should always be balanced to benefit the public, not corporations who are trying to make a profit. It's pretty clear that current copyright law is too strict. The duration should be reduced to 5-10 years (which according to studies is the timeframe to bring in 90% of the profit for the work of art). I personally don't see a case for copyright laws at all, but we should start with 5-10 years.

teraflop 14y ago
The resounding success of Steam sales, the Humble Indie Bundle, etc. shows pretty convincingly that most gamers are quite price-sensitive. In general, the people who choose to pay for content out of the goodness of their heart, rather than because it's required or because it's less convenient to get it for free, are decidedly in the minority.
- spacelizard 14y ago
  I don't think that's quite correct. I see "gamers" being more marketing-sensitive than they are price-sensitive. There are sales in many other places but for whatever reason they don't get as much public exposure as the Steam sales. Even though almost all of it can be acquired for free, people tend to contribute financially to what they think is the least fraudulent option because they certainly do see the service value in purchasing any kind of content. Unfortunately, when it comes to this content, most people also seem have no idea how the publishing business behind it works. Of course all the publishing companies want to keep it this way.
damoncali 14y ago
Back in the day, you could buy netscape for about $30. Or you could get it for free- legitimately. The paid offering did not last long. When you legitimise "piracy" (not a good word, but you know what I mean), you can bet the price will approach zero.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
zokier 14y ago
> There used to be a website where you could buy Red Hat Enterprise Linux (without the trademarks) for a lot of smaller price than the official version. That business doesn't lasted long. I'm not sure what you mean? CentOS and Scientific Linux, the two main RHEL clones, are doing fine, as is RHEL itself.
- nawitus 14y ago

leobabauta 14y ago

Believe it or not, I have a thriving business where all the products (books and courses) are uncopyrighted. People will still pay for uncopyrighted works. I'm only one of many examples.