How Do You Promote A Bad DRM Scheme? With A Bad Movie Of Course

from the bad-gets-worse dept

Recently, we were talking about the horrible customer reviews that Warner's Ultraviolet DRM was getting. These customers were having such a hard time trying to justify the headache that came from complying with the requirements to watch their legally purchased movies. Warner seems to be trying to make the service worthwhile and is now bundling free digital movies with video games. If you buy Batman: Arkham City, you will also get a digital Batman movie for free. Which movie will you get? Batman Forever of course. Wait. What? If the goal of these promotions is to get people to start using the service, wouldn't you think they would try giving away a movie people would actually want to watch? As opposed to the worst Batman flick ever?

I guess the people running Warner just don't realize that customers want quality content. Sadly, when you are offering crap to customers there really isn't much you can do to polish it up. Maybe the next deal will actually be worth it. Most likely not though.

Filed Under: batman, batman forever, drm, reviews, ultraviolet, video games
Companies: warner bros.

Despite Publisher Apprehension, Good Old Games Proves A Market For Old DRM-Free Games Exists

from the build-it-and-they-will-come dept

In preparation for the London Game Conference, Edge Magazine spoke with Guillaume Rambourg about the path Good Old Games has taken on DRM and what other game companies can learn from it. While Rambourg was light on the details of just what he will be speaking on at the conference, he remains confident that other publishers can learn from GOG's experiment with The Witcher 2.

I will be sharing the sales numbers on GOG compared to the competition. I think the numbers will speak for themselves, what DRM-free sales of even a triple-A title can achieve. Our values are universal and they don't only apply to older content. They apply to triple-A, day-one releases.

I certainly look forward to learning more about what this experience has to show other developers but I am glad he still leaves plenty to glean from this interview. He continues by explaining that publishers have always had the ability to do exactly what GOG is doing, but they refused to do it, citing unreasonable expenses for low returns. In the early days of GOG, they were met with animosity from publishers over the idea of releasing older games. These publishers didn't want to dedicate time and resources to preparing these games to run on modern computers. They figured it was a losing strategy.

This is something that I have observed over the years. Very few PC game companies have released older games for any price. This led to the creation of a number of abandonware and warez websites. These sites have made available a good number of unauthorized games to the public. GOG specifically took notice of this and has actually used those sites to its advantage.

When we sign content for GOG, we contact abandonware websites and make them our affiliates. So they remove the illegal content, and instead they put a GOG banner and they direct sales and traffic to us. Step by step, we are cleaning up the market and we are making the back catalogue segment a visible, and viable, market for the industry.

This is a winning strategy. I have been to a number of these sites in the past and have observed that most of the well respected sites have policies in place to remove games that are available through legal channels and even link to that legal content when it is available. Not only does this build confidence in the abandonware site, it also builds a positive attitude toward the publisher that makes these games available.

The idea of releasing older games is a proposition that only recently took hold with most publishers. A lot of it had to do with GOG and Nintendo's Virtual Console. Prior to these two platforms, most of the work done in bringing older games to modern machines was done by the fan community through the use of emulators and cracks. Most of those efforts were either ignored or attacked by the industry. Now that the experiment has been proven a success in most avenues, I would hope that game publishers will see value in bringing their older games back. The gamers want it. The publishers just need to provide it. Not only will this move provide more legal content for the fans of the games, it will also bring in more revenue that did not exist before.

Filed Under: drm, good old games, pricing
Companies: good old games

Ding Dong: Another DRM Is Dead... And With It All The Files You Thought You Bought

from the how-it-works dept

Every few months, it seems, we hear of another online content store dying or changing... and with it, out goes all the content that people thought they were "legitimately" buying, because the connected DRM server goes dead. It makes you wonder why anyone buys any DRM'd content at all, knowing that in a flash, it might all go away. The latest is that the online music service Rhapsody is officially turning off the lights on its "RAX" DRM, such that anyone who has RAX files had better go through the painstaking process of "converting" all those files ASAP, or they're all gone:

Greetings! This is another reminder to convert RAX music files NOW to avoid losing any of your music. We want to make sure you can continue to enjoy all your music for as long as you please.

On November 7th, 2011 Rhapsody/RealNetworks will no longer support certain music files you purchased before July 2008. These songs will continue to play after November 7th unless you change to a new computer or substantially update your current computer. However, we strongly recommend you back up these RAX tracks to audio CD to ensure you can continue to enjoy your music.

Once you take this small step, you can continue to play these tracks on your audio CD or rip them to any format you desire and play them on your PC.

Please don't delay - after we shut off support for RAX files, you will not be able to play them if you move to a new computer or upgrade your operating system.

I like how Rhapsody pretends that backing up all these songs to CDs, then re-ripping them back to your computer, is just "a small step."

In the meantime, those who continue to insist that music is "licensed" and not "bought," can you explain what happened here? If the music was truly "licensed," why can't Rhapsody just provide non-DRM'd versions of the same music? Once again, all this really does is make you wonder why anyone "buys" any DRM'd product.

Filed Under: drm, rhapsody
Companies: realnetworks

Don't Complain About Piracy When You Create Crappy Games

from the crappy-game-meet-crappy-sales dept

This story really boggles my mind. Recently, Steven Sargent, studio exec of Appy Entertainment, took to the press to complain about the Google Android platform. The first part of the small interview was a complaint about the amount of piracy on the Android platform compared to the iPhone, 70:1 and 3:1 respectively. This isn't too surprising to most who are familiar with the Android platform as it is far easier to side load apps on it than the iPhone. However, that is not the worst part of the complaint.

Right after he complains about the amount of piracy, Sargent goes right into complaining about general development for the Android platform. "There are too many devices for a company of our size to deal with the compatibility on Android. Compatibility was a real nightmare." He then followed up with a complaint about getting textures and audio to work.

I really don't know what to tell this guy other than the following. You admit to creating a crappy game with spotty compatibility across phones and then have the gall to complain about piracy rates? Seriously? Do you not see a correlation between the two complaints? We have already seen that some amount of piracy is due to underserved customers. In this case, I don't think it's a stretch to say a lot of the piracy, or more likely the low sales numbers, is to due to the spotty performance of the game rather than the platform itself.

When you give potential consumers no reason to be confident in the performance of a game on the platform for which it is sold, they will attempt to test the game prior to making a decision to buying it. If that game ends up not working, they will not buy it. Not because they got the game for free, but because it lived up to the expectation of crappiness that you as the developer instilled upon them.

Filed Under: crappy games, drm, video games

Hollywood's Kinder, Gentler DRM: UltraViolet, Getting Slammed In Reviews

from the shocker dept

Remember UltraViolet? This was Hollywood's plan for a new, kinder, gentler DRM for movies that would try to provide some additional features. Or, rather, it would (oh so generously) grant you back just a few rights that anyone could get with an unauthorized version of a file... and you were supposed to thank them for this. As we noted at the time, what consumer problem does UltraViolet actually solve? The answer is absolutely none. It only attempts (and fails) to solve a perceived studio problem. Meaning that it was destined to piss off customers.

And that's exactly what's happening.

Jeff Malfant points us to an amusingly satirical Wired article, pretending to be from the studios' vantage point about UltraViolet:

UltraViolet will make purchasing a movie only slightly more of a pain in the ass than searching BitTorrent. Driving to a local video store and buying a copy on DVD or Blu-ray should only take about a half-hour more than downloading it, and I want to assure you that the legitimate copy will contain all the ads, auto-loading trailers and overproduced menu screens that even the pirates can’t figure out how to include.

Once you’ve bought it, all you’ll have to do is take the time to register it and give us whatever information we decide we need. We know pirates don’t have to do that, but we think you’ll find it fun. It’s sort of like Facebook, only instead of friends and family, you have a humongous powerful group of international corporations hanging on your every datum.

Once you’ve signed in, that’s when the fun begins. You see, the movies you paid for with your own money will be stored for you in your “locker.” Just like the lockers you use at school or the gym, they’ll be convenient, somewhat secure, they won’t actually belong to you and we can do anything we want with anything in them.

Let the pirates have their boring old “hard drives” and “networked media servers.” With UltraViolet, you’ve got a locker!

But even more telling, as sent in by Keith, are some of the user reviews popping up on Amazon that appear to totally slam UltraViolet as ridiculous and annoying:

This review does not relate to the movie, but it is focused on the ridiculous process to download the digital copy. After creating accounts for both Flixster and Ultraviolet, linking the accounts, enabling WB to view my personal information, the system hangs and doesn't download the movie. I contacted Ultraviolet first with the issues and error messages. After a day, I was told this is not an Ultraviolet issue, but a Flixster problem. I then contacted Flixster. They responded by sending me to the FAQ. To date, I have not gotten a proper response from Flixster on the error messages. I plan on canceling both accounts and will NEVER buy another DVD tied to Ultraviolet. This is a complete rip off and WB should be ashamed of this dreadful service. Please do yourself a favor and don't buy the movie with the digital copy. If you want a digital version, just got to iTunes.

And another:

First off I really liked the movie, if I was just rating the movie, it would probably be 3 1/2 stars, however, I have spent 4 days now trying to get this so called "digital copy". I knew what Ultraviolet was, and I thought it had promise to be used to stream to any device not locked to just one service (itunes), but it doesn't work. First off you have to sign into 4 different services to even get this stuff to maybe work, [...] some ultraviolet site and to "manage" your collection flixster collections...when in trying to link all of these useless accounts I can no longer access the movie to stream. So I am left with a product that does not work and customer service is a joke. I have been bounced around from site to site and from rep to rep who keep telling me to do the same thing over and over again, no matter how many times I tell them what has happened and what the issue is.

This flixster ultraviolet "suckloution" is the worst ever, you are better off ripping the DVD...

And another:

Warner Brothers has really pulled a fast one with this 3D edition that was supposed to include everything with this "UltraViolet" digital copy. It's NOT a digital copy, but rather an authorization to access a streaming video of the original cut of the movie online. This is NOT the package I pre-ordered! When I saw the commercials for the "UltraViolet" digital copy, I thought there would be some special feature-- I never dreamed that special feature would be WB promising me a digital copy that I couldn't use in iTunes EVEN THOUGH EVERY OTHER DIGITAL COPY OF A MOVIE DOES. The digital copy you do get (IF you can get the website to work!) has to be played on some kind of Adobe player THAT WILL NOT PLAY THE FILE. So you're stuck with their online streaming swill even though you were promised a digital copy.

And there are plenty more along those lines. When will the industry finally realize that DRM doesn't help anyone?

Filed Under: drm, reviews, ultraviolet

And Of Course: Study Shows That Getting Rid Of DRM Reduces 'Piracy'

from the no-surprise-here dept

We've been noting for years that, contrary to the popular wisdom within much of the content industry, adding DRM to a product is not good for business. DRM restricts the legitimate buyer, thus making the product less valuable. When you take away value, it shouldn't be a surprise that fewer people are willing to buy. This seems obvious to some of us, but many companies still insist that DRM somehow increases sales. A new academic study has backed us up with empirical evidence that DRM hurts sales, and removing DRM actually tends to decrease infringement, because the product is more valuable to buy. Again, nothing in this research strikes us as that surprising, but we're wondering when the content industry will finally realize this basic fact about the counterproductive nature of DRM.

Filed Under: drm, piracy, studies

Canadian Copyright Reform Authors Know The Law Outlaws Circumvention Even If No Infringement... But Don't Seem To Care

from the have-they-learned-nothing dept

We've been expecting Canadian politicians to re-introduce last year's bad copyright reform bill without any changes. Despite widespread public complaints over the bill, the supporters of the bill (who are being pressured heavily by US lobbyists and diplomats), insist that there's no real issue and that those arguing against the bill are merely radical extremists.

Of course, as Michael Geist has discovered, by obtaining last year's clause-by-clause document that explains the bill to Canadian Ministers, that those behind the bill seem to recognize that it goes way beyond copyright law in the arena of digital locks. That is, it's against the law to circumvent digital locks even for non-infringing works and the common defenses against infringement are not allowed for the digital locks/anti-circumvention rules. This is not unlike the US, but it's still quite troubling. Remember, this is from the Canadian government itself:

The Bill introduces new causes of action (such as those relating to TPMs and RMIs) that could be used in civil lawsuits regardless of whether or not there has been an infringement of copyright.

[....]

Generally, an owner of copyright in a work or other subject matter for which this prohibition has been contrevened has the same remedies as if this were an infringement of copyright (proposed s.41(2)). However, a contravention of this prohibition is not an infringement of copyright and the efences to infringement of copyright are not defences to these prohibitions.

As Geist notes, this might make the bill unconstitutional:

The constitution grants jurisdiction over copyright to the federal government, but jurisdiction over property rights is a provincial matter. Digital lock legislation that is consistent with existing copyright law - ie. one that factors in existing exceptions - is more clearly a matter of copyright. The C-32 provisions are arguably far more about property rights since the provisions may be contained in the Copyright Act, but they are focused primarily on the rights associated with personal property and expressly exclude copyright defences.

What amazes me is that this remains such a big issue. I can't believe anyone can credibly claim that it makes sense to block all circumvention of digital locks even in the cases of non-infringement. I know we have some supporters of such laws who read this site, and I'd like to see an honest explanation for why an anti-circumvention provision cannot include a clear exception for cases of non-infringement, and why standard defenses to copyright infringement can't apply to breaking digital locks?

Filed Under: canada, circumvention, copyright, digital locks, dmca, drm

The Giving Tree... In The Age Of DRM

from the well,-that-was-quick dept

It appears that xkcd has decided to do a modern update on the Shel Silverstein classic, The Giving Tree, in the age of DRM:
While this may just be a little comic joke, the larger point is worth highlighting. In the age of DRM, things that might have been considered normal "sharing" in the past are no longer allowed, despite being easier than ever in reality. That should trouble people.

Filed Under: drm, giving tree, sharing, shel silverstein, xkcd

Canada Plans To Re-Introduce Bad Copyright Plan, With Damaging Digital Locks Provisions, With No Additional Consultation

from the try-try-again dept

The US entertainment industry is nothing if not persistent in trying to pressure foreign countries into implementing ever more draconian copyright law. And in Canada, it appears that the US firms have a willing partner in the form of Heritage Minister James Moore, who has announced that, despite massive and widespread criticism of last year's (US-driven) attempt at putting in place bad changes to copyright law, the current government plans to introduce the exact same bill with no changes and no further consultation.

Mr. Moore told The Canadian Press in an interview that the Conservative government will re-introduce its copyright bill this fall, in exactly the same form as legislation that died with the last Parliament.

The measures will go back to a legislative committee for study, and Mr. Moore said groups who testified before MPs won't be asked back to comment again.

“We've taken a couple runs at it before in minority Parliaments, but we think that we have a very good formula with the old Bill C-32 and when we come forward with our legislative agenda this fall we want to pick up where we left off, which is to continue the study of the legislation,” Mr. Moore said.

I guess that's what you would think when you brush off widespread and sustained criticism as merely being from "radical extremists."

Filed Under: anti-circumvention, canada, copyright, digital locks, drm

Printing Error Shows Flaw In 'Lock-It-Up' Video Game Business Model

from the clerical-error dept

It should come as no surprise to Techdirt readers that many people within the games industry hate used game sales. One of the methods these companies are implementing to fight these sales is to force buyers of used games to pay extra to gain access to the multiplayer portion. This works by inserting a one time use code in the new copies of games. Once the multiplayer code has been used, only the owner of the console used to activate it can access the multiplayer parts of the game. If that player decides to later sell or give away the game, the new owner would have to buy a new multiplayer code from the publisher, generally $10. So far EA, THQ, Ubisoft and Activision have dabbled in this system for various games.

It should also come as no surprise that such a system has a major weakness, the printing error.

Edge Magazine is reporting Ubisoft's first foray into this new system has hit a road block. XBox 360 versions of Driver: San Fransisco were shipped to North America with a misprinted multiplayer code. Reports indicate the 360 is expecting a 25-character code, but the insert only contains a 19-character code. This results in an invalid code error when trying to redeem it. In response to this unforeseen (at least to Ubisoft) incident, Ubisoft is making the multiplayer portions of Driver free for all players worldwide, at least for 360 owners. There is no word on if this free multiplayer will be available for PS3 or PC owners.

In the end, it makes you wonder how, after 30+ years of printing registration codes inside PC games, such a system could fail so badly when translated to console games. 

Filed Under: drm, one time use codes, printing error, video games
Companies: ubisoft