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goodbuy
Bye, have a good life

All the best

PS I have a feeling you'll be back! :P
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mrkgnao: [...] OK.
Thank you.


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Star_Ocean: Beyond having a German storefront, could changing EU commerce rules and regulations also be to blame for GOG having to restrict sales of games?
Such as?
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HypersomniacLive: Such as?
Well, since I'm from America, I haven't a clue. I just think it might not be as simple as getting rid of the German storefront. I do know Germany and Poland are both in the EU and that there may be rules in place to force businesses, no matter their country of origin, to respect the laws of other member states.
Post edited June 21, 2016 by Star_Ocean
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Star_Ocean: Well, since I'm from America, I haven't a clue. I just think it might not be as simple as getting rid of the German storefront. I do know Germany and Poland are both in the European Union and that there are probably rules in place to ensure businesses, no matter their country of origin, respect the laws of other nations.
I'm not aware of anything that could be a problem, but I'm not a lawyer.


It seems that the EU concerns itself with things like light bulbs, cable cars, condoms and curvature of cucumbers (very strange norm valid until 2009) rather than important things. All stupid things get regulated, but the strange German “youth protection laws” are not rescinded.
Anyway, good luck with all your future endeavors.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzhW20hLp6M
Post edited June 21, 2016 by Star_Ocean
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Star_Ocean: What would you have GOG do when a country demands they restrict the sale of certain games? Defy them? Take the games down for everyone?
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mrkgnao: Cavalary said all I had to say.
I have not spoken to you much, but whenever I did, you had something valid to say.

Good luck to you.

Personally I feel Gog should make you a job offer. You have made such contributions to them, you might even be able to change conceptions from within.

Perhaps a pipe dream but good luck in anything you choose to do.
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Star_Ocean: Well, since I'm from America, I haven't a clue. I just think it might not be as simple as getting rid of the German storefront. I do know Germany and Poland are both in the EU and that there may be rules in place to force businesses, no matter their country of origin, to respect the laws of other member states.
Companies have to respect the laws of the country they do business in, but more often than not laws have a ton of clauses covering a number of varying cases. One has to invest resources and money to make sure they're not breaking any of them, or implement a system that abides by all of them, so the "don't touch" route is the easiest and cheapest one to take.
Post edited June 21, 2016 by HypersomniacLive
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zeogold: I'm not sure what you expect us to do.
Boycott GOG? Yeah, not gonna work, considering that 85% of users probably haven't even touched the forum.
Complain perpetually to the staff? Already happened. It's what we've all been doing since the beginning of this place.

The best we can ever do is try to make the best of however things are.
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Cavalary: Something, anything. Beats "making the best of things as they are" aka giving in. As long as you keep complaining, it counts as something at least.
Meh, I suppose I just don't care enough. GOG is a business. They're never going to actually listen to us, they're going to try to follow the money.
I mean, I hate to be a cynic, but let's be honest here:
GOG could suddenly, out of nowhere, close down the entire forum without any warning and still turn a profit. They'd probably have a small backlash at first, but most people don't visit the forum anyway, so they'd probably lose a couple thousand that particular year and swiftly recover. It's just one small forum on a big internet, so people just move on.
A far as the other non-forum issues, I think Steam has already proved that people who support DRM-free games, no region locks, and no regional pricing are in the slim minority. Heck, I'd even venture to say that most people probably don't even know what DRM IS.

The only possible solution you could get is Cyrapxt's idea, a large, organized effort of either a mass spam or a mass boycott. The question is who would actually do it, and whether it would actually work.
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Cyraxpt: eventually they would adress this problem with "Guys please, we're working on a solution so now you can stop spammin our support"... NOPE, solution appears = spamming stops.

The only way that gog REALLY gets the message it's when it affects them.
You're basically correct. I agree, I only think GOG will do anything if it directly affects them (again, they're a business, their job is to make money), but I also agree with Fairfox. I'm not really sure if there's enough people here who'd actually be dedicated enough to DDoS support like that.
I think GOG would sooner just let the forum die altogether.
Post edited June 21, 2016 by zeogold
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zeogold:
And that's the point. GOG didn't use to be just a business. It was founded by some guys who came after a long history of "piracy" and then deciding to start selling games in ways that'd make "pirates" like themselves decide they're worth their money (look up the story of CD Projekt, there are various interviews). And then once CDP also went into development and the on-line market picked up, the sales part went international and became GOG, but it was a place with a mission of changing the industry to make it worth it for consumers who wanted something different and held hard against the current practices, so it catered to them, not to the random masses. It happened to turn a profit alongside that, but following the money wasn't the top priority. And that's how things were for some 5.5 years. Then there was a reversal, following the money became the top priority and the random masses became the target audience, with that niche demanding crowd holding the line being seen as dead weight dragging them down from their lofty goal of taking on Steam.

The problem is that they still have this cap of the ones that try to do something different, there's still the DRM-free thing, and of course with them as another significant player there's next to no room left for anyone else to start over now and try to rebuild what they threw away. They picked up this niche and blocked it while moving away from it. Which means that GOG is still the only place where good things may yet happen. But only if it'll be pretty much beaten into them. Somehow.
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Cavalary:
I'm an American. What you just described about a company starting in order to be committed to an idea, then eventually realizing that they're turning a big profit and ending up following the money is what's happened to just about any company here I can name, including ones that used to be non-profit organizations.
Again, I hate to be the cynic here, but I'm fairly used to this being the fate of every company, to become "just another business". At least GOG hasn't been bought out yet, which, personally, I'm STILL expecting might happen, although it may be some years down the road.

It's just, for lack of a better word, progress.
Is it what we want?
Well, no, it's not.
Can we stop it?
I don't know. But if you judge from history, progress (or, if you would like to be a bit more accusatory, greed) tends to be one of the most unstoppable forces there are.
Post edited June 21, 2016 by zeogold
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Cavalary:
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zeogold: I'm an American. What you just described about a company starting in order to be committed to an idea, then eventually realizing that they're turning a big profit and ending up following the money is what's happened to just about any company here I can name, including ones that used to be non-profit organizations.
Again, I hate to be the cynic here, but I'm fairly used to this being the fate of every company, to become "just another business". At least GOG hasn't been bought out yet, which, personally, I'm STILL expecting might happen, although it may be some years down the road.
But GOG always had big competition with steam and with nothing (or not much) left making GOG better than steam and given the fact that GOG is selling less and less GoG and more ands more indies) people wouldn't need GOG anymore. There is a reason why GOG is becoming more and more like steam but I think that in the end this is not the right way to attract and keep customers.
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MarkoH01: There is a reason why GOG is becoming more and more like steam but I think that in the end this is not the right way to attract and keep customers.
Probably not, no, but what are we going to do about it?
It's as the saying goes:
You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.
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zeogold: You're basically correct. I agree, I only think GOG will do anything if it directly affects them (again, they're a business, their job is to make money), but I also agree with Fairfox. I'm not really sure if there's enough people here who'd actually be dedicated enough to DDoS support like that.
I think GOG would sooner just let the forum die altogether.
People are willing to complain that "x" or "y" are leaving but they can't spend 10m of their time (each day) spamming the support? This is possible if people are willing to give it a try, we don't need an army spamming their support, use the flaw of the forum against gog, each one creates x number of accounts and spam the hell of their support.

I don't get it. I don't. "It won't work". SO WHAT? Standing still waiting for changes will? It's not that i lack the motivation to do something, it's the lack of motivation of EACH ONE OF YOU that don't want to do anything that breaks my will.

* At this point i've written some stuff, deleted, written something different and deleted again. Why? Why bother? I could create 20 different al accounts and do all the work, i could create 30 different accounts and create havok on the forum... why bother? Most of the people that i actually care about left or are less active on the forum.

Whatever, sorry for disrupting your thread mrgnao.
Post edited June 21, 2016 by Cyraxpt
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Cavalary: Something, anything. Beats "making the best of things as they are" aka giving in. As long as you keep complaining, it counts as something at least.
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zeogold: Meh, I suppose I just don't care enough. GOG is a business. They're never going to actually listen to us, they're going to try to follow the money.
I mean, I hate to be a cynic, but let's be honest here:
GOG could suddenly, out of nowhere, close down the entire forum without any warning and still turn a profit. They'd probably have a small backlash at first, but most people don't visit the forum anyway, so they'd probably lose a couple thousand that particular year and swiftly recover. It's just one small forum on a big internet, so people just move on.
A far as the other non-forum issues, I think Steam has already proved that people who support DRM-free games, no region locks, and no regional pricing are in the slim minority. Heck, I'd even venture to say that most people probably don't even know what DRM IS.

The only possible solution you could get is Cyrapxt's idea, a large, organized effort of either a mass spam or a mass boycott. The question is who would actually do it, and whether it would actually work.
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Cyraxpt: eventually they would adress this problem with "Guys please, we're working on a solution so now you can stop spammin our support"... NOPE, solution appears = spamming stops.

The only way that gog REALLY gets the message it's when it affects them.
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zeogold: You're basically correct. I agree, I only think GOG will do anything if it directly affects them (again, they're a business, their job is to make money), but I also agree with Fairfox. I'm not really sure if there's enough people here who'd actually be dedicated enough to DDoS support like that.
I think GOG would sooner just let the forum die altogether.
Some clarity required for your post.
I'm fine opening a ticket to support & the like but you say DDoS & if it's actually designed to cause problems it enters the realm of illegal. (At least in Canada & I believe the states as well...)

Anyways... now that they're charging Canadian funds to me I believe they can be held to the Consumer Code but while they were charging American funds I don't think they actually qualified as operating in Canada. Depends on what "operating in Canada" entails. Amazon does business because they're shipping items into Canada; GOG isn't actually shipping anything... I'm going "outside" Canada to their server cluster in a sense.
Course there's a few specific instances where if they violate the code I can write the advocate (you actually have to snail mail a complaint) & the advocate goes after them.
Course there's other stuff I can't afford on a personal level to ever do anything about that the Consumer Code doesn't cover. Take Steam's shitty customer service & return policy. Consumer Code doesn't really cover it; there is a law in Canada relating to a required manufacturer's 1 year warranty but I'm not sure how it'd relate to Steam's return policy & I bet I'd end up having to take them to court over return policy like has happened in other countries. However I personally will likely never have the $ to do something like that.
Makes it hard to do more then just complain to them.
CDP is also changing; witcher 3 is a good game... heck even a great game. But Witcher 1 & 2 were both edgier than the witcher 3 can be I think. They also didn't retro patch a single black person into either of the 1st games just to go with the flow....