GW IPhammer reaches China?

[eldargal]

The capitalism argument is fine, up until the point people start giving their money to criminals. Find GW to expensive? But at UK RRP on ebay. Still too expensive, try Mantic/PP/find a cheaper hobby/whatever. But giving money to criminals is still wrong.

[Wildeybeast]

This is just like the constant back and forth between the music industry and illegal downloaders. Nothing will be destroyed in the long run, but there will be refocusing on the product and what consumers are willing to pay.

Actually, the illegal download market did destory something, namely physical record sales and the high street stores that rely on them. Yes, the music industry itself survived and did respond by going to digital sales, but the stores have suffered a lot and many people have lost their jobs. Somewhere along the line, someone honest is always hurt by piracy. To to justify it under the guise of high prices or companies not meeting customer needs is simply a way to salve your guilt that you are doing something wrong by supporting criminals who don't give a stuff about the original product or supporting the industry, whether it be minatures, handbags or music.

[eldargal]

Exactly, which is what makes this such an insidious problem. People are so far removed from the victims of their decisions that they convince themselves that no one except the Big Bad Companies are being hurt, and they deserve it because anyone who has the temerity to charge more than we want to pay for things can be good.

[Rapture]

Actually, the illegal download market did destory something, namely physical record sales and the high street stores that rely on them. Yes, the music industry itself survived and did respond by going to digital sales, but the stores have suffered a lot and many people have lost their jobs. Somewhere along the line, someone honest is always hurt by piracy.

Those stores were relics of something ready to disappear completely. The people that worked there were casualties of our economic system - not piracy. Progress happens and shake-up events, like piracy, are one of the many sources its inspiration. I don't think GW will be genuinely impacted by a small string of recasts, but it will keep the company on its toes and, although it may seem contrary to the short term effect, has the potential to make them stronger.

[Wildeybeast]

What!? How can it possibly make them stronger? This is utter nonsense. There will be no point in them investing in improving their product range as other are simply ripping it off and making money from GW's investment in quality. They will have to raise prices to compensate for lost trade and will have to spend money in fruitless legal battles with pirates (though I doubt they will bother doing that in China). There are no benefits from piracy, expect for the pirates and the selfish individuals who support them, whilst honest people lose out.

[Rapture]

What!? How can it possibly make them stronger? This is utter nonsense. There will be no point in them investing in improving their product range as other are simply ripping it off and making money from GW's investment in quality. They will have to raise prices to compensate for lost trade and will have to spend money in fruitless legal battles with pirates (though I doubt they will bother doing that in China). There are no benefits from piracy, expect for the pirates and the selfish individuals who support them, whilst honest people lose out.

None of this is true. Strong businesses overcome obstacles. The company will make sacrifices to retake customer support lost to piracy. This is where the balance comes into play. GW will have to alter their practices to still meet their needs but also meet the desires of consumers at the price that they are willing to pay. GW will aim for the largest profit by projecting what prices will attract different numbers of customers (simply raising prices will likely result in collapse unless undue corporate loyalty shields them). They will either continuing to operate with a more balanced producer-consumer relationship (the imbalance of which turns large enough numbers of consumers to alternate sources of the product so that the company needs to respond) or they will fail. They will only fail if the company cannot adapt or has overextended itself to take advantage of a temporary market (like the music stores).

Piracy is essentially a market challenge. Challenges promote innovation and competitive business practices. CEOs don't like them (the GW CEO would be happy to continue doing whatever he wants to maximise profits), but the market does. GW will be strengthened because they will have to reign in their operations to meet the realistic expectations of consumers. This promotes the company's longevity.

[Wildeybeast]

Piracy is not a 'market challenge'. Falling sales, rival companies and changing technology are market challenges. Piracy is crime, which companies cannot and should not have to respond to. You are, as I have previously stated, hiding behind the mask of high prices and companies failing to respond to customer desires. The music industry responded by offering digital downloads of individual songs at very affordable prices. People still pirate and the music industry is still losing money to them. People do it because they don't give a damn about the people who produce the origianl product. GW cannot compete with pirates because they could sell their stuff at cost price and the pirates would still undercut them as they are using inferior materials and are not having to invest time and money in designing the product nor paying the people that do so.

[gendoikari87]

If you want to punish GW, don't buy from them.

The fact that tou would rather give money to criminals and then HOPE you are helping put people out of work (GW employs three thousand plus) makes me think that you are at best woefully immature and at worst, genuinely immoral.

That's what I have been doing for well over two years now. But if there is another company doing the same thing for less. Yeah I'm tempted to get back in at a REASONABLE cost. GW is not reasonable, if they were, i'd be buying from them.

Piracy is not a 'market challenge'.

In the digital realm your right, because it takes nothing to copy and past and transfer. But in physical products, it is, it takes resources to make these copies, which in turn means you essentially have another competitor that can be beaten, thus leading to competition. Perhaps illegal competition but competition that leads to innovation as competition always does.

[LordGrise]

I don't support piracy. I have not, and will not buy from them. CHS I do not consider pirates because they make models and enhancements that GW does not. But that is another thread.

Now. Having said that, I will say this. Piracy is a symptom of issues in the supply and demand system. If pirates can make better copies of a given product than the legitimate manufacturers, sell them lower, and still make enough of a profit to continue doing so, then the legitimate manufacture has issues they need to correct.

In GW's case, some of these issues they cannot correct: cost of labor, cost of equipment, and cost of materials come to mind quite quickly. But quality control issues are. I've bought very little failcast; three sets of Tau sniper drones is it. But they all had issues; one minor and easily correctible, one major and requiring significant effort on my part to fix, and one of them bad enough I contacted GW and requested replacement. Which I got, promptly and without any argument. But it shouldn't have been necessary in the first place, and is likely a significant portion of GW's overall operating costs. THAT they can correct, and I don't understand why they haven't already. Pricing imbalances is another. Fixing the things that anger and frustrate your customers would go a ways towards promoting that customer loyalty thing.

[Rapture]

Piracy is not a 'market challenge'. Falling sales, rival companies and changing technology are market challenges. Piracy is crime, which companies cannot and should not have to respond to.

Untrue and irrelevant, respectively. Crimes are a fact of doing business and are regularly (especially in the case of shrinkage) factored into budgets and business plans.

You are, as I have previously stated, hiding behind the mask of high prices and companies failing to respond to customer desires. The music industry responded by offering digital downloads of individual songs at very affordable prices. People still pirate and the music industry is still losing money to them. People do it because they don't give a damn about the people who produce the origianl product.

Hiding?

The music industry responded and stayed viable. It isn't what it once was, but maybe it should never have been what it once was. This is a question left to consumers - they have already answered. Piracy will continue. The challenge to the industry is to offer a legitimate product that consumers will favor over pirated material. The obstacles in this challenge are irrelevant. It is what it is.

People do it because they don't give a damn about the people who produce the origianl product.

Of course they don't. The people who produce the original product don't give a dam about the consumers. And why should either party care about the other? These are commercial transactions.

(Obviously a generalization, but this is true for both sides)

GW cannot compete with pirates because they could sell their stuff at cost price and the pirates would still undercut them as they are using inferior materials and are not having to invest time and money in designing the product nor paying the people that do so.

Businesses compete with every interest that is contrary to their own. The challenge of doing business is to operate in the market. The market includes criminals, regulators, and consumers that may function in opposition to the business - it is the business's job to overcome them.

Piracy is a fact that a majority of companies have to face. There is no extinguishing it. GW will figure out how to deal with it and the company (and the consumers) will be better off.