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Games are over priced - rubbish. Sure, the actual cost of the CD and packaging you hold in your hand is a mere fraction of the £30 you shell out. However, you are footing the bill for months, sometimes years of development. Not only do talented programmers, designers etc need remuneration, but also the computers and software used to do this work is amazingly high priced. All this has to be paid for somehow, and, as you’d imagine, Dodgy Dave done the pub doesn’t send royalty cheques to Sony (or whoever financed the making of the game). I have the added knowledge, living in N. Ireland, that the money earned through pirated software, in the vast majority, goes to the terrorist organisations. In buying pirated software here you are, in effect, aiding needless destruction and murder (enjoy your game).
The vast majority of the pre-tax price of games represents IP. This is the rather general term that covers the Soft Co's ownership of the game’s code. You buy a licence from them to play their game when you hand over £30. This clearly isn't a physical licence you can hold or frame, but is the difference between a £5 game of the back of a truck at a car boot sale and a £30 one bought in the high street.
At the end of the day, you pay £5 for two hours at the movies (£2.50 an hour) or £30 for maybe 20 hours on FF7 - (£1.50 an hour). I'm totally aware that many people picked up FF7 cheaper and played it longer too! What it all comes down to is perceived value. If you don't think the game is worth £30 then don't buy it. Simple as that.
"Ahhh", but you say, "I'm allowed a back up". Well, for a start, who actually backs up their PlayStation games anyway? No one. If you’re going down the market and picking up copied games it isn't for back up, it is because you are too cheap to fork out the full price for your hours of enjoyment. Also, there’s the fact that the back up rule to total tosh. It applied when software was on the more volatile magnetic disks, where data could, and frequently was, lost and thus a back up was used. However, CDs are a very reliable medium (note: you're mishandling of the CDs doesn't count in their reliability in the eyes of the law) and thus back ups are unnecessary so the law does not provide for them. I don't think anyone could argue that cartridges are unreliable either...
Anyway, I could bore you with further legal ramblings but you won't be interested and its what I would call work, being a Law and Accountancy student. Way I see it, you can never complain about the death of a Soft Co if you bought pirated software as you aided the problem. You cannot bemoan the public's ignorance to the Dreamcast and its subsequent demise if you stole IP from Sega.
Now, to contradict myself (but I will explain) there are things I think you could be more justified in copying, most notably PC software. I don't mean Windows or Office, overpriced as they are, but things like Photoshop and Dreamweaver. Part of their high price is there as it is expected the licensees (ie the person who buys the legit copy) will use it in their workplace and thus earn money from the software. In something like Photoshop you are buying the right to sell on documents that have been treated with their filters, to use a very simple example. With this in mind I'll happily use "pirated" versions of their software, technically it is still breaking the law, but I can do it with a clear conscience as I know I’m just tinkering with a few snapshots of my Dad falling off a bike. The sight of their new cheaper, consumer friendly versions of Photoshop is testing it though - I think I'll have to pick one of those up sooner or later instead.
I really didn't mean to "go off on one" its just piracy annoys me. Back to what I created this posting to do, bring you a little news (after a long introduction).
Neo 4 will be ready for the PS2 at the start of September. First chip to independently allow users to pretty much play whatever back ups they want - be they PSX or PS2 - all without the need for swap disks or additional hardware, such as the Action Reply 2 carts used at the moment. However, don't expect to see your local dodgy market trader doing the mods in the back of his van. Whereas the PSX was remarkably easy to solder the required chips in place, the Neo 4 one needs 36 precision solders to be installed.
Anyway, don't do it kids. You'll probably knacker your PS2 trying to install it and do you really want to be a thief anyway?
over on playstationmods.com there's an external chip for backups and imports with ONE wire to solder, I hate piracy and must be the only person in the world who never got their PS1 chipped but if everyone else gets anyway with it it is very tempting. I'm getting an external mod chip to play imports because I'm fed up of waiting for the UK releases and the way we don't get some games.
Backups, in the law, are for YOUR OWN USE ONLY, you cannot sell them unless you sell the original with it.
So if you ever see a backup of Gran Turismo 3 down your market for sale at £5.00, you have EVERY right to demand the original with it, or else read the guy his rights about the Trade Descriptions Act.
Games are over priced - rubbish. Sure, the actual cost of the CD and packaging you hold in your hand is a mere fraction of the £30 you shell out. However, you are footing the bill for months, sometimes years of development. Not only do talented programmers, designers etc need remuneration, but also the computers and software used to do this work is amazingly high priced. All this has to be paid for somehow, and, as you’d imagine, Dodgy Dave done the pub doesn’t send royalty cheques to Sony (or whoever financed the making of the game). I have the added knowledge, living in N. Ireland, that the money earned through pirated software, in the vast majority, goes to the terrorist organisations. In buying pirated software here you are, in effect, aiding needless destruction and murder (enjoy your game).
The vast majority of the pre-tax price of games represents IP. This is the rather general term that covers the Soft Co's ownership of the game’s code. You buy a licence from them to play their game when you hand over £30. This clearly isn't a physical licence you can hold or frame, but is the difference between a £5 game of the back of a truck at a car boot sale and a £30 one bought in the high street.
At the end of the day, you pay £5 for two hours at the movies (£2.50 an hour) or £30 for maybe 20 hours on FF7 - (£1.50 an hour). I'm totally aware that many people picked up FF7 cheaper and played it longer too! What it all comes down to is perceived value. If you don't think the game is worth £30 then don't buy it. Simple as that.
"Ahhh", but you say, "I'm allowed a back up". Well, for a start, who actually backs up their PlayStation games anyway? No one. If you’re going down the market and picking up copied games it isn't for back up, it is because you are too cheap to fork out the full price for your hours of enjoyment. Also, there’s the fact that the back up rule to total tosh. It applied when software was on the more volatile magnetic disks, where data could, and frequently was, lost and thus a back up was used. However, CDs are a very reliable medium (note: you're mishandling of the CDs doesn't count in their reliability in the eyes of the law) and thus back ups are unnecessary so the law does not provide for them. I don't think anyone could argue that cartridges are unreliable either...
Anyway, I could bore you with further legal ramblings but you won't be interested and its what I would call work, being a Law and Accountancy student. Way I see it, you can never complain about the death of a Soft Co if you bought pirated software as you aided the problem. You cannot bemoan the public's ignorance to the Dreamcast and its subsequent demise if you stole IP from Sega.
Now, to contradict myself (but I will explain) there are things I think you could be more justified in copying, most notably PC software. I don't mean Windows or Office, overpriced as they are, but things like Photoshop and Dreamweaver. Part of their high price is there as it is expected the licensees (ie the person who buys the legit copy) will use it in their workplace and thus earn money from the software. In something like Photoshop you are buying the right to sell on documents that have been treated with their filters, to use a very simple example. With this in mind I'll happily use "pirated" versions of their software, technically it is still breaking the law, but I can do it with a clear conscience as I know I’m just tinkering with a few snapshots of my Dad falling off a bike. The sight of their new cheaper, consumer friendly versions of Photoshop is testing it though - I think I'll have to pick one of those up sooner or later instead.
I really didn't mean to "go off on one" its just piracy annoys me. Back to what I created this posting to do, bring you a little news (after a long introduction).
Neo 4 will be ready for the PS2 at the start of September. First chip to independently allow users to pretty much play whatever back ups they want - be they PSX or PS2 - all without the need for swap disks or additional hardware, such as the Action Reply 2 carts used at the moment. However, don't expect to see your local dodgy market trader doing the mods in the back of his van. Whereas the PSX was remarkably easy to solder the required chips in place, the Neo 4 one needs 36 precision solders to be installed.
Anyway, don't do it kids. You'll probably knacker your PS2 trying to install it and do you really want to be a thief anyway?