Two New Piracy Warnings To Punish Legit Customers
You know what’s awesome? Punishing your paying customers for buying instead of pirating material.
We’ve seen it before with intrusive DRM, and now DVD buyers are getting another dose.
The US Government is mandating that two unskippable anti-piracy warnings appear at the start of movies. These warnings will stay on-screen for 10 seconds each.
Why’s This A So Dumb You Ask?
Because if someone is ripping the movie, they can edit these stupid warnings out! Never-mind if the warning makes sense… The people who are supposed to receive the message won’t (and if they did, they still wouldn’t care). While those of us who do buy DVDs will now be subject to a 20 second threat that doesn’t pertain to us.
I feel like I’m back in elementary school, and the teacher is scolding the whole class for something that a few of my classmates did.
To hell with Hollywood. It’s bad business to make it hard for people to buy your product, and it’s pathetic to punish, chastise, and threaten your paying customers.
(Via Ars Technica)
Actor Wil Wheaton Explains Why the Entertainment Industry Causes Piracy
Actor/ geek Wil Wheaton (Stand By Me, The Guild, Eureka) explains why the entertainment causes piracy through stupidity.
I haven’t really pirated anything in a very long time because I earn enough money to pay for my own stuff. However I have bittorrented movies, music & games after purchasing legit versions simply because the cracked versions were more user-friendly than the locked-down crap I paid for.
Also, it’s become clear that pirates are also the best customers.
(Via techdirt)
Cory Doctorow: Everything New is Piracy
BoingBoing’s Cory Doctorow explains why all new media is piracy at first in a short and excellent video.
Cory Doctorow on copyright and piracy: ‘Every pirate wants to be an admiral’ – video
Neil Gaiman On Piracy
Neil Gaiman is a brilliant and prolific author who has profited greatly from his writing.
His take on the dangers of piracy is very interesting.
(Via BoingBoing)
Gaming Piracy Research is a Distortion of Reality
The Computer Entertainment Suppliers Association (CESA) has announced its belief that the video game industry lost $41 billion on pirated Nintendo DS & Sony PSP games between 2004, and June 2009 (Source 1).
To arrive at these figures, researchers checked download counts at the top 114 piracy sites for the Japanese versions of the top 20 software titles from 2004 to 2009. They calculated the total Japanese figure by factoring in the price of the games and the ratio of sales for the top 20 to the whole market. To get the worldwide figure, they multiplied by four under the presumption that Japan accounts for 25% of of the world’s software market (Source 2).
Let's shoot through the BS
Bad Research Methods
To begin with, the CESA’s research methods are deeply flawed. Their sample isn’t even close to random; it’s a sample of convenience. For all we know it was chosen to make the numbers more dramatic; I don’t know.
Regardless, nothing in this research suggests good reason to apply the piracy behavior of individuals who download the Japanese versions of video games, to the remaining population of the world. It would be just as illogical to claim that Japanese television viewing behaviors were comparable to American television viewing behaviors.
Faulty Conclusions
I’ve made this point before, and I will make it again…
Just because one is willing to download a game for free, that does not mean that he/she would be willing to pay money to acquire the very same game.
Many pirates download content simply because it is there. They might download a game and never play it, or try it for a few minutes and decide that it isn’t worth playing.
Let’s change mediums for a second. Think about television.
You have access to tons of shows for free via basic cable, or for a flat rate. You can watch as many shows as you want, and it doesn’t cost a dime extra.
Now imagine that you had to pay for each show. Would you continue to view every show that you watched when it was free? Probably not.
I have no doubt that the video game industry loses sales to piracy, however claiming a one-to-one ratio between illegal downloads, and real sales is intellectually bankrupt at best, or a deliberate distortion of reality at worst.
Digital Beatlemania
The Beatles are finally getting remastered. Digital quality versions of the legendary band’s albums are going to make their way to store shelves on September 9th (the same day that Rock Band: The Beatles will be released).
This is long overdue.
However, you shouldn’t expect to see the Beatles on iTunes or any other legal online music distributor which is pathetic because I can say with absolute certainty that the remastered albums will be available for illegal download on September 9th if they aren’t leaked even earlier.
That’s all for tonight. I have an absurdly early flight home from Arizona in the morning. Until next-time.
President Obama: Pirate-in-Chief???
Last week President Obama gave Queen Elizabeth II an iPod with 40 show tunes as a gift.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation pointed out that the President probably violated the iTunes terms of service as a result of giving her the gift. At the very least it is incredibly ambiguous.
I took a look at the terms of service for myself and they are absolutely correct that there seems to be no real answer about who owns the music after a user pays for it.
I recommend reading the original EFF post because it clearly explains the problems and ambiguity with our current intellectual property laws. Any attempt to improve upon their post would be a total waste of your time and mine.
This just goes to show you how ill-equipped our legal system is for present and future technology.
"YES WE CAN accidentally violate ambiguous terms of service agreements!"
