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Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

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Re: Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

#81

Post by bluedanieru »

wccrawford wrote: post #4
politician wrote: post #2

TLDR: "The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting antipiracy technology to work. It’s by giving those people a service that’s better than what they’re receiving from the pirates," Gabe Newell said.

But it should be noted that Steam's pre-release anti-piracy has no yet been broken. So it's not like they don't do DRM... Having said that, the conclusion is pretty much in line with what many gamers and pirates have been saying: Stop screwing the customer and creating pirates of them. I'm lucky enough to live in an English-speaking country, but I'm sure that if I lived in a country that typically sees long delays be…

>I'm lucky enough to live in an English-speaking country, but I'm sure that if I lived in a country that typically sees long delays before localization, I'd find a way to get it early. Even if that meant learning English and engaging in piracy.

Well lucky you. Steam is no better in this regard than anyone else though; they do region lockouts. Valve doesn't with their games afaik, but Steam certainly does.

Re: Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

#82

Post by bluedanieru »

DrStalker wrote: post #61

Steam used to be a great way to get games at the same time as the USA for the same price. Now it allows access at the same time but with significantly higher prices in Australia. In this case it is about price. I don't like being ripped off, even if the amount I'm being ripped off is slightly less than if I went into a physical store to buy the game. So far this behavior is limited to AAA titles from publishers other…

Do yourself a favor and get a (preferably pro-rated) host based in the US and set up squid on it.

Re: Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

#83

Post by bluedanieru »

stcredzero wrote: post #72

What people don't realize about DRM, is that it's asymmetric warfare, and the corporation is in the role of the guerrilla! If you have a popular product and everyone in the universe wants to play your game, then your few development groups (formed against bureaucratic friction) are going up against the vast resources and nearly frictionless meritocracy of the internet. Don't take the pirates on head-on! Be sneaky. Fo…

Sounds like a great way to give your game a reputation as a bug-ridden piece of shit. This happened to The Witcher.

How about a delivery mechanism that uses technology in a sane manner and doesn't punch paying customers in the face with stupid bullshit?

Re: Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

#84

Post by rick888 »

towelrod wrote: post #69
rick888 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so, you need to give them everything for free at the fastest bandwidth possible. The only way to stop piracy is: 1) give all of your stuff out for free 2) have a service that can't be pirated The reason big companies don't want piracy to become mainstream is because at a certain point, it becomes part of culture and "normal" to just pirate something, which means they won't be able to charge money for it (everyone wil…

People have spent billions of dollars buying music on iTunes. Its pretty obvious that people will pay for things if its more convenient than pirating it.

But piracy hasn't stopped or slowed down.

Re: Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

#85

Post by rick888 »

rick888 wrote: post #59
politician wrote: post #2

TLDR: "The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting antipiracy technology to work. It’s by giving those people a service that’s better than what they’re receiving from the pirates," Gabe Newell said.

so, you need to give them everything for free at the fastest bandwidth possible. The only way to stop piracy is: 1) give all of your stuff out for free 2) have a service that can't be pirated The reason big companies don't want piracy to become mainstream is because at a certain point, it becomes part of culture and "normal" to just pirate something, which means they won't be able to charge money for it (everyone wil…

I wish people would not downvote based on their own personal opinions.

Re: Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

#86

Post by bluedanieru »

shinratdr wrote: post #43
pixie_ wrote: post #29

Nowadays if a game isn't on Steam I just won't buy it. Mainly because keeping game CDs around is too much a hassle. When I buy something on Steam, I know I have that game for life and can re-install it quickly on any computer.

Agreed. I'm really hoping that EA sees this in BF3 PC sales and reverses direction. I refuse to be shoehorned into keeping around a different gaming client, if EA pulls their titles then I'm not buying EA on PC. I don't even have a problem with Origins as a service, but I don't trust EA to keep putting effort into it once they get the marketshare. I trust Valve to do so because they're doing it, right now, as we spea…

I completely agree with you about the trust issue, but if nothing else comes of this I do hope it forces Valve to reconsider their stance on in-game purchases. EA is completely in the right about that, as much as I hate to agree with them.

Re: Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

#87

Post by dorian-graph »

wccrawford wrote: post #4
politician wrote: post #2

TLDR: "The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting antipiracy technology to work. It’s by giving those people a service that’s better than what they’re receiving from the pirates," Gabe Newell said.

But it should be noted that Steam's pre-release anti-piracy has no yet been broken. So it's not like they don't do DRM... Having said that, the conclusion is pretty much in line with what many gamers and pirates have been saying: Stop screwing the customer and creating pirates of them. I'm lucky enough to live in an English-speaking country, but I'm sure that if I lived in a country that typically sees long delays be…

> .. creating pirates of them.

People choose to become 'pirates' because no one is forcing them to play video games. They have choices—pay for a game, don't play a game (A horrible thing to suggest, I know) or get a game without paying for it (Often called pirating). It's always amused me that people seem to speak of playing videogames as some right that they have and how dare anyone take that away from them.

Re: Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

#88

Post by Tsagadai »

bluedanieru wrote: post #81
wccrawford wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it should be noted that Steam's pre-release anti-piracy has no yet been broken. So it's not like they don't do DRM... Having said that, the conclusion is pretty much in line with what many gamers and pirates have been saying: Stop screwing the customer and creating pirates of them. I'm lucky enough to live in an English-speaking country, but I'm sure that if I lived in a country that typically sees long delays be…

>I'm lucky enough to live in an English-speaking country, but I'm sure that if I lived in a country that typically sees long delays before localization, I'd find a way to get it early. Even if that meant learning English and engaging in piracy. Well lucky you. Steam is no better in this regard than anyone else though; they do region lockouts. Valve doesn't with their games afaik, but Steam certainly does.

They do and it is a pain. There is a way around it though. You can use Steams website to buy games. Use http://store.steampowered.com/?cc=XX where XX is the two letter country code you have access to. They still check address and payment details match but this does allow you to use paypal.

The sooner the content world gets rid of silly region restrictions the better we will all be. It is ridiculous that even with trade agreements North American companies insist on charging non-US customers more for a usually sub-par service.

Re: Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

#89

Post by contravert »

politician wrote: post #2

TLDR: "The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting antipiracy technology to work. It’s by giving those people a service that’s better than what they’re receiving from the pirates," Gabe Newell said.

The obvious question that I don't see anyone asking is what happens when pirates build a more convenient service than Steam? There is no way a legitimate digital distributor can offer more convenience when they are saddled with many business and legal limitations.

Re: Valve: Piracy Is More About Convenience Than Price

#90

Post by nhangen »

I pay for DirectTV, Verizion FIOS, Netflix, and have an Apple TV, yet I still can't get content delivered how I want it.

The only thing the big networks get right is sports.

If I forget to record something, I have to go to Hulu, where I can't stream it to my TV in HD unless I buy another device. My alternative is to pay 99 cents (or more) on iTunes.

I also have to buy a switch so I don't run out of HDMI ports, and it's a pain in the ass to switch between all of my boxes.

Yeah, piracy is starting to sound good.

Oh...forgot to mention that Netflix's selection currently sucks big time.

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