What does DRM achieve, and does piracy equal lost sales?

[luc0s]

I have to say I agree with Gilrond on this one.

Besides that, DRM is useless, pointless and only drives loyal customers away. I actually did research on this subject and wrote a paper on it for my university. I linked it a while back in this thread. In my opinion it would be best for everyone and all parties involved if DRM gets dropped completely.

 

[volsung]

Of course DRM is pointless, it screws legitimate customers and awards the company control of YOUR environment. But we know, and they know, it has nothing to do with "piracy". It's all about control, so good luck getting game companies to admit that.

The more we play along and pretend its OK, the more royally fucked we'll get.

 

[Scholdarr]

No, any DRM means - "you, the user, are a potential criminal, therefore we'll restrict you in the way you can use your own computer and programs which run on it, lest you start infringing something". That's the presumption of guilt in action. It's found in every DRM by its own definition. Agreeing to that or not doesn't change the unethical nature of such approach.

You could say the same for bills. They have security measures as well. So the bank and the state treats you as criminal because he gives you secured bills...that's all theoretical speak without any real practical influence. And no, they don't force anything upon you.
You know, Nespresso also sells you coffee pads you can only use if you already own their machine. Same is true for Steam. They only sell you games if you use their platform. That's not unethcial, it's just usual business. It might be that you don't like that form of business but that doesn't make it unethical or "bad".

And justifying presumption of guilt because of different nature of the digital space is not acceptable.

It is. Your word games don't change the nature of digital products.

Different nature of digital goods doesn't change fundamental importance of freedoms and privacy in any way as well (such as freedom of speech and others which are commonly violated by DRM).

You have a fundamental freedom: just don't buy a product you don't like. That also protects your privacy. Easy. Freedom of speech is not in danger by any form by DRM.

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

@LordCrash: So you accept presumption of guilt in the digital space. That's an important conclusion which explains why you accept DRM. However I don't really see any good rason to change that principle in the digital space and here lies our disagreement. It's unethical there as well, and actually for police state digital space is a gold mine. Saying that presumption of innocence doesn't apply means they could harvest information about everyone while claiming it's all ethical at the same time.

You have a fundamental freedom: just don't buy a product you don't like

Luckily in case of DRM that's the way it can be actually actively repealed. By boycotting DRMed products (voting with one's wallet). However as I said, it doesn't excuse DRM's approach itself.

You could say the same for bills. They have security measures as well. So the bank and the state treats you as criminal because he gives you secured bills..

What do you mean by secured bills? Regular bank security measures are within norm, because they are applied to the bank. DRM on the other hand attempts to control your private digital space. DRM is not about security by the way. One the contrary, DRM always compromises security of the system where it's present.

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

@LordCrash: Above we talked about ethical aspects. But as others pointed out, DRM is also useless to prevent piracy, while on the other hand it only punishes legitimate users. So DRM is stupid and not needed from all aspects (ethical and pragmatical). Therefore it's completely the the opposite from what you said. Proponents of DRM are dogmatic in insistence that DRM must be used and they contradict common sense. Cory Doctorow calls it DRM Lysenkoism (about Lysenko, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trofim_Lysenko).

 

[Scholdarr]

@LordCrash: So you accept presumption of guilt in the digital space. That's an important conclusion which explains why you accept DRM. However I don't really see any good rason to change that principle in the digital space and here lies our disagreement. It's unethical there as well, and actually for police state digital space is a gold mine. Saying that presumption of innocence doesn't apply means they could harvest information about everyone while claiming it's all ethical at the same time.

Well, let's put it that way. I value saving money more than not having for example Steam DRM. I also value Steam features more than not having Steam DRM. If every Steam game would be DRM-free I would be happy as well. If a company decides that they want to sell me their games DRM-free I'm glad to buy them on the platform that gives me the best price and features. As I said before, I'm a practical guy who don't care much about theoretical problems in an luxury goods industry. I don't want to buy a product when buying a digital game but I want to buy "a good time with a game". I see no reason why I shouldn't be able to buy DRM-games if I can buy for example video streams. These are just different forms of digital entertainment and everyone has to decide for themselves whether the offer and form of consuming ("real" purchase, license, stream,...) is worth the price of not.

But I can understand that companies want to protect their digital property. And I don't think it's unethical to do so in general (the difference between us is probably that I don't think that usual DRM is "overreaching" the preemptive policy). If they "go to far" or if they offer me something that I don't think is worth my money I possibly punish them by not buying their game after all.

What do you mean by secured bills? Regular bank security measures are within norm, because they are applied to the bank. DRM is not about security by the way. One the contrary, DRM always compromises security of the system where it's present.

Bills have measurements to prevent copying and counterfeiting them. By only giving bills out with these measurements integrated the state treats every citizen as a potential criminal. That's in fact the same principle.
But I agree that usually no physical product needs any such form because they can't be easily copied. You can't duplicate a car without money or effort. But you can do so with a game. So - as you've said yourself - the preemptive policy actually makes sense here. If you call that "treating customers as criminals" or if you call that "selling a special form of entertainment to the people while trying to protect your product from wild spreading" is irrelevant imo. It's not relevant because you have the freedom and the transparency to decide to consume/buy what is offered or not. That makes the whole "treated like a criminal" argument theoretical (and yes, having the freedom and information to make a profound decision is a big issue here, in facht it's THE big issue). If streaming is legal as a form to offer digital products selling games with DRM (aka licensing) is also perfectly legal and also not unethical. Although I agree that the assessment whether something is ethical or not can be subjective. Morality and ethics are no natural facts but timed agreements in a society (at least practical ethics).


Edit:
I'm neither dogmatical pro-DRM nor dogmatical anti-DRM. I'm open minded and I think digital products have some natural circumstances that need to be assessed both on a societal and jurisdictional level (which happened only in parts so far). I personally think that companies should have the freedom in a free society to offer products and services in a way they want. If that means that they include DRM in games I can understand them (which in no way means that I share their opinion). I think different forms of offering digital games are possible and it should be a free decision and deal between companies and consumers to find a good price-to-value ratio.
I personally think that DRM in most forms isn't really necessary or efficient. Just for your information....

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

Bills have measurements to prevent copying and counterfeiting them. By only giving bills out with these measurements integrated the state treats every citizen as a potential criminal.

You only showed that preemptive aspect is similar. But you didn't show overreach. Watermarks on the bills don't violate your privacy in any way or compromise your wallet security. A black box DRM code which runs in your own computer and which you never can really trust precisely because it's a black box put there to control or spy over your system makes it clearly overreaching. So comparison with bills is invalid.

 

[Scholdarr]

You only showed that preemptive aspect is similar. But you didn't show overreach. Watermarks on the bills don't violate your privacy in any way or compromise your wallet security. A black box DRM code which runs in your own computer and which you never can really trust precisely because it's a black box put their to control or spy over your system makes it clearly overreaching. So comparison with bills is invalid.

"Black box DRM"? Sorry, but computers are not big myth. You can find out quite well that Steam or Uplay or whatever don't spy on you. That's not a privacy breach, it's imo just pure exaggeration.
By the same argument you could never buy any internet router. It could spy on you as well, even much easier than any software games platform. Same is true for example internet browsers, mail programs or every single software that connects to the internet (wanted or not)...

But I agree that the comparison to bills is only partially fitting since bills are not a product sold to you.

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

"Black box DRM"?

Closed code which can have sinister intentions. DRM is never open (by design). And it is as well by design created to be anti-user (as discussed above). Its sole purpose is to restrict users because users aren't trusted (since users are viewed as potential criminals as above). Given that nature, DRM can never be trusted in return since trust should be mutual. Since DRM treats users as potential criminals, it's normal to always treat DRM as potential malware. Practice proves this point: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_rootkit

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

By the same argument you could never buy any internet router

Correct, to some degree. That's why open firmware for routers is way more preferable. See https://openwrt.org.

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

Film director Lexi Alexander shares her thoughts on piracy and DRM. Quite refreshing for a change.

But guess what, for every IP block, DRM and who-knows-what security feature Hollywood spends thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours on, some piracy kid will undo it for free and within a couple of minutes.

And this is my favorite part: I am 100% certain that the hacking of entertainment industry's security features provides better entertainment for these kids than the entertainment we're trying to prevent them from stealing. Let that sink in for a second, then try not to bust up laughing.

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

Oh, the wonders of DRM. Apparently Origin client is snooping on its users browsing users' personal files. Who would have known?-)

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

Microsoft finds DRM and DMCA-1201 even where it shouldn't exist..

I really wonder, how long can it take, until this undemocratic garbage (anti-circumvention provisions) will be removed from the law?

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

GOG just added a DRM-free video section to their store: https://www.gog.com/movies

Let's see how GOG will try convincing the Lysenkoist publishers to release their films DRM-free now. But if it worked for games, why can't it work for films? At least someone makes the effort to improve the situation, unlike all those Netflix and Co.

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

Geoblocking form of DRM is on the rise: https://torrentfreak.com/copyright-holders-want-netflix-ban-vpn-users-140917/

I don't understand it however. Who exactly are pushing for such bans? Copyright holders (i.e. studios and publishers) for instance shouldn't have a reason to do it. The more their titles are sold, the more money they get. VPNs or not. Are these some kind of middlemen distributors who are simply interested in injecting themselves in between the content and the end user? With games for instance retailers always attempt to drag along all kind of geographic discrimination (price, availability and what not). This looks similar, so I'm not sure why it's about copyright holders with video.

 

[dragonbird]

Geoblocking form of DRM is on the rise: https://torrentfreak.com/copyright-holders-want-netflix-ban-vpn-users-140917/

I don't understand it however. Who exactly are pushing for such bans? Copyright holders (i.e. studios and publishers) for instance shouldn't have a reason to do it. The more their titles are sold, the more money they get. VPNs or not. Are these some kind of middlemen distributors who are simply interested in injecting themselves in between the content and the end user? With games for instance retailers always attempt to drag along all kind of geographic discrimination (price, availability and what not). This looks similar, so I'm not sure why it's about copyright holders with video.

Two main reasons, one of which is, as you suggest, on behalf of the middlemen. In that scenario, the original producer doesn't really give a shit, but gets pushed into it because the middleman demands it, and because the producer decides, rightly or wrongly, that it's financially attractive to keep the middleman happy.

The second is regional pricing, where there's a big price discrepancy because they're either giving lower prices in one region because of income differences, or can get away with higher prices than the baseline Because They Can. Traditionally, governments only got involved when the bypass of local distributors meant they weren't getting tax on sales, but given the power of the Copyright Lobby, that may change.

As someone who's lived in countries that suffer from this kind of BS, it really pisses me off. And I cannot, for the life of me, think of ANY logical explanation for why this also often involves artificial delays in releasing something, or why it happens when there's no local option, which tends to happen a lot with TV.

The one that really got me was when the BBC got involved in the Australia VPN issue. When I lived in Singapore, we had a BBC channel on cable. The typical delay between a series being released in the UK and on that channel was two years, and they only showed a handful of new shows every year. There were much simpler solutions to their problems than trying to ban VPNs.

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

@Dragonbird : Yeah, delayed releases seem to be be a common pattern in the film industry. I don't understand it either. The common logic dictates that with digital distribution it's complete bunk and such mentality is just retarded. Don't they get more sales if they sell everywhere right away? If anything, such kind of behavior directly fuels piracy in delayed regions so it's highly hypocritical for them to later complain about it.

 

[soldiergeralt]

it's because teleportation has not yet been invented

 

[Degs29]

I'm sure piracy does account for some lost sales. But DRM also accounts for some lost sales, perhaps even more.

Never in my life have I ever pirated a game. However, I can say that DRM policies have caused me not to purchase a game or two. Usually I'll put up with it, but even still it renders the company responsible for it in a bad light.

I have no problem paying for a decent game. Video games are some of the best entertainment values around. Think about it. The average video game is good for about 30 hours of play. At $60 a pop, that's $2/hour. Similarly, a dvd movie is good for about 2 hours...and they're about $20 each, making that value $10/hour! Five times as much. And I don't know about you, but I think video games have more replay value than movies!

Video games are cheap IMO, especially with services like GOG/steam. I'm not complaining, I just think we have it good. When that kind of value is offered, the demand for piracy is reduced. And when piracy is at such low levels, inconveniencing your fanbase for the sake of weeding out those few is a bad move!

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

@Degs29: The stronger point is that such inconvenience experienced by those who pay is not affecting actual piracy, since DRM can't prevent it anyway. So regardless whether piracy level is low or high, all DRM does is punishing the paying users and crippling the quality and usability of the product for them.