Archive for: piracy
Know that awesome 28-day movie rental ban enacted by Warner Bros? You know, the one that makes it impossible to rent those awesome new movies for damn near a full month after they’re released? It’s a poor and backwards attempt by a fledging industry that thinks artificially limiting content in a digital world will somehow drive people out in droves to plunker down money on overpriced, physical DVDs. Good news: Warner Bros is going to double the rental blockade to 56 days!
Kicker: According to AllThingsD, WB is going to announce the new, even more draconian (and guaranteed to fail) change at CES next week — an ecosystem full of techies and forward thinking people who will balk/laugh at said announcement.
People will either (1) wait the extra number days before picking up the (usually) cheaper digital version or simply pirate it. Of course, if Warner Bros. keeps pushing rental blocks out further, people may just forgo their crap altogether.
Protip for Warner Bros: This is why people are driven to piracy. Making it harder for customers to enjoy your content how they want will not end well for you.
- December 31, 2011 6:22 pm
This isn’t a post promoting piracy or anything, just an informative post about the level of downloaded games on these here interwebs. And with how that level of thefts of a game, it can still top the charts and set records for sales. TorrentFreak has posted it’s annual list of top 10 most pirated games on the internet and some expected results made the list.
Crysis 2 topped the PC download list with almost 4 millions downloads. Gears of War 3 took the 360 list, which beat out Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. With MW3 hitting $1 billion in sales in just 16 days, it’s surprising that it was still downloaded over 800k times. Super Mario Galaxy 2 topped the Wii charts for the second year in a row. Do these results surprise any of you out there?
I know people pirate games because they probably can’t afford to buy them. That is why my cabinet isn’t as stocked as I’d like it, because of the price. So these people do like that game they downloaded, just couldn’t afford it. But then that game they just downloaded hits $1 billion in a hair over 2 weeks, and the developers sit and cry that they are losing money about the piracy.
It’s a double edged sword. I agree that these hard working developers need compensation for their work. I appreciate every minute they put into giving me hours and hours of entertainment. But the level of talk about loss in sales when they are sitting in a ivory tower is a laughing matter. I don’t support piracy, that isn’t what this is about. But I know how hard it is to buy things that you really want, and I can see the levels of these numbers as high as they are.
Jump past the break to see the rest of results…
In a sickening example of backwards politics, UK sex offenders can apparently escape severe punishments according to a new ruling. The preceding judge who issued said ruling states:
A blanket prohibition on computer use or internet access is impermissible. It is disproportionate because it restricts the defendant in the use of what is nowadays an essential part of everyday living for a large proportion of the public, as well as a requirement of much employment. Before the creation of the internet, if a defendant kept books of pictures of child pornography it would not have occurred to anyone to ban him from possession of all printed material. The internet is a modern equivalent.
Meanwhile, accused — and not always proven — file sharers and so called “infringers” face various punishments including lengthy jail time, blanket internet bans, and grossly over-exaggerated fines. How this ruling could potentially affect other similar cases remains to be seen.
Thoughts?
So I happened to stop off at TorrentFreak this morning in my normal trolling of the internets and read a story that made me laugh. I honestly had no idea this was actually a thing – people in Sweden are trying to get File-Sharing to be considered a religion!? WTF Sweden? Seriously? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I like to accidentally stumble across a brand new X-Men R5 as much as the next guy, but I would never consider that a form of worship.
Since 2010 a group of self-confessed pirates have attempted to get their newly-founded religion accepted by the authorities. The Church of Kopimism, which currently has close to 1,000 members, hope that official recognition of their values would make them immune from prosecution. However, the Swedish authorities have denied the request for the second time in succession.
The only comparison to Religion is how internet pirates are oppressed, hunted and judged like those that are apart of many Religious groups. What History has taught us over the centuries is that the Human Race isn’t always as accepting as we’d like em to be. The same goes for the interweb pirates around the world. But that is where I think it ends. I just don’t see how anyone could compare the worship of something with stealing – I mean, isn’t the base of all religions about being kind to others? Would stealing the intellectual rights from another person be considered kind?
Continue on in for some more rambling.
The long-running battle between once popular P2P file sharing service Limewire and various music labels is finally over. Just one short week after the end of the official trial, the second trial to determine damages has ended with a settlement of $105 million USD reached. While said amount may sound like a lot of money (because it is), it pales in comparison to the $150,000/song major music labels had voiced before, totaling trillions in damages. Thankfully common sense came out on top.
Limewire itself has been dead since last October after a failed attempt at launching a legitimate online music store. With the end of the trial, we could be looking at the last mentions of the once infamous file sharing service. As for file sharing as a whole, the story has just begun.
If you’re a fan of less than legal means of obtaining music, videos, and/or apps, avoid downloading the free “Walk and Text” app from the Android market. While it may seem like a deal considering the real Walk and Text seels for $1, it’s actually far from it — it’s a trojan. It isn’t the most nefarious of trojans, though it’s damaging nonetheless.
Once downloaded, this fake Walk and Text app grabs such information as your phones IMEI number, contact list, and other private data which is then sent back to a remote server. From there, every single contact in your contact list with a phone number is a text message saying:
“Hey, just downloaded a pirated App of the Internet, Walk and Text for Android. I’m stupid and cheap, it costed only 1 buck. Don’t steal like I did!”
Yeah, pretty embarrassing not only because it makes you look like a thieving idiot, but also a thieving idiot who doesn’t have a good grasp on basic English grammar. Of course, if you don’t have a texting plan, paying for several hundred text messages at ~$0.20 a pop won’t be all that entertaining either. You’ve been warned…
While everyone over at Sony is up to their PSP’s in legal paperwork while attempting to sue everyone on the planet that likes to dabble in hacking consoles, they sure know how to keep up the craptastic thwarts. Rumor has it – and only a rumor at this point as Sony has declined to verify it – that Sony will be adding a Serial Number like protection to PS3 games. You might recognize this if you have ever played a PC game, or installed software for that matter. Sources say that Sony will be adding a code to the inside of game packages that will need to be entered before playing/installing games on your PS3, most likely limited to 3-5 installs.
To me, this is a bad idea. Being in the middle of a lawsuit, trying to get all evidence of the ps3 jailbreak off the interwebs – they want to counter piracy in any way they can. But seriously Sony, do you really think this will work? Have pc games stayed safe? The 1337 pirates and hackers out there will find a way to crack these codes. It might take them a bit to perfect it, but it’ll happen. It has been done on the anti-piracy attempts Nintendo has placed on their studio games, it’ll be done on these ps3 codes too.
Continue on in for more…
Well that was quick — The Mac App Store launched today. And today, we’re reporting that it appears to have been cracked. Apparently, copying a few resource files from a free app (in this instance, the new, free Twitter app was used as an example) into a paid app’s own resources folder will allow you to run the paid app at no cost. How this little trick slipped by Apple is beyond us. But now that the cat is out of the bag, we expect a fix to be released sooner rather than later.
- October 26, 2010 10:14 pm
Back in my younger years, Limewire was my Napster. For by the time I was old enough to understand how it all worked, Napster had already walked the walk. Well, Limewire put up a much longer fight, but they too are succumbing to the same organizations as Napster — the recording industry — in response to a court ruling late last year.
Limewire:
While this is not our ideal path, we hope to work with the music industry in moving forward. We look forward to embracing necessary changes and collaborating with the entire music industry in the future.
I doubt the people behind Limewire are “looking forward to working with the recording industry”. Because they know just as much as you and I that once Limewire flips the switch on download/upload/searches, their traffic is going to tank. The final blow to Limewire will take place after the recording industry relaunches a few months to years down the road with some copycat, no-one-is-going-to-remember music store front with crappy prices and poor selection. Aw well. It was great while it lasted. Then again, Limewire and similar services are for kids. Torrents are where the adults play, right?
On the flipside, Limewire’s parent company, “Lime Group” has stated that they have a new music service in the works, and that we can expect to see it within the next month. Optimistic? Limewire CEO official statement after the jump…
