Studies Keep Showing That the Best Way To Stop Piracy Is To Offer Cheaper, Better Alternatives (vice.com) 111
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: Study after study continues to show that the best approach to tackling internet piracy is to provide these would-be customers with high quality, low cost alternatives. That idea was again supported by a new study this week out of New Zealand first spotted by TorrentFreak. The study, paid for by telecom operator Vocus Group, surveyed a thousand New Zealanders last December, and found that while half of those polled say they've pirated content at some point in their lives, those numbers have dropped as legal streaming alternatives have flourished.
The study found that 11 percent of New Zealand consumers still obtain copyrighted content via illegal streams, and 10 percent download infringing content via BitTorrent or other platforms. But it also found that users are increasingly likely to obtain that same content via over the air antennas (75 percent) or legitimate streaming services like Netflix (55 percent). "In short, the reason people are moving away from piracy is that it's simply more hassle than it's worth," says Vocus Group NZ executive Taryn Hamilton said in a statement. "The research confirms something many internet pundits have long instinctively believed to be true: piracy isn't driven by law-breakers, it's driven by people who can't easily or affordably get the content they want," she said.
The study found that 11 percent of New Zealand consumers still obtain copyrighted content via illegal streams, and 10 percent download infringing content via BitTorrent or other platforms. But it also found that users are increasingly likely to obtain that same content via over the air antennas (75 percent) or legitimate streaming services like Netflix (55 percent). "In short, the reason people are moving away from piracy is that it's simply more hassle than it's worth," says Vocus Group NZ executive Taryn Hamilton said in a statement. "The research confirms something many internet pundits have long instinctively believed to be true: piracy isn't driven by law-breakers, it's driven by people who can't easily or affordably get the content they want," she said.
Apple computer (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I would daresay that Power Computing helped things. Apple wasn't floundering because of the Mac clones, but more because they were not keeping up with the PC and Linux, and the world essentially was moving to MS-DOS/Windows for its computing needs.
Until OS X, macOS was an event-driven cooperative multitasking platform. This meant that if one app didn't yield with a WaitNextEvent() call, the whole system lurched to a stop. In fact, OS 8 was known for having to reboot it often, usually once every few hours
Re: (Score:2)
Most of their profit comes from the iPhone, which is much less expensive than their other hardware.
But they make up for it in volume. :-) Seriously, they do. Its not the cost of the product, its the profit margin. A very large number of less expensive but higher margin products wins the game.
What really made them profitable was having a highly streamlined product line which makes their costs lower than other companies.
I'm not sure this is true. After all the company they outsource their manufacturing to also manufactures for their competitors.
Re: (Score:2)
They almost died back in the 90's because of the Mac clones.
Reason being their late switch to the better performing Intel (compatible) cpu's.
You cannot target professional power users if your hardware does not offer the power those professionals were after. A lot of users choose an alternative platform aka Windows because those workstations were having much better performance and could be replaced more frequent with the latest hardware. After all, the 90's were the time when some users replaced their hardware every 1 1/2 year or even more often because of the fast i
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Question is. Are we talking early 90's or late 90's. For early 90's you are totally right and a 68xxx would run circles around Intel's offerings.
However, in late 90's, around this magic 1996 year you mentioned, stuff started to change. Intel would double it's CPU speed at a tremendous rate. A single mobo could see 3 CPU generations, going from a 66MHz model all the way to 233. At the end of the decade we hit the magic 1GHz benchmark. In 5 year time, CPU's went from maybe 133MHz around 1995 to 1GHz in 1999.
M
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I worked for a big advertising agency 1993-2005 and at some point around 2001-2002 our prepress group was seriously considering a switch to Wintel platforms because of performance issues and the many headaches of OS 9 and the teething pains of OS X's early releases as well as much better network storage access.
They ultimately didn't switch for reasons that kind of boiled down to typeface management and some user resistance. We did do a pilot of one machine and the person that used it generally liked it.
The
What Mac Clones ? (Score:1)
There were maybe two or three companies that tried and were shut down quickly. Then there were a few where you needed to have mac roms to even make them work and they never amounted to much either.
The closest thing to a mac clone has always been Windows. (Viable or not is in the eye of the beholder on that score)
Re: (Score:3)
I think if one goes to a Harbor Freight, there are a lot of tools that come off the Chinese boat which seem to go the same route. A lot of the tools there look remarkably like the ones in more expensive hardware stores.
This creates a vicious cycle. People start to realize that the only difference between a $10 Chinesium wrench from HF versus a $150 part from somewhere else is the name. Or that they can hit Aliexpress or even Taobao and buy stuff even cheaper. Retail stores get undercut, so keep trying t
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
got to be the most profitable company in the world by selling relatively small amounts of product at very high prices...
Selling over 150 million iPhones a year for the last few years represents "small amounts of product"? I doubt you would even find a billionaire who would share that mentality.
They may enjoy the luxury of high prices (and margins), but they sure as hell didn't get to the top with mediocre sales numbers.
Re: Apple computer (Score:1)
Video game industry is a few giants buying everything and then milking the brands too.
Re: (Score:2)
got to be the most profitable company in the world by selling relatively small amounts of product at very high prices
Apple initially made its name by selling fairly large amounts of product at relatively low prices. Then it switched to selling fairly small amounts of product at significantly high prices. It got to be the most profitable company in the world by selling highly-polished products (in the shiny sense) which came with lock-in.
Re: These studies are hogwash! (Score:2)
The study clearly says people won't steal if you give them shit to them for free.
It's a whole new concept in fighting crime!
Re: (Score:2)
If you sell the stuff for cheap enough, they will buy it.
SPECIALLY if you get around retarded horrible taxes in the country, and sell this product for a price the local population can actually buy.
There's a reason why steam is pretty much the king of brazil when talking about selling games.
Re: (Score:3)
Study after study done by actual scientists are "hogwash"? When they dished out intelligence, you must have gone to the wrong queue...
Gouging and overbearing DRM induces piracy (Score:1)
Charging $40 for one movie on a Blu-Ray is ridiculous and anyone trivially stealing from such ridiculous gougers doesn't feel bad about it at all. The threat of a DCMA letter is low enough to be disregarded as a deterrent.
Re: (Score:2)
Worse.. when they charge $40 for a TV series which should have been funded via the enormous amount of commercials played during the show.
the markup on TV series on DVD/Blu-ray must be amazing.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
They're still wistfully looking back on the era when mass-market VHS tapes were around $20 each and Laserdisc as the premium option was somewhere between $50 and $100 depending on the title, quality of the transfer, and any extra features.
The problem is that with DVD they picked a format that serves more than one purpose, and to a lesser extent likewise with Blu-ray, such that both are easily read by inexpensive commodity PC hardware in addition to purpose-built players. Had studios/publishers/distributors
Re: (Score:1)
But you see, they don't want to charge you a reasonable price. They want to charge you a premium price for a product that is full of ads.
They would rather spend a dollar trying to force you to play by their rules than make a hundred dollars by catering to what the buyers actually want.
They think this is rational, because they believe they will make more money in the long run, studies be damned.
8 years later same conclusion: Service not price (Score:5, Informative)
Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem. -- Gabe Newell
Didn't we already have this discussion 8 years ago [slashdot.org] ???
Re: (Score:1)
Thanks for the non-sequitur. Really, you should be a comedy writer.
Re: (Score:2)
Typical content from 8.0 years ago, though was just as whacky, [slashdot.org] and the Space Shuttle Discovery docked with the the Space Station for the 1st time. [slashdot.org]
Re: (Score:3)
Or over 15 years ago - when the iTunes music store first opened and started selling music for 99 cents.
Like who would pay 99 cents for a music track they could pirate for free? Yet, the convenience of just finding it and clicking buy was much easier than Napster and friends and hoping it wasn't a mislabeled track. Plus the convenience of having it in a minute after purchase.
And the impressive sales of that caused music to go DRM free a few years later, w
Re: (Score:2)
Or over 15 years ago - when the iTunes music store first opened and started selling music for 99 cents.
Like who would pay 99 cents for a music track they could pirate for free? Yet, the convenience of just finding it and clicking buy was much easier than Napster and friends and hoping it wasn't a mislabeled track. Plus the convenience of having it in a minute after purchase.
... and not having to worry about malware.
Re: (Score:3)
A friend sent over instructions for ripping a bluray to HDD just yesterday. Took him years to get the process prefect. Still, it involves multiple complex steps, having just the right hardware and software, and at the end of it you get something you could have pirated with a fraction of the time and effort.
If they catered to people like me they could actually make more money. For example, when I buy CDs they are usually second hand. The older ones tend to sound better, from back before the loudness war star
Re: (Score:1)
For example, when I buy CDs they are usually second hand. The older ones tend to sound better, from back before the loudness war started.
You would need to purchase albums that were produced before the Loudness Wars amplified at the dawn of the consumer digital music era (mid- to late-90s) and were not remastered, but there is no compelling reason to purchase "used" CDs over "new" ones because that is in no way a guaranteed means of sidestepping the dynamic range compression. Where did you hear that?
Re: (Score:3)
You can generally look up which releases are overly compressed online.
http://dr.loudness-war.info/ [loudness-war.info]
The 80s was a golden age in many ways. I've got an original Brothers in Arms release and it sounds incredible, one of the most dynamic albums ever made. Every subsequent re-release and "remaster" ruined it a little bit more.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Exactly, not everyone here has an attention span that
... Oooh, shiny!
Pundits misunderstand ... (Score:3)
"The research confirms something many internet pundits have long instinctively believed to be true: piracy isn't driven by law-breakers, it's driven by people who can't easily or affordably get the content they want," she said.
No, the pundits are misunderstanding. Piracy is driven by the convenience of the piracy. Its merely the inconvenience necessary to get them to go legit is proportional to the affordability. However if piracy is convenient enough affordability offers little prevention.
... similar thing. Nearly anyone will do it if easy enough and the consequences low enough.
Once upon a time I had some software bundled with a university textbook, molecular modeling and visualization software. Think a digital version of the plastic ball and stick kits, now add geometry cleanup and various 3D renderings. Not wanting to deal with the hassle of copy protection I did not use any. The textbook included a coupon that let the student buy the software at the university bookstore for US$30. The software was required for the class, software sales were 10% that of the textbook. The publisher said to add copy protection. I selected the simplest, crudest, least like to generate customer support problems copy protection that I could find. Cracks were quickly produced and widely distributed for other software using this copy protection. I didn't care, I wanted to minimize customer support calls. This copy protections software worked. Sale increased to 80% that of the textbook despite cracks being immediately and readily available. This was in a university environment, where many are technically competent or can find someone who is quite easily. Yet the simplest crudest easily defeatable barrier to piracy caused the piracy rate to drop from 90% to 20%.
People will pirate if it easy to do so, regardless of how low cost a software product is. In other words people will break the law if it is easy enough to do so. Traffic laws, piracy
Re: (Score:3)
Wrong. Piracy will never be as convenient as a good, reasonably-priced offer by the original content distributor. Those that will pay will basically always look there first and only look at alternatives if they do not find what they want there. Those that look at pirated version first will almost universally not buy a legitimate version if they cannot get a pirated one. Study after study shows this. There is absolutely no point in preventing non-commercial or low-key commercial piracy. Sure, if a pirate act
Re: (Score:2)
And you think that this could not be done for legitimate distribution as well? That most legitimate offers suck at this time does not mean that they have to.
Re: (Score:3)
Piracy will never be as convenient as a good, reasonably-priced offer by the original content distributor.
You're missing availability. Piracy is better than having 10 bloody game stores independently running on a PC, multiple different libraries of music that can't talk to each other, multiple different services offering streaming etc.
Price is only one factor. Not only is piracy as convenient as downloading a game on Steam (okay there's an additional click because you need to install the download), but the end result has been shown to actually run better on computers with less bullshit affecting the end user.
He
Re: (Score:2)
I said "good" offer. What you describe is not a good offer. It is a service nightmare that consumers understandably try not to use.
Re: (Score:2)
I said "good" offer.
Every publisher is giving a "good" offer. The level of "goodness" being the system you use to get content is not at all within their control. What I describe is a pure luck that favours the first mover over any other factor of "goodness". E.g. EPIC game store could actually be epic, could actually live up to it's name, could offer cheaper games than competitors and thus meet all of the definitions of "good", but still not be suitable for the reasons I mentioned.
Re: (Score:2)
Piracy will never be as convenient as a good, reasonably-priced offer by the original content distributor.
You're missing availability. Piracy is better than having 10 bloody game stores independently running on a PC, multiple different libraries of music that can't talk to each other, multiple different services offering streaming etc ...
That would be because app stores should really just be a front for web services that 3rd party clients plug into to buy and download/cache your purchases thus allowing you to have all your crap in one place instead of every service having its own client. The same incidentally goes for movie streaming services like Netflix. Having said that, he did point out that most of this music is DRM free now so there is nothing preventing you from keeping all your music in one place except laziness. Come to think of it
Re: (Score:3)
No, the pundits are misunderstanding. Piracy is driven by the convenience of the piracy. Its merely the inconvenience necessary to get them to go legit is proportional to the affordability. However if piracy is convenient enough affordability offers little prevention.
This. I jumped on Steam today with my debit card in hand ready to make a purchase only to be greeted with:
"Notice: Sales of Metro Exodus have been discontinued on Steam due to a publisher decision to make the game exclusive to another PC store."
I had no such problems on The Pirate Bay. Incidentally my card is still here on the table if the publisher wants to take my money through a means other than installing the Epic fail store on my computer.
Re: (Score:2)
The pundits are correct. They say "people who can't easily or affordably get the content they want". Lack of either will cause piracy.
In your case, when your software had no copy protection, it was easier to simply copy it than to buy it. Once you had minimal protection, buying was easier than copying and cracking.
Affordability was, as you say, never a factor. But the way of paying for the software might be a barrier as well. If it requires hassle, that will cause piracy as well, simply by being a hassle.
Wh
Decades of this conclusion change nothing? (Score:5, Interesting)
I mean, I'm one of the unfortunate people who ran a BBS back in the late 80's and early 90's who got raided by Federal agents over copyright violation accusations. (Ultimately, they just wound up sitting on all my equipment for over a year, keeping it in a storage locker someplace, until deciding to drop the case and return all of it to me. But as we all know with computer gear, a lot of it had already depreciated considerably by then -- so I was left with a lot of stuff I couldn't resell for much of anything.)
But way back THEN, we kept trying to tell everyone who would listen that software piracy was a big waste of time for anyone to chase after and try to prosecute. The SAME people guilty of pirating were the BEST CUSTOMERS or ADVOCATES for buying stuff made by the companies trying to squash it!
For example? One of the "big issues" they had with my BBS was that someone had uploaded a cracked copy of a version of AutoCAD to the "New Uploads" folder. While it's true that's a really expensive piece of software? It's also true that the users on my BBS were mostly kids who could never afford to buy AutoCAD, nor would they ever have a real cost justification to buy it, if they DID have the money. By them pirating it around though, it encouraged some of them to buy a book on how to use it, and they spent some time learning the application. That, in turn, means there's a whole self-taught generation of people who could grow up to work for companies who DO legitimately buy the software, the maintenance agreements, and all of the upgrades and add-ons for it. That's a big win for AutoDesk, whether they admit it or not! Those people aren't going to be happy if the company buys a competitor's CAD product. They want the one they're comfortable with!
When you challenge most software firms with this kind of logic, they typically turn around and give a lecture on there being a "right and a wrong way" to go about learning their products -- perhaps throwing in the fact that they sell "student versions" much cheaper for students. And you know? That's all true, technically. If you're purely a "letter of the law" and "show no mercy" type, I guess there's your answer? But I bet the "pirates" on BBS's like mine, back then, OFTEN got a career in I.T. or in using one or more of these business apps thanks to having a way to download it for free, on their own terms, to use on their own PC, on their own schedule. And it just wouldn't have ever happened if you expected them to opt to pursue it in college (when they're already cramming their brains full of other course content they need to get through to graduate).
Re: (Score:1)
When you challenge most software firms with this kind of logic, they typically turn around and give a lecture on there being a "right and a wrong way" to go about learning their products -- perhaps throwing in the fact that they sell "student versions" much cheaper for students. And you know? That's all true, technically. If you're purely a "letter of the law" and "show no mercy" type, I guess there's your answer?
A strong argument can be made that current US copyright law violates the highest law in the land, and is therefore illegal, which makes the position taken by the "letter of law" folks particularly absurd.
The argument rests on the right to ethical practice of law, certainly an universal and inalienable right in any society based on the rule of law. In the US, this right can be asserted as a right "retained by the people" under the 9th Amendment, and "reserved to the people" under the 10th.
James Madison deli
Re: (Score:2)
Unfortunately the highest court in the land (who's job it is to decide whether lesser laws violate the highest law in the land) decided in Eldred v. Ashcroft that the US copyright law is in fact constitutional.
Good luck getting the right mix of judges on the bench (and the right case going all the way to the highest court) to get that ruling overturned.
Re: (Score:1)
Unfortunately the highest court in the land (who's job it is to decide whether lesser laws violate the highest law in the land) decided in Eldred v. Ashcroft that the US copyright law is in fact constitutional.
Good luck getting the right mix of judges on the bench (and the right case going all the way to the highest court) to get that ruling overturned.
There's a fun game you can play. Pick a random circuit or Supreme Court decision and see if you spot the cases where they ignore the legal ethics issues.
There are many such cases. You can even spot at least one from last year - and it's an important case with substantial economic implications - so this is not a problem that is going away.
That willful blindness is a big part of the reason why the US has such severe problems with ethical practice of law (and why the legal profession collectively makes far m
Re: (Score:2)
I learned Photoshop in college, through illicit copies. I can't even guess how many copies I've since paid for, between personal use and work.
Re: (Score:2)
I learned Photoshop in college, through illicit copies. I can't even guess how many copies I've since paid for, between personal use and work.
This implied causal chain may very well have been true for you. However, I don't believe it is for most.
Did you pirate a copy of Photoshop because it was free, or did you pirate that specific program because it was the leading application in its category and you wanted to learn that specific program? And then, did you buy copies for work because you had learned it in college from the pirated copy, or did you buy and use it because it is the leading application in its category?
Compare this for a moment wit
re: Photoshop vs. The Gimp, etc. (Score:2)
You have your subjective opinion on the issue, and I don't know if any comprehensive study has ever been done that would give us answers to prove you right or wrong? But I can very definitely state that in my 30 years or so working with computers and I.T., I've seen MANY, MANY examples where people went on to drive commercial sales of software products, thanks to them having a way to get their hands on free, pirated copies of the programs first.
In your Gimp vs. Photoshop example? I know many people who tr
Re: (Score:2)
I've seen MANY, MANY examples where people went on to drive commercial sales of software products, thanks to them having a way to get their hands on free, pirated copies of the programs first.
That may be. My question is still, why did they go to the trouble of pirating that specific piece of software to begin with? If it was because they wanted the experience of that program because it was going to be something they needed to know for later, then it is unwarranted to claim that the purchase was driven by the piracy. The purchase was driven by the need to use that program.
I see that many times, where people pay for Word because they need the interoperability with other people, even though they c
Re: (Score:2)
I guess I'm not sure how your point really relates to my original argument though?
It seems to me like it's not so relevant to the matter why a person decided to download a pirated piece of software, as long as the financial reality is that they can't afford to buy it?
Usability and capability of a piece of software clearly helps drive its desirability. But that's a universal truth. (Whether you're a company who can afford to buy anything they like, or a pre-teen who doesn't have $10 to her/her name -- you'
Re: (Score:2)
Sure, it might be a little mixed, even in my own experience. I'm old enough that when I stumbled onto Photoshop, it was in competition with MacPaint. Gimp wasn't around. For me, it was "here's how to do fun stuff with pictures" and then I got to know the interface and filters and other tools, and never wanted to switch. I tried Gimp later, and couldn't deal with it because everything looked different, before deciding to pay for Photoshop. If Gimp had been around and free and I learned it first, I might have
Gabe Newell eloquent words on the topic (Score:5, Informative)
"We think there is a fundamental misconception about piracy. Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem," he said. "If a pirate offers a product anywhere in the world, 24 x 7, purchasable from the convenience of your personal computer, and the legal provider says the product is region-locked, will come to your country 3 months after the US release, and can only be purchased at a brick and mortar store, then the pirate's service is more valuable."
The proof is in the proverbial pudding. "Prior to entering the Russian market, we were told that Russia was a waste of time because everyone would pirate our products. Russia is now about to become [Steam's] largest market in Europe," Newell said.
From: http://www.escapistmagazine.co... [escapistmagazine.com]
How to male software sell (Score:2)
Break up the software into shareware type products at a low price.
That link together as a work flow but can be stand alone.
Find the impulse buy level for each seperate software product.
Sell as parts, as a bundle. Add in how to ebooks.
Use version drift to further keep people buying back in with steep discounts for the next version.
Discounts for buying into more of the software.
Keep innovating.
Listen to your users. Add features as needed due to OS, GPU, CPU supp
Re: (Score:2)
"Make" with "male" and enjoy the comments.
The two claims are different. (Score:1)
I buy lots of virtual content because the price is decent so it's a factor but that doesn't mean that the other claim of piracy bring a hassle isn't one too.
Finding ebooks and comics and such take time and effort which you have less of if you just pay.
Price isn't everything. Lack of easy access to pirated content is one too.
Plus getting caught. Torrenting using random free VPN service at least may not work.
Fixed that story title for you (Score:2)
s/Best/Worst/
No profit in that cheap-assed approach to solving the piracy "problem". Dare I say "crisis"? The greedy bastards certainly dare.
The ACTUAL solution approach that I favor would be to focus on cost recovery and accountability without the unending quest for obscene profits. That's a fake problem because there is NO amount of profit that can solve the problem, in start contrast to all the actual problems we have to deal with.
I still can't figure out why such approaches have so little appeal on Slas
And nobody that looked at facts is surprised (Score:2)
This has been clear for a long time now. The stupidity, greed, arrogance and authoritarian mind-set of the content "owners" is the reason they are incapable of seeing this. They still believe entertainment data is somehow "theirs" and that, of course anybody copying it without their say-so is "stealing" and that without a doubt this must hurt their revenue.
Nothing of that is true. It is an antiquated mind-set suitable for cave-men where physical goods are the main type of good, but not reflecting actual rea
Sigh. (Score:4, Insightful)
I want to buy Aliens:Special Edition in a way that I can play it any time I want to, as it's my favourite movie.
- If I buy online, it's literally impossible to buy legitimately. None of the stores have the special edition. Only the ordinary. I've sat and compared running times for all the big box-sets as well, in case it was hiding in one of those. Nope. I just can't buy it in the UK online, whether from Google Play, Amazon, Netflix or anyone else.
- If I buy it on Blu-Ray it comes wrapped up in a shitty menu that takes me ten minutes to navigate in order to start the movie. I can't play that on anything other than a Blu-Ray player, and it seems to want to go on the Internet. It's also "DVD-resolution" no matter what the box says (and I'm not even into HD, let alone a resolution-nerd)... it's blocky, grainy and horrible - especially in the dark scenes, which kinda ruins the movie.
No good for, say, taking on a long plane journey which is where I would be most likely to want to watch my favourite movie to pass the time. I can't copy it to the laptop, I can't even play it sometimes as the copy protection has decided to just spin that disk forever on that laptop several times.
- If I buy it on DVD, I have similar problems. It would literally be the only movie I have that I need to turn on another device for in order to watch (yes... I rebought all my movies to stream online via official services... what a horrible person I am!).
However:
- The movie is shown on TV all the time, meaning I'm one-click away from a perfect DVB recording of it, minus the adverts, stored in a standard format, that plays everywhere, for free.
- I can download it in *minutes* from a Google search from people donating their bandwidth and time and effort in order to let me watch my favourite movie.
Now... I don't pirate. I've been firmly of the opinion for the last twenty years that if I have to break the law to consume a product, then I just won't consume it. As such, the only copy of my favourite movie that I have is a VHS (and I don't own any VHS players any more), an ancient DVD someone bought me and a Blu-Ray boxset that I bought at a bootsale. Meaning that "the TV/movie industry" has seen precisely zip from me for that movie for over 20 years.
Since then, I have put way more hours into trying to GIVE SOMEONE MONEY for the damn thing legitimately than the entire series of movies would have cost me if it were available.
It was after several such instances (Aliens: Special Edition, the British TV sitcoms The Two of Us, Just Good Friends and The Good Life - the latter is available up to series 2 on Amazon, it was available on the BBC store at one point but that closed down and removed all their content. JGF is available only on DVD but is played on UK channels ALL THE TIME. The Two of Us published one series on DVD and the other series has been "coming soon" for the last ten years. It's played on UK TV all the time) that I decided that I need to stop bothering. They've had their chance and obviously don't want my money.
The BBC archives are all digital now... I understand that there are rights issues with some things but literally two of these above are BBC works, one of those is ITV (which is still broadcasting it and runs online streaming TV channels!): Honestly, just work out how much you'd have to pay people to air the show, put it online, charge that. If people want it at that price, they'll get it, if they don't, they won't. By contrast Channel 4 (the next biggest UK TV broadcaster) put every single episode of Whose Line Is It Anyway (the original UK version from the 80's/90's) online, for free on a streaming service and on YouTube.
I know for certain - because someone did it once to prove the point - that ten minutes online, on any torrent site, or on Kodi plugins that search for illegal online content will get me all the above, in a format that "just plays" forever.
I consider it extremely rude and stupid that a genuine, paying customer, who only wants to
Lars Doucet's 4 currencies (Score:3)
Defender's Quest programmer Lars Doucet has an excellent series of articles [fortressofdoors.com] on what is at stake when a customer, or would-be customer, decides to buy or to pirate a computer game. In sum, there are, not one, but four currencies: literal money, time, pain-in-the-butt and integrity.
Pirate sites can make you feel dirty (it costs integrity) and make you fight viruses and false download links (paint-in-the-butt), but usually makes the game available in days or even instantly (low time cost) and cost zero dollars. Legit game stores have to compete with that.
So, if the game's DRM is obnoxiously hard on legit customers (high pain-in-the-butt cost) and is more expensive than the pirate version, it will lose hard to piracy, because the only "currency" in which the legit version costs less is the integrity currency. It's no wonder Steam, GOG.com and other online stores for PC games nowadays try to make buying and playing the game as seamless as possible. (Of course, there are still AAA games that the publishers insist on having obnoxious DRM).
Music streaming services got this really well. Spotify, iTunes, Deezer and Google Play Music are all easy to use, fast to listen and have each of them an exellent and comprehensive library of songs. You don't have to subscribe to multiple services to listen to the music you want.
Now, video streaming services are doing the exact opposite: do you want to see a particular movie (not any movie, or a movie of a particular genre, a particular and specific movie)? Maybe it's on Netflix. Or on Hulu. Or is it on Amazon Prime Video? Perhaps it will be on Disney+. Or you have to "rent" or "buy" it on Google Play Video or something.If it is an anime, maybe it is on Crunchyroll or Funimation. The cash and pain-in-the-butt currencies skyrocket on that system. It's not feasible to subscribe to every video streaming service on the planet. It is no wonder many of us are returning to the torrent sites.
Re: (Score:1)
Pirate sites can make you feel dirty (it costs integrity)...
Frankly, giving money to anyone who endorses DRM and/or pushes for more expansive copyright laws and/or harsher punishments costs a lot more integrity. What you're referring to is simply not helping the publishers as much as they think they deserve—you're not costing them anything—whereas paying them will actively help them to harm others.
You could probably throw in "legality" as a fifth currency, though, somewhere between money and inconvenience but with more probabilistic overtones due to unev
Don't pirate, you miss the good stuff (Score:3)
Without piracy you don't get the full experience of owning content:
- Movies with adverts
- Unskippable logo screens
- The privilege of trying to guess which of the 10 streaming services you subscribe to actually has your movie.
- The benefit of running 10 game store clients on your computer at the same time, all wanting to run at startup, all just dying to sell you their exclusive bullshit.
But wait there's more.
- Wouldn't you rather part with more money being nickle and dimed with DLC?
- That RTX2080 is a bit to fast for you? Well Denuvo will happily drop 5-10fps of your framerate and triple the loading time of your game.
- Got too much HDD space? Well why not download all the things in all the languages with all the content you won't use rather than get one of those crappy "repacks" at 1/2 the size of a retail game. SSDs are cheap now anyway.
Re: (Score:2)
Without piracy you don't get the full experience of owning content: - Movies with adverts - Unskippable logo screens
Product placement is the only "adverts" I typically see in any of the movies I buy. I can't recall a purchased movie I have stopping in the middle to show me an ad.
Also, what is a "logo screen"? The movie title? Again, I don't see these and I purchase a lot of content.
- The privilege of trying to guess which of the 10 streaming services you subscribe to actually has your movie.
Oh. You want to purchase content in a way that you don't actually own it or control how it is delivered. That's just silly, isn't it? You're not buying content, you're renting it or buying access to viewing it for the length of time you belo
Re: (Score:2)
Product placement is the only "adverts" I typically see in any of the movies I buy. I can't recall a purchased movie I have stopping in the middle to show me an ad. Also, what is a "logo screen"? The movie title? Again, I don't see these and I purchase a lot of content.
I didn't say middle. I've never seen a purchased bluray that allowed you to get to the menu screen without showing you a trailer or an advert.
Likewise you get to endure a nice title card for the publisher / studio before you get to the menu. Which is a frigging waste since you get to see it again when you hit play. In general if I open up a downloaded file it starts playing. If I throw in a bluray or a DVD it can be a good minute or two before you have the privilege to actually watch what you bought.
You cla
Re: (Score:2)
I didn't say middle.
Well, since I see no ads at the start, and I don't bother watching anything past the end credits, it would have to be "in the middle" for any ads to appear for me.
I've never seen a purchased bluray
I've never purchased a Blu-Ray, simply because I don't have the hardware to play one. Good thing that content isn't locked into just Blu-Ray.
Likewise you get to endure a nice title card for the publisher / studio before you get to the menu.
What's a "menu"? I've bought plenty of content that I play on a regular basis that I see no "menu", "adverts", or "logo pages" for.
I guess if you buy the wrong format of content, you are locked into what th
Re: (Score:2)
Your ignorance is causing you to be profane. Your problem.
I'll take my ignorance along with that of my massive DVD collection, massive Bluray collection, list of Firmware hacks on the internet to bypass the user content skip blocks, and the endless articles on the internet talking about the problem you seem to think doesn't exist.
It's better than .... oh wait maybe your magical fairy land where the rules of reality don't seem to apply doesn't sound too bad... Where do you live? Or maybe you're so desensitized to ads that you don't know what they are anymore. Is an
Re: (Score:2)
Really? I put a DVD into my DVD hardware, type "mplayer dvd://1" (or some other number) into the command line, and golly if I don't get to view the content without ads, menus, or logos.
So you're using an unofficial DVD player which is designed to avoid these problems, you may have bought the dvd but by using a player that's not officially blessed the movie distributors consider you just as bad as the pirates. You're using a tool specifically designed to circumvent the drm present on those dvds.
Re: (Score:2)
So you're using an unofficial DVD player which is designed to avoid these problems,
The hardware is "official". Who decides what "official" software is? And since you admit I am avoiding the problem of adverts, logo screens, and mandatory menus, you are at least acknowledging that they are only problems when someone chooses not to use the methods that can trivially avoid them.
you may have bought the dvd but by using a player that's not officially blessed the movie distributors consider you just as bad as the pirates.
Oh, that's just absurd. Your argument has just devolved into one where ads, menus and logo pages are a requirement for you to view because someone who put the DVD together decided you should see them. You've just han
Re: (Score:2)
It is absurd, but it is their view...
The movie publishers do want to control how you watch their content, they tried to stop decss and then implemented much stronger drm on bluray. The drm is not there to stop pirates, pirates will always find a way around it, the drm is there to force law abiding citizens to play by their rules.
Technology (Score:2)
The industry should have fixed this long ago, and I'm getting too old to wait for it.
Here is a hint (Score:2)
If you spread the content across streaming sources with exclusive licenses; the cost is not your $15/mo subscription. The cost is ALL the freaking $15/mo subscriptions.