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Eh, this game is being pirated more than the average app. From what I heard at Greg Yardley (PinchMedia)'s talk at 360idev yesterday, the average piracy rate i

by jdg 17y ago

Eh, this game is being pirated more than the average app. From what I heard at Greg Yardley (PinchMedia)'s talk at 360idev yesterday, the average piracy rate is 34%. My personal experience with Boxcar lines up with those numbers, along with a 0.056% conversion rate from pirated to paid. The "average" there, again according to PinchMedia, is 0.043% or 1 in 233. They're taking the right approach in that, well, the truth is if someone is going to pirate something then even if you try and dissuade them they'll just move on to the next one. In my particular case, I send a push notification letting them know we've detected that they are using a pirated copy, and then disable their account. If they purchase the legitimate version, their account will automatically be re-enabled. If I didn't have a backend server with monthly hosting costs, I wouldn't care that the application was being pirated. They use it, then move on. Based on the conversion rates I've seen myself and have heard of from others, it's just not worth the effort to try and get someone to purchase it. Those conversion rates also invalidate the entire "I'm just trying it before buying it" argument, which is complete bullshit. Pirates discuss it on Twitter: http://twitpic.com/jor06 http://twitpic.com/jor06 And I also get emails about it -- angry ones: http://jdg.net/post/160979167/retard http://jdg.net/post/160979167/retard http://jdg.net/post/151845213/some-people-just-amaze-me-unfortunately-this-is http://jdg.net/post/151845213/some-people-just-amaze-me-unfo... http://jdg.net/post/142912680/yep-dont-buy-this-piece-of-crap-or-how-about http://jdg.net/post/142912680/yep-dont-buy-this-piece-of-cra...

theappfarm 17y ago
Interesting data...to your point about our piracy rates being high at 85% - I agree but think it is only a symptom of our App being new and expect it to trend toward 50% or less in a few months. Also important to note is that calculated the piracy rate as the difference between iTunes sales and Pinch media uniques. I have found that Pinch Media's data is less conclusive than it used to be so I wasn't using their metrics for either cracked or jailbroken phones. As for the pirates try before they buy excuse, I agree that this is probably not the case. I think it is a churn game (similar to music) for most pirates - they try hundreds of apps for very little time and stick with only the very few that they like. As for your piracy block - I tried this once and decided better to let them have a lite version of the app over blocking them entirely. Not sure the point of angering the most vocal, early adopters on the web. Check out a post I wrote dealing with this: http://www.icombatgame.com/2009/05/22/on-the-web-every-users-opinion-counts-even-the-pirates/ http://www.icombatgame.com/2009/05/22/on-the-web-every-users...

by jdg 17y ago

theappfarm 17y ago

Interesting data...to your point about our piracy rates being high at 85% - I agree but think it is only a symptom of our App being new and expect it to trend toward 50% or less in a few months. Also important to note is that calculated the piracy rate as the difference between iTunes sales and Pinch media uniques. I have found that Pinch Media's data is less conclusive than it used to be so I wasn't using their metrics for either cracked or jailbroken phones. As for the pirates try before they buy excuse, I agree that this is probably not the case. I think it is a churn game (similar to music) for most pirates - they try hundreds of apps for very little time and stick with only the very few that they like. As for your piracy block - I tried this once and decided better to let them have a lite version of the app over blocking them entirely. Not sure the point of angering the most vocal, early adopters on the web. Check out a post I wrote dealing with this: http://www.icombatgame.com/2009/05/22/on-the-web-every-users-opinion-counts-even-the-pirates/ http://www.icombatgame.com/2009/05/22/on-the-web-every-users...