I must say, from what media coverage I've read, this law firm appears to be the worst kind of ambulance chaser. I don't know how much Atari and Codemasters are paying, but the costs to this law firm of sending out the same standard letter hundreds of time must be negligible (I imagine most of the costs are in getting hold of file-sharers' personal details so you can sue them in the first place - something which raises its own set of questionable issues, but that's another debate), and the bullying tactics of saying "pay us £300 or be sued by someone with expensive lawyers and infinitely deeper pockets than you" leaves a very sour taste. And that tactic does reflect onto the likes of Codemasters and Atari too. Do consumers want to support businesses like that?

I had little sympathy for all those claims farming companies that went bust with their "Had a fall at work? Sue your employer!" message, but at least they had something of the moral high ground in that they were helping the little guy stand up against the bigger employer. The employer at least had the resources to fight a dubious claim; most individuals don't and £300 versus the costs of defending a claim is very cleverly calculated to maximise the chances of people paying up without a fight. The £16,000 case is irrelevant because it was never defended. It sets no precedent at all, although Davenport Lyons seemingly are quite happy to overlook that fact when touting their success.

In business-to-business dealings you'd think very carefully before suing your customer because if you do, you're actually pretty unlikely to do business with them again. These filesharers might be a drop in the ocean, but surely the simple fact that they even took the time to download your product means they were a *potential* customer. Thousands of others didn't even bother to "steal" your product, so Mr Billins is a fool to argue that there's no link here. Publishers and developers should take a long hard look at the music industry and see whether suing customers there had any beneficial effect on that market - especially versus the huge amount of negative PR it produced.

Let me first say that whilst downloading media in any format be that music, video games, TV, film is illegal and cannot under law be condoned I am disgusted with a video game industry and companies such as Atari, Codemasters, Topware Interactive, Reality Pump and Techland that would seek to fine its customers for trying to download illegal copies of their games.

The article states that 25,000 people are to be issued with illegal notices and the families face £300 fines. I cannot help but think that when these 25,000 consumers and their families are fined £300, effectively labelling them as criminals and thieves, they will stop buying video games from the companies that are trying to fine them. I know I certainly would.

We are living in a day where the average video game consumer is a loyal member of multiple online communities, blogs, consumer portals and other public facing websites where great interactive communities of game fans swap stories, reviews, articles, news and lets be fair a certain amount of illegal downloaded software.

Suing these people can only lead to 25,000 irate and vocal video game fans blacklisting the video game developers and publishers that have fined their most ardent fans. This action will only lead to less sales for the offended publishers and video games developers as their irate fan base stops buying their products altogether.

These companies must find a better way to address software piracy than enforcing legal action on its own customers. These are not criminal overloads with secretive game disc copying factories hidden in underground silos. These are UK families, children, sons, daughters, school children, workers, students, customers and above all game fans.

If I may directly address Roger Billens from the law firm leading the action, Davenport Lyons, comment where he says “In the first 14 days since Topware Interactive released Dream Pinball 3D it sold 800 legitimate copies but was illegally downloaded 12,000 times. Hopefully people will think twice if they risk being taken to court,” he said.

Well Roger let’s see if Topware Interactive sell even 800 copies of the next version of Dream Pinball 3D when their 25,000 biggest fans have been forced to pay £300 in legal fine and their respective mums have stopped their weekly allowance and banned them from playing video games in the house forever.

This strategy displays in my mind extremely limited vision and to me seems similar to trying to sue drug users for injecting drugs instead of trying to convict drug dealers. If you were providing proper legal advice to your clients you would stop taking their money and provide them with a strategy of legal measures that tackle the root cause of file sharing and illegal downloads and not the consumers that buy your clients products.

If I was one of the people being fined I would make sure to go onto your favourite forums, blogs and online game communities and your file sharing networks and boycott the video game publishers that are trying to blame you for video game piracy. You the consumer should not be forced to take this abuse. You are these companies’ biggest fans, you are the kids, the low paid workers, the students, you are the technical generation, you are the video game developers and consumers of the future.

Original Article http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/Technology/Crackdown-On-Game-Downloads-Thousands-Of-UK-Households-Hit-By-Fine-From-Lawyers-Davenport-Lyons/Article/200808315082665?lpos=Technology_0" onclick="window.open ( this.href ); return false;" class="comment_url" >http://news.sky.co...ogy_0

imagine having a crimanal record for downloading a feckin Pinball game!

Now that really is criminal!

imagine having a crimanal record for downloading a feckin Pinball game!

Now that really is criminal!

Yeah at least downloading GTA has some sort of irony associated to downloading that illegally! But com on pro pinball, you should to go to jail you tasteless scumbags!

By the way very good and interesting comments above, thank you!

Imagine if retailers tried to sue their customers that steal things from their shops! What an outcry there'd be.

Oh, hang on....

So, what's the moral position on stealing a pre-owned game from a retailer?

Is that OK? I'm kind of thinking it is.

>Imagine if retailers tried to sue their customers that steal >things from their shops! What an outcry there'd be.
>Oh, hang on....

Imagine if games companies that produce games that are little more than reprogrammed copies of others work got sued, that'd be great. EA and that repackage of Crazy Taxi with Simpsons characters first....

The difference with duplicating games and stealing physical copies is that you can't claim a sales been lost and it's the same as copying someones idea and making your own rather than stealing a completed physical embodyment of their work.

This whole industry runs off nicking other peoples ideas, making their own version and then crying fowl when someone essentialy bypasses the R&D stage.

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