From: purp@wixer.cactus.org (Jim Meyer)
Subject: Thexder and Piracy (was Re: copywright & Piracy (sic)
Organization: Real/Time Communications
Date: Tue, 25 Aug 92 17:49:45 GMT

In article <1992Aug24.160827.16677@riacs.edu> 
 owen@olympus.arc.nasa.gov..arc.nasa.gov (Owen S. Nishioka) writes:
>In article <1992Aug23.144840.42508@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu>
  ozma@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu writes:
>>I do notice that I've seen a few games, like Thexder,
>>sell for $15 to $18 and they aren't exactly in every Mac-owners home.  Why is
>>that?  Do people equate cost = quality?  And then why do expensive games like
>>Spectre (wow, and you only get one copy of the game) run for $50-$60 and rake
>>in the dough?  Sure, for most people's tastes, Spectre is probably a better
>>game than Thexder (hmmm).  But I would have thought that the high price would
>>have doomed it.
>
>What I forgot to mention was that, IMHO, the reason people didn't pirate
>Penguin games was also that pirates don't tend to keep copies of
>software that didn't have to be broken in the first place.  i.e.  Why
>waste time on a game that costs 15 bucks.
>
>Just my 2c as well.

Poppycock! Nothing personal, but that's not true over the whole of the
body of software pirates.

Speaking as someone who was on the inside of this issue (i.e. I've
pirated software as recently as 2 months ago), I can tell you that the
large majority of software pirates are those who just have a neat new
program that their friend gave them, they like it, and they're eager to
share. I personally refer to these guys as 'distributors'; they're not
involved in the breaking of the code, but they are the folks at the
middle and bottom of the pyramid, the ones who spread the cracked code
from California to New York. 

The worst part of this is that some of them don't even know what they're
doing is wrong! It's true; you see, they have a friend who helped them
set up their new machine, and in the process dumped a whole bunch of
neat software on their hard drive (that being the sort of thing friends
do). And, being the non-techie that they are, well, they have no contact
with others regarding computers (the example I have in mind is a
part-time writer friend of mine; she doesn't discuss computers with her
friends, just writing!). And then, every once in a while, the techie
friend drops by for dinner, brings a new pirated game, teaches the
non-techie how to play, and leaves. True, the non-techie is a cul-de-sac
in the piracy chain, but he or she still has a drive full of unowned,
unpaid for software.

As for my views on piracy, well, I'm not lily-white. I do take an
occasional copy of something that looks interesting to me. And (as the
story always goes), I evaluate it. My criteria are simple: for games, if
it amuses me for more than about 4 hours worth of play, I buy it. That's
how I came to own PoP, Hellcats, and several other games. For other
software, if I find it useful, I buy it. That's why I own Quark XPress,
Illustrator, Freehand, ATM, ad infinitum. You see, I don't HAVE the room
on my hard drive for software I don't use regularly. Nor do I find it
interesting to have a few thousand floppies (or even dozens of Syquest
cartridges) filled with software that I *might* need some day. And yes,
I also pay shareware fees. And send postcards as postcard-ware fees. :)

The reason I've evolved this set of views was my purchase of PageMaker
several years ago. I went on the advice of friends (who I still consider
friends, despite the advice), reviews, and even listened to a
salesperson. And, in my opinion, got burned. I still have it, but I
never use it and can't really sell it, now, since I'm several updates
behind the real world. But I took a several hundred dollar hit, and
after Aldus Corp.'s refusal to refund my money after months of tech
support proved that the program would not do many of the things I needed
it to do (some of which it will *do*, but in roundabout, unfriendly
ways), I decided that the commercial software vendors have far too much
power for me to continue trusting them.

So flame me at will; I see no reason to change my views. I won't see a
company profit from too much marketing hype and not enough programming
substance at my expense again.

Oh, and the reason Thexder isn't on everyone's machine is simply that it wasn't
worth it. I spent the $15 to find out. Bleh. Hard to control. Not too
exciting after about the first week. I *gave* my copy, docs and all, to
the first friend who expressed interest.

--Purp, who owns what he has.
-- 
+---------------+------------------------------+-----------------------+
| Jim Meyer     | If I express an opinion, you | purp@wixer.cactus.org |
| Austin, Tejas | can bet no one else agrees.  | aka jimpurp@pro-lep   |
+---------------+------------------------------+-----------------------+
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.games,rec.games.board