Gamasutra has a fascinating editorial by Russell Carroll, from
Reflexive Games, talking about the amount of piracy in casual games and
what measures have proven effective. The scary number is that piracy
runs at up to 92% for their titles, and rather than one pirate copy
equals one lost sales, Reflexive found that they had to stop one
thousand pirate downloads to gain one extra sale.
Read on in the full article.
I think the title of this should read 1000 Pirate Downloads Is Only LOSING One Legal Purchase.
(Not trying to be a spelling nazi, think more of an unofficial proofreader).
Thanks
<cough>
Industry will never "get it" until it gives up and goes with the flow - all digital media should be free to copy across all platforms. This does not mean no one makes money. It means, be intelligent, and make money from other ways than a single upfront charge for a product a consumer hasn't tried yet. Make money from add ons, from extra levels, from in product advertising, from merchandise, from offering extras if the user purchases a copy, pay per use after a free period etc.
There are so many options!
The industry (not just mobile games, but PC games, console games, films, TV, music, etc.) is just too fat and lazy to be innovative, creative and intelligent.
Why should I, as a consumer, pay for something up front I may not like, or only use/listen to/watch a couple of times? Is the industry going to give me most of my money back when that happens? I think not. But morally, it should. So in actual fact, the industry is having morals forced on it, and it doesn't like it. But tough, because it is unstoppable.
Honestly, trying to stop so called "piracy" is like one man standing in the middle of a bay with his arms spread wide trying to stop the tide coming in. Utterly pointless. Intelligent people would harness this unstoppable force (free, easy and widespread copying of digital media), and use it for the benefit of the industry rather than trying to fight it.
All these wonderful blaming games.
ajck accuses the whole content industry of being too fat and too lazy. Sometimes, companies from that industry blame everything on pirates, hackers and crackers. Those in turn, the, ah, non-paying customers sometimes blame it on the high price of content - no way they could or should pay those prices, they argue.
But relax. Markets are just like that. Must have been this way 4000 years ago when they traded olive oil and other goods in Ancient Egypt. The sellers sometimes cursed the buyers, and the buyers cursed the sellers, but at the end of the day, a whole lot of olive oil had been traded.
And maybe even then there were people that argued having olive oil is akin to a human right, that olive oil should be free, and the fat and lazy olive oil traders should make their money from cooking recipes, advertising on their oil amphores, selling merchandising articles for famous olive oil brands, and so on. After all, those olives, they grow *for free*, dammit 😊
Anyway, I find it interesting that the writer reports his company could increase sales by 70% by making their digital goods *less* free, by introducing and/or strengthening some protection, not *more* free.
hi
what a bullsh** - 1000copies = 1000 x loss !
from 1000 copies maybe 10 or 20 would maybe buy it if it is worth - many install and try and forget about it !
the previous post was right - one must make money with extra services not with the product itself !
ciao
miniME, did you read the linked article? Heck, did you even read Ewan's post?
You are the first one at all to bring up the straw man that somebody pretends "1000 pirate copies equals 1000 sales lost". I wish you a lot of fun striking that straw man down, using words for things that cows and bulls produce.
No, the company in the article has found a rather good arangement with the fact of 92% piracy. They sell games nevertheless, and they see clearly that almost all of their current pirates - 999 out of 1000, not 990 or 980 like you write - would never buy anyway, and you know what? That's ok with them!
Dear Pirate,
Cant say I disagree more than, in my view you are 100% wrong.
In the physical world we all have to pay for things before trying them. I defy you to goto your local supermarket or a resturant, try something, then not purchase it just because you decided you didnt like it. Or how about not paying your Taxes, just because you didnt like them. Whilst you may get away with 'stealing' this property if no one sees you, chances are you will also be caught and punished accordingly. In the UK that probably means being sent on a very expensive holiday - because you had a misplaced childhood.... but I digress
None of the digital media producers force you to purchase their products. If they choose not to give you something for free, it is entirely upto you as a consumer not to use that product. What is not reasonable is for you to take someone elses property and decide you want to distribute, for free or otherwise. It is not your property to do what with.
Lets assume you have a house. You only stay in it for some of your time. Your argument is; why should I not take your house away just because you dont use it for a certain %age of the day. What complete b****. This is called stealing - and is no different to you taking someone elses digital products.
If there was even the remotest chance of consumers being honest enough to only pay for what they used dont you think this would have become common place by now ?. Similarly with subscription based products, many of us have been there and tried the schemes you mention and they have generally not worked.
Dont know exactly what industry you work in, obviously non that involve creation of digital media, unless you too are as you describe in your mail. Our experiance is a large number of very innovative, creative and intelligent people work in the s/w industry - probably more than any other industry, obvious exception is the creative accountants....
Since the defn of 'software piracy' is the illegal copying, distribution or use of software there is little/no 'so called' ness about 'piracy'. If you copy or distribute someone elses property without their permission then you are acting illegally.
I personally do NOT want adverts in products, add ons I have to purchase, pay per use etc, I want a sensible product at sensible prices that does what it says on the tin.
Rant mode off.
Shareware was try-before-buy. Shareware authors quickly found out that they made more money by asking money upfront, than by waiting for a customer to actually pay after an extended period of usage.
Shareware is almost non-existent today.
Sander van der Wal
www.mBrainSoftware.com
I remember an album sleeve having that slogan on it and a 'skull and cross bones' I was really alarmed by it - I was young and impressionable and I actually beleived it. hahaha
Stealing is a crime kids!! Obey the law, the law is correct. Buy what you are told when you are told to buy it. Pop idol is good. Artists signed to major labels are good.
Shareware is almost non-existent today.
That shareware in general should be dead somehow escaped me, being a shareware author myself. You can of course consider it "dead as a business model", and say that all those sharewares hope for paying customers in vain, but then I would ask you: What do have to back up this claim?
I think shareware as a business model in principle works quite well, but of course easily available cracks can ruin it.
1st of all you can welcome me as a new member. This discussion engaged me to sign up with this forum 🙄...
After having read thousands of posts in all sort of software boards and developing software myself for about 10 years now, I am convinced a very high percentage of "end users" mainly wants to be part of something new.
They don't think about whether or not they really need a piece of software: "It's new? I want it, I need it!". And then, after having installed it, they forget all about it and will never use it. But for just some time they have found some sort of inner peace, until the next new item shows up on the market. I'd call that addiction to piracy.
Anyway, imo those people are actually the ones that keep the software industry up and running! Once a developer comes up with a good copy protection ("good" means that it cannot be cracked within 2 days 😮), some of those junkies won't be able to wait any longer and BUY the new software, just out of curiosity.
Providing a NEW SOFTWARE post in a hacker forum is probably more effective marketing and draws more attention to potential "customers" than broadcasting it on BBC!
Don't get me wrong, I certainly don't tolerate stealing property of any kind from other people, be it software or anything else. But I am also convinced that we will see more flexible and dynamic ways of publishing software within the next couple of years, aiming to pull money out of customer's pocket slowly and sneaky.
rbrunner wrote:Do you mean shareware in general, or shareware for smartpones in particular?That shareware in general should be dead somehow escaped me, being a shareware author myself. You can of course consider it "dead as a business model", and say that all those sharewares hope for paying customers in vain, but then I would ask you: What do have to back up this claim?
Anecdotal evidence, by talking to smartphone shareware authors. They see lots of people using their apps and asking for support, and hardly any sales.
Not that I don't know about the problems with anecdotal evidence, but as far as I know it's the only kind of evidence out there. Which is in itself a clear indication of the state of the smartphone software market.
I think shareware as a business model in principle works quite well, but of course easily available cracks can ruin it.
There are lots of ideas that work well in pricinple, and not in the real world 😉 From what I know, cracks are easily available for smartphone software.
Sander van der Wal
www.mBrainSoftware.com
Kind of off-topic, but whatever...
Originally shareware meant that the full program was distributed, and if you liked it, you'd pay the author. I like how the word "share" fits into this concept.
These days, what's called shareware is usually crippled in some way in the trial version, either there's a time limit, or it's not feature complete. This is not different from how other commercial software is distributed and sold. It's hard to see what this has to do with sharing.
puterman wrote:Kind of off-topic, but whatever...Originally shareware meant that the full program was distributed, and if you liked it, you'd pay the author. I like how the word "share" fits into this concept.
A major advantage was that you knew the program worked, because one of your mates used it and recommended it. This led to a very high conversion ratio.
Also, sharing an app was the only way it could be cheaply distributed, so people were encouraged to do so. Not all people paid, but on the other side, distribution costs in the retail channel were huge, small ISV's could not reasonably compete in that channel.
About liking the app and therefore paying the author, this was inherent to the distribution model, so they made it a feature of the shareware model, instead of a defect 😉
These days, what's called shareware is usually crippled in some way in the trial version, either there's a time limit, or it's not feature complete. This is not different from how other commercial software is distributed and sold. It's hard to see what this has to do with sharing.
Interestingly, a modern way of distributing apps for smartphones in a shareware-like way, called super-distribution never really caught on a few years ago.
Sander van der Wal
www.mBrainSoftware.com
This is outrageous. You say "BE CREATIVE, FOUND NEW WAY TO MAKE MONEY" and "GIVE PRODUCT FOR FREE". It would be nice to HEAR your business plan how to make money if you don't sell anything LOL. OMFG how stupid people are.
Really there are major problems with software producers and their products.
you see consumer protection laws are rife for physical products as it is easy to return something that is defective, and or purchased for the wrong purpose. However the IT industry has created their own problems, and inherent in them is the concept of never returning peoples money.... You buy software and it doesn't work the way it was advertised ... solution? wait until they release a patch... never mind the downtime or frustration to the end user ... never mind the trouble that is often caused with updating or removal..
I simply won't spend $20 per pop trying software for my new phone to find out that its simply not living up to the advertising or a terrible product and then go through the nightmare of trying to get my money back ... due to this idea that I would then pirate it ..
Releasing shareware often doesn't work either as it is usually crippled, again you don't truly know what its like until it is released...
and finally... why I don't like the whole anti-pirate theme?
I've never had software that wasn't buggy or had problems the first time I've installed it ... there is always something that is not quite right (or it hangs etc etc).
I can go into a shop and use a vacuum and go 'wow' I like it and I buy it ... I can't do that with software ... those interested in DRM need to grow up.
I DO buy my software and I have worked for companies designing, creating and selling software so please don't think I haven't been on the other side of the fence insofar as piracy -- I just understand that people should not have to pay for, and be stuck with .. crap software that they then wait for fixes to repair etc etc (or the vaporware often sold!)