Hi everyone.
First post by a lurker, that was/is following this threat (and was shaking
his head in disbeliev for several times)
Over on the GalCiv forum, there was a post by Brad Wardall about a study re.
copy protection and its effectiveness.
By Frogboy
Posted October 2, 2006 14:33:48
A digital copy protection company has conducted a survey that found "only"
28% of consumers avoid protected games.
Next Generation asked me what I thought of that.
You can read the whole thing over at the link below. However, this was a
survey done by a copy protection company that apparently thinks it's not bad
that more than 1 out of 4 people avoid games that are protected. That's way
higher than I ever thought it would be.
If I make a game and it has a feature that is going to drive away 1 out of 4
gamers, it's coming out.
End Qote
This is the study, Brad was refering to:
Start Qote
A digital copyright protection company has conducted a survey that
found "only" 28 percent of consumers avoid protected games, but Stardock CEO
Brad Wardell tells Next-Gen why he questions the thoroughness of the study.
Wardell is well-versed in dealing with copy protection issues.
Stardock actually chose not to incorporate copy protection technology in its
commercially and critically successful PC game, Galactic Civilizations II,
other than a simple serial number that users enter to receive updates for
the game. The developer felt that copy suppression technology often
inconveniences consumers, so it opted out of the feature. The move was
significant because of the proliferation of PC game piracy, and it appeared
to leave GCII quite vulnerable to illegal copying.
A statement outlining ECD's aforementioned study revealed the
following statistics"
"72 percent of consumers are 'not actively avoiding' buying games
that have copy protection."
".Nearly 60 percent believe that it doesn't matter whether the game
is protected."
"51 percent noted that copy suppression technology that impacts
initial download time, but does not slow down or otherwise interfere with
game play is the ideal."
"68 percent of consumers are happy with a technology that protects
games without impacting game play -- even if the solution allows a minute or
more of delay."
"69 percent stated that their PC has never been negatively affected
by copy protection technology."
"Of the 83 percent of consumers who reported actually purchasing PC
Games, 77 percent would be in favor of purchasing copyright protected games
if they were available at a reduced cost."
After poring over the ECD study results, Wardell offered a comment to
Next-Gen via e-mail. "I think [ECD's] findings are probably correct," he
said. "But there are two key things missing from the study: 1) Does the
presence of CD copy protection make someone LESS likely to purchase the
game?"
He then addressed ECD's finding that "only" 28 percent of consumers
are turned off by copyright protected games. "If more than one out of four
gamers won't buy a game because it has CD copy protection that's huge. One
could deduce then that a significant number of people are less likely to
purchase a given game if it has CD copy protection."
He then asked the question,"2) What percentage of gamers end up buying
a game because CD copy protection thwarted their piracy efforts?
"My contention: The number of people who end up buying the game due to
being thwarted by copy protection is far FAR less than the number of buyers
lost due to the presence of the copy protection.
"I am not against copy protection. I am against copy protection that
treats gamers like criminals or inconveniences them," Wardell concluded.
[For the record, Wardell wasn't insinuating ECD criminalizes or
inconveniences gamers--his comment is a generalization. - Ed.]
End qote.
This is the link to the article
//www.next-gen.biz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3910&Itemid=2
Ralph Hoenig, Germany
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))))
So I really doubt that