I'm not so sure this could work for PC games. You could download a few of Radioheads songs and listen to them to see if you like them, then go buy the CD. But if you gave away the whole game like MEPC what would be the incentive to get the average gamer to go buy what he already downloaded. I think if the publishers did what Stardock is doing by offering real incentives to buy the game by offering more patches and additional content, then this might work.
And with, "more patches and additinal content," you mean the patches and content that you have to download via an open internet connection - I take it that's the same internet connection which is impossible to use for an online authentication... see the hypocrisy? Btw, Bioware is offering the first expansion to MEPC for free... unfortunately fans didn't seem to realize that in the hysterical state.
Honestly, there are differences between the music industry and the pc games industry and I don't think you can compare them on every level. Take the example of Radiohead - these guys are a fairly well known group, they could without any doubt simply finance themselves, they could be totally independent if they wished to do it... or just found their own label. Even if if they earned absolutely NO money with their records, they could make enough money with merchandising and concerts. Established artists have absolutely no problem with piracy because they'll make their fair share of money anyway.
The average game developer does not have these possibilities. NO publisher or game developer can give away a brand new product for free. The costs to produce a game are much higher than the costs to produce a music album.
This change in policy could be seen as a win for fans and a loss for Bioware, but that would be too simple.
That's correct, because it is also a win for the FXP and filesharing scene. The release scene will probably be a bit pissed that they don't get a really new copy protection to crack, but that's about it.
Don't get me wrong - I value customer rights, but I despise one-sided views. People these days talk alot about working together with the fans and customers, but piracy is a problem that does not primarily concern fans and customers - it concerns the people that are neither fans nor customers. The reasons why people pirate games are manyfold - the formular "people pirate because they can" is too simple... we know that from numerous studies. Socialization and cultural influences play a role, as well as group pressure and last but not least financial aspects (among many other things). In my personal opinion it is impossible for the games industry to find models that address all these problems.
Please don't forget that the faces of piracy are manyfold, there is not just the elite release scene, the not so elite FXP scene, and end-user-piracy which usually is a synonym for p2p nowadays... piracy has more ugly sides, like street corner sales for example. There are people who make hard cash with pirated games, just think about certain Asian and Eastern European countries. These guys are not fans, they don't care about the game - they care about money... and no additional content will keep them from seeling the stuff.
When it comes to the article about the heroic aspirations of The PirateBay, I can only quote the internet:
You know, I think the media really fucked up when they called it “software piracy”. Everyone WANTS to be a pirate. If they’d called it “software faggotry” everyone would still buy all their shit.