CD Projekt sues pirates

Good for them. The fact that The Witcher 2, a DRM-free game, was pirated 4.5 million times pretty well refutes the argument that DRM causes piracy. Now CD Projekt is taking a stand, clarifying that there's a difference between being DRM-free and waiving your intellectual property rights, and is taking legal action against those who have torrented The Witcher 2.

CD Projekt demands Witcher 2 pirates pay up, '100% sure' it's targeting properly | Joystiq

I, for one, couldn't support CD Projekt more for this, though I suspect some will whine that they should not only provide DRM-free games but also then not follow up in any other manner if someone has illegally downloaded the game.

 

Capt. Jack Sparrow is finally going down!

 

Sigh. I respect CD Projekt for issuing DRM free games. But the unanswerable question still remains... if you pirated it, does this mean that you would have bought it if you couldn't? And I'm not sure they can leverage fines against consumers unless the fines are instituted and collected by the government.

 

I think the purpose is more to scare people into buying future games rather than recuperating losses. There will always be pirates, but if people are getting sued than some would-be pirates would just buy the game instead.

 

True, and most people wouldn't fight a $100 fine whether it's technically legal or not. They'll just be freaked out and pay it.

 

For some yes, for some no. Regardless, it's the AUTHOR'S RIGHT to decide whether or not they want to give away the game for free, not the people who want to play it for free. CD Projekt spent a lot of time and money making the game, and if they want to say "the only people who play this game are people who have paid money for it," that's their right.

 

I am all for this. 100%. Go get em.

This is a great example of supporting paying customers while fighting piracy. I hope this works for them and that this turns heads for other publishers.

This is the first serious anti-piracy measure I've seen that actually targets piracy. The fact that this is innovative is the only thing that's sad about this story. Good for CDProjekt. Bad for Ubisoft, Rockstar, EA, Atari, Capcom, Sega, Warner Bros...

 

Abso-frickin-lutely! I think they are taking the correct approach to dealing with piracy. Using arcane, antiquated DRM methods will only hurt your legitimate customers. And suing everyone and their mother(or dead grandma, etc) like the RIAA does doesn't help either. Provide a better service, and people will pony up to support you.

 

I don't understand how your post is supportive of what CD Projekt is doing. They provided a better service, and 4.5 million people STILL stole the game. And so they ARE trying to bring legal action against each and every individual with an illicit copy.

 

If this means more companies will go DRM free, I'm all for it. I just have a bad feeling this will all blow up in their face and cause worse issues later.

 

What are the piracy stats for Witcher 2 vs other games with DRM? I know 4.5 million sounds like a lot, but I'm pretty sure there are other games out there which have been torrented more whether they have DRM or not.

 

If anything, maybe people will actually look and see that while DRM doesn't encourage piracy, it also doesn't stop it.

 

guys, DRM as bad as it is, it is a must for all these companies spending millions of dollars producing games like witcher 2, I mean the programming effort in witcher 2 is overwhelming...

 

I meant that a game developer suing pirates is innovative. Suing pirates isn't innovative by itself, but a game developer doing it over their IP (and especially doing it in place of crazy and ineffective DRM) is a novel use of an idea previously popularized by the RIAA and MPAA.

Piracy count figures tend to be strongly correlated with popularity, regardless of DRM.

The whole point is that the game doesn't have any DRM.

 

What about pirates who use encryption, stolen computers, VPN's or other peoples internet connections....

 

I'm sure many of you guys condone the RIAA and the MPAA for suing alleged pirates, too.

This is extortion. IP addresses are not identities.

I do not condone this and I am not considering any purchase of any future CD Projeckt titles if more news outlets confirm this.

 

yes definitely, however I am just saying for companies like EA for example, they need DRM, I don't think the sales of witcher 2 is nowhere near BF3 for example (I am a fan of witcher 2 btw), so they need DRM..

 

First off, the numbers were just estimates from one of the guys at CD Projeckt. Based on the way he calculated it, I personally think it's pretty over-inflated, but that doesn't make much difference in the end.

Second, I should elaborate on my comments about suing. Imo, there is a right and a wrong way to do it. These guys said 'Hey, we're serious about this so knock it off, last warning', and then they went through with it. The publisher didn't go and sue random people just to make a point, which is generally what the MPAA and RIAA do. The developers themselves said 'We want to protect our IP' and they did it. Anyone remember the ridiculous cases that the RIAA went for? People who had downloaded one song years before, people who had passed away being sued for downloading, etc etc. Instead of going for the people that hosted the files, or had downloaded thousands, they go for someone that downloaded 10. Not to mention they sue for $10k+ per song.

That kind of litigation is ridiculous and a misuse of time and money. If you want to make an impact, get the biggest perpetrators or the people providing the hacked software. Or go after China.

Another huge issue that has garnered some attention, especially with the net neutrality and censorship camps. These days, it can be pretty hard to actually tell who is committing the piracy. You can't just get a log of IPs from the ISPs, that doesn't prove much if people use half a brain.


Honestly, there is a fine line to walk between making products 100% DRM free, but making your customers happy, or cutting down on piracy and alienating your paying customers. 'Soft' DRM measures, like a Steam activation, are pretty much hassle free for most people, and don't often lead to major service concerns. Go read up on Valve/Gabe Newell's stance on DRM sometime; they pretty much agree with CD Projeckt. If you can provide a better service, your customers will spend the money. Steam adds value on top of the DRM, and I have no qualms with giving them more money for it

 

Didn't Spore have something like 8 million downloads, and half of those were because of the DRM, to make a point, by people who otherwise would not have bought/played the game?

No, it isn't. Low prices are a must for these companies if they want to drive sales. If something is $5, $10, even $15-$20 on a Steam sale, I will not pirate it. DRM, on the other hand, does nothing to stop piracy. Most games are cracked the day they're released, or even before, and the pirated version often works better than the DRM'd one. For instance, the DRM in Witcher 2 was killing frame rates, so they removed it. The DRM in L.A. Noire will not allow me to play the game I just paid $25 for.

Next, you're going to start saying that DVD encryption is necessary for movie studios, even though the tools to break it are out there for free on the internet, and so simple that even a complete novice can copy a movie with a few clicks.


I'd like to see these "100% accurate" tracking methods. As long as there is open Wi-Fi, there can be no 100% accurate tracking.

 

Well, at last we have numbers from a new company proving what was already quite known: piracy doesn't correlate directly with DRM (or lack of thereof).

I am quite happy CD Projekt is looking for (legal) alternatives to claim their game rights.

 

Haha, noobs. If they would have buyed it, it would only cost $50, now they have to pay $1000+, haha!

 

DRM is a must for the sake of peace of mind of the investors. There are numerous cases proving (The Witcher 2 is the most current) that DRM does not reduce the piracy rates.

 

Im confused at this. What if you torrented the game and then bought it after some point? Would you still be charged a fine?

 

I'd say that normally (and legally) yeah. If you rob a store and then go again and purchase something (same price) doesn't exonerates you from the first action (the robbery).

 

I completely agree. I aint shelling out so much money for some games that I even wanted to buy - lucky I got a 360 and rented mw3, but paying $80-100 AUD for that is just ridiculous. I have to work just over 8 hours for a 4-5 hour campaign... is that fair?

One game I have bought every year - nba 2k. On PC, they acknowledge its a port, and SO ACTUALLY CHARGE LESS.

Gaming companies have unrealistic expectations. A game that is good, and moves the industry forward (think half-life 2) is still going to make tremendous profits for the developers. There is no need they need to make the 1 bn infinity ward make from each call of duty game.

 

First up its rare to find a game that makes 'tremendous profits' for a developer. Developers get shafted on both sides of the equation in software publishing. Publishers get at least 80% of the wholesale cost of the game. Developers get some of what's left.

Second, your argument t is that "but but the level of content is not 'fair' for the price.....the stolen one runs better....etc"

If you don't feel there's enough content in a game to justify its price tag, write the developers and tell them and don't get the game. If you feel the experience of the protected game is poor, write the developers and tell them, and don't get the game. But don't steal it!!!!

I've lost track of the number of highly talented individuals and companies that are no longer in this industry because of lame pseudo-justifications from thieves that are basically killing the PC gaming industry and making problems worse by providing market setting publishers like EA with justification to increase prices further.

 

The problem is you usually don't know that there's enough content or that it has issues until you buy the game. But guess what? Customers have no recourse! You buy the game you can't return it. I don't justify pirating, and have supported the industry for 30+ years as attested by my vast collection of hundreds of games (maybe thousands? I dunno).

I have had to, on numerous occasions download hacked versions to get it to work on my machine. Writing a letter won't get my money back and it will almost never fix the issues or content of the game. So I'm stuck. Trust me, I've sent my number of complaint letters, and it resulted in, at best, a form return email or letter saying "Sorry, but thanks for your money." The door needs to swing both ways, but so far it's a one way door.

 

1. I buy games cause I can and prefer it, I feel torrent versions are too much hassle for me.

2. If I'd pirated it, how you gonna make me pay a fine? No way I would end up paying this. How would you even identify me? IP? That does not really work.

3. What if i own the game and pirated it? :O Then , what if I just buy it now though I have already pirated it?

 

I paid $25 for L.A. Noire and was left with a game that does not progress past the loading screen for my trouble. There are no refunds for software so literally my only recourse is to "steal" the product I've already paid for, only in working form.

 

1. That's good.

2. It does work. The RIAA and MPAA has been doing this successfully for years. They will get a subpoena to reveal your identity, they will sue you if you don't pay the fine (for significantly more than the fine) and a court of law will force you to pay. It really does work.

3. If you own the game and you pirated the game, your piracy is not exonerated, as was stated with a nice analogy.

 

I 100% support it. Might not be feasible for them to actually successfully sue a lot of people (especially since they will be all around the world), but I think it's important that theyre pursuing people. Pirating is killing PC gaming imo. People half justifying it because games are too expensive, or they wouldnt have bought them anyways are the same people that complain about PC games becoming console ports and DRM being intrusive.

If you want a game, buy it. If it's too expensive, wait for a sale. Other complaints? Just dont get it.

 

It doesn't work. They nab a couple dozen people, not the millions that pirate. If CD Projekt actually goes after as many people as they can, that is more robust. But you can't pick a select few people and say it works.

True, but again, where's the recourse for the consumer? Nothing, period. You buy the game. It causes issues and can't play it fully or in part, you can't return it. They ignore your plea. A pirated version corrects the problem. What are you going to do? Just be happy that they took your $50 for a product that doesn't work, and shrug your shoulders?

Any other product if you bought it and it didn't work the store or manufacturer would be forced to replace it with working version, fix it, or refund your money. Hell even if it did work you could get your money back.

There are zero protections for the consumer when it comes to games, music, and movies, period. Everyone is assumed guilty.

 

I meant that it would work specifically in terms of being able to be identified by IP.

 

Yes, when you're only approaching a select few. But millions? You'd have to get solid evidence that it came from those specific IP's and then users. What about universities, hotspots, stolen internet. Doing that on a mass scale of 4 million plus would take more time than any court would be willing to spend time doling out subpoena's. It would literally take years, maybe decades. Not to mention tens of millions of dollars.

I appreciate their dedication to the cause. But until I see 4.5 million subpoena's delivered (which requires evidence against an individual not an IP address) it won't be effective.

 

Again, I was responding specifically to TheHansTheDampf. He was wondering how on earth they could possibly identify him by IP address.

Individuals are sued by the RIAA and MPAA pretty regularly at my university and others. The school is as non-compliant as is possible, but they are legally forced to comply if given a subpoena to do so. They discuss this with incoming freshman every year. I know many universities have log-ins set up for the students, which simplifies this process even further, but mine is not one of those, and it still doesn't stop the RIAA or MPAA.

I also don't think they need 4.5 million subpoenas for this tactic to be considered effective. They made about $10 million from all digital sales (steam, d2d, gog, etc) - not sure about shelf sales. If they get for $1000 per infraction, 10,000 claims would literally double all of their digital sales. They could probably get significantly more. Since they're using a 3rd party agency to take care of this, it's hard to say how broad of a brush they will be able to use.

 

This is a real issue. Until this can be properly addressed I can't get behind any anti-piracy measures. It is not, "good for them" as some have posted. It is bad for everyone as the laws which most Western countries are founded on are being trampled upon. They're training you to trade your rights as a consumer for a few hours of entertainment. Yet some applaud that? Moreover, they have completely trampled on fair use laws for the sake of profit.

Sure, developers et al involved in the production of digital media are entitled to compensation. But that cannot be construed as a justification for DRM and other anti-piracy measures. It is not on the same level as RFID or magnetic sensors in a store to prevent shoplifting.

A system, perhaps a subscription based system, whereby you can get a number of digital titles per year at various price points along with the ability to say, get a certain number of refunds per year for titles you were not satisfied with, would go a long way towards restoring consumer rights.

Now, don't read this and think, "ooooh an NBR mod supports piracy!" I don't support it. I simply understand it. What I do support is consumer rights for which digital media has none.

 

So connect to your neighbor's wifi, use a VPN in addition for some extra protection, and spoof a fake MAC address. I'd love to see someone who does all that get sued.

 

You know WingNut, heres my stance on piracy and DRM.

First of all, DRM is useless. It only aggravates the legit buyer. I don't know of one drm method that wasn't cracked or overcome within the first few days a game is released.

Those that pirate will never buy. Whether a game has drm or not, they will only ever download. So if a game isn't pirated, they will download a different game.

The Witcher2 is a prime example of a game that was made to make it more attractive to purchase. Priced at $39.95 and drm free, you really have no excuse not to buy the game if you want to play it. The game kicks butt and was well made. Cd projekt deserves support for this. I really liked the fact that i paid $39 for this on day one! I wish more companies would keep the prices reasonable

One thing to note is that you cannot stop piracy. imagine you standing waist deep in the ocean and you see that big wave coming at you. You can't stop that. All people can do is make games more attractive to buyers. Geeks will come up with more and more innovative ways to spread software and games. Even if cd projekt makes a splash here and wins the court case, there will be others to fill the void

 

I don't know if a book is going to be any good until after I've bought it and read it, but that doesn't mean I can steal it from Barnes and Noble, read it, and if I enjoyed it, go back and pay them the $20 the book cost.

 

Assuming your neighbors are oblivious, this would be sufficient to protect yourself, if your neighbors have open wifi and you can reach it. However, this behavior is immoral and very illegal in the USA

 

That's not even a good comparison because it's a physical book written linearly using only ink and paper. My point was buying a game and it doesn't work, but a third party hack fixes it, and many times requires downloading the whole game. But if the book was missing words, had horrible grammar and spelling, and pages in the wrong spots, without being able to even open certain pages, yes, I'm getting my money back. If it was a digital book (i.e. Kindle) and it was garbled text, etc, and I couldn't get my money back, or get it fixed, then if someone else offered it fully legible, sure I'd download it. I paid for a product that they failed to deliver on. You can't use physical media as a comparison with digital distribution as far as stealing because you can have infinite copies of it at pretty much no cost in comparison to a book that is of finite quantity.

Well said. That's the point I am trying to make. I don't advocate piracy. But when you have no recourse when you've already spent the money, what else are you supposed to do? There are lemon laws in place for cars and pretty much anything in existence to protect consumers from stuff like this. But no consumer rights for digital media, period.

 

I agree that there is a consumer rights issue in terms of buying software, especially video games. Although you may have difficulty returning a book for being terrible, you certainly could return a book for *not working at all* - and in both cases this would be easier than trying to return a video game for any reason.

None of this justifies piracy, but it is a big issue in it's own right.

 

How about unauthorized reproductions of an artist's copyrighted photographs or paintings? Teachers photocopying entire books for entire classes instead of having students buy the book? These are situations where a physical object is not stolen, but intellectual property rights are being violated, and they've been prohibited (and generally considered reprehensible) for a long, long time.

Electronic media is not a brave, new frontier with no rules. It's entirely analogous to intellectual property matters we've had before.

 

Same thing with "try before you buy". Piracy from this standpoint exists primarily because consumers know if they buy it they can't return it.

I always thought a tiered return policy could be in effect. 100% refund in 24 hours, 50% in 48 hours, 25% 48 hours+. At least you can get some refund, and send a message back to the publishers that their stuff stinks or doesn't work.

You're not getting my point. The point is that consumers have no recourse... period. A painting isn't even the same. It's a static object. You know what you're getting. Textbooks are different too. Most universities allow return of textbooks within a limited timeframe. As far as photocopying entire books. Never heard of that and don't know anything about it.

Everything supports the publisher. Nothing supports the consumer. If there was customer protection for this kind of stuff it wouldn't happen nearly as much.

 

This is absolutely true. IP (property, not the address) has intellectual value, not physical value. The media on which it is distributed tends to have negligible cost. Even for digital media, you can look at a simple example:

On the one hand, we have someone who walks into a store and steals a DVD movie. That is theft. This person stole something physical right out of a store. Pretty straightforward. Compare that against someone who buys the DVD from the store, but then makes 100 copies of the DVD and sells them easily on the street for 50% of the price he paid for the 1 DVD. He is able to pull this off because the value of the product rests in the intellectual value of the content on the DVD, not the physical media itself. He is not guilty of theft, but of copyright infringement (commonly called piracy). This is the same (but on a larger scale) as the offense committed by someone who elects to torrent someone's intellectual property. They obtain it for themselves without paying the intellectual property owner, and often distribute it to others as well. The intellectual property owner deserves to be paid, even though you didn't steal anything (you duplicated it). As it turns out, the physical or digital copy has no (or very little) value- the value is with the license to access the IP.

 

There's all sorts of things where I can't have any recourse. If I go to a restaurant and the food is awful, what am I going to do? Pay anyway and don't come back. If I go to a movie theater and the screen is poorly lit and the sound has static problems, what am I going to do? Unless they voluntarily give money back, my only recourse is to not go back to that theater.

You don't sneak into a movie theater and illegally watch a movie there for free to make sure it's up to your standards before buying tickets to that theater. There's not a single other thing in society where it's considered legal or appropriate to do something like that against the seller's wishes (consensual "try before you buy," like car test drives and game demos, are another matter). But that's what pirates are doing.

 

I disagree that pirating behavior would change in any significant way if consumers had easier returns - but now the debate is shifting into the motive of the pirate, which doesn't have any bearing on whether CDProjekt should pursue people for violating their IP ownership rights.

Books and music CDs are also torrented like crazy. Books and music can be sampled before purchase, and books in particular are easy to return you have any issues. All sorts of IP is pirated en masse. It correlates strongly with how popular the intellectual property is, and has little to do with the consumer rights one would have if they went out and purchased media with the IP.

 

Simple.

Restuarant; complain and get another entree to replace the first or get complimentary entree for next visit or get a refund.

Movie; get a refund or complimetary ticket for next visit.

Just about everything in the consumer world has recourse except illegal activities. Buy drugs on the street corner? Bad quality? Too bad. Unless you want to do something else illegal to address your dissatisfaction.

These analogies of yours are not working. Yes, we know piracy is illegal. That's a fact in most countries in the world.

However, nearly all products unless there is a risk to the public for accepting a return, have a method of recourse for consumer dissatisfaction. All but digital media. While the majority of consumer products may not have a so called "try before you buy" policy, they will have a method for a refund (partial or full) in case you are not satisfied. Moreover, credit cards have what's called a chargeback in case the merchant wishes to trample on consumer rights. Even Paypal, who tends to side with the consumer far more often than not, has a method to address consumer dissatisfaction.

 

I started another post re: "Why DRM Stinks". Basically I paid for F1 2010 via Steam and got the securom error and so back to the desktop. I had to download a crack just to get it to work after I paid for the game.

I'm not going to give CD Projekt here a lot of credit because the retail version came with DRM and they removed it IIRC because the game ran like crap with it. So all this DRM-Less luv by CD Projeckt is somewhat disingenuous.

First off anyone who's been around the net awhile knows how to block incoming IP's via peerblock and pirates have moved beyond torrents to distribute their stuff. It's been moving towards usenet and filesharing sites. I think the 4.5 million is a bunch of crock. Just goes to show how figures lie and liars figure.

I did buy the game on sale at Amazon for $16 and the first Witcher for $2.50 on Amazon as well. And good luck trying to squeeze blood out of a turnip in this economy.

As HTWing stated I think this has the potential for backlash against them.

 

No this is extremely immoral to do. I will share a personal story as to why people shouldn't do that. I was sleeping one morning then I get a loud *bang* *bang* on the door. I open it and get wrestled to the ground by the FBI in a dawn raid. I was under suspicion of downloading some rather disgusting material from the internet. I did not do anything, and after their investigation they corroborated that I did nothing. This all happened because I had an unsecured wireless network and one of my neighbors were doing some really nasty illicit downloading. I lost all my electronics for a couple of months, and even had a stigma placed on me till everything was sorted out.

It's really messed up to prey on unsecured networks to do something illegal.