EZ-Flash USA Forum

Precisely my point.

Not really talking about anything advertised nearly as specific as xxhp (in most cases, with games all you get are a couple screenshots on the back of the box and some messed up story line which gives only a really blurry idea of what the game is about, while the real money is going into TV and magazine adverts to cause the feeding frenzy of "mom mom! I want that") - more along the lines of known "brand x" releasing something far below their capabilities and far far below repeat customers' expectations, hyping it in advertising (and marketers are good at dodging quality when it comes to adverts for products they are paid to sell not like) knowing full well their brand name will carry a certain number of sales before (and sometimes after) word gets around. ie: marketing something as entertainment, then providing none...

Did i ever say it's not breaking the law (NO) BTW this is not planet America it's planet earth (more then one law)
i'm in the U.K so the DMCA dose not mean a lot to me BTW quoting the DMCA and NOT reading it IS breaking the law under the DMCA (read it and you will see)
the U.K. is under the ECD (European Copyright Directive) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EU_Copyright_Directive

Under this law i CAN download a rom if i plan on buying it at a Future date (Time shifting/scaling)


i'm going on about per unit the component side of a card not the data side (a mario game will allways cost more to make then a no-name)

what if you play, end up hating it and decide not to buy it anymore?

Good God what a lopsided comparison. Should I even bother explaining what's wrong with that?



...

Ah hell, why not. When someone downloads a rom, what is physically lost? You cannot make an apples to apples comparison of physical property versus virtual property. In your comparison -- it doesn't matter if it's the vehicle producer, the dealer, or the purchaser -- someone at some point in that chain has lost something physically tangible. In the case of a video game, or other software, that is taken from its physical media and duplicated, nothing except for potential (as you noted) is lost.

The weight this potential actually holds is far less than that of a regular consumer. What you are dealing with is the chance of selling to someone who is inclined to pirate. Of course I'm not going to get into details about this cause I have nothing to cite to back this up, except the people I know which is hardly a broad survey. Please however, don't think you can get away with saying they "lost the $40 they might gotten from you". It's bullshit, and the figures companies quote are entirely misleading. They need giant disclaimers that say "Had everyone who pirated our software actually purchased it instead, we were set to gain $X. However, the actual chance of that happening is limited to Y% of total copies (Some Study, 2007), resulting in a more likely $X*0.Y profit."

your right you cant measure the consumer intent and its not physical property that is lost on copy
however if you consider someone that buys a NDS (cant make a pirated copy of your friends DS right eheh ermm)
there are those that buy the DS and buy a flash cart or 20
and never pay for a single game
you can begin to say yes the companies are losing money
and yes these people would otherwise buy games
it becomes true
so they dont lose money based on every game released thats ridiculous anyone can see that
but when you REALLY WANT f-zeroDS and you download it for your flash cart and play it love it complete it and do it all over again
yes your a theif and yes the company lost a potential profit

after you play the rom for a bit and decide you hate it and will not buy it from that time on the 1st time you can
delete the rom you have to delete it right away.

I have over 600 PS1 games when i 1st had 600 games (about 580 are backups and now i have about 530 backups) replaced by the real games.

i have put in the bin over a 100 ps1 games as i know i will never buy them next i will sort out my D.C games
then after that my PS2.

then one day when it's close to the end if it's life i will sort out my DS roms...

So what you are saying is that you grab copies of all the games, then after 10 years or something... you go find them all 2nd hand or in a bargain bin for like $1 each.

I've actually always thought that a good way around the RIAA (in the US at least) would be to pay people like $0.25 for ridiculously scratched up CDs. We've all seen them, those CDs that your friend left in the foot area of his car for like 3 years and the data side of the CD is so bad it makes you cry a little inside?

Just collect lots and lots of those CDs and you are safe! Or not, who knows :p

Slothette64: funny thing is, if it wasn't for flashcarts and the ability to do more with a DS than you can straight out of the store/store bought games... I would never have gotten a phat, lite, and the current little collection of 6 DS carts I never play (4 were grabbed strictly because of the save chip hardware, the other two lost their appeal quickly - polarium being an example).

So shoot me, they have only gained in sales with my instance, as I knew even before I got a DS the games would be generally targeted at someone much younger than me that would typically nag their mom to buy it

At any rate, staying on topic... maybe
downloading 1's and 0's is not morally wrong (unless you count the desecration of mother earth to bring electricity and material for gadgets morally wrong, but that is another discussion entirely). It is only what you do with those 1's and 0's after downloading that can really be questioned as ethical or moral.

$X * 0.Y profit is still lost profit.
And...it does not matter whether there is sometihng physically involved. Property is property whether electronic or physical. A DS ROM is tangible since you can interact with it through seeing it and it involved ___hours for the dev to make it. To them it is tangible. They intend for it to be tangible - thats why they don't release the ROM and place it on a card! We're arguing semantics here - in the eyes of the law a ferrari is a ROM - if both are stolen they are stolen. It does not matter whther the actual loss is .01$ . Lost money is lost money and the owners have the right to reclaim it.

Ethically paying for crap is horrible, but there's no law against stupidity.

BS. a DS ROM is as tangible as this forum is. (no more no less it's the same)

so your saying for a rom downloaded it is Lost money lets work that out.
the normal cost for one DS game is £24.99 i've got over 1000 roms that's £2499.00 i have not cost the dev's
that much as i ant GOT that much in the 1st place (and if i did it will not be spent on games)

when you buy a game you think it's tangible will your NOT BUYING the game your buying the right to PLAY
the game (a right is the legal entitlement to do or refrain from doing something or to obtain or refrain from obtaining an action) you are calling this tangible

I have to ask... this is only partially ont topic, but what is your guy's take on buying a console ($400CAD xbox 360 for example), and essentially finding out *only* after you read the manual that you don't own the bloody thing but wrather only a license to use it? Theft is theft... regardless of how many lawyers say they can defend a big companies actions in a court of law.

Would anyone happen to have a blackcats invite they could send me PM or email. I'm an active supporter of ezflash, dabble in ngc/xeno and ps2/crystal. If I am sponsored I promise to earn my keep with my SL ratio.
Thanks in advance.
Btw I guess its clear to see where I stand with this topic.

Tangible : capable of being precisely identified or realized by the mind (http://m-w.com/dictionary/tangible)

The company lost any sales you might have given them. Don't try to whitewash theft. My real problem with piracy is that pirates try to invent rationalizations for it. Thefit is theft no matter what you call it. Even if the game devs do not /physically/ lose something, they lose an opportunity to earn money. If you want to pirate ROMs, go ahead, but don't think that your actions don;t have consequences and that your actions are isolated.

Actually, when I buy a game i am physically allowed to do whatever i want with the thing. I can dump its contents ( as long as i don;t break encryption (DMCA)) but the company is allowed to set whaever terms it wants when you do sometihng with something you don't own. Case in point: Xbox Live: you can mod your xbox however the hell you want but MS is allowed to abn you from XBL since you essentially make a deal with them when you pay for it: "I won't mod/cheat/hax my acct and you'll let me play on XBL." Since MS controls pretty much verything they also include a "we reserve the right to ban you for any reason" clause. You can do whatever you want with the game. (Aside from copyright infringement, theft etc.) but since you own the DS and the physical cart noone will stop form mating them together and playing.

Edit: you're european so DMCA doesn;t apply , but WIPO does and be sure to try to stop any copyright treaties the EU might try to pass

If they don;t make that clear upfron you may have a good case for misleading you, if they do (small print counts ) caveat emptor




personally I think its BS but MS's lawyears are a crafty bunch

if nintendo didn't want there software pirated they shouldn't make it so easy to do so. for example the wii was the first system to be hacked into and from what i've heared it was quite easy.