I am making this blog today because I ended up having a rather heated debate with a friend of mine concerning the matter of the PC vs the Console as a gaming platform. I myself believe that the PC will forever be the king of all platforms for various reasons, while my friend highly believes that consoles will eventually drive PCs to the edge of extinction.
Everything was going fine until my friend pointed out that the sole reason the PC will die out, will be because of pirates, and that it is because of them illegally downloading PC games that developers will lose interest in the PC as a platform; eventually only making things for consoles. After he said that I wanted to smack him.
Within the gaming industry, and in fact all media industries, pirating is seen as the great evil. The propaganda put out there wants you to believe that the person who illegally downloads a game, or mp3 files, is the same as the thief which breaks into a store and steals whatever they want that isn't bolted down. What's worse, because most of what is pirated happens to be media that is available on the PC, it is overlooked that there is in fact content that is pirated for consoles themselves. The media likes to push that pirating is a PC problem, that this thing only happens on, and to, things affiliated with the PC. It is because of this that people get the stigma that things aren't good on PC because they can be stolen, and anything put on the PC needs to be feverishly protected.
I won't deny that I have pirated a thing or two in my past. I don't think there is a person on the internet who can with a straight face say there isn't something they haven't pirated. It's because it's convenient. If I want to listen to a CD by my favorite band, do I want to have to go all the way to the store and pay for it? Or do I just start a download that takes probably an hour that doesn't cost me anything? Pirating isn't about getting something for free, it's about getting something in a more convenient manner. In fact, it's because of iTunes that music piracy has gone down. If you look at my above analogy, it is in fact more convenient for me to log onto my iTunes account, and just purchase it from the iTunes store. Not only does it more often than not download faster, but I am also 100% guaranteed to get the songs I am looking for.
People pirate content for consoles. You cannot deny this fact. I can jump onto any random torrent website, search for a game for Xbox 360, Playstation 3, or the Wii and download the game, burn it to a disc, and run in on my console. Yet people who are enamored by the console refuse to recognize this fact. During this argument I was having my friend made the mistake of saying that consoles are better platforms because you can't pirate their content. BULLSHIT. If there is a form of media that is created, that is made using computers, you can use computers to hack it, and therefore pirate it. Every form of media that is distributed today in some way is formed on a computer, so therefore, every form of media we have access to can be pirated.
The concept I could never get my friend to understand however, are the situations where preventing piracy, both hurts the consumer, and encourages piracy by itself. This is most common in the PC gaming industry with the inclusion of DRM in games. For those who don't know, DRM stands for Digital Rights Management and is programming put into place to prevent piracy, mainly by inconveniencing the consumer. One such case of DRM is (if I remember correctly) in the PC version of Assassin's Creed 2. In order to play the game on the PC, you need to have a constant internet connection. Should you lose your internet connection, the game stops working. Keep in mind this is when Assassin's Creed was just a single player game. How does this help to prevent piracy? How does inconveniencing your customer, by making sure they have to have a constant internet connection, make them not look for the convenient version of the game that does not include this incredibly stupid feature?
So do I think pirating content is wrong? Pretty much. I feel that if a game, a song, a show, anything is worth you putting in the time to find a download for it; it to you has enough value to deem it worthy of your money. There are plenty of gamers out there who will throw the, "I don't have the money," or, "I just want to see what the game is like as there isn't a demo" excuses around (I won't lie, I did at one point or another as well) but in the end, they are just excuses. They are just us trying to validate our actions which we know are wrong. Don't have the money? Well there are plenty of free to play games out there you can enjoy while you save up the money for it. Just want to see what it's like? Wait a week or two then check Youtube and read game reviews to help you decide if it's worth the money. The free way may be easy for you, but in the end it just hurts the rest of us. There is only one exception to any of this.
During the debate I was having, I made mentions to, "the acceptable form of piracy." There is one situation where I deem it morally acceptable to pirate a form of media; if you can not legally get it where it is you live. Games for Windows Live is an extremely annoying online interface for some PC games that (among it's other annoying flaws) has region restriction. What this means, is that if you are in a 'region restricted' area, even if you bought a legal copy (say off of Amazon or Ebay or something) you will not be allowed to play the game, because you are in an area that is disallowed by the system. In my opinion, if the developer, the distributor, or the publisher has told you that because of where you live you can't play there game, you have every right to pirate it. If you are willing to pay for a product, yet the people in charge of getting that product out there has told you that you aren't allowed to have it, then the fault is not on the pirate that the media was illegally downloaded.
I thought I'd put this out there for you guys as some food for thought. To me, pirating is a problem caused to developers, but because of the inconvenience publishers put on the consumers. No matter what you do, you will always have people who want things for free. It's an effect of living in a capitalist society, you always want to get the best value for things. However the way to prevent and reduce piracy isn't through burdening and inconveniencing the customers who support you, that only encourages them to get rid of their support.
-Adam Gadal
P.S. Should I do more random gaming rants, or just rants about general things? Let me know at geekoftheweek@fusionrockradio.com
Everything was going fine until my friend pointed out that the sole reason the PC will die out, will be because of pirates, and that it is because of them illegally downloading PC games that developers will lose interest in the PC as a platform; eventually only making things for consoles. After he said that I wanted to smack him.
Within the gaming industry, and in fact all media industries, pirating is seen as the great evil. The propaganda put out there wants you to believe that the person who illegally downloads a game, or mp3 files, is the same as the thief which breaks into a store and steals whatever they want that isn't bolted down. What's worse, because most of what is pirated happens to be media that is available on the PC, it is overlooked that there is in fact content that is pirated for consoles themselves. The media likes to push that pirating is a PC problem, that this thing only happens on, and to, things affiliated with the PC. It is because of this that people get the stigma that things aren't good on PC because they can be stolen, and anything put on the PC needs to be feverishly protected.
I won't deny that I have pirated a thing or two in my past. I don't think there is a person on the internet who can with a straight face say there isn't something they haven't pirated. It's because it's convenient. If I want to listen to a CD by my favorite band, do I want to have to go all the way to the store and pay for it? Or do I just start a download that takes probably an hour that doesn't cost me anything? Pirating isn't about getting something for free, it's about getting something in a more convenient manner. In fact, it's because of iTunes that music piracy has gone down. If you look at my above analogy, it is in fact more convenient for me to log onto my iTunes account, and just purchase it from the iTunes store. Not only does it more often than not download faster, but I am also 100% guaranteed to get the songs I am looking for.
People pirate content for consoles. You cannot deny this fact. I can jump onto any random torrent website, search for a game for Xbox 360, Playstation 3, or the Wii and download the game, burn it to a disc, and run in on my console. Yet people who are enamored by the console refuse to recognize this fact. During this argument I was having my friend made the mistake of saying that consoles are better platforms because you can't pirate their content. BULLSHIT. If there is a form of media that is created, that is made using computers, you can use computers to hack it, and therefore pirate it. Every form of media that is distributed today in some way is formed on a computer, so therefore, every form of media we have access to can be pirated.
The concept I could never get my friend to understand however, are the situations where preventing piracy, both hurts the consumer, and encourages piracy by itself. This is most common in the PC gaming industry with the inclusion of DRM in games. For those who don't know, DRM stands for Digital Rights Management and is programming put into place to prevent piracy, mainly by inconveniencing the consumer. One such case of DRM is (if I remember correctly) in the PC version of Assassin's Creed 2. In order to play the game on the PC, you need to have a constant internet connection. Should you lose your internet connection, the game stops working. Keep in mind this is when Assassin's Creed was just a single player game. How does this help to prevent piracy? How does inconveniencing your customer, by making sure they have to have a constant internet connection, make them not look for the convenient version of the game that does not include this incredibly stupid feature?
So do I think pirating content is wrong? Pretty much. I feel that if a game, a song, a show, anything is worth you putting in the time to find a download for it; it to you has enough value to deem it worthy of your money. There are plenty of gamers out there who will throw the, "I don't have the money," or, "I just want to see what the game is like as there isn't a demo" excuses around (I won't lie, I did at one point or another as well) but in the end, they are just excuses. They are just us trying to validate our actions which we know are wrong. Don't have the money? Well there are plenty of free to play games out there you can enjoy while you save up the money for it. Just want to see what it's like? Wait a week or two then check Youtube and read game reviews to help you decide if it's worth the money. The free way may be easy for you, but in the end it just hurts the rest of us. There is only one exception to any of this.
During the debate I was having, I made mentions to, "the acceptable form of piracy." There is one situation where I deem it morally acceptable to pirate a form of media; if you can not legally get it where it is you live. Games for Windows Live is an extremely annoying online interface for some PC games that (among it's other annoying flaws) has region restriction. What this means, is that if you are in a 'region restricted' area, even if you bought a legal copy (say off of Amazon or Ebay or something) you will not be allowed to play the game, because you are in an area that is disallowed by the system. In my opinion, if the developer, the distributor, or the publisher has told you that because of where you live you can't play there game, you have every right to pirate it. If you are willing to pay for a product, yet the people in charge of getting that product out there has told you that you aren't allowed to have it, then the fault is not on the pirate that the media was illegally downloaded.
I thought I'd put this out there for you guys as some food for thought. To me, pirating is a problem caused to developers, but because of the inconvenience publishers put on the consumers. No matter what you do, you will always have people who want things for free. It's an effect of living in a capitalist society, you always want to get the best value for things. However the way to prevent and reduce piracy isn't through burdening and inconveniencing the customers who support you, that only encourages them to get rid of their support.
-Adam Gadal
P.S. Should I do more random gaming rants, or just rants about general things? Let me know at geekoftheweek@fusionrockradio.com