Piracy and Community

I just recently recieved my copy of Poser 5, which has been out for awhile now. Poser 5 shipped with new, highly-intrusive and incredibly annoying anti-piracy features. You know, “product activation.” Poser 4 didn’t have this.

On one hand I understand the anti-piracy issue perfectly, especially for Poser. Poser’s a pretty complex program with a niche market, and I seriously doubt that many people active in the Poser “community” actually have legitimate licenses to use the product. Of course, judging from the home-made materials in this community — clothing, etc — much of that community is also undersexed adolescent boys using the software to create their own porn.

The wide distribution of Poser 4, legal or otherwise, means there’s a lot of support for Poser 4, both professional and amateur. There are lots of models, tutorials, discussions, and books. All of which adds significant value to my *legal* installation.

But with Poser 5, Curious Labs put a serious dent in the Poser community for this upgrade. Despite significant improved rendering, lighting effects, user interface, and any number of other great changes, it looks like lots of people haven’t upgraded.

No doubt some were put off by the licensing requirements. (I would have been, too, if I had known about them.)

No doubt some couldn’t fulfill the licensing requirements, because they couldn’t afford a legal copy.

And probably some have put off upgrading because high-quality model developers like “DAZ”:http://www.daz3d.com aren’t developing for Poser 5 yet. Because there aren’t many Poser 5 users to buy Poser 5 models, I assume.

Is it possible the casual piracy actually helps make the product more attractive as a purchased product as well? It might have less of an effect with Microsoft Word, which has wide appeal, but with something niche like Poser, casual copying actually increases distribution and exposure of the product, which in turn increases legitimate sales. I would _think_. It would be interesting to do some studies to see where the scales tip in favor of the manufacturer relaxing piracy controls…