Cracks in figures

[Urs]

A few ramblings back, if I may

If you can afford a computer that runs ACE, you can afford ACE. That's why ACE is such a great example.

The problem of the wealth divide is nothing that u-he can tackle, nor can we be held responsible for it. We try to contribute by our freeware offerings, but we don't have the means to run a model of "fair price by income/country/status".

Back to ACE, I've posted a graph on page 2 that shows how obvious people who use cracks can suddenly afford it once it stops working. We can determine that for 1300 people who click the link, 100 are buying. Others may be pissed off, or they move to something else, or they buy another day or they're simply too poor indeed. We don't know. But we do know that by very conservative thinking, 7% of warez users can afford to buy there and then. In this we have left out the other time bombs, we only look at ACE day as a strikingly enlightning example - it's not even power users we're hitting, it includes casual users.

So the true question is, lo and behold, what size is the "warez market" compared to actual buyers? If the warez market is the same size as actual buyers, i.e. if for every copy sold there is one warezed copy, then we're losing 7% of sales, based on a conservative estimate. I hope we can all agree on this.

Now... can we determine the scale of the warez market? Not entirely. But some warez sites have download counters. So, for a fraction of the "market" we can compare warezed download figures to our own downloads. So we use the conservative total of downloads, divided by our own demo downloads and multiply that with our sales times 7%. This would give us a totally valid estimate of lost sales per such warez site.

I hope you can follow.

I also hope you see that with all reasoning, I'm scared and convinced that even the conservative estimate - it truely is such - would unveil a giant, jaw-dropping loss.

[Urs]

Sorry, one mistake in my ramblings - those 100 sales are per clicks of 4 years, not just one. So if we disregard the growth of popularity of u-he as a brand over the past few years, we need to assume a rough 2% conversion rate instead of 7%. I'll give that to the sceptics, but I'm still scared that even 2% amounts to an enormous sum if we follow through with this model. I thnk we once figured that the ratio of demo downloads to sales is in the same vicinity. Goes to show...

[kinwie]

Now,if we transpose what you say from another pov :

I dont play tennis as a pro. But I pay to rent a tennis court, and I did not steal my racket. I read a lot, but I'm not an editor. And I pay my books. People have a lot of leisure and hobbyes and do pay for that. Because people work to offer them good conditions to practise whatever sport/hobbye they like. When you go to the swimming pool you're not expecting dead fish in the pool because employees have been fired because the swimming pool has been pirated.

Lets face the simple truth : some people do pi_ate everything because it's possible ( aka digital) and supposed to be easy. Thats just that.

Should they think a bit more about it, and try to match whatever moral standards they show in other aspects of their lives, I think most of them would not use w_rez. Its also a matter of education, share true information, spreading the word, try to raise a bit people consciousness.

Wise!!
That's the action we should do as plugin user to involving in support for our favorite developers

...waiting for podolski aax32 win...tick-tock-tick-tock

[chk071]

Thanks for the insights Urs, very interesting numbers. I'm still not totally convinced about the "lost sales" thing though. I've seen people with several TB sized harddrives in their computer, full of movies and music. I have my doubts that they would have bought all that stuff, if they hadn't downloaded it illegally. Thing is, sometimes these people download because they can. I bet they haven't watched and listened to 50 % of the stuff...

That said, of course you cannot know, so you have to calculate in disregard of such consideration. Which doesn't pay the thing full justice imo and doesn't help to understand the warez scene.

[Urs]

Thanks for the insights Urs, very interesting numbers. I'm still not totally convinced about the "lost sales" thing though. I've seen people with several TB sized harddrives in their computer, full of movies and music. I have my doubts that they would have bought all that stuff, if they hadn't downloaded it illegally. Thing is, sometimes these people download because they can. I bet they haven't watched and listened to 50 % of the stuff...

That said, of course you cannot know, so you have to calculate in disregard of such consideration. Which doesn't pay the thing full justice imo and doesn't help to understand the warez scene.

I absolutely agree. In my simplified typologie of the players in the piracy scheme, these are "collectors". They're like big vacuum cleaners - but not just. I've known many of those in the past. They're the librarians of the underground, but most I've known are also prone to notoriously brag about their treasures. They tell other people what's on and what's hot, and they gain a lot of social recognition by mercifully equipping their aquaintances with only-the-best of their collection. In other words, "collectors" are like human torrent trackers. If you know a collector, you can be sure that he'll pump your harddrive full of whatever you want, as long as you express your eternal gratitude to them.

I'm very sure that collectors won't buy ever. But their aquaintances would

[Dominus]

Just reposting this, in case you missed it:

However, some of our timebombs are really friendly. They just display a black hole on the UI or so. This means, the users can still bounce their tracks.

We have to yet decide if we also want to impose more "demo restrictions" that work on the audio. While I think this is less friendly, it may increase our revenue from cracks dramatically.

We've been discussing the use of "honeypots" for crackers to turn piracy into a marketing instrument. There's a great potential there, but it requires a way of thinking that's "not me". I'd much rather see piracy go away completely.

I'd say if you can make something go out of tune randomly, that would be enough to make people that are actually using the crack in production decide to buy it. That'd work well for both instruments and effects. If there's any false positives, it could be straightened out without too much screaming on the owner's part, as opposed to volume spikes or random noises/voices.

The levels of arguments are quite extraordinary. While we condemn piracy, "perfect copy protection" is only good if every company uses it.

From what I understand, iLok 2 hasn't been cracked, but we saw what happens when everyone uses it and it screws up. I have yet to see any plugin that's protected by iLok that I'd have to own. I do have a few on my iLok, but I use them less and less (I think I used one of them twice this year, in fact), and the only thing stopping me from selling them is that I'd have to give Pace money to do so, and I'd rather not give them another dime. I've mentioned your methods of copy protection many times on those iLok complaint threads, even though I don't own any of your plugins. (I haven't messed with electronic music in quite a long time, but Satin does look promising. If you ever came out with a Guitar effects plugin, I think you'd have me as a customer then. )

Some say, if our stuff wasn't cracked, people would use other stuff. They argue, one can't afford "not to be cracked" as long as others are cracked easily. Of course, this is taken with a large grain of salt.

It's controversial. By nature.

The thing is though, there's always "other stuff". There's so much freeware out there that you don't really need to pay for software anymore. Of course, there's no need to steal the stuff that you can't afford either.

I commend you for the way you're handling it though. You can stick it to the pirates without scaring off potential customers. I think that may be the most important thing.



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As far as the 7%, that seems like a low number, but could be realistic. I've met a few people that brag about the stuff they have that didn't pay for it. Whether or not they know what they're doing, I couldn't say, but they could pay for at least some of it.

[The_Hidden_Goose]

I think when some warez users end up taking their hobby seriously, they end up wanting the developers of their favourite tools to still be there in 2 years time and making more great tools for them.

Most warez users probably never really take that step up. That's not to say they dont' make money with it, and that's not fair on any level.

I started many years ago using a mix of freeware and warezed stuff (confession!). Now I don't think there's any pirate software on my computer at all (I might've installed some non-music utility for a specific purpose and then wiped it when done, to avoid paying loads for a tiny little one-use thing). But certainly all my music software is legit now, and I feel better for it - more secure in that support is there if needed, more secure in that the developers are less likely to give up the ghost, and ultimately feel less guilty. It's also given me more focus rather than, as others have mentioned, having a screenful of plugins - none of which I had come anywhere near to mastering.

There are always going to be a fair amount of people who don't suffer from guilt at all, however. I suspect these are the ones that would never buy it, even if it was $5.

I must add that I've never had a pirated ACE, so my buying of that wasn't through ACE-day. The demo is plenty good enough for anyone to get to grips with it. And the price is, frankly, a steal as it is - especially considering what you get for your money.

[carrieres]

Thanks for the insights Urs, very interesting numbers. I'm still not totally convinced about the "lost sales" thing though. I've seen people with several TB sized harddrives in their computer, full of movies and music. I have my doubts that they would have bought all that stuff, if they hadn't downloaded it illegally. Thing is, sometimes these people download because they can. I bet they haven't watched and listened to 50 % of the stuff...

+1

[Urs]

Hi Dominus,

Yes, saw it, but hadn't had an immediate reply

I don't think iLok is perfect at all. Being "uncracked" is not the only attribute that makes a protection "perfect" - it's also acceptance, cost and "un-user-punishment-ness"

As for the way we react on a crack, we have tried various strategies and we think what we do is quite good - we just might have to do it more often

- Urs

[tanabarbier]

Interesting thread indeed.

There is something I allways say when I speak with crack addicts (I'd say that about 101% of the students of audio engineering that study where I teach use cracked software), and that to me is a good argument.
At least I feel that they "get it" in a "deeper" level, they understand why it is important. That argument is very much alike psycoanalysis. If you don't pay for your weekly sesion, you don't involve yourself in it, and so you won't have any good results out of it. (OK I don't want to start a debate about the need of it or not, or whatever, it just is more true than the opposite)

I explain them that if they want to learn, they better buy one 20 $ plugin and take 4 month to learn it inside out, and then go to the next from there. And they get it. They also really couldn't care less about something than about it "being wrong", and they look actualy defensive whem I say that it is "not that cool", when you think about the developper.

Basicaly what I am trying to say, is that the message seems (in my opinion) to pass better when you explain what they have to gain, and not why it is bad from a society-point-of-view.

Also I feel bad beause in class we use Bazille, TYRELL and Zebralette a lot, and right after I see that allmost all of them use a cracked Zebra...DAMN

Well, thank you URS for your view on things, your work and everything. The way I see it you are 400% right about everything.

[Zombie Queen]

I'd say if you can make something go out of tune randomly, that would be enough to make people that are actually using the crack in production decide to buy it.

And I'd say people would start to rumor that it's buggy or something. U-he has excellent reputation, at least at KVR, there's much too loose on pushing this harder. I think Urs' policy of gently tapping people in the right direction is a wise one. It's only sad to hear they ain't making decent money, this could only mean that nobody in this business is.

[Urs]

It's only sad to hear they ain't making decent money, this could only mean that nobody in this business is.

No worries, nothing to complain about. Our revenues are pretty decent. Among cost for employees, advertisement, office and taxes is still enough dough left to keep us happy.

[arakula]

Dunno. It's not like anything too private was discussed. They're mostly from Japan, they use Vsthost and OllyDbg to crack

Intriguing. I never thought of my host as an instrument in a cracker's toolbox...

[Tricky-Loops]

Dunno. It's not like anything too private was discussed. They're mostly from Japan, they use Vsthost and OllyDbg to crack

Intriguing. I never thought of my host as an instrument in a cracker's toolbox...

You should implement a time bomb that goes up when crackers use VSTHost...

[arakula]

Dunno. It's not like anything too private was discussed. They're mostly from Japan, they use Vsthost and OllyDbg to crack

Intriguing. I never thought of my host as an instrument in a cracker's toolbox...

You should implement a time bomb that goes up when crackers use VSTHost...

What, and shoot my own PC whenever I debug VSTHost?