Copying and using software without paying for it is a practice as old as software itself. I don't know when trying to prevent or even criminalize it, and labeling it piracy, started, but it was probably when someone started making money off selling software. Like so many others around me, I have a complex two-sided view on this issue - I am both a former Bulgarian high-school student with a love of computers and games and no money to spare, and a current successful computer programmer and game developer who makes a living by creating software and games that people pay for.
When we were still in elementary school, my sister and I started saving money for a computer. Our parents and grandparents contributed, and we hoped we would be able to afford one in a few years. Then a couple of years later hyperinflation struck Bulgaria, my parents lost their jobs and their savings, and our computer money, however little value it had left by then, had to be spent on meeting our daily needs - together with everything in our special savings accounts our parents had opened for us at birth that were probably supposed to get us through college.
A few years later, thanks to the first real right-wing democratic government in 70 years, led by Ivan Kostov, the situation had improved drastically. My father had taken part in the privatization of the 'home-building complex' he'd worked in at communist times and was now the proud owner of 30% of a construction company. We were now finally able to afford a computer, after more than five years of waiting, and this was the largest Christmas gift my sister and I ever received. It came pre-installed with pirated versions of Windows, Diablo 2 and a few other games. The second thing I did on the next day was buy a few computer magazines that had demo games on them, and after choosing some I liked, I went to the local pirate and paid him an average Bulgarian day's wage to burn me a disc with them on. This was a normal practice. I'd also been buying fake Nintendo cartridges for my fake NES before that. Regular games cost half a month's salary so they were completely out of the question; did I mention the whole computer configuration cost a whole *year*'s salary?
When fast DSL and cable-TV Internet appeared three years later and sparked the torrents revolution, we were all extremely happy, as we didn't have to pay the pirate dealers any more. The net itself wasn't much cheaper, but we would have had it anyway, because chatting and browsing were cool.
In the meantime my sister and I had learnt to repair the computer ourselves, as everything would break way too often, but computer repairs were expensive. Besides, it was an interesting job - we had developed an understanding and love for computer software and hardware, and especially games.
A few more years down the line this led to both of us becoming software developers/engineers/programmers/whatever in the by now thriving Bulgarian IT industry. I worked in business, creating professional software that companies paid for to optimize production. I did an internship in Microsoft HQ in the hope of working on Windows that I'd pirated and repaired so much for myself and the people around me that I now knew and loved it. I decided the only software worth my time was games and became a mobile-games developer. Ever since the hyperinflation times my standard of living has been improving at an exponential rate much higher than the global economy's average. I can now afford to buy software I need and games I like. And I do it. I even do it retro-actively: I've been buying from GOG all the great games I'd pirated in high-school that I'd like to see eternalized. I haven't bought a single crappy one, though, because I know very well in retrospect which ones were crappy.
This brings me to my next two points, which are really important - as a software developer I've come to prize software freedom and am a strong supporter of GOG 's DRM-free policy. As an avid gamer I've come to appreciate high-quality games and would want to reward and support their creators - not only in the hopes that they'll continue creating masterpieces, but also as thanks for the work they've already done.
What I find really disturbing with software, but especially games, is that they rely a lot on marketing - sometimes so much that they spend more on it than on development itself. They want to persuade people to buy on release, or even worse, pre-order, and pay exorbitant amounts like 60 Euro per game or 270 Euro for an office suite. This is OK for a company that uses said software to make money, but it's way too much for consumers.
If game companies start relying less on hype and more on quality, they can mostly remove their marketing budgets and greatly reduce their prices. People can start buying gold versions that have all possible expansions, DLCs, and most importantly, bug fixes. Companies can even get to a larger market and ultimately increase their profits by selling at many different price levels so that anyone can afford their games.
Gamers can start rewarding the companies that make the best games (the ones they like), not the ones that pay the most reviewers and advertisers. They can spend more time playing quality games rather than reading reviews and trying to find out which the quality ones are before spending significant sums on them.
Game companies can also be friendlier to users and spend less time treating them as criminals and more trying to provide a quality gaming experience.
This might all sound like a crazy fantasy, but the solution is already here - it just needs to be explained and legalized. Currently, the combination of torrents and DRM-free software can provide all of the above benefits: one can download any game or other software they hear about, try it out for themselves, see if they like it; delete it if they don't, buy it if they want to keep it. Buying should only happen through DRM-free sources as that serves two purposes - free software is promoted; and rather than developers trying to prevent cracking and crackers trying to circumvent their defenses and mischievous viruses sometimes getting there (probably planted by the software companies themselves, as they actually profit from making torrents unsafe, though I've never witnessed such a practice, so maybe I'm wrong), the torrents can just contain the safe DRM-free installers.
The downside is that torrents containing pirated software are illegal in many countries - mostly uploading, but sometimes also downloading them - and also that people often don't realize the continued existence of quality software depends on them buying it, so that if they only pirate stuff and don't later buy the things they actually liked, such things will gradually disappear. Hence the legalization and explanation effort needed.
As a conclusion and in summary, what I propose is that after you've 'pirated' games, finished and liked them and want to recommend them to your friends too; or other software that you find useful and plan to keep on using - then you should decide how much exactly they're worth to you, keeping in mind that the more you pay, the more likely it is such games will be created again, or the programs will be improved; and then look for a DRM-free version to buy that matches that price. If all versions are cheaper, then buy more than one. If they're all more expensive, then wait for a sale - though keep in mind that the earlier you buy, the more likely it is the people who made the thing will get paid, rather than their successors, publishers or investors. If no DRM-free versions exist, don't buy - so that companies will learn that treating their users badly, with suspicion rather than trust, won't make them money.
Furthermore, I propose that this becomes the normal way for 'using' and purchasing intellectual 'products' that are hard to develop but infinitely cheap and easy to copy, be it games, other software, e-books, songs, or movies; that it becomes legal and every person on Earth realizes how it works and starts doing it.
Even games that don't rely on marketing get their earnings mostly on release. After that the game sinks into the stores under the weight of many many new titles. Then they make a promotion or some noise and the game gets another "spike" in earnings... and that's it. I don't see how you can get around that - and you propose a "solution" without even looking at the sale cycle of one unmarketed game.
ОтговорИзтриванеWindows and Photoshop really rely on piracy - this is what makes their product so ubiquitous and widespread, there are many things they do to encourage piracy of their products.
But you're wrong if you think that "explaining" people that buying is good, they'll do it. I know a lot of people (developers like you, actually), who have improved income, but would never buy the games they love. Understanding the link between buying and supporting the developers isn't a difficult mental challenge. But people, just like every living organism on the planet, follow the path of least resistance - every living thing has to be efficient and conserve energy if possible. Only people like you and me, people who think too much, or people who are escapists and put a lot of value on games, would be buying them.
There's one more reason for people to buy games. Gabe Newell said that people will buy on Steam if they make their service easier and more comfortable to use, with better features, than what the pirates are offering. And indeed, just clicking "download and install" is easier than the hassle of cracking a game; and the social aspect (your friends are playing this and that) really makes people love the Steam service.
The freemium model, and the model "games as a service" is one of the ugly results of the biological "path of least resistanse" that consumers are following. If you want a story-driven game with limited, carefully crafted content, you have to understand that you'll make less money because people can get it for free without any consequences.
I haven't been really clear, I'm not completely against marketing and playing games on release. I wouldn't do it, but if most people would - OK. I still see no problem with relaxing the correlation between marketing budget and profits. If millions of people are persuaded by costly marketing to download and play the game for free, and then it turns out to be really good and a month later most of them actually pay $60 each for a DRM-free release, the model will still work.
ОтговорИзтриванеPeople's following the path of least resistance will likely be the only problem. If games just stop being created due to no one paying for torrents, the market force of people wanting new games and not getting them will start acting. Things like Kickstarter prove this will happen, as game genres that were dead are being revived through fan support. This is a form of pre-ordering though, the worst way of selling software, so we'll now be even worse off.
Maybe my solution is far from perfect, but it must be possible to only pay for quality products... Steam charging by the minute could work, but this goes against different psychological barriers - e.g. I don't like even the current DRM, let alone a kind that measures my every action. I'm open to suggestions - including proof that my assumption ('it must be possible to only pay for quality products') is wrong :).