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+--- Thread: This is perhaps one of the most intelligent quirky analogy ridden things I've read (/showthread.php?tid=5015)
This is perhaps one of the most intelligent quirky analogy ridden things I've read - Dark Jaguar - 29th September 2008
And it's from a CEO/game designer no less.
Quote:Daniel James has a presence which extends somewhat beyond the borders of his person, so that when you meet him it seems like you are having a Very Real Experience. As a game designer and a CEO (in that order), his company Three Rings is known for putting out incredibly quirky shit. I asked him to write a piece because I knew it would be interesting, but also because (as the purveyor of several digital worlds) he's in a unique position to discuss it. - (CW)TB
The business model of putting bits in a box and charging to experience said tasty bits is forever broken. Furthermore, to prevent the copying of bits is futile and ultimately destructive to the goal of any modern digital business, which is to conscript enthusiastic 'users', and from them, customers.
Our mission at Three Rings is to create an emotional connection with players. We want to become one of the ten places you go on the interwebs. We want to be on your Chrome start page. We want you to dream of puzzley pieces and Pirates (or Zombies). If some folks would like to give us some money, that'd be great too.
Money can't buy you love, but love can bring you money. In software the only sustainable way to earn money is by first creating love, and then hoping that some folks want to demonstrate that love with their dollars.
The cheddary 'Free to Play' is not just a cheesy marketing slogan, but a shift in assumptions; it costs approaching nothing to give away some bits, or let people play Puzzle Pirates for free. Every player, free or paid, adds value to the community and excitement for other players. Free players are the content, context and society that encourages a small fraction of the audience to willingly pay more than enough to subsidize the rest.
It's perhaps easy to stand in the server-side tower, printing coin of the realm and lording it over a bit-mountain. One of online games' many business model advantages is sidestepping DRM questions by maintaining the canonical database that is highly valued by members of the community.
'Not fair', the vendor of music or packaged software cries. Well, tough shit. Nobody added your business to the list of protected species, despite what your lobbyists and lawyers say. Find a business model that's actually appropriate to the 21st century, and perhaps scale back your expectations of vast profits accordingly (oh, and fire some lawyers and lobbyists, too, please). For example, as some musicians have done by returning to live performance as their main source of revenue.
We all know folks who collect music, movies or software, thrilled by all the notional value acquired, but rarely look at any of it. To me, it seems worthless. I assume that any bits are commonplace and easy to come by, and the value is in their use. Everything should be shareware to be tried and tested until its value is proven and the love-meter swings open the wallet. If I were to pass on some music or a piece of code I become a vector of word of mouth viral marketing, the best kind, the kind that money can't buy. To fight this inexorable trend seems as counter-productive as the cellular operators practice of not distributing game demos in order to fleece people with marketing and crappy games. Way to kill a platform, guys.
DRM takes a big poo on your best customers -- the ones who've given you money -- whilst doing nothing practical to prevent others from 'stealing' your precious content juices. Worse, it makes these renegades feel nice and righteous about sticking it to 'the man'. Stop trying to persuade people to love you more by hitting them a rusty pipe. Put down the pipe, and give up on DRM.
For my part, I was shocked when I read that Spore had been made available, with DRM completely disabled, on the piratey interseas on day frickin' ZERO, the day before the game actually came out. I'm not sure what sort of turbo hackers we're talking about, but considering how quickly PSP firmware gets hacked (a scene I'm actually a part of), I really shouldn't be surprised.
Then I'm reading further about how utterly controlling the DRM on Spore actually is (5 total installs, and a requirement to "deauthorize" a machine with a program, which only helps if all signs of authorization are still present on the machine, so if you happen to have had a catastrophic hard drive failure which requires a reinstall of all of everything, yoi're down an install of that game you "own"). I end up finding out that even when I do buy the game, I'm very likely to download some seedy hack for it anyway JUST to fully unlock it. This is the sort of thing I shouldn't have to do.
The people who steal games already know where to go to find this stuff, due to how they are stealing these games. It's now undisputable fact that they aren't being put out even a day by these methods. What possible justification do they have for sticking it to us legitimate players with this stuff any more? There ARE still DRM methods I agree with. The 'product code', as old fasioned as it is, can now be coupled with a suite of online services. As much as people whined about one-online account-per copy (now increased to a "family sized" box o' cereal), that seems perfectly reasonable to me. Let people use their software as easily as they ever did before (sans code wheels dongles and live snakes), and use that little product code as the key they need if they ever want to take their game online. Most games these days have pretty rich online modes. In the end it'll make the single player modes essentially "shareware" but that's just how it is. There's plenty of legit customers still paying you for games. Try to woo them better and expand that.
Yeah, I'd say I agree with this. Forcing the good behavior out of thieves by hitting everyone else with DRM that won't ever apply to the thieves does nothing. It's like when your parents can't figure out who specifically broke the vase so they just punish the lot of you until someone fesses up. It doesn't really do anything for them because that kid is now doubly not going to fess up.