"Why should all the hard work of the code monkeys be for nothing because some suit completely outside the loop sees two alternatives: one labelled no DRM with lower profits, and one labelled with DRM and higher profit"

OH! so your justifying your piracy by saying that your just playing the game "so the code monkeys effort doesn't go to waste".

YOU ARE STILL A LIAR. You are lying to us, and your lying to yourself. Dont try to come off all high and mighty here. We will never believe that you pirate games "to stick it to the man". You do it because your a cheapass who doesn't pay for things he can get for free.

 "Why should all the hard work of the code monkeys be for nothing"

it doesn't go to waste since there are thousands of over people who will buy the game and play it; the ONLY way their work could go to waste is if no one plays the game.

And seeing as you are so "concerned" for the code monkeys, don't you think they deserve some kind of "thanks", like say helping covering their paychecks? By stealing those games you give NOTHING back to all the developers that worked hard on the game... sure a lot of the money you spend on the game will go to publishers and their like, but that's also the only way the developers will get their paycheck. What right do you have to play their games if you won't even do the minimal thing for them and help cover the expenses that went into making the game? That's the real waste, when their work gets exploited by pirates who don't want to give anything back... you might aswell just go to the coders, tell them "this is a good game", then backhand them and say "now make another game for me bitch"

And piracy by it's definition is illegal... ergo if it is not considered illegal then it is not piracy. the way people use software at the office for instance is 100% legal because the office paid to have the software used in the fashion

And when it comes to piracy the high majority are NOT using it as just a way of "renting" a game... and hell of a lot of the people who start like that will play the game say "eh it's ok, but not worth buying" and then keep playing it... and if you don't like DRM then just plain don't play the game... if your not willing to deal with the drm then play something else. 90% of piracy has nothing to do with DRM and most of doesn't have anything to do with "testing" a game; its just a bunch of people being cheap... hell when it comes to the 360 which is the topic of the article, their already exists methods for legally renting games to try them out, and DRM isn't even much of issue for consoles

"You want to sit there with your wallet open while they drag at your cash?"

 one of the alternatives to "not pirating" is just boycotting the game and not playing it at all. not a single penny is lost from your wallet when you choose to just NOT play the game... it still doesn't help the coders a paycheck but atleast your no long treating them like your bitch

really, the only thing worst than a pirate is one that thing he has a right to pirate, believes he is doing nothing wrong, and tries to act high and mighty about what he does... really the least they can do is stop making delusional excuses and just admit what they are doing

" Don't play their games? What a strange notion, I don't hate the content, I hate the package. Why should all the hard work of the code monkeys be for nothing because some suit completely outside the loop sees two alternatives: one labelled no DRM with lower profits, and one labelled with DRM and higher profit. And piracy is not essentially stealing, it is stealing; get atleast that much right. Taking something without compensating he-who-owns-it is theft."

You don't seem to understand the concept of a "boycott."  You see, when grown ups want to deal with corperations they don't like, they do a little thing called "boycotting."  What happens is they stop buying the products from the store they are "boycotting" and, thus, the company gets the message that they're doing something wrong.  Why?  Because it cuts into profits.

Your goal and your prefered method of obtaining your goal are so completely out of whack, so I'll talk slow and walk you through it.  When a company sees someone pirating their games, they think "how can we make sure we don't lose this possible revenue?" not "Gee, there are a lot of people that don't like the way we're doing X."  Your method of telling the companies they're doing wrong is not helpful or insightful.  It is, in fact, cutting off your nose to spite your face.  Why?  Well, when companies see they are losing potential revenue from idiots pirating they do a little thing like add measures to counteract pirating.  This is where DRM comes in.  They put in the DRM to stop you from pirating.

One of you is going to have to stop this cycle of stupidity and I'm here to tell you that the companies wont stop, because they're right and you know they're right.  People don't pirate the fight the power, they do it because they're lazy misserable punks.

Also, theft requires that property be removed.  Piracy involves copying the data, nothing is removed(except, perhaps, the DRM or other anti-piracy measures).  This is where piracy is not theft.

"Interesting that you would call the act of piracy stupid and immature, as I am certain that you have in some fashion, willing or not, been a patron of illegitimate software usage. This could be a game you personally downloaded, or the MS office software in your office. Having worked in IT, I can gaurantee you that there is not a one-to-one parity of license to installation; especially with site licenses. All of this is piracy, by definition. Not all of this is what the industry paints as piracy, however."

I don' tknow how you missed it, but the excuse "other people were doing it" didn't work in grade school and it doesn't work in real life.  Welcome to the real world.

Also, that was a piss poor redirection of attention.  I'm not the subject of investigation here.  Piracy is.

" Moreover, the act of paying for software is irrelevant to me; I make enough money to buy whatever I want, the question ultimately is what is actually worth purchasing. Piracy in this instance is magnificant because one can try before they buy and should the application in question meet expectations, one can decide if they want to purchase it. Take Sins of a Solar Empire, as an example. I knew from the get go that there was no useful DRM with it, and as such I went out of my way to purchase this from the store. The game is so-so, but I like the cut of a companies jib who tells me they trust me enough with their product not to punish me right off the starting line."

Try before you buy?  Ever hear of renting a game?  Yeah, it doesn't work for PC games, but no one's perfect.  I'd assume this is why they have these little things called "demos."  You see, you get to try the game before you buy it.  It gives you a small snippit of the game for you to understand the basics of what's going on and after your time is up you get to decide if it's worth it to buy the game.  Yay!  No underhanded dealings or anything.

"As per being reasonable, you should perhaps draw a line, mentally or what have you, between being a pawn and being reasonable. You want to sit there with your wallet open while they drag at your cash? By all means, do what tickles you, but know that they don't give two shits about you or what you think so long as you are a willing victim. Such is big business."

The funny thing about this is that EA(as an example) wont get a red cent of my money if I don't give it to them.  Did you not understand that?  Well, let me go a bit slower.

You see, there's this thing called "choice."  It's when reasonable and rational human beings decide upon a course of action and take it.  When it comes to buying something like entertainment I have the choice in what to buy.  No one is going to force me to buy an EA game if I don't want to buy it.  Thus, it is not, in any conceivable way possible for EA to drag out of me any thing I don't want to give them.

If I want a game from them I'll buy the game from them.  If I don't want to encourage their shoddy business practices or their use of DRM I wont buy the game from them.

How can I possibly be so unreasonable?