quote:
Originally posted by papillon:
Of course they can't take every single person's opinion or situation into consideration - but you also can't tell every single person to just suck it up and buy games that don't work. For some people, piracy is now the only option.
You'd usually say "We apologise for the inconvenience, but our games require an internet connection to start", not "we don't care if you can't play it, buy the damn game already". To my knowledge, Peter hasn't told anyone to suck it up and buy the games anyway. Not yet at least [img]http://princess.cybrmall.net/ubb/wink.gif[/img]
And no, piracy isn't your only option. If the game doesn't work on its own, the pirated one won't either. And a crack that can be applied to a pirated version of the game should work equally well with a legal version. Whether it's legal or not is an entirely different matter.
On a slightly related note, the Norwegian government is in the process of making new laws regarding intellectual property, piracy and such, based on the new laws the European Union is getting (Norway has to comply through the EEC agreement). One of those laws will make it illegal to break copy any protection on CDs in order to transfer files to a different player than the one the CD was made for, like an IPod. All the uproar this has caused aside, the definition of "copy protection" is a bit special here. The government has decided that it requires an EFFECTIVE copy protection, otherwise it forfeits the legal rights. Meaning that if a protection can be easily bypassed without significant knowledge, it doesn't count as a protection. So if all it takes to bypass the protection is to use a marker and cover over a part of the CD, it doesn't count as a protected CD and thus transferring its contents to players like an IPod is legal. CDs that are unprotected to begin with can be transferred to MP3 players and such without breaking the law.
Also according to Norwegian law, you are allowed to make a copy of a music CD and share with family and close friends (if you're curious as to the legal definition of "close friend", you're not alone). A certain sum is paid by the government to a couple of organisations to compensate for this, I don't remember the number at the top of my head. The sharing thing only applies to music (and maybe video, I don't know), copying and sharing software to family/friends is illegal.
I don't know if these copy protection laws will also be applied to software. If they are, it means that using a program that can easily make 1:1 copies of CDs are completely legal, while cracking a protection like V-Mate is not since that requires extensive knowledge. Of course applying an already finished crack doesn't take knowledge, but as far as I know editing the data in the EXE file is already considered a violation of intellectual property and thus is illegal.
Heck, that was a long one (too). Anyway, my point is that unless a company like PP takes serious measures to protect their software, they risk forfeiting a lot of their legal rights. A CD that can be easily cloned with software isn't necessarily considered protected, it doesn't require a crack to play. Once a crack is required, PP can take legal action against anyone who makes or distributes it. One can debate the practical consequences of this for a long time, but in law it can make a world of difference.
[This message has been edited by AG3 (edited 04-20-2005).]