I understand that you're trying to say that the reason you won't pirate Elemental or other Stardock games is because it is no bad DRM & otherwise they are a nice company.

Most people I know that pirate games also say this. They say that they will pirate a game to try it out and if they like it they will buy it.

I have never seen one of them actually buy anything they already "own" through pirating. Saying they're just trying it out is often a justification mindgame for them, so they can feel okay about pirating things.

I'm not saying that you will do this, but I am saying be careful that you don't fall into the trap of saying you're just trying out a game, liking the game, and then never buying it because you already have it.

well i am trying not to be like that... i like keeping a collection of books and games its just that games are harder to collect since they are 4+ times more expensive

also I was trying to give good feedback on the DRM - its the best out there... both good at keeping pirates away and good at not being a pain to the customer 

I understand what you're trying to say.  

Piracy is not as simple of an issue as most people try to put it.

The rate of piracy of a thing comes down to 3 key things: Demographics. Demographics. Demographics.

If *I* were making a first person shooter, I would probably put pretty restrictive DRM on it because that demographic is much more likely to pirate.

IF something is easy to steal, people will inherently, even unconsciously, reduce their view of its intrinsic value. As a result, people who can afford to buy expensive hardware, pay for their monthly iPhone bill, etc. suddenly "can't afford" a video, music, or a game because they subconsciously treat paying for it as a luxury.

The reason Stardock's retail products don't have DRM is because we have made the determination that OUR demographic is inclined to pay for software and is very sensitive to any inconvenience. Thus, we don't put in obnoxious copy protection because we would lose more sales as a result than we would gain from putting DRM on it.

That said, there are regions of the world where the demographic simply won't purchase IP unless they have to. A Chinese version, an Eastern European version, a Russian version, etc. would have something on it because (and I realize this is politically incorrect but it's reality) their cultures don't value non-tangible property like people in western Europe, North America and Japan do.  That isn't to say that everyone in those territories is a pirate, far from it.  But the level of casual piracy in those territories exceeds the threshold where you gain more by being generous than by protecting it.

People who say anything can be cracked are both right and wrong.  I used to crack games for fun. I didn't distribute them but it was a great way to play with Turbo Debugger and learn assembly language back in the day.  But the Internet is changing that.  Pretty soon, parts of these games will be server based and at that point, publishers will have the option to require a net connection -- a constant one - to play and that's a whole new level of pain.

My own view remains the same - don't treat your customers like criminals and they will reward you with increased sales.  But that is a view that is heavily based on the type of games we make and where we sell them.

I think its his third name.  His previous (Middle) name, VladimirVladimir or something like that appears to have been changed to ScienceMad.  If I had to guess, that's probably the name of the first account that got banned and the forum Mods have been nice and folded his accounts back together.

seanw3 I am in the same situation you are   ..i rarely play games.. and i dont like the way they make them today... to simple.. not a lot of thought ... great graphics but thats a secondary trait ... and the industry treats it like a primary one

its games like Elemental that grab me.. ihavent played FPS and RTS since forever... 6-7years...

... but i do care about DRM

..this is still my second account .. but i changed my account name to something that fits me a bit better

i havent bothered to check my first one...

Frogboy I dont like piracy and i dont like theft but the fact that you guys at stardock have not gone down the path of "guilty untill proven innocent" i respect your games alot more. More to the point i dont preorder games untill i hear feedback. That is untill Elemental, because of the way you treat your customers. 

Kudos 

I live in world where I continually feel powerless. Pirating to me was an attack on a society that doesn't value my personal qualities. I constantly feel dejected and undervalued in a world of aesthetic primacy, while the ancient utility values are tossed by the wayside. I have since had some other philisophical changes and pirating is no longer a piece of this.

Collectivism is my goal now.

Instead of fighting piracy, we need more education and enforced responsability. Too naive even for me (globalization? globalization my ass!) but that's how I see it.

That said, future is about Google OS in which you "share" all your data with the internet, only online games (single player or not) and lots of headaches trying to prevent hacks and similars from getting easy bounty from massive data theft.

The respect for intellectual property is often linked to the average wealth of members of that nation. South Korea is also fiscally well-off (reasonably) and has a healthy respect for IP. This world bank wealth distribution map could just as easily be a map of the "Who's Who" in terms of rampant piracy.

Advances in technology have opened up the abillity to sell to poor nations and many companies expected that they could take their luxury products into them and expand their market. However the reality is people who make less than $2,995 a year cannot afford luxuries priced at western world values. At the begining of this last decade, Microsoft (among others) spent a lot of time promising big returns on "The Next Billion Users," while failing to respect the reality of the economy. The result was a lot of sabre-ratling at these countries for their "lax" policies on piracy because many felt they were being denied profits in that market, but the money was never there to begin with.

This has nothing to do with piracy in developed nations, or piracy by governments, mind. Just an observation about piracy also being linked to the economy and not just culture of a given nation. i.e, although piracy is a problem in "China," an individual Chinese person having immigrated to a western nation and making a fair wage here is often willing to pay for IP.