Well, Blue asked us to chime in. We did. So far the consensus has been he should censor talk of piracy. I'm not down with it, but it's also not my decision. Either way, I'm not going anywhere.

Prez wrote on Mar 12, 2010, 09:24:
discussing it intelligently might bring some "casual" pirates around to the "legitimate" gamer side.

Good luck with that one.

Crucify the pirates or attempt to convert them? An interesting philosophical question.

BobBob wrote on Mar 12, 2010, 08:48:
An ignore feature would be nice, unless Verno ignores me.

I'd never ignore you bud

I've never been a big censorship guy anyway. Let people say what they want to say - if you don't like it... well, it's not all about you.

That goes both ways. We have plenty of people who work in the gaming industry who probably don't appreciate seeing that around here. There are tons of forums, IRC channels and so on to discuss piracy openly. I don't really consider Bluesnews in the same vein as I do some retarded site like nfohump(NOT a warez site, just a site that discusses it openly)

As far as the "benefits" of allowing the topic, what, may I ask, would be the benefits of censoring it?

Others already touched on it here. Less idiocy from the userbase about it, not potentially hurting relationships with the sites advertisers and avoiding staining the sites reputation just to start. I shudder to think of these forums devolving into a state like nfohump or something along those lines. Go have a look at a thread there, the benefits will be immediately obvious Prez

As for piracy discussion I agree with Verno not really sure what "benefits" are there to talk about it, other than attracting the wrong kind of crowd, and just turn threads into flame wars. I think there's enough of those threads here without the piracy discussions

Bam, exactly. There's literally no positive or redeeming aspects that it brings to the site. In fact it can have many negative connotations. I like a lively discussion as much as the next guy so either way is fine with me but I see why people want it to be forbidden.

This comment was edited on Mar 12, 2010, 10:02.

The PC Warrior wrote on Mar 12, 2010, 06:52:
theres no good reason to pirate a game. stop acting like you cant live without them, its an entertainment product. pirates arent taking from the rich and giving to the poor. they are stealing videogames. this isnt some essential human resource needed to survive, these people arent getting together on the web to figure out the best way to scam food from their dictator and his puppet government.

and thats fine. but you want to talk about it? they have like 20 different forums to do that on. you dont need to do it on legit gaming sites. do it and shut up about it if youre going do it. stop pissing in the industrys face about it, hasnt really helped pc gaming so far has it?

Why are you pissing and moaning at me about it? I'm simply arguing that burying our heads in the sand and pretending it doesn't happen doesn't make it go away, while discussing it intelligently might bring some "casual" pirates around to the "legitimate" gamer side. I am making no apologies for piracy nor am I encouraging it. Just saying that listening and discussing is almost always better than ignoring.

I've never been a big censorship guy anyway. Let people say what they want to say - if you don't like it... well, it's not all about you.

As far as the "benefits" of allowing the topic, what, may I ask, would be the benefits of censoring it?

An ignore feature would be nice, unless Verno ignores me.

I still don't understand how and where did this whole thread turned into a piracy discussion. Maybe I need more coffee and read through this again.

As for piracy discussion I agree with Verno not really sure what "benefits" are there to talk about it, other than attracting the wrong kind of crowd, and just turn threads into flame wars. I think there's enough of those threads here without the piracy discussions

Unlike Jerykk I can admit my bias here. I've obviously done it since I know way too much about it so I can't really "vote" without bias. I do agree that there is an argument to be made about it attracting the wrong kind of users to the site. I post on several other forums and piracy discussion is banned on all of them because it brought too many problems without any real upside.

In general I think the forums could do with some more modern "standards". There are several users here who do nothing but post nonsense and troll other users. If there were some ignore functions or filtering methods then this whole discussion would be kind of moot.

Unless it breaks some kind of rules here, I say never apologize for what you say. I'm sure if you saw these people naked you wouldn't care about their opinions.

Whoa there!

I wasn't completely clear on my intentions. I do in fact buy the games I play. However, I might also elect to get the 'non-drm' versions so I can play hassle free.

I agree that this was the wrong place to post that.
My wrote that in anger when I noticed that this game would require both Steam & WL. It was more of a "I'll show them" sentiment.

Consider my hand slapped.

Bad Gojo, bad!

There ARE reasons that people who otherwise wouldn't (and in fact never used to) end up resorting to pirating games. There's a certain give and take in the Game Publisher/Developer - Consumer relationship that has been missing for a LONG time now. Devs and pubs aren't completely blameless, nor are they doing much to help their own cause in the long run.

theres no good reason to pirate a game. stop acting like you cant live without them, its an entertainment product. pirates arent taking from the rich and giving to the poor. they are stealing videogames. this isnt some essential human resource needed to survive, these people arent getting together on the web to figure out the best way to scam food from their dictator and his puppet government.

and thats fine. but you want to talk about it? they have like 20 different forums to do that on. you dont need to do it on legit gaming sites. do it and shut up about it if youre going do it. stop pissing in the industrys face about it, hasnt really helped pc gaming so far has it?

On a side note, why is it that PC Warrior used proper punctuation in this thread's post, yet reverted back to his non-punctuating ways in his very next post? Baffles the mind, it does.

You have to ask him nicely to do so. But even that only has a short shelf life. Maybe if you put "PC Warrior please use proper punctuation and capitalization in your posts? Pretty Please??" as your sig...

For that matter, our resident psychobabble expert space captain could do with a little capitalization encouragement!

And I wish the anti-piracy people would quit with the binary thinking. There ARE reasons that people who otherwise wouldn't (and in fact never used to) end up resorting to pirating games. There's a certain give and take in the Game Publisher/Developer - Consumer relationship that has been missing for a LONG time now. Devs and pubs aren't completely blameless, nor are they doing much to help their own cause in the long run.

That's bull shit, you can't just look away and ignore somebody breaking the rules/law/whatever so flagrantly in a forum as public as this. It's not a matter of protecting the integrity of discussion when one of the participants admits to an illegal act of which there are no redeeming qualities. Disregarding the fact that this isn't a website for porn, what if somebody were to start in about how they like having sex with preadolescent boys?

Wait... did you just compare piracy to child molestation and/or pedophilia? Wow, you are certainly the pinnacle of reason and sensibility.

"Redeeming qualities" are fairly subjective. For example, I don't think there are any redeeming qualities in third-person cover systems, regenerating health, aim assist, etc. Does that mean that the mere mention of such things should be banned? Should we not be able to discuss anything that doesn't have "redeeming" qualities (whatever those may be)?

On a side note, why is it that PC Warrior used proper punctuation in this thread's post, yet reverted back to his non-punctuating ways in his very next post? Baffles the mind, it does.

After looking into this more, Steam has zero install limitations at all. GFWL has a 15 install "limit", but it just requires a single call to support to get it completely reset.

Piracy sucks. It's stealing, plain and simple. The excuses people use "I don't like their DRM!" are completely inane. First they wouldn't have DRM without piracy, and second, if you don't like something about the game, don't buy it and don't play it. Pirates, stop screwing PC gaming please.

BTW, I don't mind allowing discussions of piracy, as the pirates just make themselves look like idiots when they try and justify their theft.

** I'm getting some sort of error about activation limits **
Quote:

For those who cannot sign into LIVE due to an error message indicating they have exceeded the maximum allowed number of activations, please:

1. Go to <!-- m -->http://www.xbox.com<!-- m -->
2. Select “Support”
3. Select “Contact Support” and find a phone number for your region/language

When you speak with a LIVE representative please explain that you are using Games for Windows LIVE with DoW2 and you are being told that you have exceeded the maximum allowed number of activations. They will likely ask about how many times you have installed the game and other relevant information. The customer service representative should be able to assist you in getting the game running again.

Please feel free to PM a developer, such as myself or Jager, and let us know if your issue is resolved by this process. If not, we will do what we can to ensure you’re back to playing the game as fast as possible!

Thanks for your patience in this matter!"

http://community.dawnofwar2.com/forums/topic/3519

This comment was edited on Mar 12, 2010, 00:48.

Planning or premeditating an illegal act should be forbidden in the discussion. Discussion of illegal acts and how they impact our gaming world should be 'okay'.

Discussion of piracy is not piracy, nor does it encourage it. No one is posting links to torrents and discussing which cracks were best and such.

Discussion of piracy is an important issue in my opinion. I think the PC platform in general has a major piracy problem because comapnies have opted to force customers into paying for software before they can try it more often than not. With services like steam there is no reason why someone shouldn't be able to try/rent full games and see how everything works prior to buying. With internet activation taking the 2nd hand sales out of the market in many ways you have even fewer options as a buyer.

It's clear PC gamers want to be able to play software for free, but instead of meeting them halfway and allowing this to a certain extent, or charging a smaller fee to play the game for a short time prior to buying, they offer nothing. Edit: Ok in fairness they do offer demo's in some cases but these do a shit job showing you the whole product, they see more designed to bait and switch by showing you the best part of the game then when you buy the full game you realize....oh...the game is shit...wich they'd put that in the demo.

Many of the people claiming to pirate games I feel are saying this just to piss people off. Maybe they really do, the hell if I care. The PC game companies have become more and more hostile to me as a consumer while simultaneously making their software worse. Does anyone even debate that the software you buy on the PC today is a HUGE step backward compared to what you got just 5 years ago?

Remember when you'd buy a game and look forward to the contents of the box? WTF happened to this industry!?

I'm not down with banning people for admitting they pirate or for deleting posts in which they do. At all.

I'd rather keep an open discourse with them - not all of them are evil incarnate, self-entitled jackasses, and many can be made to see reason.

Moreover, a good many "pirates" here are the type who go out and buy games they pirated if they like them.

There is no talk of piracy until someone bought it up. Sheesh let it slide for once! Read the full thread!

Of all the chimps that bleat about how awesome it is that they steal shit, I think there's approximately two that even have any amount of input beyond "Fuck this, I'm stealing it."

So banning the topic (and/or the people who keep trying to talk about it), really isn't gonna do a lot to the quality of the conversation around here.

However, I also think that piracy is currently a hot topic in PC Gaming, especially with the retarded level of DRM we're getting, and it's kinda hard to debate DRM without ever mentioning piracy.

But if you chose to ban it, I wouldn't shed a tear over it.

Creston