Article link: Bethesda Moderator Antics - Virtual Image Ignorance

In a recent thread on the official Bethsoft forums about OBSE, a mini-discussion about virtual CD/DVD images arose. Someone linked to an older thread that shows Bethesda, yet again, having both fundamental ignorance about technology and disgusting arrogance in their own flawed policies. In this thread, a user was asking for help identifying why his game was stuttering, and posted his DXDiag. Eventually, a moderator, Dogsbody, came by, and said the following.



Yes, you read that correctly. Dogsbody is refusing to help someone simply because they have a virtual drive on their computer. Again, this is another example of Bethesda incorrectly making assumptions about a tool. Virtual drives are perfectly legal. There is no proof he is using it to evade copy protection. Even if he was, as long as he is not using it to evade Bethesda's copy protection, they have no legitimate reason to refuse to help him. The thread gets worse, though, if you can believe it. After a variety of people point out the absurdity and idiocy in Dogsbody's post, he replies yet again.



Again, it doesn't matter if they are "commonly used for piracy." Also, the Shivering Isles installer does no such thing. I have both Alcohol 120% and Daemon Tools on my PC, and installed Shivering Isles with absolutely no problems. Then Dogsbody switches to a completely irrelevant argument, rambling about evading copy protection, when that has nothing to do with anything. He finishes by making a typical arbitrary and incorrect interpretation of the license. It's not over yet, though! People continue to point out the flaws in Dogsbody's reasoning, and since moderators are infallible, perfect, and not allowed to be criticized (ah, censorship is fun), Dogsbody posts one more laughably stupid post and then closed the thread.



Yeah, a moderator's posts are not open to debate, even if they are blatantly false. The license has absolutely no restrictions on what medium you use for your backup copy. The license does not say that a "suitable archival medium" means a DVD, and nothing else. Next, Dogsbody tries to retreat behind horrendous statistical knowledge (look, more ignorance) by saying that he was actually trying to help the user. Yes, he was trying to help, while stating that he refused to help someone who dared to install legal software on their computer. Of course, 20 cases of an extremely vague correlation proves absolutely nothing. It is likely that Dogsbody realized the stupidity of his previous posts (but perhaps not) and tried to backpedal his refusal to help into a tech support suggestion. Sorry, Dogsbody, but your posts are quite obviously a refusal to help a user because of an ignorant and incorrect assumption. Great business policy, as always.
---

Part Two (July 19th, 2008)

Yasgur thinks copyright infringement is theft. Courts, common sense, and the definition of the word theft say otherwise. I suppose basic knowledge of the law is too much to ask of Bethesda moderators before they start closing topics.



The above was in reference to converting meshes/textures from a Morrowind mod that likely used Morrowind assets.

If anything, it is copyright infringement. It is not theft. It never will be theft, and so, Yasgur's comment is both hilarious and sad. Perhaps the RIAA/MPAA succeeded in brainwashing him.

Wait a second... Oblivion has copy protection now? Although I've reinstalled several times I do not remember it ever asking me for a keygen or anything else of that nature. Actually, if I remember correctly, there was such a lack of copy protection on SI that people reported being able to just pass their copies around to friends since they could use the normal disk to play the game.

And the one thing which is worth questioning... Were they even running it from a virtual drive? Since playing the game with a HDD backup is supposedly "impossible" why does all this even matter?

The only copy protection customer annoyance Oblivion has is a simple DVD verification. For some unknown (and silly) reason, Shivering Isles has the infamously awful SecuROM copy protection customer annoyance, which is ultimately useless as you still have to use the original Oblivion DVD to play.

Edited your article to use quote tags for better formatting

I noticed this one on the official forums and decided to leave it alone. It made me chuckle, and slightly sad. I was disappointed to say the least.

Oh, thanks. Completely forgot about quote tags.

Hey, I just thought of sumthing!!! Windows XP is commonly used to pirate stuff and I've seen 10 or 15 people do illegal stuff with it so you guys better not come to me with any questions that's even remotely related to Windows XP. If you do, I know that you are evil pirate scum and will refuse to help you.

LHammonds

Says the person with an HTTP file retriever (commonly known on the scene as a "browser"), a piece of software used to buy drugs and violently oppose peoples' religious beliefs. I'm not listening to any of your nonsense.

Go get your fix somewhere else, hophead---and if you reply to this post, I'll report you.

hehehe. You crack me up. Oh, I'm waiting on that report yer gonna send me. I'm kinda bored at the moment if you can't tell.

It's time to take this to its logical conclusion.

All pirates are carbon-based lifeforms. Viva la robolution!

The forum moderators are not hired Bethesda employees so this doesn't really have much to do with Bethesda, but besides that I agree. Dogsbody should just have helped the guy.

Well, I assumed that Dogsbody was at least following some flawed policy that Bethesda employees had passed down to the moderators.

Although, if he was just making it up as he went along, that's even worse.

Eh. I understand what Dogsbody means, but what he means is biased. What a jerk.

I've been on very few forums (he means two) and this one's nice so far. At least I've never seen any moderator here flaunting his power y'know, Thanos style.

"No, I AM RIGHT!' *locks thread, bans, pins new topic 'Thanos FTW, No Debate'*



Even so, this guy is seen as representing Bethesda, especially if he is given officiating powers on an official forum and interpreting User License agreements. But agreed: it's no reason he can't help the guy. What a jerk.

http://www.bethsoft.com/bgsforums/index.php?showtopic=821828

More Bethsoft technological 'know how':



A PS3 emulator on the Xbox 360? I mean come on.

Not sure what's wrong with just using pseudo-tags.

Funny!

This is yet another example of Bethesda’s inane logic, thanks for the entertainment.

How insulting, I bought shivering Isles and every TES game ever.... But on my computer I simply use Daemon tools for everything and load the Iso images on my hard drive.

The virtual drive is just better all around, I use it for all of my games.

No spin up time, its just faster load times for me.

I'm doing something bad??? I really don't see how.

No, you are not. If it were illegal to make it where the game does not require the CDROM to run, places like www.gamecopyworld.com would have been taken down a LONG time ago but they have been around for years!

If you want to break the disc you bought or make a backup copy (such as making an image on your hard drive and using it) you are totally within your rights to do so.

Anyone is allowed to make backups of their software and it is not stated "how" these backups are made. A DVD-2-DVD copy is one method, a DVD-HD-Image is another.

It is just absurd to label people with Image mounting tools as pirates...just as it is absurd to label as people murderers who own weapons.

LHammonds