Thanks for your thoughts everyone. :)

Maybe Linus says it best, though he's talking about free software: "I'd like some free beer." ;)

I'd prefer if people used free (as in freedom) software, and that free software was more usable with the willing assistance of the hardware manufacturers. Better yet, open source the blueprints and internal specs of all the PC and smaller device hardware available.

But that's not going to happen, probably not in any of our lifetimes. DRM isn't going anywhere, either. I can't make enough money, code or wealthy family connections to significantly affect any of the important decisions being made about these things.

If I keep waiting on the world to get better, there are a lot of fulfilling gaming experiences I'd miss in the meantime. Missing those games would matter to me more than being a purist about DRM, and how companies treat me also factors into this.

If Steam ends up changing its policy to something so bad even I'd avoid it, I'd back up every game install directory and find another way to run the games. SC Controller means no reliance on Valve is necessary (and, deep down, I think at least Gabe Newell might want it that way). Probably would give up multiplayer, but that matters less than in-person co-op with my family. Yet another migration to avoid bad policy or functionality; distro, OS, makes no difference.

There's always a way to game with Linux, so I'm not worried. Even if all the storefronts went to crap, I'd use RetroArch and stuff like OpenMW or download self-hosting games like 0AD. Still would have a lot of options even if Steam went downhill.

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Quoting: sbolokanovI think we need to agree, that we do not agree...

...I hope both sides see what they actually say.

Thanks for the concern. We just have fundamentally different ideas on how things work with DRM and there's nowhere to go from there.

Sometimes being a bit of an asshole is the only way to convince someone they're being one, but it didn't work this time.

I don't care that we don't agree, live and let live about that, seriously. But it pissed me off to have well thought-out talking points ignored, only to hear more of the same arguments when I already said they weren't convincing.

Shmerl still isn't listening and that was the last straw. Just saying it clearly so no one mistakes my position.

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Quoting: Shmerl...if you see it as aggressive... such positions simply must be firm.

I quit. Thanks for showing you don't give two shits about anybody posting here.

I'll remember that.

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Shmerl, I say this with the kindest, most honest, and honourable intentions... you're a holier-than-thou arrogant ass who doesn't properly listen to anything people say if they contradict your own opinions. Nobody likes someone who won't listen. If you're looking to make friends or change minds you won't be able to by being so aggressive about it. "DRM-Free is better because it's consumer-friendly" isn't enough of a reason for some, and acting like if we keep hearing the same talking points it will change our minds is demeaning and insults our intelligence as individuals who can make their own choices.

I was willing to have a real conversation with you *because* we're on differing sides. But no, for you, there's only "us" and "them". That's no way to live because then we can't grow past the ends of our own noses and learn nothing new. We can't humanize our opponents in our own eyes, which is important, otherwise we've reduced the "other side" as something less than human. Not to mention fighting so much fosters tensions on either side... eventually there's nothing but digging in heels, plugging ears and nothing improving between anyone.

(Presuming you're not perfectly aware of all this already and are just trolling us, I can't tell.)

Wake up.

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Shmerl, I, too, would still like direct, irrefutable proof from Feral that they're doing this for DRM reasons. Two... just... stop talking... you don't know what you're talking about and you're embarrassing yourself.

Post-purchase authentication was the original purpose of DRM in its earliest forms. Fucking around with your game's digital access, gameplay capabilities, not to mention data scraping from your machine without telling you, the more egregious DRM stuff all came later. Even Wikipedia's definition of DRM is defined as "access control".

Apparently, even Nintendo Entertainment System cartridges would make you look up things in their manuals to prove you had bought a game; I remember DOS and Windows games did that too. It was all about access control. It's still about access control, authentication, today.

Here's a funny story that shows my point: My partner rented Metal Gear Solid for the PlayStation. At one point a character in the game prompts you to look up Meryl's codec frequency on "the back of the CD case". He was mystified, did the character mean an in-game item? Something he'd missed? Turns out it was listed on the actual CD case that the game came with. (For young people who wouldn't know: video games were often rented without their original packaging or manuals.)

Ideally, the perfect DRM system only catches those who aren't legitimate buyers, but that doesn't happen. Doesn't mean I like it, but I'm sending my authentication data to Steam as permission to access my library. That's a restriction on how I can use the software, and I have to prove this to them with that email address, password and phone number, over and over, years after my initial purchase.

GOG will ask you for this access, too, repeatedly if you don't have cookies saved. How else do they create a business without some restrictions on who accesses their games? You have no online business if you don't place some restrictions on your assets.

By the definitions I've put forth so far, there isn't ANY online storefront that is effectively DRM-Free; so long as you're making a purchase and it isn't free (as in free beer). That's why the whole DRM argument is sort of pointless.

It's good that GOG aren't assholes with the DRM they've chosen, but they're just assholes in general to me, so nope. :P

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Quoting: Mountain ManI don't know the answers, but my gut feeling says that the pirates don't readily become buyers just because it hasn't been pirated yet.

According to some surveys, people who say they pirated something also paid for several digital subscription-based services, too. (ie. Netflix, Spotify etc.)

So "pirates" are increasingly looking to be regular Jos who either can't afford this additional product, or can't find it in any other form (regional restrictions, censorship, lack of publishing licenses, EOL lack of support or hosting).

Make it easier to buy than pirate and people will do it willingly, if they can afford it.

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Quoting: ShmerlDo you see Feral games on itch.io? Feral don't release their games DRM-free anywhere, not just on GOG.

*sighs* Talking to you is tiring. You're a one-trick pony that's a hairsbreadth away from sounding like a paid GOG shill.

I'll restate my point simply: Maybe GOG has things wrong with it that it could do better? That was my somewhat off-topic point and you side-stepped it. Maybe we can agree GOG is fallible, at least? No? Then we're not having a real discussion, because you're not making convincing arguments for your points, and I don't care what you have to say next if you intend to continue making the same points that keep getting refuted.

I wasn't arguing about DRM, I was arguing GOG sucks ass for what I perceive to be legitimate reasons.

But if we must talk about DRM, here goes: Every commercial enterprise (attempts to) secure its products somehow: like security guards, cameras and security tags in a physical store or registered logins associated with email addresses and/or phone numbers. Those methods are fair in my opinion. Then there's shit like Denuvo, SecuROM, RedShell [External Link], and the analytics that Canonical were sticking unto Ubuntu without their users knowing beforehand. Those methods are not fair or ethical and I try to avoid groups that have used those underhanded methods.

Steam's Steamworks DRM seems no worse than, in Linux's case, making sure that steam_api.so is running alongside the game. I consent to the data collection on my hours playing. I consent to them seeing every forum post I make. I acknowledge that I have no guarantee of privacy or security by using Steam's services. But that's just for my gaming. That isn't my bank account. It isn't information needed for employment. It isn't even really my credit card, since I use a loadable credit card for Steam that has no money on it most of the time and is useless to exploit when the last pennies are taken by the credit card company as fee for the use of that card.

Every web-facing or smartphone-connected digital storefront can be compromised and people's information leaked to third parties. GOG is no exception there, either.

I find all these risks acceptable, at least for me. That's a choice every gamer makes, whether consciously or not. I hate the concept of DRM, but something like it will always exist in the digital commercial space, whether a person believes it's an ethical system or not. Even GOG does a form of DRM, the login to the web page and the authentication of your email address are the "restrictions", despite how useless against piracy all DRM is in reality.

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Quoting: RybladeMaybe it's because JudasIscariot can be painfully arrogant and belligerant when told he's not doing things correctly.

I really hated that guy. He felt like the PR guy who drew the shortest straw and was told "just keep 'em happy, and don't directly promise anything we can't deliver on".

If he's any indicator of what the rest of the developers who want to put a Linux port of a game on GOG is like, no wonder Feral may have balked at it. Treat people a little more like intelligent beings and not just a tiny group of that need to be appeased every once in a while to keep them around. I won't kiss the foot that keeps kicking me, it's abusive. (Not implying anything about the law here, it was just a matter of self-respect.)

Even if Steam's staff don't speak directly to us as often, at least they've gone all in on Linux instead of this half-assed toe-dipping shit.

Finally, maybe Feral didn't want to work with GOG because their own newest games don't even have a Linux port? Or their client? Even itch.io has a Linux client and I'm sure their user share is miniscule for Linux in comparison to Steam *and* GOG!

If I were Feral, I'd see GOG as not being serious as a company when it comes to Linux. That's what I believe.

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I have no idea what'll happen to those games. Offsite "naughty" patches that keep the sexual content away from Steam's internal database if the devs choose to take the sexual bits down? Complete takedown? Partial takedown while letting paying users keep their digital merchandise? Refunds?

I just don't want my library to partially disappear, or anyone's, for that matter.

If images of a sexual nature really *did* cause some sort of harm as these advocates claim, we'd be living in a far darker world where no one would be free to safely walk the streets at night *or* day. (Apologies to anyone who lives in a rotten place where this may be true.) Ironically, it'd probably be a place where they couldn't protest sexual images in the first place.

There are no victims in these pictures, just imaginary depictions, same as in books (which deserve to get waved away because they're more *art* than *entertainment*. /s)

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This is pretty egregious. I still remember how difficult it was to wrangle Windows into working the way I wanted on XP and 7, and every new development I hear about now sounds more and more like Microsoft wishing they'd done what the iPhone is doing: a Store the users can't leave.

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