id's Hollenshead: Piracy 'hidden benefit' for PC manufacturers
by Ludwig Kietzmann 
{ Aug 21st 2008 at 10:00PM }
Oh, those sly PC hardware manufacturers. As if it wasn't bad enough that they keep building better, more powerful rigs every six seconds, id Software's Todd Hollenshead believes they also secretly benefit from software piracy. No stranger to the public flogging of the illicit C:\ scourge, the CEO candidly told GamesIndustry.biz that manufacturers typically "line up on the wrong side of the argument." "They have lots of reasons as to why they do that," he said, "but I think that there's been this dirty little secret among hardware manufacturers, which is that the perception of free content - even if you're supposed to pay for it on PCs - is some sort hidden benefit that you get when you buy a PC, like a right to download music for free or a right to download pirated movies and games." Hollenshead believes that this is what motivates manufacturers to stick up for the law-abiding minority when it comes to issues like peer-to-peer sharing.
"I think that if you went in and could see what's going on in their minds, though they may never say that stuff and I'm not saying there's some conspiracy or something like that - but I think the thing is they realise that trading content, copyrighted or not, is an expected benefit of owning a computer." Heck, the only reason we got one was to steal quotes from Tom Bramwell's interviews.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Josh @ Aug 21st 2008 10:04PM
"Heck, the only reason we got one was to steal quotes from Tom Bramwell's interviews."
You BASTARDS.
Smoke_Dawg_187 @ Aug 21st 2008 10:05PM
Yeah, piracy is just not cool. I try to explain to all my friends that it is wrong, but they continue to do it.
Clinton oxendine @ Aug 21st 2008 10:05PM
well that is a good reason to have a pc
Smoke_Dawg_187 @ Aug 21st 2008 10:06PM
Same on the pirates.
victor @ Aug 21st 2008 10:16PM
He makes a very good point. Now just wait for the waft of piracy-advocates to come piling in and claim what he says is complete crap.
Red Leader @ Aug 21st 2008 10:12PM
I'll admit that I pirated some music back when napster came out, but I always felt it was slightly more of a crime to pirate movies and games.
Zertoss @ Aug 21st 2008 10:21PM
I think he has hardware manufacturers confused with ISPs. Or at least I did up to the part on sticking up for P2P.
Anyway, I don't pirate. I can afford to buy whatever software I want. Haven't bought anything for the PC all year.
Cesaria (Pitchfork Fest 2008 FTMFW!) @ Aug 22nd 2008 12:07AM
My god. I didn't think it was possible to find a more lurid Peach than Samfish's avatar, but there you go all proving me wrong with your gimp Peach. What's next, two Peaches one cup?
Psaakyrn @ Aug 22nd 2008 12:45AM
Are you sure it doesn't exist yet?
Zertoss @ Aug 22nd 2008 9:33AM
I haven't seen it, but I'll be sure to let the internet know they need to get right on that.
Also, this is one of my tamer Peach pics.
caramelzappa @ Aug 21st 2008 10:35PM
It's definitely true. I pirated a lot during high school when I had no real income, and when I built my first PC there was this logic where you think "If I'm spending this much on the parts, why should I have to spend that much money on the games if I don't have to?"
After a while I realized how messed up that logic is, and now I buy all my games. Thanks to Steam, buying games is actually easier and more convenient than piracy, unlike store-bought games.
Lard @ Aug 22nd 2008 1:26AM
Nothing like convicting everyone before they've had a trial, eh Tommy boy?
I'm not advocating piracy in any way, but this kind of attitude (like the RIAA/MPAA's) doesn't help things in the slightest.
Grow up Tom.
mopo @ Aug 21st 2008 10:51PM
YARRRRRRR me hearties.
steam is much better, i agree with caramelzappa.
*puts back on eyepatch and pillages the villiages*
BigD145 @ Aug 21st 2008 10:53PM
Um, no. That's stretching things a bit. A person doesn't spend a thousand dollars just to pirate a fifty dollar game.
Getting f*cked over by retail stores for a used copy of a scratched game disc with no manual makes me want to pirate. Looking at a beta version of a game that's just gone gold and is sitting on a shelf makes me want to pirate.
Mischa @ Aug 22nd 2008 12:48AM
Retail stores don't sell used copies of PC games, homeboy. And if a used (non PC) game is scratched you can easily discover this in the store, and return it for a non scratched copy. Problem solved.
Stop making weak excuses for STEALING.
chispito @ Aug 21st 2008 10:54PM
This is stupid and counterproductive. He doesn't suggest there is any inappropriate behavior on the hardware manufacturers' part, or that there is something better they could be doing. I've never seen a PC ad once and thought, wow that's encouraging me to pirate. Also, it's ironic that you could read his comments to mean that it ticks him off that some people buy PCs for the open source content.
Essentially, he's accusing themthe manufacturers of not feeling really, really bad about Hollenshead's own problems--like some kind of jealous lover.
#28 @ Aug 22nd 2008 12:37AM
Yeah, this is all just a bit of stupid paranoia.
labrats5 @ Aug 21st 2008 11:11PM
Absolutely 100% correct. He has guts to say it, so all the more credit to him.
If you are not a pirate, it is extremely difficult to fill even an 80 gig hard drive. pirated video is the driving force behind the sales of large hard drives. Pirated games an graphics cards have a similar relationship.
The thing is though that the games industry should have seen this coming. Everything the PC gaming industry has done over the last 15 years has skewed their demographic to people with three defining traits: they are tech savvy, they love games, but they hate gaming companies. These are the exact sort of people who will flock to piracy.
You know why Blizzard is so successful? There are many reasons, but they all basically boil down to one thing: people LOVE blizzard. They don't pirate because unlike most every other company with which they either hate nor have a detached emotional relationship to, people actually care about Blizzard.
Brand loyalty is a good way to combat piracy. Try it.
caramelzappa @ Aug 22nd 2008 1:29AM
That's ridiculous, 80gb is hardly anything, including to people who buy everything legitimately. I have over 50gb of space taken up by steam games alone, and Crysis is another 12gb, Gears for Windows another 5 or so. My dad has close to 30gb of pictures he's taken over the years. Pirates do demand a large amount of hard drive space, but the real reason we have terabytes of drive space has nothing to do with that. Games are getting more complex, with higher resolution textures and more detailed models, the more megapixels we take out pictures in the more space each one takes up.
Short story, as quality increases so do storage needs, Pirates have nothing to do with it.
chispito @ Aug 21st 2008 11:31PM
"If you are not a pirate, it is extremely difficult to fill even an 80 gig hard drive."
Oh come on. Your typical soccer mom could blow through 80GB of photo and video storage in a busy summer.
BigD145 @ Aug 21st 2008 11:53PM
I can easily fill a 300+ GB hard drive with the games I've bought over the years. You must not use your computer for anything more than email and browsing.
shadowarmy75 @ Aug 22nd 2008 12:03AM
Not to mention games themselves are pretty large. A typical game is what, 5 GB? Then if you play WoW, there goes a huge chunk.
#28 @ Aug 22nd 2008 12:38AM
You don't pirate games because you hate gaming companies, you pirate because it's easier and a pirate is lazy.
labrats5 @ Aug 22nd 2008 8:58AM
I was certain everyone would comment on the 80 gig thing.
First off, yes lots of people have more than 80 gigs of non-pirated stuff. That's a minority. I could go through the trouble of breaking down average consumer spending to prove it, but that would be a waste of my time.
The 80 gig thing was easily the least important thing I said. Fine, change it to 'it's extremely hard to fill a 500 gig hard drive without piracy'. Does that really change anything? Hard dive space is doubling every 2 years. media files are neither increasing in size nearly as fast nor getting cheaper. That means more money to legitimately fill your average hard drive. Consumer spending on media has if anything decreased, but these hard drives are still filling up.
victor @ Aug 21st 2008 11:03PM
"I think he has hardware manufacturers confused with ISPs. Or at least I did up to the part on sticking up for P2P"
No, but you're mistaken in your logic. P2P is probably the worst thing that has happened to ISPs as of late, as the people who use these systems suck up an immense amount of bandwidth. Consequently, with more and more US ISPs setting up download limits, it's P2Pers that are largely responsible for bringing this around.
yarrr @ Aug 22nd 2008 4:35AM
"No, but you're mistaken in your logic. P2P is probably the worst thing that has happened to ISPs as of late, as the people who use these systems suck up an immense amount of bandwidth. Consequently, with more and more US ISPs setting up download limits, it's P2Pers that are largely responsible for bringing this around."
No, Streaming HD content is the cause of that.
t_m @ Aug 21st 2008 11:39PM
He's pretty much correct.
Back in the days when PCs cost the earth, it was a pretty clear choice.. buy a cheap console, and then have to pay for everything... or buy an expensive PC, but get everything else free.
I haven't pirated any games since i was back in college, but the majority of the people with TIME to play all these games are college kids/young single guys.. and while they mighthave the money to spend on $600 graphics cards every six months, thats only because it give them access to free content.
SIde note: I noticed a broadband provider recently advertising its limits in terms of how many dvd movies you can download... i'm not aware of any legal sources for dvd movie downloads...
game devs need to work on some form of subscription download service thats pre-installed on most PCs.
arrakisman @ Aug 22nd 2008 8:31AM
Not sure how they would be monitoring that without some privacy issues. I do know Comcast has been getting lots of flack for throtting the upload speed of P2P.
big z @ Aug 22nd 2008 12:43AM
I've got a peg-leg, a hook and a PC with an internet connection! Aaaaaaaaarrrrggg!
RabbidMickeyMouse @ Aug 22nd 2008 12:19AM
What other purpose is there these days for the kind of space you get with computers (500MB-1TB) other than storing more content than is reasonable to assume they've purchases legally?
Granted, I know people who large HDDs filled with legal content, such as people with music and movie project hobbies, but I've more often seen people who fill their drives with pirated stuff.
ChomskyKnows @ Aug 22nd 2008 1:57AM
bunch of smart guys over at id...
Mischa @ Aug 22nd 2008 12:48AM
Follow my train of thought:
"'C:/ scourge??' Is that the name of some virus, or some pirating site..? Oh wait, it's just another pun..."
Curse you Ludwig, curse you.
Psaakyrn @ Aug 22nd 2008 1:06AM
5 gigs? I thought games are 10-20 gigs now...
meist3r @ Aug 22nd 2008 1:37AM
Well and the servers and hard drives for all that increased bandwidth don'T exactly grow on trees either.
Fruition @ Aug 22nd 2008 6:05AM
"law-abiding minority"
Sounds sad, but definitely true...
Jack @ Aug 22nd 2008 10:05AM
I know places where you need an "ID" to see "PC" thats "RG" UM?
http://www.squidoo.com/doughboy
kchenisp @ Aug 23rd 2008 12:16AM
Surprised no one mentioned it yet, but you've all seen those nvidia bumpers (that is, advertisements) when you start just about any game?
What did you, as the consumer, receive in exchange for having to watch a commercial that runs every time you start your game? Nothing.
From the dev/publisher's point of view, the pirates buy hardware and then steal the software. Ok, fair enough. But then the hardware manufacturers give free money to the dev/publisher. Those ads run with absolutely no benefit to the consumer -- they don't get a price break for the game, they don't get free stuff from nvidia. It's money that the dev/publisher gets to pocket for doing absolutely nothing except selling your time to nvidia. They have no right to complain about pirates who only buy hardware, because they're reimbursed by nvidia. The people who do have a right to complain is, as always, the legit consumer.
You're the one who has to watch the ads -- for nothing. You're the one who has to subject yourself to DRM -- for nothing. All of these things are costs that are put on your shoulders, and they don't actually do anything to stop the pirates. So what we really have here is a situation where dev/pubs include piracy as part of a business model, and use it to justify making life harder for you, the paying customer, because they're not willing to absorb the cost of piracy as a cost of doing their business. It's been a long time since piracy has affected any dev/publisher, it only affects you, the buyer.
Nick @ Aug 24th 2008 1:34AM
The problem is'nt that he is not right, he is right actually. The problem is that he does'nt come with any trace of solution to that situation after making such a statement. Making such charge against the hardware manifacturers without any more substance to back up his claims is just irrevelant. This kind of speech will just vanish into the wild cause it does'nt bring up anything, while it actually hold truth, which is sad. I actually am, like Anonymous at 20:47 and many others, pirating and spending my money on hardware. But if I did'nt have the hardware, I would'nt be able to run his or other compagnies games decently. So when you think about it, is his statment bringing anything new to the situation, or chaning anything? no. I would'nt buy a game i could'nt run decently. I will tell you mister Id CEO, I pretty much like Id Software, John Carmack in particular, but you have to push the matter much more far then this if you want to make any kind of impact. The broadband ISPs have a much bigger responsability in the piracy case than the hardware manifacturers have. The hardware manifacturers actually benifits from the piracy situation, but without being really aware of it. If they are guilty of something, it is to not denounce it, and not to encourage it. Check out the ISPs first. Tne internet is a great information and communication tool right, but what is the point in having a high bandwith connection if it's not to pirate content, there is no other point. You see, there should be some kind of piracy taxe, and everyones with some kind of brain knows it. The situation with hardware manifacturers is totally different, there should be a coallission between software and hardware manifacturers to back each others of, and there is already one that have been created around last year, including the big players in the industry like Microsoft, AMD-ATI and Intel. So well...what's really the point behind that accusation of yours?