Digital Distribution Is Far Better Than A Disk

[QUOTE="IndigoSunrise"]

Reasons why Digital Disribution Wins

-Doesn't take up space - with consoles, it takes up HDD space instead

-No need for a loud disk drive - it really isnt that loud unless you play with no sound (but why would you do that?)

-All of your games are neatly stored - is there something that stops people from neatly storing their physical media?

-No need for used/new games - no renting games either... big FAIL

-We can drive those nazi's Gamestop out of buisness or at least force them to change their evil nazi esque ways

However lets be fair and also count the benefits of physical storage.

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Reasons why A physical game CD/Cartridge wins

-Games will become scratched and dirty over time eventually becoming good for nothing more than coasters - never had that problem... do you use your disks as cup coasters?

-Former freinds can borrow them and never give them back - lol! you must have bad friends

-Stickers, plastic wrap and other useless things are awesome - indeed. i do like the smell of a new videogame

-Do you enjoy paying more for what a publisher calls a "collector's edition"? That consists of nothing more than the regular game and a wortheless art book/plastic figurine? Then physical formats are for you - i dont believe i was ever forced to buy a collector's edition of any game

-Enjoy a increasingly large and unmangable libary of game cases that will eventuall topple and kill you - yup, almost happened to me... TWICE!

-Can be fashioned into a shuriken for those pesky suprise ninja attacks - the ninjas around my neighborhood are pretty nice... they at least warn you of a imminent attack

ogvampire

my 2 cents...

This debate is utterly pointless; technology WILL inevitably move on, whether the conservatists like it or not.

This debate is utterly pointless; technology WILL inevitably move on, whether the conservatists like it or not.

Hanass

It baffles me how people can be against technology moving forward.

I tend to get over excited everytime some new form of technology is announced, I went crazy over the iPhone for example.

The faster we advance the better.

[QUOTE="Brownesque"][QUOTE="mythrol"]What happens when I want to trade in my game? I like the idea of Digital distribution, but it effectively turns my game value into $0 as there's no option for me to be able to trade in the game. That is the main reason I am against it at this time. If there was some way to get around this. . .(maybe by lowering the extremely high cost of games right now) then I'd be all for it. Also, another issue with DD is that they're charging the exact same amount as full retail discs. Ignoring the current "going rate" for how much someone could get the game online from ebay or even used from Gamespot.Burning-Sludge

Can you say extremeist? You are pretty much are saying that either we should be screwed by a digital distribution monopoly or the developers should be screwed by having the millions of dollars put in to the games being for nothing. Either way you are going to see a massive decrease in the number of developers.

i strongly disagree with the tc . for obvious reason . resale value and game can be install on hardrive ,i can borrow friend copy or rent it , im a collectioneur , not everybody have access to high speed internet , hey tc do you work for microsoft?legol1

Have people ever thought of these advantages, which outweigh their silly emotional attachments to a "physical copy"?

- No transportation = less greenhouse gas emissions

- No plastic/wood used = less waste generated/less resources spent

- Can and will stimulate faster optic fiber technology development (Internet speeds)

- Can and will stimulate faster HDD/SDD technology research

Have people ever thought of these advantages, which outweigh their silly emotional attachments to a "physical copy"?

- No transportation = less greenhouse gas emissions

- No plastic/wood used = less waste generated/less resources spent

- Can and will stimulate faster optic fiber technology development (Internet speeds)

- Can and will stimulate faster HDD/SDD technology research

Hanass

[QUOTE="Hanass"]

Have people ever thought of these advantages, which outweigh their silly emotional attachments to a "physical copy"?

- No transportation = less greenhouse gas emissions

- No plastic/wood used = less waste generated/less resources spent

- Can and will stimulate faster optic fiber technology development (Internet speeds)

- Can and will stimulate faster HDD/SDD technology research

Flame-Eternal

That's crazy though. Does the ability to re-sell you're games for a couple of bucks really outweigh the tons of advantages DD has?

[QUOTE="Hanass"]

Have people ever thought of these advantages, which outweigh their silly emotional attachments to a "physical copy"?

- No transportation = less greenhouse gas emissions

- No plastic/wood used = less waste generated/less resources spent

- Can and will stimulate faster optic fiber technology development (Internet speeds)

- Can and will stimulate faster HDD/SDD technology research

Flame-Eternal

Still not good enough of a reason to give up on what I said. You do realize that we have 10 years left to completely stop polluting, right?

[QUOTE="Hanass"]

Have people ever thought of these advantages, which outweigh their silly emotional attachments to a "physical copy"?

- No transportation = less greenhouse gas emissions

- No plastic/wood used = less waste generated/less resources spent

- Can and will stimulate faster optic fiber technology development (Internet speeds)

- Can and will stimulate faster HDD/SDD technology research

Flame-Eternal

[QUOTE="Burning-Sludge"]

[QUOTE="Brownesque"] Your game is valueless anyway. It's artificial scarcity produced by the sole fact of IP laws. IP laws go, your data is now valueless. Data doesn't have any inherent value. It's 1's and 0's arranged in a specific order to get instructions followed. It can be transmitted over a cable line or typed into a cell phone. It can be told over the phone or written down on a piece of paper. It just so happens that digital distribution via the internet of digital data stored on a physical storage medium is the most effective means of distribution and data management. The problem here is that the publishers, distributors, and retailers in this instance can't screw you twelve ways to Sunday trying to control the means of distribution, so, boo hoo, we don't want that to happen. So they petition the government and they make intellectual property a law. Wanna know what that is? That's a system by which you have been conspired against for the effective profiteering of individuals who want data for the sole purpose of generating cash for a class of individuals with no need whatsoever. But, you might say, where will the developers get their pay check? Did you like the game? Send them some money. I'm not going to support this system on the sole basis that it's the existing status quo. Digital distribution is the bomb because it's the way things should be distributed from a technical and economic perspective. The only question is incentive. Well, bud, do you want to give the developers incentive? As far as selling your games is concerned though, you have no reasonable expectation of it anyway. Talk about hurting the developers. They have no turn-around on that game sale. They see almost nothing as it is when they sell a new copy, when you sell away a used copy you're effectively causing the entire business to shrink and convulse. They're bleeding money as a result of the used games industry and its affecting the way they make games and the way they price them most especially. Your videogame purchases, whether on hard discs you can sell to retailers or not, are effectively leases. That's how they should be treated under the existing IP legal system. Trading in games should be illegal. That or software should be freely distributed and payment should be free to give as a matter of RECIPROCITY symbolizing APPRECIATION for the work and the accomplishments of the project.Brownesque

Can you say extremeist? You are pretty much are saying that either we should be screwed by a digital distribution monopoly or the developers should be screwed by having the millions of dollars put in to the games being for nothing. Either way you are going to see a massive decrease in the number of developers.

I know it's a monopoly on consoles and that's why I don't want Digital Distribution on consoles. It would tighten there hold. Now you want the gaming industry to reduced to flash games or force me to "pony up" 10 million to get Super Smash brothers.

[QUOTE="Flame-Eternal"][QUOTE="Hanass"]

Have people ever thought of these advantages, which outweigh their silly emotional attachments to a "physical copy"?

- No transportation = less greenhouse gas emissions

- No plastic/wood used = less waste generated/less resources spent

- Can and will stimulate faster optic fiber technology development (Internet speeds)

- Can and will stimulate faster HDD/SDD technology research

Brownesque

So you want the publisher to be able to turn off the game you purchased unless you can break into the source code?

[QUOTE="Brownesque"] You shouldn't be able to sell anything. You shouldn't be able to sell physical game discs. It should be against the law to sell them to retailers. Why? Because it's a lease. You don't own that property. Under existing IP law you have no claim to any of the contents on your disc. You have no reasonable expectation of resale. Resale of your lease is akin to selling something on the black market. You don't own it. It's stolen goods. Give it back to the proprietor for redistribution if you don't like it. If you want something you can resell, go buy a teddy bear. Go hug that teddy bear, because I'm guessing after reading the above, you're going to need it. Since you like physical objects so much, I mean. "Yeah, Data is 1's and 0's. . .but at least with discs I have a PHYSICAL object. " You don't have anything. You have a lease via physical distribution. With digital distribution you download it to your HARD disc. Kind of a funny name. HARD disc. HARD, physical disc. What makes a CD any more physical than a hard disc, exactly? "Now imagine someone spending $60 on a video game and not being able to get any return value for it." With no more black market and no more retailer markups to worry about, you have now effectively reduced the cost of the distribution of your product by at least 50%. "How do I take a DD game I bought over to a friends house to play a game? The only way I could see would be to log into my xbl account and then REDOWNLOAD the game on his system. But that would take quite a long time. With physical media I'm able to grab it and go and instantly play it once I arrive." The publisher says "how do I get this game over to the customer's house? Well, I have to send the data via digital distribution to a manufacturing plant, at which point it will be stamped to a physical disc and put in a physical storage medium to protect it (a game case), sealed and put on a truck, sent to a dock/airport, sent overseas, transported via another truck to a distribution center, put on another truck and sent to a retailer, who will then markup the price for the privilege of selling the game for me to eager customers, who will then transmit the physical disc to their homes and stick it physically into their players." You have as many restrictions on hard media as on DD, and you should have more.mythrol

Take a look at this:

That's what you're buying. You're not buying the data. Your access to the data is contingent upon the owner of the intellectual property's interest in your access to it. Your distribution of it is barred. That's why copyrights exist. That's why patents exist.

So you want the publisher to be able to turn off the game you purchased unless you can break into the source code?

Burning-sludge

i dont understand tc point of view , resale game or rent game is a great thing for gamer . borrow a friend copy is great if you are a gamer . legol1

I D.D. my PC games, but only because the market for reselling PC games is a tough one anyway...and because the games are $20 cheaper to start with. Console games? I'm pretty against DD. I appreciate being able to sell a game to someone else if I'm done with it and they want to play it for less than full price. The desire to take away my ability to sell something I bought has been an entertainment industry goal (not just gaming, but movies and music) for the last decade. Sorry, but I'm not in.Flame-Eternal

That is corrrect Flame-Eternal. We should stop that from happening by every legal means we can.

[QUOTE="Flame-Eternal"]I D.D. my PC games, but only because the market for reselling PC games is a tough one anyway...and because the games are $20 cheaper to start with. Console games? I'm pretty against DD. I appreciate being able to sell a game to someone else if I'm done with it and they want to play it for less than full price. The desire to take away my ability to sell something I bought has been an entertainment industry goal (not just gaming, but movies and music) for the last decade. Sorry, but I'm not in.Burning-Sludge

That is corrrect Flame-Eternal. We should stop that from happening by every legal means we can.

i cant stand hardcopies. I really do hope we see DD become the standard asap.

[QUOTE="legol1"]i dont understand tc point of view , resale game or rent game is a great thing for gamer . borrow a friend copy is great if you are a gamer . Brownesque

[QUOTE="Brownesque"][QUOTE="legol1"]i dont understand tc point of view , resale game or rent game is a great thing for gamer . borrow a friend copy is great if you are a gamer . legol1

[quote="Burning-sludge"]So you want the publisher to be able to turn off the game you purchased unless you can break into the source code?

Brownesque

There is nothing they can do about it if I have a disk with the data on it. They can't send goons into my house to retrieve it or erase the data off the disk. But with digital distribution they can delete or disactivate the games remotely.

[QUOTE="Flame-Eternal"][QUOTE="Hanass"]

Have people ever thought of these advantages, which outweigh their silly emotional attachments to a "physical copy"?

- No transportation = less greenhouse gas emissions

- No plastic/wood used = less waste generated/less resources spent

- Can and will stimulate faster optic fiber technology development (Internet speeds)

- Can and will stimulate faster HDD/SDD technology research

Brownesque

[QUOTE="legol1"][QUOTE="Brownesque"] So you're admitting the virtues of free software.Brownesque

[quote="Burning-sludge"]So you want the publisher to be able to turn off the game you purchased unless you can break into the source code?

Brownesque

That can be done, but then you will complain about hardware prices being too high because they will go through the Stratosphere.

That's crazy though. Does the ability to re-sell you're games for a couple of bucks really outweigh the tons of advantages DD has?stepat201

Still not good enough of a reason to give up on what I said. You do realize that we have 10 years left to completely stop polluting, right?Hanass

You shouldn't be able to sell anything. You shouldn't be able to sell physical game discs. It should be against the law to sell them to retailers. Why? Because it's a lease. You don't own that property. Under existing IP law you have no claim to any of the contents on your disc. You have no reasonable expectation of resale. Resale of your lease is akin to selling something on the black market. You don't own it. It's stolen goods. Give it back to the proprietor for redistribution if you don't like it.

...

You have as many restrictions on hard media as on DD, and you should have more

Brownesque

Regardless of the legal jargon and technicalities thrown around by various people in forums -- of which I've never known anyone to have the complete answer, I think it's something that would ultimately be decided in the courts on a case-by-case basis, however, the very fact that you can resell games without any legal intervention currently at the very least shows it is an allowable practice -- the consumer market should dictate what's acceptable and what isn't acceptable, not the other way around.

If the average consumer feels spending money on the purchase of media is contingent on them feeling "in control" and having "ownership" of the product (not the ip obviously) and ultimately being able to resell their "property", then so be it, let those purchasing decisions dictate the market.

[QUOTE="Brownesque"][QUOTE="legol1"] i can resale everything i own my car my tv setup my console why not game . piracy is bad but every used game have been bought brand new once . legol1

[QUOTE="Brownesque"]

[quote="Burning-sludge"]So you want the publisher to be able to turn off the game you purchased unless you can break into the source code?

Burning-Sludge

That can be done, but then you will complain about hardware prices being too high because they will go through the Stratosphere.

[QUOTE="Burning-Sludge"]

[QUOTE="Flame-Eternal"]I D.D. my PC games, but only because the market for reselling PC games is a tough one anyway...and because the games are $20 cheaper to start with. Console games? I'm pretty against DD. I appreciate being able to sell a game to someone else if I'm done with it and they want to play it for less than full price. The desire to take away my ability to sell something I bought has been an entertainment industry goal (not just gaming, but movies and music) for the last decade. Sorry, but I'm not in.Brownesque

That is corrrect Flame-Eternal. We should stop that from happening by every legal means we can.

What should I with the Nintendo Wii games Nintendo pressured me to give money to them to "steal" from them. Should I call the non-emergency line for a social worker can come and take me to the nut house while Nintendo's goons take back there games. FYI this system (status quo) pays for the creation if there game if is good enough, and it prevents me from loosing money to a Duke Nukem ForNever deal.

We can drive those nazi's Gamestop out of buisness or at least force them to change their evil nazi esque waysIndigoSunrise

[QUOTE="Brownesque"][QUOTE="Burning-Sludge"]

That is corrrect Flame-Eternal. We should stop that from happening by every legal means we can.

Burning-Sludge

What should I with the Nintendo Wii games Nintendo pressured me to give money to them to "steal" from them. Should I call the non-emergency line for a social worker can come and take me to the nut house while Nintendo's goons take back there games. FYI this system (status quo) pays for the creation if there game if is good enough, and it prevents me from loosing money to a Duke Nukem ForNever deal.

[QUOTE="IndigoSunrise"]We can drive those nazi's Gamestop out of buisness or at least force them to change their evil nazi esque waysdr-venkman

[QUOTE="Burning-Sludge"]

[QUOTE="Brownesque"] No. Want I want is free software. But that's what they can do. They can already do it now. It's the status quo. You don't have the legal ability to play these games freely just because you own the disc.

Brownesque

That can be done, but then you will complain about hardware prices being too high because they will go through the Stratosphere.

If the price of software falls to zero the price of hardware would go up inversely so to prevent losses until that it's to high to make maximum profit.

[QUOTE="Burning-Sludge"]

[QUOTE="Brownesque"] Why? It's not your property. You think you're entitled to something that is not even legally (and probably by your own admission) not your property? It is the sole intellectual property of the publisher. Sorry, but that's the way the piece fits into the IP law puzzle. Frankly, I think neither you nor the publisher should have property rights, because I think property rights are a construction of distributors to scalp people. This software is FREE. It costs nothing to reproduce. It only costs something to create. The process of creation costs something, and THAT's where we should be paying them, either as a contingency to the work or as reciprocity for work completed.Brownesque

What should I with the Nintendo Wii games Nintendo pressured me to give money to them to "steal" from them. Should I call the non-emergency line for a social worker can come and take me to the nut house while Nintendo's goons take back there games. FYI this system (status quo) pays for the creation if there game if is good enough, and it prevents me from loosing money to a Duke Nukem ForNever deal.

Don't you want the gamers to be the investors while the game is in developement and have them be rewarded after the game is done?

[QUOTE="Brownesque"][QUOTE="Burning-Sludge"]

That can be done, but then you will complain about hardware prices being too high because they will go through the Stratosphere.

Burning-Sludge

If the price of software falls to zero the price of hardware would go up inversely so to prevent losses until that it's to high to make maximum profit.

[QUOTE="Brownesque"][QUOTE="Burning-Sludge"]

What should I with the Nintendo Wii games Nintendo pressured me to give money to them to "steal" from them. Should I call the non-emergency line for a social worker can come and take me to the nut house while Nintendo's goons take back there games. FYI this system (status quo) pays for the creation if there game if is good enough, and it prevents me from loosing money to a Duke Nukem ForNever deal.

Burning-Sludge

Don't you want the gamers to be the investors while the game is in developement and have them be rewarded after the game is done?

Regardless of the legal jargon and technicalities thrown around by various people in forums -- of which I've never known anyone to have the complete answer, I think it's something that would ultimately be decided in the courts on a case-by-case basis, however, the very fact that you can resell games without any legal intervention currently at the very least shows it is an allowable practice -- the consumer market should dictate what's acceptable and what isn't acceptable, not the other way around.

If the average consumer feels spending money on the purchase of media is contingent on them feeling "in control" and having "ownership" of the product (not the ip obviously) and ultimately being able to resell their "property", then so be it, let those purchasing decisions dictate the market.

Nitrous2O