A Message On Football Manager 2012 Activation

[bieritarier]

This whole buying and selling thing is something that the consumer won't quite understand, if it is the case the you are buying a license to play the game then we need to have a clear-cut guideline that everyone understands because it's all quite confusing.

We can start out with when we go into the local gamming store and we say:

You - "Hello, I would like to buy a copy of FM"

Clerk - "Hey look, pal. You are not buying anything, you are just someone who we give the permission to if you want to play our game. Now, fork over your cash..."

That is exactly what publishers (and to some extent devlopers) try to achieve. These guys constantly just calculate fantasy numbers about Sales not achieved due to piracy or people re-selling games, counting each downloaded copy + each sold copy as a lost sale. It doe snot take into account the income structure of the target group, average spend on games peole are able to make, the amount of people that first download and then buy (a significant amount of people), download multiple releases, people that downloaded because the game was not released in their country and therefore is almost impossible to get hold of, etc. Granted it is hard to calculate or prove that. I don't support piracy. Just as much I don't support greed.

[Jonas66]

Now I might be mistaken here, but I'm struggling from the initial post to see totally how this will combat piracy? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I could install the game on my PC and then activate it via steam and then I wouldn't need to insert the disk every time. Then I could give the disc to someone else, they could install it, activate it via steam and and play it without the disc, then pass it to friend number 3 and so on.

Is that not the case?

[tigerhgrrrrrr]

This whole buying and selling thing is something that the consumer won't quite understand, if it is the case the you are buying a license to play the game then we need to have a clear-cut guideline that everyone understands because it's all quite confusing.

We can start out with when we go into the local gamming store and we say:

You - "Hello, I would like to buy a copy of FM"

Clerk - "Hey look, pal. You are not buying anything, you are just someone who we give the permission to if you want to play our game. Now, fork over your cash..."

Correct me if im wrong but official adverts for FM games say RRP £xyz. It doesnt say RRP (for a license to play the game only - non transferrable) £XYZ.If Sega are to get so cut up about this whole issue may be they should be more clear in future......

[Rhazmuz]

@pele10

I run STEAM and I run several of the programs on that list as well.

I suggest you try and download STEAM, make an account and see if it doesnt work on your PC

[Super Bladesman]

Kriss is Morgan Freeman, no?

[bieritarier]

In no way was I suggesting £10 is not a significant sum, though to some it may be. The point was £10 retail means second hand sell on would be what £3-£4 only? For what it is worth I wish I did have £25k free for a new car, though I need a new kitchen more. If I did buy a car though I would not be the only licensed driver, my partner would be able to drive it too - if that is acceptable to the manufacturers!

Maybe what we the Customers and the retailers seem to battle with is this new rules for a relatively new industry situation. Am not saying SI/Sega are not entitled to do what they can to protect business but such measures dont work if applied to cars, clothing etc so for us to make such associations probably doesnt really help our own understanding.

Well, new industry? Around for more than 20 years now. The internet has made it difficult for many people, some reacted better than others.

I'm going back to the very original point. steamworks does not prevent priacy in any way. Piracy it the problem. steamworks does prevent second hand sales, which is not a huge problem (that is what I said and you supported that view) but the only thing publishers currently can quite effectively prevent, and do prevent since they're using numbers from another reality which make them believe it is a huge problem.

[x42bn6]

In no way was I suggesting £10 is not a significant sum, though to some it may be. The point was £10 retail means second hand sell on would be what £3-£4 only? For what it is worth I wish I did have £25k free for a new car, though I need a new kitchen more. If I did buy a car though I would not be the only licensed driver, my partner would be able to drive it too - if that is acceptable to the manufacturers!

Maybe what we the Customers and the retailers seem to battle with is this new rules for a relatively new industry situation. Am not saying SI/Sega are not entitled to do what they can to protect business but such measures dont work if applied to cars, clothing etc so for us to make such associations probably doesnt really help our own understanding.

It doesn't work because software is so cheap and easy to replicate, whereas cars aren't. A car is also an asset that can grow and fall in value and gives you huge competitive and economic advantage by having easier mobility.

Software licensing is an evil the industry now adopts and loves, and customers are largely unaware of how harmful it is.

[Kriss]

The reason I can't buy FM12 is, I buy the game boxed in the shop SI tell me I've got to download steam, then steam says it wont run with the programs I have installed on my computer (hence the list of programs you need to uninstall or stop before using steam)

You need to be properly accurate, if you have problems running Steam and have any of those applications, they MAY be the cause, not they WILL cause Steam to malfunction.

I have four on that list and Steam runs just fine for me.

[bieritarier]

Now I might be mistaken here, but I'm struggling from the initial post to see totally how this will combat piracy? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I could install the game on my PC and then activate it via steam and then I wouldn't need to insert the disk every time. Then I could give the disc to someone else, they could install it, activate it via steam and and play it without the disc, then pass it to friend number 3 and so on.

Is that not the case?

the activation code will be mapped to your account and cannot be used on another account subsequently. you are neither allowed to share or sell your account.

[LaTTsSpURs]

Although I agree with your reasoning, in terms of brothers having to buy 2 copies of the game who live in the same house. The fact that you are effectively justifying piracy, which not only costs SI and other game makers but also the consumer (YOU!) is just baffling. If piracy didn't exist SI wouldn't have to spend time, money and resources having to combat it and that cost is reflected in the game price. Simple. It's also the reason why everyone has to use Steam.

Surely that means every multi player game is pro piracy?, also if nomore than the one person who bought the game can play it why can you add manager to create one or more managers of a team? seems exactly the same to me unless the original owner had to be there as well, which as they live in the same house makes that null? Just for clarity i am in no way advocating piracy, just seems we wandered into a grey area

[milnerpoint]

I use AVG and never stopped it to install steam or FM, its seems to have worked fine.

[Smurf]

Piracy is not theft! It's piracy.

Software piracy is the illegal distribution and/or reproduction of software applications for business or personal use. Whether software piracy is deliberate or not, it is still illegal and punishable by law.

[Smurf]

I use AVG and never stopped it to install steam or FM, its seems to have worked fine.

Ditto.^^^^^

[milnerpoint]

Surely that means every multi player game is pro piracy?, also if nomore than the one person who bought the game can play it why can you add manager to create one or more managers of a team? seems exactly the same to me unless the original owner had to be there as well, which as they live in the same house makes that null? Just for clarity i am in no way advocating piracy, just seems we wandered into a grey area

The license is to run one copy of the game on one computer at one time, the number of people using said copy at that time is irrelevant.

[LaTTsSpURs]

ok im a relative newbie so thanks for clearing that up

[tigerhgrrrrrr]

You need to be properly accurate, if you have problems running Steam and have any of those applications, they MAY be the cause, not they WILL cause Steam to malfunction.

I have four on that list and Steam runs just fine for me.

Not aimed at Kriss particularly but can anyone enlighten me about VirtuaGirl2 ? LOL

[Richjuk]

Software licensing is an evil the industry now adopts and loves, and customers are largely unaware of how harmful it is.

Software licensing has always been around, it is just now company's are trying to enforce it.

[robilaz]

This is totally pointless - why do you have to have the Internet to play a game. It drives me crazy when my Internet is down or I'm not at home and I want to play on FM. This is really, really STUPID!!!!

[Dune297]

This is totally pointless - why do you have to have the Internet to play a game. It drives me crazy when my Internet is down or I'm not at home and I want to play on FM. This is really, really STUPID!!!!

You don't need internet? Just start Steam in offline mode after you activate it.

[x42bn6]

Software piracy is the illegal distribution and/or reproduction of software applications for business or personal use. Whether software piracy is deliberate or not, it is still illegal and punishable by law.

Well, yes, but you cannot compare it to theft, which has an obvious emotive response. It just so happens that it is one of those offences where the damage does not scale linearly (or greater) with the number of offences, but rather has diminishing returns, unlike theft.

[Smurf]

This is totally pointless - why do you have to have the Internet to play a game. It drives me crazy when my Internet is down or I'm not at home and I want to play on FM. This is really, really STUPID!!!!

Authenticate it online once. Then switch to offline mode. You won't need internet access again.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=3160-AGCB-2555

[Smurf]

Well, yes, but you cannot compare it to theft, which has an obvious emotive response. It just so happens that it is one of those offences where the damage does not scale linearly (or greater) with the number of offences, but rather has diminishing returns, unlike theft.

It's not exactly the same as stealing or theft, but it's a form of it. When someone pirates software it damages everyone. The software developers are hit, retail shops sales go down, and anyone that legitimately purchases the software is hit (where more sales would = more funds to improve/expand the software [in theory]). The illegal distribution and duplication of any software is damaging and has an impact on the economy. Where software piracy isn't anything new (rife since the 1960's) it is a lot more accessible with the advent of the internet. And nowadays computers are taught in the classroom and it should be taught in school what EULAs are, and how pirating software is damaging the economy, developers and the loyal customer. Even moreso in todays society. It just needs to be done.

[x42bn6]

It's not exactly the same as stealing or theft, but it's a form of it.

Form? Not really - it's under a different set of laws altogether. Piracy falls under copyright infringement, which is different to the theft and fraud acts in many countries, with not a lot of overlap.

When someone pirates software it damages everyone. The software developers are hit

[snip]

Debateable. As I said before, a million pirates and a billion pirates make no difference to SI's bottom line, since anything times zero is zero. What matters is sales.

If piracy didn't exist, then sales do not automatically go up. In fact, due to a lack of word-of-mouth, it might even go down.

Lots of people pirate because the software is free, not necessarily because they would have bought it if it wasn't available to pirate. You can pirate a rubbish game but the publisher doesn't get to claim lost sales because nobody would have bought their game anyway.

The scholarly evidence for piracy out there has mixed conclusions at best. One of the main things that is clear, however, is that pirates buy more - weaken the economy? It's not very clear-cut at all.

[Smurf]

Regardless, someone is getting something for free instead of paying for it. Whether the game is rubbish or not. Someone else is enjoying that for nothing, where the person who created it is getting nothing.

[x42bn6]

Regardless, someone is getting something for free instead of paying for it. Whether the game is rubbish or not. Someone else is enjoying that for nothing, where the person who created it is getting nothing.

Yes, and I'm saying that if they didn't have the option of piracy, a lot of users are still not going to purchase your software, so the person who created it still gets nothing.

For those that will, the additional sales must balance out the lack of word-of-mouth of the software (piracy spreads the popularity of the software, as does legitimate sales), as well as the fact that some pirates actually pirate then purchase which isn't going to happen any more.

The word-of-mouth is a big factor. Piracy is part of the reason why the likes of Adobe Photoshop are so popular. If Adobe had walled-off Photoshop with incredibly tough DRM and anti-piracy measures, it would never be as popular as it is today. The word-of-mouth effect cannot be underestimated.

[pigfacemonkeyman]

It's not exactly the same as stealing or theft, but it's a form of it. When someone pirates software it damages everyone. The software developers are hit, retail shops sales go down, and anyone that legitimately purchases the software is hit (where more sales would = more funds to improve/expand the software [in theory]). The illegal distribution and duplication of any software is damaging and has an impact on the economy. Where software piracy isn't anything new (rife since the 1960's) it is a lot more accessible with the advent of the internet. And nowadays computers are taught in the classroom and it should be taught in school what EULAs are, and how pirating software is damaging the economy, developers and the loyal customer. Even moreso in todays society. It just needs to be done.

This is a joke right!

[Smurf]

That's implying that word of mouth is only spread by people who pirate the game.

I wish Adobe had walled off Photoshop and it's other software. The amount of useless twats using Photoshop as a page layout program is astonishing. Nevermind they don't understand basic terms such as bleed, colour management, colour profiles, typography, imposition, scale, basic design principles, and a couple of dozen other things.

Although, personally I do know people who are leading contributors to the Adobe community who admit they first pirated the software, then bought it later. But it's hardly comparable to football manager. With a Creative Suite for adobe costing in the €1000's compared to €30 for Football Manager. Yeh there are people that will Pirate then buy later. But most won't. Most will go out of their way to not pay for the game they enjoy. And if they do enjoy it and piracy is made more difficult for them, they are likely to buy it than not.

If you can get Football Manger into a TV show, like Photoshop was introduced to CSI and the likes. The magic CSI Photoshop can zoom into a reflection of a screw to see someones face wearing sunglasses and then zoom in further to see the reflection of the sunglasses to the person who murdered him.

Photoshop partially popular due to Piracy, which really spiralled out of control with Hollywood versions of the software.

Piracy existed before the internet for all software. The internet just accelerates it. And I applaud any measure to slow it down.

[pigfacemonkeyman]

Q. Can I play more than 1 copy of Football Manager 2012 at a time?

A. As mentioned, you can have the game installed on more than one machine at a time, but you can only play on a single machine. If you were playing on your desktop and then moved to your laptop, you would need to log-in to Steam on your laptop, which would then sign you out of your desktop.

Can someone please tell me what mechanism prevents the same copy being played on more than one computer at the same time when using offline mode?!

I am asking because it is not covered in the answer above, and as this activation method is purely about preventing piracy, I would like to know that this aspect of it actually works.

Cheers

xxx

[Scab]

There is none. You can have one copy in offline mode and one in online mode playing at the same time, but this is in violation with the terms of use. You can't have countless offline installs as the game at some point needs to be activated and thus permanently tied to a specific Steam account, and sharing this account is once again against terms of use (and will usually result in account termination).

[smanager]

I think piracy can't be stopped. This anti-piracy feature was not on FM09?

[bieritarier]

That's implying that word of mouth is only spread by people who pirate the game.

Piracy existed before the internet for all software. The internet just accelerates it. And I applaud any measure to slow it down.

UBI Launcher, EA Origin, Securom and the like.

I think we all understood your position, and I don't think anybody has actively supported piracy.

But let'S see what the measures have brought paying customers:

- need to be permanently online (Ubi Launcher)

- requirement to disclose personal information to publishers or other companies (Ubi Launcher, Steam, EA Origin etc).

- specific DRM drivers messing up your system (Securom) or even spying on you in the background (see the Sony Music scandal).

- unskippable anti-piracy messages on Blu Ray and DVD.

- compatibility issues with other (legal) software (Nero image drive and Securom), and therefore a shedload of work to get a game or whatever else running.

- compatibility issues with older hardware (DVD players, DVD drives, CD players, mp3 players)

- limited rights to copy the data (games, music, video) to other devices even for your personal use.

etc.

The only thing pirates have to do (sometimes) is spend some time setting the stuff up. After that, you don't have to suffer from all the invasive DRM.

I stopped buying CDs using DRM measures 5 or 6 years ago since my car headunit had serious issues playing them. And I am not legally allowed to rip the music and copy it across to another medium (CD, USB stick). Luckily I mostly listen to indie bands and most indie labels stopped this crap.

I will not buy from any online music store that uses DRM either. The danger of not being able to play it on either my portable mp3 player of in my car is too high - let alone the other restrictions.

I made my peace with Steam - as long as I can activate a boxed copy of the game. I rarely buy online since STEAM in Germany is a ripoff company. I will not pay twice as much as people in the US or the UK just because STEAM only offers euro prices for Germany.

Equally, I will not buy games of which I cannot activate the much cheaper UK version in Germany - this btw is another example that shows that it's about maximizing profits.

That's just me and quite a lot of my friends. Now would I buy more stuff if these DRM measure were not in place? Probably not since I have bills to pay. Would the companies currently using heavy DRM be making more money from me if they removed the invasive stuff? - most likely since their product are not worse than the stuff I buy. I just don't like the package that comes with it.

So you check the number of customers you lose because they'Re fed up with all the DRM crap. Then that a priate doesn't have to worry about all that crap. What, apart from legal action is the motivation for a pirate to shell out money for something that means a lot more trouble than downloading for free?

[x42bn6]

That's implying that word of mouth is only spread by people who pirate the game.

I'm not - you can spread word-of-mouth with legal copies too. But there are way more pirate copies out there than legal copies, so it makes sense to think that piracy is more effective at spreading word-of-mouth than legal copies.

I wish Adobe had walled off Photoshop and it's other software. The amount of useless twats using Photoshop as a page layout program is astonishing. Nevermind they don't understand basic terms such as bleed, colour management, colour profiles, typography, imposition, scale, basic design principles, and a couple of dozen other things.

Does it matter, though? There will always be terrible graphics designers out there. Adobe makes a killing out of training people to use their software anyway.

Although, personally I do know people who are leading contributors to the Adobe community who admit they first pirated the software, then bought it later. But it's hardly comparable to football manager. With a Creative Suite for adobe costing in the €1000's compared to €30 for Football Manager.

Football Manager's audience is much larger than Photoshop's. In addition, SI release versions of Football Manager more often than Adobe release Photoshop.

It is comparable, even if on different scales. People fall in love with the software, and will become loyal customers in the end. Why do you think some people don't pirate?

Yeh there are people that will Pirate then buy later. But most won't.

Does it matter if most won't? Like I said, the piracy numbers are really meaningless in the sense that those who don't buy (later) still make no difference to SI's bottom line.

What matters in this case are those who pirate and buy later. Those who pirate and don't buy are potential customers who are still not tempted to jump over, but the number is an largely insignificant number like the average number of hairs on customers' heads.

And if they do enjoy it and piracy is made more difficult for them, they are likely to buy it than not.

No - they could simply not buy it at all, and ignore about the series altogether. It's debatable which is more likely, but if they can't be bothered to buy software, they might just play something else.

Piracy existed before the internet for all software. The internet just accelerates it. And I applaud any measure to slow it down.

Piracy is so lethal to the industry that the software industry is larger than ever and has grown in tandem with the hardware market.

Reducing piracy is meaningless - like I said, a million pirates is no different to a billion pirates. What you really want to do is kill piracy through conversion to legal, not killing avenues for piracy. If your sales go up, your piracy rate might go up - it doesn't matter - what matters is that you boost your sales. Killing avenues for piracy does not necessarily increase sales.

Steam might reduce piracy (I doubt this, but I'll humour you), but unless it brings more sales to the table, you are spending money for nothing.

[pigfacemonkeyman]

There is none. You can have one copy in offline mode and one in online mode playing at the same time, but this is in violation with the terms of use.

Thanks, so is piracy and this is supposed to prevent it. If what you say is true, then isn't it making it easier for people to exercise one of the exclusive rights of the copyright holder without authorization, rather than harder?

[Scab]

- requirement to disclose personal information to publishers or other companies (Ubi Launcher, Steam, EA Origin etc)

Well... only if you consider an email address "personal information", which I suppose one might, but even then it's hardly sensitive information. You don't actually have to provide anything personally identifiable to use at least Steam.

Not in disagreement over the other points though.

[Kriss]

Thanks, so is piracy and this is supposed to prevent it. If what you say is true, then isn't it making it easier for people to exercise one of the exclusive rights of the copyright holder without authorization, rather than harder?

You should be looking for your answers on the Steam website/forums, we're not going to allow discussion here on ways to circumvent terms of use etc, even if it's just out of curiosity and even if the suggestions aren't viable, so please desist, ta muchly.

[x42bn6]

Well... only if you consider an email address "personal information", which I suppose one might, but even then it's hardly sensitive information. You don't actually have to provide anything personally identifiable to use at least Steam.

You can correlate that email address to other things, though - find the email or username somewhere, correlate to forum posts, correlate to Facebook profile...

If you are setting up a dummy emaiil address solely for this purpose, you need to maintain multiple email addresses (more risky) in case you lose access to your Steam account for any reason.

[smanager]

Why the game on Steam costs 49,99€ and on Sega the price is $39.95 ? It's gonna be another Steam ripoff? I hate that stupid network.

[Scab]

Thanks, so is piracy and this is supposed to prevent it. If what you say is true, then isn't it making it easier for people to exercise one of the exclusive rights of the copyright holder without authorization, rather than harder?

It's fairly easy for two people to share one copy against the terms, but this was the case before Steam as well. Steam probably makes it a bit more annoying if anything, considering the offline install needs to go online at some point for patching.

[Dune297]

You can correlate that email address to other things, though - find the email or username somewhere, correlate to forum posts, correlate to Facebook profile...

If you are setting up a dummy emaiil address solely for this purpose, you need to maintain multiple email addresses (more risky) in case you lose access to your Steam account for any reason.

And why would they try to find those?

[Dune297]

Why the game on Steam costs 49,99€ and on Sega the price is $39.95 ? It's gonna be another Steam ripoff? I hate that stupid network.

It's $39.99 here in USA on Steam. It's mainly the publishers who set the prices anyway, not Valve.

[milnerpoint]

Why the game on Steam costs 49,99€ and on Sega the price is $39.95 ? It's gonna be another Steam ripoff? I hate that stupid network.

Dont buy it from steam if you dont like their pricing, you can buy it anywhere else available and just activate it through steam.

[Smurf]

Doesn't matter what I say, or you say. There's always a counter argument. I could go through your post and counter it. But you already know what the counter arguments to your post are, as I did when I made my post.

Push and pull and we end up where we started.

[x42bn6]

And why would they try to find those?

Good question... A lot of identity fraud victims don't know they are victims.

Privacy is about reducing your visible (online) footprint, for safety reasons and to avoid fraud. The reason some people are victims of identity fraud is because they didn't keep their details secure enough - not for any external, deeper, mysterious reason.

[smanager]

@Dune297, @milnerpoint: Thanks for your answers!

[x42bn6]

Doesn't matter what I say, or you say. There's always a counter argument. I could go through your post and counter it. But you already know what the counter arguments to your post are

I don't. Please enlighten me.

[Dune297]

Good question... A lot of identity fraud victims don't know they are victims.

Privacy is about reducing your visible (online) footprint, for safety reasons and to avoid fraud. The reason some people are victims of identity fraud is because they didn't keep their details secure enough - not for any external, deeper, mysterious reason.

And what would Steam have to do with this?

[Smurf]

requirement to disclose personal information to publishers or other companies (Ubi Launcher, Steam, EA Origin etc).

The only thing you have to disclose is an email address. And if you setup an alter ego email address you don't even have to manage that account anymore. You can simply set your alter ego address to automatically forward messages to your current email address.

Any time you get an email from Steam about your account it gets forward from Fake Email to Real Email.

But I'm not that paranoid to start doing that.

[x42bn6]

And what would Steam have to do with this?

If you had read a few posts above, you would realise that this was in response to Steam storing an email address, and discussions around personal information.

[Dune297]

If you had read a few posts above, you would realise that this was in response to Steam storing an email address, and discussions around personal information.

And how do you expect anyone to get to this information?

[Scab]

You can correlate that email address to other things, though - find the email or username somewhere, correlate to forum posts, correlate to Facebook profile...

If you are setting up a dummy emaiil address solely for this purpose, you need to maintain multiple email addresses (more risky) in case you lose access to your Steam account for any reason.

Very true. I only object to referring to a service asking for your email as one asking for your "personal information", which suggests full name, home address, etc. I think it's a bit misleading.