Minecraft: Piracy OK
 

I thought about putting this in the Minecraft thread, but maybe this deserves a discussion all of its own, considering the forum this is (supposedly a FOF forum). Notch tells Minecraft Fan: "Just Pirate It" - Minecraft Forum

For the record, I have bought Minecraft and enjoy it immensely. I can see both sides of the coin, but I really think that Notch is wrong here. For the developer of a game (even though he's made supposedly millions) to tell a prospective buyer to pirate his game is ludicrous and frankly an insult to the people who have bought the game. There is no way I would pirate a game...ummm...even if I knew how, especially considering the "independent" developer aspect. I have sent quite a few people links to the FOF demo but I would never consider giving them my TCY or FOF code. It's the same with Minecraft.

The people that are going to pirate minecraft are going to pirate minecraft. What he's doing asking that they pay at some point if they enjoyed the game. I seriously doubt you're going to see a rush of people that would have normally bought the game run out and pirate it simply because Notch said it's ok. He's using piracy as a marketing tool. If 1 person that wouldn't have bought the game no matter what enjoys it and it leads to a couple people that wouldn't have otherwise bought the game trying it out and buying it then it's a win for Mojang.

I personally don't know anyone that advocates piracy and think it's ok, but the approach some have toward it is as much of the problem as anything else. We're seeing companies that understand piracy and how to use it to their advantage are having success right now while other developers (Ubisoft) are giving up and just blaming piracy for their failures.

Piracy is forcing companies to evolve. Those that are willing will be successful those that are crying over piracy and how wrong it is are being left behind while blaming their inability to adapt on something outside of their control.

Why are the fonts so big on that forum?

Haven't you seen the graphics in Minecraft, they are trying to stay with the theme of the game and the time period it looks like it was created... ;)

(actually I don't see big fonts).

I think it's less that piracy is ok, and more that combating piracy shouldn't be the biggest concern of developers. Some people are going to pirate, publishers are better off giving people a reason not to rather than trying to come up with ways to stop them.

I hope that piracy doesn't increase - but psychologically giving permission to do something can cause people to remove the restrictions which prevent them from doing it normally.

(there was an interesting psychological experiment a decade or so ago with a school where a small proportion of parents were late picking up their kids consistently, the school introduced a fine system to punish people who left their kids late .... rather than dissuade people the fine actually was percieved as 'giving permission' for leaving the kids late and removing the guilt associated with it - they found the amount of kids being left late went up hugely)

But he makes a good point - take the game now, but if you like it and have the funds later, then be a good citizen and buy it.

That's basically been my MO forever. I'll grab a torrent of a CD or a game to see if I like it, and if I do I'll buy it. If I don't, I delete it and move on. Stores - online and otherwise - make it impossible to return software or music once it's been opened (and for good reason I suppose), but it makes it impossible to try before yo buy.

I'm with Toddzilla on this. Yes there's demos, but, a lot of demos aren't the full version of the software. I'll only download demos that are the full version, but, I'm totally ok with it being a timed or session restricted demo.

Agreed - I do the same for the most part.

Isn't Notch a member of the Pirate party in Sweden?