🚀 go-pugleaf

"Xocyll" <Xoc...@kingston.net> wrote in message 
news:k7qdv29nuhme9s4aai2sksa48cndigfn1h@4ax.com...
| Steve Andrewartha <s_andr...@hotmail.com> looked up from reading the
| entrails of the porn spammer to utter  "The Augury is good, the signs
| say:
|
| >pc games wrote:
| >
| >> Its clear the only pirate among the 3 is Jim, but at the end who did
| >> reduce sales for PC Games? All 3
| >
| >Nope. You cannot assume that, if a theft/loan of a game is impossible,
| >then the would-be thief/lender would go out and buy the game. Most
| >piracy is undertaken be people who only make the acquisition BECAUSE its
| >free.
|
| I used to know a guy that ran a pirate BBS.
| He, and various others like him have vast collections of pirated games
| and applications which they don't use.
|
| They collect them, like stamps;  and like a stamp collectors stamps,
| they aren't actually used.
|
| >The actual impact of piracy on the games market is unknown, but is
| >certainly much less than you imply if you say that every theft is a lost
| >sale. I do not condone piracy, BTW.
|
| I actually downloaded one of those piracy reports by the SPA (Software
| Publishers Association) some years back.
|
| They came up with their "lost revenue" figures by estimating the number
| of computers in the country, estimating how many of those computers were
| capable of running the software, then estimating what percentage of
| those computers would use the application, then subtracting actual units
| sold from that number.
|
| A guess based on a guess based on a guess, then presented as though it
| was a concrete FACT.
|
| Xocyll

I did a little digging, and found what is considered a legitimate and 
respected piracy study...
http://www.bsa.org/globalstudy/

The actual study report (in PDF) is here:
http://www.bsa.org/globalstudy/upload/2005%20Piracy%20Study%20-%20Official%20Version.pdf

I paid close attention to how they calculate piracy rates (it's explained 
towards the end of the document), and you are right...  It appears to be 
pretty much all guesswork and assumptions based on previous surveys, 
astrology charts, and which knuckle hurts the most when they whack their 
hands with a ruler.

I mean, seriously...  If they had definitive proof to substantiate each 
instance of piracy, they'd be hauling people to jail, not writing a report 
on how bad it is.

CoinSpin