" Piracy "

Anyways if someone sells the same prints as me at a lesser price than me, then obviously I'm selling them at a price higher than they are worth, costs included. The same costs will apply to the other person as well, all other things being equal. Now since there are indeed artists who make a living in exactly the way you mentioned, by printing etc., I think that such copying and printing to the same quality is extremely unlikely as it doesn't make any sense to copy and print someone else's artwork at the same cost. In other words that example doesn't really work in reality..
Of course it does. You seem to think Profit is a dirty word. Profit is what people are in business for. Without profit there is no business.

Take this print for example

Jack Russell Gallery - Home

it's being sold by Ex-England Wicket Keeper Jack Russell at ?250 for a glicee. Original oil paintings are as much as ?20000 on his site. I know how much it costs to produce a glicee print (cost of printer, inks, paper etc) and its a lot less than ?250. But I think ?250 for a glicee by Jack Russell is a good price to pay (I am considering buying one). But I tell you now, I could make glicee prints for a lot less than ?250 and still make a healthy profit.

Just because something is digital it doesn't mean it is worth any less than something that you hold in your hand.
 
Of course it does. You seem to think Profit is a dirty word. Profit is what people are in business for. Without profit there is no business.

Take this print for example

Jack Russell Gallery - Home

it's being sold by Ex-England Wicket Keeper Jack Russell at ?250 for a glicee. Original oil paintings are as much as ?20000 on his site. I know how much it costs to produce a glicee print (cost of printer, inks, paper etc) and its a lot less than ?250. But I think ?250 for a glicee by Jack Russell is a good price to pay (I am considering buying one). But I tell you now, I could make glicee prints for a lot less than ?250 and still make a healthy profit.

Whenever did I say that? Make your profits, just don't take grand mothers and young kids to court to secure your profits.


Just because something is digital it doesn't mean it is worth any less than something that you hold in your hand.

Really don't know when I said that? Art is invaluable. It can't be measured.
 
the one way to stop piracy is to reduce the cost of softwares and games and cinemas:mad:
all new games from ea are RS999:eek:
can all of us have the ability to buy this softwares and games???
can every one spend 7K for a Xp??
in this case rockstar is very good,they reduced the game price to 499
and in case of cinemas moserbear doing great job buy selling good cinemas at only RS 35 :happy
 
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The way I see it is the companies have to make money, if you can't afford it you can't afford it and it's not as though a movie is something that everyone is entitled to watch/ its not a necessity.
 
You can't get everything as you like or the world would be utopia. But slowly but surely Kubuntu etc are certainly getting there. Maybe another 5 years who knows,
Well if I wanted everything as I liked I'd be a millionaire and hence price would not be an issue. This is not about getting what I like, but getting what is economically efficient for the market.
 
I don't think price has much effect.

I don't really know what prices are like in India but here are some UK prices (mostly from Amazon)

Vista Home Premium - ?88
Elbow's current Album for MP3 download - ?6.49
Single MP3 track - 49p
DVD movie (new releases) - ?10
Photoshop CS4 - ?546.34
Ticket to my local cinema - ?8
Football Manager for the PC - ?18

Certainly DVD's and Music are a lot cheaper than they used to be, 49p for a track that's nothing, its about the same price as a chocolate bar.

It's about what value you place on an item. You could say that ?90 for an operating system is expensive, but in real terms is it? You use it every day and it'll last you a good few years. Compare it to a pair of football boots, a pair of decent Nike footie boots will cost over ?100, you dont use them as often but people will pay the price.

People pirate films,music and games because its easy to steal them and you feel mostly guilt free when doing it.
 
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Also, I'd like to commend the studios in India for releasing their movies at reasonable prices on DVD. Compare this: a Bollywood movie, 1-2 months after release, is priced at (usually) Rs. 99. (less than $2). Comparatively, if you wish to buy an English music CD, 2-3 years after release, it will be priced Rs. 325. It's a bit silly, in my opinion.

The price reduction on movies has definitely increased sales, I think. I mean, my family buys 6-7 movies a month on DVD, nowadays! The reason they have been successful is because they have adjusted their price to the market. The average income in India cannot justify spending Rs. 325 on a music CD... which may not even be good. These movies have separate pricing schemes in the UK and US that match the average income here.

In terms of software piracy, Kev, you make the point that the expensive software is aimed towards businesses. While this is true, I give you two counterexamples: operating systems and differing international markets.

With regards to operating systems, I am pointing at Microsoft with their last release, of Windows Vista. The prices were hefty for any consumer--something like $250 for the most basic version, which had less features than Windows XP, up to something like $550 for the "Ultimate" version which was the only version which really added new features compared to XP. That is something like 60-80% of the price of computer base itself for a piece of software that you pretty much have to have to be able to collaborate effectively with about 80% of the business world. The bone I have to pick with this is that once your development is complete, you do not have any more expenses associated with your product apart from physical expenses (such as boxcovers and CD covers) and developing bugfixes. This is the difference between vodka and software--when you're making vodka, you still have to buy the ingredients, you still have to mix stuff together, you still have to wait while the mixture ferments, you have to buy the bottle, you have to bottle it, package it, etc. With software, once you've developed it, you send it to the batch-burning machine and chew on your fingernails.

With the second point, it is similar to my DVD argument earlier. If software companies adjusted their prices to international markets, it would be much better. Even in US markets, I think MS finally took a step in the right direction by offering Office Home and Student Edition for something like $80. I still think it's a tad expensive considering the market it's aimed: poor college and high school students, but it's not bad considering hardcover textbooks these days are in excess of the $140 range. Coming back to the international pricing, again, the cost of setting up a business is much lower in a country like India. There's also not tons of investment money flying around the venture capital market, so collecting enough capital to set up a small office with a couple of computers with Office/XP is no trivial job. It's even worse that purchasing volume licensing for these two pieces of software will probably far exceed the cost of the actual hardware.

The final point I have to make is that I believe Microsoft sells almost none of its popular software in India if you factor out the stuff that comes bundled with a new, branded computer. This is largely due to price. Decreasing the price would hence sell more copies than they have done in the past, and would only increase revenues. I struggle to understand why an upgrade to XP still costs upwards of $100 (and is actually equal to an upgrade to Vista Home Premium). There is surely almost $0 costs associated with that product now, and it's nothing but a slap in the face of the consumer to make such a huge profit margin.
 
That maybe so, but the UK minimum wage is nearly ?6 per hour. You can't really do a direct comparison based on the exchange rate because cost of living is so different.

Sohum

A couple of points. I purchased an OEM copy of vista shortly after it came out when I built my PC at the time (it wasn't high end by any means) and I don't recall it being anywhere near to 60% of the cost of the base unit.

Back to vodka again. You say that once Microsoft release their latest OS they have no costs other than burning it. What about developments (not all bug fixes!), what about tech support staff for you to ring? What about the actual cost of developing it in the first place. Yes with vodka you have to keep buying ingredients but your development costs are pretty much zero, you dont need a helpdesk and believe me the ingredients are pretty cheap. I've never distilled my own vodka but I have done beer. Believe me there's a big profit in making alcohol.
 
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That maybe so, but the UK minimum wage is nearly ?6 per hour. You can't really do a direct comparison based on the exchange rate because cost of living is so different.

Wasn't trying to compare. Interesting figures though.
[SIZE=+1]546.34 British pounds = 39,305.036 Indian rupees[/SIZE]

Guess I could get a Honda Scooter for that!
 
I don't really know what prices are like in India but here are some UK prices (mostly from Amazon)
Here are your comparative prices in India.

Vista Home Premium - Rs. 8688 (?121)
Elbow's current Album for MP3 download - not available, AFAIK
Single MP3 track - Rs. 45 (63p)
DVD movie (new releases) - Rs. 99 (?1.5)
Photoshop CS4 - Rs. 46,000 (?640.22)
Ticket to my local cinema - Rs. 250 (?3.5)

Can you believe that prices in India are actually higher than in the UK? For a market that is clearly not as developed and has a far lower average income? If anything, this illustrates my point perfectly that software companies are too bullheaded to adjust their prices properly.
 
Probably a new Honda Scooter would be in the region of ?2000, so you could get a used on in the UK for that too.
 
Here are your comparative prices in India.

Vista Home Premium - Rs. 8688 (?121)
Elbow's current Album for MP3 download - not available, AFAIK
Single MP3 track - Rs. 45 (63p)
DVD movie (new releases) - Rs. 99 (?1.5)
Photoshop CS4 - Rs. 46,000 (?640.22)
Ticket to my local cinema - Rs. 250 (?3.5)

Can you believe that prices in India are actually higher than in the UK? For a market that is clearly not as developed and has a far lower average income? If anything, this illustrates my point perfectly that software companies are too bullheaded to adjust their prices properly.

Only the single mp3 price makes sense to me. Do they allow you to download any single mp3 you wish? In highest quality?
 
Here are your comparative prices in India.

Vista Home Premium - Rs. 8688 (?121)
Elbow's current Album for MP3 download - not available, AFAIK
Single MP3 track - Rs. 45 (63p)
DVD movie (new releases) - Rs. 99 (?1.5)
Photoshop CS4 - Rs. 46,000 (?640.22)
Ticket to my local cinema - Rs. 250 (?3.5)

Can you believe that prices in India are actually higher than in the UK? For a market that is clearly not as developed and has a far lower average income? If anything, this illustrates my point perfectly that software companies are too bullheaded to adjust their prices properly.
Not all higher though. My prices came from Amazon which sells software and music etc pretty damn cheap. ?1.50 for a DVD, we can't get anywhere near that even for bargain bin buys. ?3.50 to go to the cinema, ahhh I remember back in the day when they used to cost that. 63p for an MP3 track, thats similar considering the biggest MP3 seller is itunes and they are famous for their 79p per track policy. Recommended retail for vista home premium in the UK is ?165.99.

Away from movies and stuff, whats the cost of a litre of petrol in india? Average UK price for a litre of unleaded petrol was 90p last month near as damn it. I'd bet it'll be half that. Yes you have a far lower average income, but cost of living will be different also. It's fairly easy for the price of bread for example to vary from country to country as its made and priced locally. But its a different kettle of fish to take a product made in one country, export it to another then sell it for far less than it cost you to make. You can't just lower the price of something because you find that some people can't afford it in a different country.
 
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