It feels like to me that as you purchase a PDF, the machine should start personalizing it for you, under the assumption you will download it at some point.This is a bad idea. It's not efficient because you're processing and storing files that you have no reason to process and store (ie. no one has asked for it yet). It's just unused data, sitting there taking up processor time and storage space.
I think it's a good idea, because this process could be running anytime, not just when people demand stuff. Is there not server time in the middle of the night that could be used to personalize stuff?
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Wouldn't that mean tens of thousands of copies of the CRB would need to be repersonalised and then stored each time a new printing came out? (Same with every other hardcover) as the PDF is updated?
I guess you could be given whatever version was current on purchase date and then go through the current process when you decided to update your PDF. But still - I know memory is cheap, nowadays but that seems like an awful lot of storage space to me in order to save customers a few minutes.
(Self-confessed technoramus here though. I may well be way off - I remember upgrading my computer to 48k, most of which was used up by DOS. A megabyte still seems enormous to me. :p)
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Is there not server time in the middle of the night that could be used to personalize stuff?
Paizo's customer base is global; people are downloading stuff all the time, not only during business hours in the US. I'd be mildly surprised if there's a noticeable lull just because it's the middle of the night in in the Western Hemisphere.
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Wouldn't that mean tens of thousands of copies of the CRB would need to be repersonalised and then stored each time a new printing came out? (Same with every other hardcover) as the PDF is updated?
It means you would store thousands of copies (at least one for every user that purchased a given product) of every Pathfinder book Paizo has released. I don't think it would be a matter of process time as much as it would be a matter of storing all those files on the off chance that a customer wanted to download a fresh copy of something.
I mean, weigh those file storage requirements against the 10-30 seconds it takes to personalize. That's a no-brainier to me.
-Skeld
Yeah, that's what I meant too. I don't know how much memory that is or how cheap memory is nowadays, but my impression is that it's a serious overinvestment.
Does the server regularly delete or not save personalized files?
Does the server regularly delete or not save personalized files?
I didn't think so, I thought that was the point of the personalising process (and why it takes such a long time, even if you've downloaded it once before).
I thought there was one 'master', unwatermarked copy and when you download it it first of all adds in the watermark and then gives it to you. When you lose your copy and download it a second time, my impression was that it repeated the process, not that it went back to your pre-personalised file.
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Does the server regularly delete or not save personalized files?
I would be *shocked* to find out that a personalized file is still on the paizo servers more than ~10 seconds after confirmation that the final packet was received by the user's device.
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Does the server regularly delete or not save personalized files?I didn't think so, I thought that was the point of the personalising process (and why it takes such a long time, even if you've downloaded it once before).
I thought there was one 'master', unwatermarked copy and when you download it it first of all adds in the watermark and then gives it to you. When you lose your copy and download it a second time, my impression was that it repeated the process, not that it went back to your pre-personalised file.
That's probably how it's done: a single master copy with a personalizer that adds watermarks when a user requests a download.
I'm still trying to wrap my brain around how waiting 10-30 for the personalizer to run can be considered a "long time."
-Skeld
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This is not a "feature" I have to deal with on other sites.
How does it work on other sites with a watermark? (Or is that what you mean by the 'feature'?)
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I have noticed that DriveThruRPG, Frog God Games, Legendary Games, and Kobold Press don't watermark files purchased through their sites, so there's no personalization process. That does make it more difficult on their part to fight piracy. That's a business decision by those companies that apparently made the most sense to them.
Speaking as someone who has purchased well over 200 Paizo PDFs over the years, I really don't see why/how waiting 10-30 sec for a the download is any kind of hardship.
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I downloaded AAW's Wrath of the Jotunn from DriveThruRPG last week and it watermarked my copy with my name and order number. I even had to wait for it to personalize before the download started.
Watermarks are there as a user-visible means of discouraging PDF piracy, not preventing it or really even to track down people that do upload them to torrents (although, if you uploaded a PDF with the watermark intact, you'd get your account locked, or worse).
If Paizo wanted to catch people, they'd bury the name/email/order# info internally in the header of the PDF file. When a PDF got uploaded, all they'd need to do is extract the right bytes and they'd know exactly where it came from. And... for all we know, they're already doing that.
Anyway, watermarks and personalization are part of the process. It's the way Paizo decided to go. Just because other websites don't personalize/watermark doesn't make Paizo's decision any less valid.
-Skeld
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That was a long time ago and I don't want to beat a dead horse, but "private storage" and "cloud storage" are mutually exclusive.
Do cloud storage services have clauses stating that any data they backup becomes their property? Because otherwise I imagine any use of such data outside of storage would be illegal, to say nothing of reputation destroying.
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Ye, drivethrurpg stuff does have watermarks. At least some of pdfs do.
And yeah, piracy is impossible to prevent, but discouraging anyone putting them publicly available is a good thing. Though I don't think it discourages people sharing them privately to their table, but then again I doubt Paizo expects them to avoid doing that, otherwise Archive of Nethys and PSFRD would probably get taken down. I guess PFS' "you have to own material to use it" rule does work for the business well enough.
It became a problem during the first Humble Bundle sale when the time to personalize exceeded 10 seconds for the first time. Enough of us were unsure what to do that the entire system got bogged down with failed download requests. Even though we are in the middle of another Humble Bundle sale, we do not seem to be having that problem again (plus the adjustment to the wait time in the personalizing message is definitely helping).
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DriveThru stuff has watermarks, but it also allows watermarking and downloading a batch of pdfs in one go instead of needing multiple separate personalization and download clicks. That is the feature I really wish paizo would offer -- bulk downloads. Even if it doesn't actually save on time, it'd save a ton on clicking and scrolling through a huge list of downloads.
Does the server regularly delete or not save personalized files?I would be *shocked* to find out that a personalized file is still on the paizo servers more than ~10 seconds after confirmation that the final packet was received by the user's device.
Be shocked. I think it's a day or so that personalized PDFs are stored. I've had occasions where it's more efficient to download a PDF onto my desktop and laptop instead of transferring a single download between the two. Only one personalize necessary.
That was a long time ago and I don't want to beat a dead horse, but "private storage" and "cloud storage" are mutually exclusive.Do cloud storage services have clauses stating that any data they backup becomes their property? Because otherwise I imagine any use of such data outside of storage would be illegal, to say nothing of reputation destroying.
Right. And releasing allowing user information to leak is also illegal and reputation-destroying, but it didn't stop Target or Ashley Madison, or Yahoo, or any of the other dozens of services from having their databases compromised.
My point is this: files stored on my device(s) are my responsibility to secure. Files stored on Dropbox are - by definition - shared with another entity. You're just one SQL injection or malformed URL bug away from everything you've got stored there being accessible to anyone/everyone. Sure, a malware infection could upload my PDF collection somewhere, but that requires effort, bandwidth, time, and has little purpose. Dropbox-hacking... well, they're a huge target, and the data's already prepared for download.
Okay... I see the watermarks on my DriveThru purchases now... they're on the bottom of the PDFs, not the top, and they're a lot smaller than Paizo's. Honestly, I never noticed them before!
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Right. And releasing allowing user information to leak is also illegal and reputation-destroying, but it didn't stop Target or Ashley Madison, or Yahoo, or any of the other dozens of services from having their databases compromised.
None of those are specifically based on cloud storage as their business model. And none of them intentionally used/shared user data. An incident like you're harping on is not what I was addressing.
Speaking as someone who has purchased well over 200 Paizo PDFs over the years, I really don't see why/how waiting 10-30 sec for a the download is any kind of hardship.
Well, obviously I am a big baby. But anyway I've never been able to discern what watermarking has ever done for me as a customer or as a publisher. I know seeing a watermark on an otherwise attractive piece of art looks like a blight to me.
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If you're a PFS player, and some people play PFS exclusively, you need a physical book or a PDF watermarked with your purchasing information to use the options therein. Lots of people opt for PDFs since they're much more portable.
Watermarks don't exist to serve the interests of the customer, but to serve the interest of the company. Companies do things all the time to protect their interests and that's ok.
No one's calling you a baby.
-Skeld
We aren't doing the Demon Babies bit then...
No one tells me anything!
Watermarks don't exist to serve the interests of the customer, but to serve the interest of the company. Companies do things all the time to protect their interests and that's ok.
Tripod Machine is proud to be watermark-free.
None of those are specifically based on cloud storage as their business model. And none of them intentionally used/shared user data. An incident like you're harping on is not what I was addressing.
Right. And releasing allowing user information to leak is also illegal and reputation-destroying, but it didn't stop Target or Ashley Madison, or Yahoo, or any of the other dozens of services from having their databases compromised.
So tired. If it's on the Internet, it's exposed. That's the point. The inescapable point. Cloud == other person's computer. Storing your credit card information, PDFs, sexual preferences, or nude pics on someone else's computer is a Bad Idea if you care about it.
Deliberate isn't the issue. Storage of files versus personal information isn't the issue.
Cloud is someone else's computer. And regardless of legality, unless Paizo grants you license to share your files with others, cloud storage is doing so. It's a bad idea, and against the license. Corporations function legally as living entities, so uploading your files onto their servers, you're sharing them.
I'm done. I'm being encouraged to repeat my argument - which is a side-topic at best - because people keep focusing on edge portions of it, not that it's a bad idea and - unless Paizo says otherwise - a bad idea that's against license, technically. The day Paizo decides to allow Dropbox integration or storing, it's their business to do so, and the risks fall to them. In the meantime, it's OUR responsibility to not share our files, and keep them safe. Uploading them onto ComeGetMeBigBoyImReady.com is neither.
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Tripod Machine is proud to be watermark-free.
Watermarks don't exist to serve the interests of the customer, but to serve the interest of the company. Companies do things all the time to protect their interests and that's ok.
So? What does that have to do with Paizo?
-Skeld
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Cloud is someone else's computer.Never said it wasn't.
I don't really understand what you are saying, would you restate the point (for the slow - ie me)?
As I understood Anguish, he was saying that Dropbox (or any other cloud based solution to the problem of efficiently downloading PDFs) involves you storing those PDFs on someone else's' computer. As such, you're at risk of being held accountable for something over which you have no control (whether due to negligence on their part, bad luck on their part, fraud or hacking attack by a third party). Which is a downside.
I took your initial reply to him as meaning that the risk of reputational damage and/or penalties for fraud was a mitigation of that risk. Given the difficulties of establishing how stuff got out (in the case where your PDFs did get distributed somehow) and the fact we're all minnows and unlikely to represent any kind of reputational damage, this doesn't seem much protection to me (and no protection against the actions of hackers).
Is that right? Were you saying something more than that?
I'm not a lawyer, but from my understanding, your intent when you place something onto a cloud service matters. If your intent is to share that file with others, and you do not own that file, that is a problem. If your intent is to make an online backup or for easy portability to all of your devices (assuming you have a license to do that, as is probably the case with paizo's PDFs although I can't seem to find any legalese whatsoever about your rights with the PDF...), then you're covered by fair use if not other carve-outs into US copyright law.
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I'm pretty sure there's nothing wrong with uploading your purchased PDFs to a third party cloud service. (Though I'm also not a lawyer).
That doesn't mean you face no consequences if the files find there way elsewhere. As I understand it, Anguish is making a pragmatic, risk-minimisation argument rather than a legal one.
Great, now I want a pita...
I think if Paizo doesn't want us to store files on a 3rd party cloud service (or on any other device that isn't our personal property?), they need to make that clear. Short of that, it's a common and expected way for people to store things these days and it's going to be used.
I'm sure paizo are fine with it. (Wasn't it Gary who contemplated delivery of PDFs via Dropbox in the first place?)