Do you feel like a criminal?

[Ahigh]

deleted

[Bones]

I checked the one that closest resembles- "I just don't care".

[missioncontrol]

Is the first one the I don't care button?

[versapak]

As many quarters as I popped into these machines back in the day...

I feel justified in my MAMEing.

That being said...

I do currently support the companies by purchasing their classic compilations (Enough to have one legitimate version anyway, as I can't be bothered to purchase 50 versions of the same compilation. cough cough Namco cough). I just choose to play the MAME version instead.

[Samstag]

I feel exempted for being a coin-op developer.

[paigeoliver]

I wish I could read an article about software piracy that is both in a major media outlet AND is written by someone who knows what they are talking about.

Other than roms I am down to two pirated bits of software. One is a certain pricey graphics application that I would have never bought in the first place. No lost sale there. I would still be using ulead imagepals today if I had to pay $500 for that application.  The other is Carcassonne (a game), which I tried to legitimately purchase from the webstore for $4, but my German wasn't good enough to figure out their shopping cart.

Software is not music, bits about itunes and DRM have no place in an article about software piracy.

Numbers like the piracy rate are absolutely impossible to track. How are they generating these numbers?

A lot of software sellers are just pursuing the wrong markets, as a lot of people just never buy any software anyway. I used to buy software all the time, now I haven't bought anything other than a few games since around 1999. Most sellers of software that isn't highly specialized would do better trying to market themselves to system builders to bundle the software with their systems.

[SOAPboy]

I checked the one that closest resembles- "I just don't care".

i didnt check any because that wasent an option..

I just really dont care..

[shmokes]

I chose I love the idea of stealing without fear for reprisal because it was the funniest.  There's probably some measure of truth in it too, I suppose.

[Bones]

If I could legally by the Mame ROM collection for $200, I would.

I own Illustrator 11. That is $1000 worth of software here is Australia. I would never pay $1000 for it though. I purchased it using the student ID of a friend and purchased the identical Education Version for just under $200.

If I it were not for my mates ID I would have just got a pirate version from somewhere. As it turns out, Adobe got something from me. Not the full price they might have expected but compared with the alternative of squat, I think they did OK.

But I can't buy the full ROM collection for $200, so they all get nothing. I am not justifying it, it is just the simple fact.

[shmokes]

I agree.  I'm not saying necessarily that piracy is justified, per se, but in many or most cases the companies bring it upon themselves.  Certainly this is the case in the music industry.  The RIAA goes on and on about how they are losing all their customers to piracy, when in reality they are losing all of their customers that THEY have priced out of the market.  $15-$17 for a CD?  Give me a ---smurfing--- break!

Case in point.  Y'all might remember me talking about allofmp3.com -- where you can download music iTunes-style for 2 cents per megabyte, making an entire 192 kbs MP3 cost only about 7 or 8 cents.

Well, that was back in April, when I first found that site and I've been using it ever since.  Thing is, my user account keeps track of the account activity.  I can check at any time how much money I have spent there in total and I am now over $110.  That's $110 in about six months.  Guess how much money I had spent buying CD's in the five years prior to finding AllofMp3....

ZERO DOLLARS!!!

I'm not an anomaly.  I've turned probably a dozen of my friends on to that site and all of them have become music buying maniacs.  The record industry deserves piracy, IMO.

[missioncontrol]

Do you feel like a criminal?

sometimes I feel like a nut




but sometimes I don't

[duffjr]

i just clicked number 1 because it was decent and arguable.  i used to play metal slug on neorage but some restaurants still make money off that game.  i'm not sure if you mean the manufacturer or vendor.

if this has been said before, "piracy is a victimless crime."  i don't necesarrily believe in it, but it's what i do.  my computer bill would be like $10,000 if i actually paid for every song and every program i've ever used.  i'd be forced to post on forums all day if piracy were regulated.

[menace]

I went with number 1 as well since it is largely correct--even if I wanted to pay for it I couldn't and the number of game manufacturer's that still generate revenue of the mame roms is so close to 0 as to be negligible--its like "stealing" people's garbage--sure it belongs to them but they don't want it.

The record industry deserves piracy, IMO.

Too true--the music industry was tried and CONVICTED of price fixing the price of cd's a couple years ago.  I know this because i received a $15 check in the mail as part of the settlement.  I feel no remorse-- NONE-- if someone steals music--no more than if I robbed a thief's house.  My only regret is that the music industry is structured so that the artists are forced to deal with the thieves in order to get their product out there.

Wasn't the directtv thing a scam?  I seem to recall the letters were sent to people who may have purchased equipment for the purposes of testing but directtv had no real evidence that a crime was committed--sort of a scare tactic to extort money from people who might not know their legal options...Now where was that tactic used in the mame community?  oh that's right...but thats another post.

[ChadTower]

I feel exempted for being a coin-op developer.

[Crazy Cooter]

I feel exempted for being a coin-op developer.

That's probably the lamest excuse I've ever heard from an adult.

I'm a software developer.  Does that exempt me from paying for any software?

For the games I've played illegally on Mame, I feel morally correct in doing so.  Most of the illegal games I play are for evaluation of other coin-op games, in many cases, games I have never seen in real life before (especially looking at horse racing games while working on Breeders' Cup).

What I didn't say (but what I think you inferred) was that I play games illegally all the time with Mame.  I don't.  I use Mame to evaluate games (typically not even playing them) very infrequently.

You have to take my response in the context of the posed question.  But I can see how you were confused.

I do own several arcade games, and I do play those games 100% legally on a very frequent basis.  For example, I have a donkey kong cabinet at work, and I spent 3 hours trying to get GEGOTW on marp tonight.  Just guessing, I think most people with scores on Marp don't own the games that they have uploaded scores for.

I do appreciate your standing up against people rationalizing what is simply piracy, however.

So if you used illegal copies of horse racing games to develop Breeders Cup, how is that different than someone selling an illegal MAME cd?  Either way there is profit due to theft.  Of course one has more profit than the other.

[Crazy Cooter]

I feel exempted for being a coin-op developer.

Where's that choice?  I think 99% of us are coin-op developers  .

[ChadTower]

It is not possible to use a ROM to develop another game, not literally anyway.

What he would be doing is research on similar existing products, not using that to develop a game.

[Crazy Cooter]

If I steal Saint's book and then start selling arcade machines, I've used something I stole to make me money.  I didn't resell the book, but I stole what I learned from it.

No difference.  Sounds like using the classic "this pirated thing is for educational use only"...  It's all stolen property.

Besides with www.starroms.com & www.gametap.com, those that want to pay can.  Those that don't won't.

[ChadTower]

No difference.

[Crazy Cooter]

He downloads pirates the rom, plays it, and learns the same things about it that any other player learns.  Then writes code to do the same thing, incorporating what he liked from the stolen IP, and sells it for profit.

compared to:

He downloads the rom and plays it.

Which is more criminal?  Of course the stolen IP was used in the development of Breeders Cup.  If it wasn't important, it wouldn't have been stolen in the first place.  Second, using Saint's book as an example, that's not a tool either, but it does offer insight, outline what to do, and generate ideas.

[ChadTower]

Which is more criminal?

[Ed_McCarron]

And, IP is notoriously difficult to pin down.

Case in point:  an arena for robotic combat.

Back in the day, there were threats of lawsuits flying hither and yon due to 'stolen IP'.

From what our lawyer told my group "You could ask any engineer to design such an arena.  They'd all come out with the same thing - a steel box with lexan walls.  Therefore, its common enough to not be enforcable under IP laws."

We never did get sued.

Look-and-feel comes into play a lot in this area.  It doesn't have to even be specific data - if it looks like Pac Man, and it feels like Pac Man, expect a knock on the door from the lawyers.

Does that keep me from playing the 5 or 6 games I actually like and don't own the rights to?  Nah.

[ChadTower]

As far as who's right and wrong, that's not the topic.

[Crazy Cooter]

Knowledge gained from playing a game is not IP, it's just knowledge.

Look at the guy going after EA Sports for Madden 2006.  EA took his ideas, AFAIK no code or anything was used.


(CT & I have to duke it out.  It's like our 2nd job... or our first, judging by what time it is heheh.)

[ChadTower]

Look at the guy going after EA Sports for Madden 2006.

[Crazy Cooter]

He doesn't stand a chance against EA whether he's right or wrong.  They can drag it out into the millions for legal fees.

[ChadTower]

Very likely will turn out to be true, though it ends up cheaper for them to settle with him for a token sum if he has any chance of a judge hearing the case.

[Howard_Casto]

I feel exempted for being a coin-op developer.

[RayB]

Sorry but this is a typical biased poll. No options for "none of the above". No option for "I don't think or feel anything".

[ChadTower]

Yeah, I didn't vote, because there is no option for "I don't have a MAME install".

[ChadTower]

I need to be redeemed to the one I've sinned against because he's all I ever knew of love.

[shmokes]

My favorite is the rationality that as long as they didn't lose a sale there's no harm done -- the one that says, "Well, had I not pirated it I still wouldn't have bought it, though I use it regularly now." That's like saying that it's okay if someone breaks into my house and lives there while I'm gone, so long as they leave everything just so before I return. 

Don't get me wrong, I'm by no means getting all high-and-mighty.  I just don't feel like I need to convince myself that something is right, when it clearly isn't, just so I can do it.  If you carry around guilt for doing the bad thing, just stop doing it, don't make up feeble excuses that nobody, including yourself in your heart of hearts, would seriously entertain.

[ChadTower]

Well said.  If you want to do something you know is wrong, at least be a man and own up to what you're doing.  Don't sit around and come up with flimsy reasons it is acceptable.

[Grasshopper]

The record industry deserves piracy, IMO.

Indeed. The hypocrisy of the record industry beggars belief. They lost any claim to the moral high ground a long long time ago.

Remember when CDs first appeared? The record companies wanted to charge us a second time for music we already owned and they basically got away with it. You couldn't return a vinyl record and receive an equivalent CD in return for a nominal fee. Oh no. If your vinyl records got scratched you had to buy the music again. When it suits them they say you're buying the physical media and when it suits them they say you're only buying the right to play the music. They can't have it both ways. To rub salt in the wound they charged more for CDs than for records even though CDs are cheaper to produce. Even today the markup on CDs is a friggin' joke.

[ChadTower]

Why should you be able to just return a record and get a CD without charge?  It is a different product.

I can't return my '99 Civic and get an '06 Civic for free.

[RayB]

Stole the words right out of my mouth Chad... 

[DarkKobold]

I feel like a smooth Criminal.

Anyone know if Annie is OK?

[ChadTower]

I always found it hilarious that for decades, during Red Cross CPR training, you'd have to yell ANNIE ANNIE ARE YOU OKAY at the mannequin before giving it mouth to mouth... once that song came out, people would always follow it with a TEE HEE...

...the dummy we used in high school had WHORE written on the forehead in permanent marker.   

[Grasshopper]

Why should you be able to just return a record and get a CD without charge?  It is a different product.

I can't return my '99 Civic and get an '06 Civic for free.

I didn't say without charge. I said a nominal fee i.e. just enough money to cover the cost of the CD itself but not the IP rights.

Record companies say CDs cost so much because you're mostly paying for the right to play the music. Fine but if you've already earned that right by buying a vinyl record you shouldn't have to pay for the same right a second time when buying a CD.

[ChadTower]

Record companies say CDs cost so much because you're mostly paying for the right to play the music. Fine but if you've already earned that right by buying a vinyl record you shouldn't have to pay for the same right a second time when buying a CD.

They have also said at times that the physical medium is the license, thus you have technically bought a piece of vinyl with the music imprinted on it. 

Where in that license you describe does it say you are entitled to more than one physical copy, particularly one on a different medium, and therefore in a different format?