~4 minute readEDITORIAL
Thoughts on Software Piracy
At Infocom, we take an unusual approach to the prevention of software piracy. Rather than spending large amounts of time, effort, and money on designing ever-better anti-piracy techniques (our games come virtually unprotected on a number of machines), we spend our time improving the games and the packaging in order to make them more of a value. Our thinking is that a game which provides a lot of enjoyment will be worth spending some money on, and we feel that our games are somewhat less likely to be pirated on that account.
We are in a fortunate position. Our technology allows us to create sophisticated works of interactive fiction in less time than others might take. In addition, our "machine independence" â our ability to develop a game that will run on dozens of microcomputers â allows us to spread our very large development costs (over $300,000 per game) over a larger number of total units to be sold. And lastly, consumers consider our interactive fiction to be the best on the market.
Unfortunately, most of the other companies in our industry don't have it so easy. They tend to buy their products from independent developers, who get an advance against royalties and a percentage of the revenues; they have trouble differentiating their products from competing ones, increasing advertising costs; and they must translate each product from machine to machine if they are to sell large volumes, which is both costly and time-consuming. All of this has led to the present sad state of affairs in which very few software companies are profitable. The end result of this trend will be fewer new titles released, more me-too products, and less innovation, none of which are in the consumer's best interest.
When pirates offhandedly joke about the "absurdly high price" of software as if it were some tremendous windfall to software manufacturers, they fail to realize that computer software is not a mass-market item. If each game sold millions of units, then the six-figure development and marketing costs would be lowered to less than a dollar per unit. However, very few games sell as many as 50,000 units (most sell far fewer), often leaving a cost per unit of $5 to $10, not even including the cost of manufacturing, which can easily reach $3 to $4 in the small quantities produced. And don't forget the overhead involved in running a business: sales staff, product support staff, and the costs involved in getting information (ads, press conferences, trade shows, sales literature, newsletters...) to the retailer and consumer. This overhead easily adds another $5 to $10 in cost per unit. Adding all these costs together results in games that cost the manufacturer $13 to $24 to produce. Since the manufacturer receives an average of 40%, a retail price of between $32 and $60 is required for the product to break even. You can easily see why prices are what they are and why most software companies still can't seem to make a go of it.
Ironically, software piracy hurts not only the companies whose games are pirated but all of today's honest consumers who will have fewer good titles from which to choose. In short, piracy threatens to destroy the industry, pulling down the good companies and the bad companies alike. The person who feels a game is too expensive can do what the rest of us do when faced with the same problem â vote with his wallet and not buy it. How many of us would steal a car (even with the keys in the ignition) simply because it's overpriced?
Software and its documentation are subject to copyright protection; nearly every country in the world provides this protection of "intellectual property." Without it, there would be little incentive to invest time and effort in writing games, books, movies, or music. The copyright promotes these activities by assuring those who undertake them that they will be able to reap their rewards (if any). Penalties are clear: violators are subject to fines of up to $50,000 and prison terms of up to 5 years. Since violations are a federal offense, the FBI has become increasingly involved in the enforcement of the laws.
Earlier this year, Infocom was instrumental in the formation of the Software Publishers Association (SPA). A prime concern of the SPA has been to combat piracy. We ask our consumers to help Infocom, the rest of the industry, and software consumers in general, by reporting flagrant violations of the law to us directly or to: Software Publishers Association, Suite 1200, 1111 19th Street N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036, (202) 364-0523. Please include any relevant information, such as price lists, phone numbers, and passwords, if such information is available.
We at Infocom take great pride in producing what we believe to be the finest-quality interactive fiction available on personal computers. We have always tried to create the best-value product possible, and we are grateful for the support of our consumers, whom we consider our partners in our efforts. Only with the good-faith efforts of both manufacturers and consumers can we all look forward to an exciting future for home computer software.
This article appeared in
New Zork Times, The
Jan-Mar 1985
These historical, out-of-print articles and literary works have been GNUSTOed onto InvisiClues.org for academic and research purposes.
