Category: Politics/Government

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Games Marketing/Business Politics/Government

Inconvenient Copy Protection or Inconvenient Copy Protection?

I just got the latest issue of PC Gamer, and I was reading the letters to the editor when I came across the complaint of Jon Ferrell. Jon wrote about the annoyance and pain involved in needing to have a CD in the drive for no other reason but copy protection. Besides being inconvenient to have all of your game CDs available if you ever want to play any of them, if any of them break due to constantly being on the move, guess who replaces them? Not the manufacturer!

His letter continues, pointing out that the advent of hard drives eliminated the need for floppies to run all of your software, but then we regressed for the sake of copy protection. In fact, it got worse as we now have automatic, online checks for compliance.

So what is the PC Gamer response? “As much as digital rights management inconveniences paying customers, we find it difficult to criticize game makers for taking reasonable steps to protect themselves from widespread piracy.”

The editor goes on to say that now with systems like Steam, online checks make your CD-swapping days a memory…of course, some people don’t appreciate the fact that their limited bandwidth or their privacy are compromised in the name of copy protection. My favorite quote:

“If only someone would come up with an either/or scheme, where you could insert the disk or check in online, then we’d get the best of both worlds.”

WTF? Best of both worlds? Both worlds are pretty messed up, if you ask me, and it is pretty messed up to think that they are reasonable measures to take. It wasn’t too long ago when Stardock made the news for not using copy protection in Galactic Civilizations 2, and I seem to remember reading about it in PC Gamer, too. In fact, around that time, PC Gamer had an entire article dedicated to the problems with Starforce and rootkits. Best of both worlds? I’ll take the world of Stardock’s creation over draconian measures to protect companies from their paying customers , thank you very much.

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Games Politics/Government

Space Invaders and Politics

I have been looking into Space Invaders and how it was like to play the original. I played Love Invaders, which has an amusing intro (1978 was all just a big misunderstanding), and Invasion 3D, which actually had some interesting game mechanics, such as exploding UFOs that also destroyed nearby aliens and aliens that drop down to replace dead allies in the front lines.

During my research, I also found the Wikipedia entry on Space Invaders, and I learned that when it was first introduced in America, it apparently sparked outrage even that many years ago. I thought that the public rallying against video games was a fairly new phenomenon.

From Wikipedia:

This phenomenon led to the first outcries against video games by groups of concerned adults, who felt that the content of video games was a corrupting influence on children. In the case of Space Invaders, the issue was not usually the highly abstract and stylized violence, but with the fact that the game could not be “won” in any familiar sense. As framed by the critics, the player is powerless to do more than to delay an inevitable defeat. They suggested that the game taught an unwholesome life lesson, inculcated defeatism, and possibly was intended to put the United States at a disadvantage in its economic rivalry with Japan by undermining the competitive spirit of American youth.

Space Invaders taught defeatism? So is Grand Theft Auto sending a better message by actually allowing you to overcome the odds and win?

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Games Marketing/Business Politics/Government

Michigan Ordered to Pay Back Video Game Industry

A Michigan judge ordered the state to pay $182,349 to pay for legal fees the ESA incurred to challenge an unconstitutional law banning the sale or rental of violent video games to minors. Governments now owe or have paid over $1,500,000 in legal fees trying to pass unconstitutional laws, including the more than $500,000 owed by the state of Illinois.

You can read the ESA press release.

In his decision declaring the law unconstitutional, the judge dismissed the state’s claim that the interactive nature of video games makes them less entitled to First Amendment protection. “The interactive, or functional aspect, in video games can be said to enhance the expressive elements even more than other media by drawing the player closer to the characters and becoming more involved in the plot of the game than by simply watching a movie or television show. It would be impossible to separate the functional aspects of a video game from the expressive, inasmuch as they are so closely intertwined and dependent on each other in creating the virtual experience. Not only does the Act not materially advance the state’s stated interest, but it appears to discriminate against a disfavored ‘newcomer’ in the world of entertainment media. Thus, ‘singling out’ the video game industry does not advance the state’s alleged goal.”

Eventually taxpayers have to notice this waste, right? I mean, maybe the first time a government official authorizes an unconstitutional law, he/she made a mistake, but after so many end up failing for the exact same reasons, it has to be obvious that these officials are purposefully wasting our money and our time, right?

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Game Development Games Marketing/Business Politics/Government

Illinois Anti-Video Game Law Appeal Rejected, Still Costing Taxpayers

According to Game Politics, Governor Blagojevich’s administration has not paid the ESA’s legal fees in the court fight over “Safe Games Illinois”, the law that the governor managed to pass last year before it was ruled unconstitutional. Since the payment of over half a million dollars has not been made, the ESA is now asking for almost $8,000 in interest.

Also reported at Game Politics, apparently Blagojevich appealed portions of the unconstitutional law, and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit has affirmed the initial ruling.

You can read the entire ruling at Game Politics.

And you can see why I voted third party in this last election. If not, let me point you to one of my earlier posts where I dissected the arguments used to support the unconstitutional laws. Statistics were used in a blatantly deceptive way, and the video game industry was targetted even though the same “supporting” arguments and evidence would have shown that the movie industry was even more of a danger to the children the law was supposed to be protecting. I personally became convinced that this law was just an example of opportunism and politics, and it showed me that I can’t trust this administration.

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Geek / Technical General Politics/Government

How Well Do You Know GNU?

Recently the Free Software Foundation put forth a call for volunteers to help answer licensing questions about the GPL, LGPL, and Free Software licenses in general.

The Compliance Lab does do one job which is very public: we answer licensing questions from the free software community. When people want to learn how they can mix code under different terms, or what license would be best for their program, we try to help them so they can spend less time worrying about legal nitty-gritty and more time hacking. It’s not the most glamorous job, but it’s a unique way to help out.

If you are interested in volunteering, or even if you just want to see how well you understand the GPL, take the Free Software licensing quiz.

The questions can be tricky, especially if you are not at all familiar with the GPL or LGPL. Some things might surprise you. I answered four or five answers correctly, which shows that I have a few things to learn. Even if you don’t want to volunteer, the quiz is informative, so go ahead and see how well you do.

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Games Politics/Government

German School Shooting Blamed on Video Games

ZDNet featured a news story titled Violent games blamed for German school attack. A man stormed his school, wounded 27 people, and then committed suicide. Due to this fascination with war simulation and video games, government officials are now calling for a ban on “killer games”. GamePolitics.com has also covered this news story.

Apparently it extends beyond video games. Banning paint ball and laser tag is also under consideration.

One official, however, seems to have a more rational opionion:

The opposition Greens warned against banning violent computer and war games.

Volker Beck, a leading Greens member of parliament, said it would be better to focus the debate on the proper use of computers and not jump to conclusions before it was clear what motivated [the killer].

Not jumping to conclusions? I wonder how many people will oppose this time around.

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Game Development Geek / Technical General Politics/Government

Games 4 Girls Competition Registration Is Open

In an effort to attract more females to computer science, a male-dominated field, the Games 4 Girls competition asks college women to create computer games designed to be fun for middle or high school age women.

In previous competitions, Game Maker was required, but this year other tools and platforms can be used. The only requirement is that the games can run on Windows XP (the competition is partly sponsored by Microsoft, after all).

This past year’s winners were Cornell University’s Green, Eggs, and Pan, the University of California-Irvine’s Eterative Tale, and North Central College’s DummerUnfall. Honorable mention went to Fluff, created by the team from University of Buffalo.

For this year’s competition, each member of the winning team will be awarded $1,000. Second and third place team members will receive $500. Also, three teams will win $1,000 for their Women’s Club/Organization. If you are a female college student, and you’re interested in the competition, the registration date is December 22nd, 2006. Deadlines and general information about the competition can be found at the Games 4 Girls site.

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Games Politics/Government

I Voted

I woke up late today, so I couldn’t vote in the morning. I finally managed to do so.

And I voted third party.

That is, I voted for neither Blagojevich or Topinka.

I also voted against Don Harmon and Deborah L. Graham, even though the latter was running unopposed.

I wasn’t too familiar with the “stakes” of this election, but if it was anything like last election, I’d rather vote 3rd party than support either of the two major candidates.

In any case, I did not support candidates who would support laws such as the unconstitutional video game legislation introduced by Blagojevich. And I feel good about it.

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General Politics/Government

Copyright Extension Debate: Urban Legends

Jerry Brito’s Not an Urban Legend exposes the holes in the arguments for a need for extended copyright.

The arguments made to extend copyright vary slightly, but you’ll almost always hear that without the protections of copyright, people wouldn’t have the commercial incentive to create. It’s convenient for the people making such an argument to ignore the fact that Walt Disney pretty much built an empire by creating new works from works that were no longer protected. When Disney was creating works, the public domain wasn’t more than a generation old. Today’s Walt Disney must wait many, many more decades before he/she is allowed to do the same, and yet arguments are still made that extending copyright is a good thing.

Jerry Brito basically pointed out the flaws in one such argument, made by James DeLong of IPCentral. DeLong claimed that the idea that older creations are not forgotten by their creators and so are not deteriorating into nothing due to the inability of preservationists to copy them into a less fragile medium. He points to entire packs of older movies being sold on Amazon as proof that copyright holders are “diligent [in] panning their slag for gold.”

But I would point him to another series for sale on Amazon called Dover Thrift. It is a series of books, priced at about $2 each, the underlying works of which are all in the public domain. That is, they are being printed—and someone is making money—without copyright.

Therefore, what I argue for is not no copyright, but rather sensible copyright. I argue for taking into consideration the public domain, and not just the interests of creators, when setting copyright terms. What should be the balance is up for debate, but an informed debate requires that we face facts and not simply dismiss those facts as urban legends because they are inconvenient to our position.

Sensible copyright would be nice.

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Geek / Technical Linux Game Development Marketing/Business Politics/Government

Open Source Java

A friend pointed me to this article: Sun Promises to Open Source Java.

If Sun does make Java open source, it is good news for people who prefer to run Free operating systems. It’s one less technology that they have to do without. Existing open source solutions are always behind the one provided by Sun.

Now the choice for Free software developers is “Do I switch to Java or do I continue to use the language I have been using?”

It is interesting that Sun’s main concern is fragmentation of the codebase. When you give people the right to redistribute the source, it is bound to happen; however, the worst-case scenario nightmare that opponents of Free software think of is not typical. There aren’t exactly hundreds of forks of the Linux kernel, for example. Everyone basically works off of the main branch of development. If someone wants to take Linux in a different direction, they are free to do so. Of course, if everyone is sticking with Linus’ original project, then the fork won’t exactly be a problem in terms of “fragmentation”. And with Free software, forks are free to merge back into the original project anyway. Contrast the situation with software under the BSD license, which would allow someone to fork a project without giving anything back.