A Message On Football Manager 2012 Activation

[Smurf]

I don't. Please enlighten me.

Perhaps someone else would care to point them out. It's several times we've gone tit for tat, at the moment I'm not in the mood to go that route. I might tomorrow.

But your arguments are flawed. Example, you keep saying that if people stop pirating it doesn't mean sales will go up. Well that's not true. They certainly won't go down as a sale was never made in the first place. So they'll either remain the same or go up. And it's more likely they'll go up as people that enjoy the game will want to play it. They could choose not to buy it, but that won't damage sales, as they were never a purchaser of the game in the first place.

[x42bn6]

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

If Steam gets hacked, or your connection gets tapped, or if your browsing history is recovered from your hard disk, or if you get keylogged...

Don't think data you send to a private server is fully secure and will never be exposed, ever.

[milnerpoint]

@Dune297, @milnerpoint: Thanks for your answers!

I actually agree with you the steam pricing is a bit off especially outside of the UK, search around you will def be able to get it cheaper either online or off the shelf and like i say its just a case of activating it through steam as usual, no need to give them any of your money if you dont want too

[pele10]

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.

i got sick of uninstalling my programs to get steam going, but finally got steam working after i uninstalled advanced window care. So after the hassle of trying to get steam to work i will not be buying fm12 this year as fm was the only pc game i bought.

the list will come in handy on release day when the steam meltdown happens

[Dune297]

If Steam gets hacked, or your connection gets tapped, or if your browsing history is recovered from your hard disk, or if you get keylogged...

Don't think data you send to a private server is fully secure and will never be exposed, ever.

And this is true on any server. Sega was hacked and your forum account information was exposed. So what?

[x42bn6]

Example, you keep saying that if people stop pirating it doesn't mean sales will go up. Well that's not true. They certainly won't go down as a sale was never made in the first place.

There's no point in talking about sales that were made in the first place, since you cannot go back in time. You can only increase sales for the future version of the software.

Pirates who buy after pirating will no longer pirate and will not buy. That's a loss in sales.

If piracy is eliminated or reduced, those who are never made aware of the game through piracy + word-of-mouth (i.e. someone pirates, friend sees them playing this awesome game, they decide to buy) are lost sales.

And it's more likely they'll go up as people that enjoy the game will want to play it.

Or, for FM, they might download an updated database and continue to play the old version.

In addition, if they enjoy it, they might be willing to jump through more hoops to pirate.

----

You claimed piracy is theft. Assume it's true and consider this: Say you test-drove an expensive sports car and loved it. You later had an opportunity to steal it

for free and not get caught.

Then imagine that a day later, this expensive sports car cannot be stolen because it has a security guard protecting it.

Do you really think that because you enjoyed the car so much, now that theft is impossible, you will go out and buy this expensive sports car?

You will only buy the sports car if you are willing to part with your money - the reality is that not everyone is going to do so.

People steal (or pirate, although not equivalent) because of opportunity and cost, not because they want to be loyal customers. Make it difficult to pirate and they will see the opportunity as less likely, and might simply walk away.

And on the flip-side, if the car dealer's security guard looks incredibly threatening so that theft is even less welcoming, people will not want to approach the car and look at it. That's what restricting piracy can threaten to do.

[bieritarier]

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.

Thanks for supporting my point. Etiher you live with this information being disclosed (and yes I have receiving all this bloody advertisement spam via email), or you can't play the game. Point is, I need to supply information to play a game. I don't like that, be it just an email address or not. Plus it is something that is not required to run the game, just a DRM measure (and a way to send you spam).

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.

See above. Email address is personal information. Not that I generally care about disclosing my email or even post address. I just don't want to be forced to do it.

Perhaps someone else would care to point them out. It's several times we've gone tit for tat, at the moment I'm not in the mood to go that route. I might tomorrow.

But your arguments are flawed. Example, you keep saying that if people stop pirating it doesn't mean sales will go up. Well that's not true. They certainly won't go down as a sale was never made in the first place. So they'll either remain the same or go up. And it's more likely they'll go up as people that enjoy the game will want to play it. They could choose not to buy it, but that won't damage sales, as they were never a purchaser of the game in the first place.

you aregue less piracy at least mean the same amount of Sales. As I pointed out before, achieving less piracy through invasive DRM means some people won't buy because of this crap. So 10 people buy instead of downloading since the DRM took 2 days longer to be cracked and 10 people wait for the crack to be available and download since they don't want to go through all this DRM nonsense.

How many people do you think were pirating FM a couple of years back when it became obvious that there is a generic issue with the activation codes? and that isn't even invasive DRM!

I agree with one thing you said - it's catch 22 I have read the pro's you mentioned before, and I don'T agree. You have read the cons I point out before, and you don't agree. I need to get to work now anyway.

[milnerpoint]

and the car analogies are back, again!!!!

Kriss how long to a new page?

[x42bn6]

And this is true on any server. Sega was hacked and your forum account information was exposed. So what?

The more places you leave personal information, the more insecure your real-life identity becomes.

Steam becomes one more place where personal information is stored.

[Lazaru5]

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)

The following applications have been known to cause issues with Steam and playing games:

Anti-Virus Applications - Any Anti-Virus program could potentially block Steam and Steam game access, especially when not properly configured for use with Steam. Please make sure that Steam and all Steam games are listed as exceptions in these programs. If the issue persists, please try disabling or temporarily uninstalling the program to test the issue.

• Avast!
  
• AVG Anti-virus *
  
• BitDefender
  
• F-Secure
  
• Iobit Advanced System Care *
  
• Kaspersky Anti-virus
  
• McAfee Anti-virus
  
• Nod32 Anti-virus *
  
• Norton/Symantec Anti-virus
  
• Panda Anti-virus
  
• Threatfire
  
• Trend Micro
  
• VIGuard Anti-virus
  

Anti-Spyware Applications

• Ad Aware
  
• CA Pest Patrol
  
• PC Tools Spyware Doctor with AntiVirus (may need to disable Full-Screen detection in the Advanced settings)
  
• Spybot Search & Destroy
  
• Spycatcher Express
  
• Spyware Terminator
  
• Webroot Spy Sweeper *
  

Firewall/Security Applications

• CA Internet Security Suite
  
• Comodo (With Portal 2 running the firewall in Defense+ in training mode allows the game to run)
  
• CYBERsitter
  
• ESET Smart Security
  
• Netlimiter
  
• McAfee Personal Firewall
  
• Nvidia Network Access Manager/Firewall *
  
• Nvidia ForceWare Intelligent Application Manager
  
• Outpost Firewall (Disabling System Guard under Proactive Protection allows Portal 2 to run)
  
• Panda Internet Security
  
• Peer Guardian
  
• PeerBlock
  
• Tiny Personal Firewall
  
• Verizon Internet Security Suite
  
• Zone Alarm
  
• Constant Guard by Comcast
  
• Online Armor
  

Other Applications

• IOBit Advance System Care
  
• Airfoil
  
• Alcohol 120%
  
• AOLacsd.exe (AOL connection driver)
  
• ATI Hotkey Poller
  
• ATI Tray Tools
  
• BitTorrent/uTorrent (all clients)
  
• Creative Software (Alchemy, MediaSource 5 on Asus G60VX models specifcally)
  
• Catalyst AI
  
• Daemon Tools
  
• Download Accelerators (all clients)
  
• EVGA Precision
  
• Garfield Daily Desktop Comic
  
• GhostSurf 2007
  
• Google Toolbar, Google Updater
  
• GSC
  
• Hamachi
  
• HotSpot Shield
  
• K-Lite Codec Pack
  
• LimeWire, BearShare or other Peer 2 Peer applications
  
• LogMeIn
  
• Microsoft Screen Magnifier in Windows 7 (magnify.exe - may cause in-game cursor issues)
  
• MSI Afterburner
  
• nProtect GameGuard *
  
• PC Time Limit
  
• Skype
  
• Slysoft AnyDVD
  
• StarDock KeepSafe
  
• SteamWatch
  
• iolo System Mechanic
  
• TeamSpeak (can lead to mic issues)
  
• Total Recorder
  
• Tuneup WinStyler Theme Service
  
• UPEK Protector Suite
  
• Ventrilo (can lead to mic issues)
  
• VirtuaGirl 2
  
• Western Digital Backup Anywhere
  
• Whitesmoke Translator (may cause the Source engine to crash)
  
• WindowBlinds
  
• Xfire
  

* We recommend that applications listed in bold with a ( * ) symbol are fully uninstalled from your system if disabling them does not resolve the issue

@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

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.

and again, as so often, you have missed the point. Almost all of those programs on that list are widely used and have been around a long time, I'd wager that there aren't that many on there that *most* people haven't heard of, come across, or considered buying at some point. To then be told that to play a game they have to (potentially) uninstall software that they (most probably) use regularly is unacceptable! Especially when the reason is not the game software but a 3rd party DRM software that the game manufacturers have no control over.

Then there is the reason why Steam would be incompatible with many of the listed programs... well as they are *mostly* designed to look for software that has malicious characteristics (such as a virus, root-kit, Trojan horse, etc) that must mean that Steam is doing something that these programs are designed to prevent!

Steam is also widely used software, it is therefore in Valve's best interests to ensure that their software is compatible with *most* other software, especially commonly used software as many in the list are. If they can't (or won't) it is because what the software is doing is malicious (or seen as malicious by the above software)... it can't be for any other reason!

Do you really want to install a potentially malicious software on your computer? Would you knowingly install a virus, root-kit, Trojan, key-logger or whatever on your computer? Of course you wouldn't, yet Steam, which is incompatible with oh so many common security programs, is OK cos "Valve are a massive company"?

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

This is the key point. SEGA don't want you to play a multi-player game on the same computer, they want you sat side-by-side on the sofa with a laptop each, a copy of the game each, and playing "on-line" through Steam... don't be surprised to see the "add manager" button removed in future versions...

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 then downloading for free?

There is none... but the more posts that I read in this thread, the more it appears that the *true* targets of this measure are not those guys who will pirate the game deliberately, it's the "un-intentional" and the "ignorant" that are being targeted. The family that wants to play a single player game on 3 different machines at the same time, the brothers that want to share a two-player game, those who sell the game on the second-hand market... all of these will be affected, 100% guaranteed, the real pirates? They'll still pirate it...

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.

And this is wrong! As the decision to use Steam is a SI/SEGA one, they should be the ones giving the answers to any questions people might have, (because they should have already asked all of these questions anyway...). I do not for one minute believe that SI/SEGA didn't ask these questions, I would have in their position - i.e. "how does this affect my current customer base?". So if they've asked the questions, then they know the answers too... and they don't want to share them because we won't like them... (I refer to all the Steam related questions in general, not just the one you replied to Kriss ).

Toddle off and ask Valve is v.poor customer service... we aren't customers of Valve, we are customers of Sports Interactive and ONLY Sports Interactive (in many cases)! Therefore, Sports Interactive should be answering the questions of their customers...

[Smurf]

There's no point in talking about sales that were made in the first place, since you cannot go back in time. You can only increase sales for the future version of the software.

Pirates who buy after pirating will no longer pirate and will not buy. That's a loss in sales.

That is pure speculation. You have no idea if anyone who pirated it actually bought it. Or if it they can't pirate it whether they'll buy it or not.

[Dune297]

The more places you leave personal information, the more insecure your real-life identity becomes.

Steam becomes one more place where personal information is stored.

And this is more paranoia. The tiny chance of Steam being hacked on top of the even tinier chance that your identity would be the one picked out of 35 million?

[Smurf]

you aregue less piracy at least mean the same amount of Sales. As I pointed out before, achieving less piracy through invasive DRM means some people won't buy because of this crap. So 10 people buy instead of downloading since the DRM took 2 days longer to be cracked and 10 people wait for the crack to be available and download since they don't want to go through all this DRM nonsense.

How many people do you think were pirating FM a couple of years back when it became obvious that there is a generic issue with the activation codes? and that isn't even invasive DRM!

I agree with one thing you said - it's catch 22 I have read the pro's you mentioned before, and I don'T agree. You have read the cons I point out before, and you don't agree. I need to get to work now anyway.

Yeh and more DRM might mean more people buy it. People may not have bought it in the past due to lack of DRM.

So 10 people don't buy it because of DRM. But what if 20 people buy it because they can't pirate it anymore.

Could easily be 5 people buy it. Or nobody buys it. Or less people buy it.

Ifs and buts.

[Dune297]

Then there is the reason why Steam would be incompatible with many of the listed programs... well as they are *mostly* designed to look for software that has malicious characteristics (such as a virus, root-kit, Trojan horse, etc) that must mean that Steam is doing something that these programs are designed to prevent!

Steam is also widely used software, it is therefore in Valve's best interests to ensure that their software is compatible with *most* other software, especially commonly used software as many in the list are. If they can't (or won't) it is because what the software is doing is malicious (or seen as malicious by the above software)... it can't be for any other reason!

Do you really want to install a potentially malicious software on your computer? Would you knowingly install a virus, root-kit, Trojan, key-logger or whatever on your computer? Of course you wouldn't, yet Steam, which is incompatible with oh so many common security programs, is OK cos "Valve are a massive company"?

Potentially malicious? You are kidding me right? It's a program that over 3 million people at any given time use. It's okay because Valve is a massive company who thinks of their customers. So you're telling me I've spent thousands on virus software? I suppose so. Valve shouldn't have to worry about programs not allowing Steam. It's not their problem.

[Kriss]

There won't be a new page because I'm calling a halt to this.

All possible points of view have been made, the reasons for using Steam only this year have been given (whether or not you support the logic)

All of the discussion now going on actually belongs on the Steam forums not here, and all the questions being asked are answered there.

Aimless created a very good unnofficial Steam support thread which I refer you to.http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/156429-Steam-Problems-FAQ-and-Basic-Crash-Troubleshooting

As Sega - David has said there'll be help and advice available too from Sega/SI. There is a Steam FAQ regarding FM12 here - http://community.sigames.com/showthread.php/275972-Football-Manager-2012-Activation-Steam-FAQ

Please don't open any new threads protesting the decision, it is final and irrevocable for FM12.

Thanks for all your input here whatever your views.