As many of you know, Ive had a horrible time battling piracy of my Canon 40D and 50D Crash Course DVDs, as well as the others. An extremely small percentage of those who watch the DVD actually pay for them (less than half a percent). For those of you who have paid for them, I deeply appreciate it, none of this would be possible without you and it is only by your continued support I am able to do this. I feel bad even bringing it up, but if you guys knew all the crazy things that happen to me (being ripped off by customers) you would understand. Its a daily thing now…
For those of you who are illegally using torrent downloads, you just don’t know how badly this hurts my business. If you are one of these people and are benefiting from my extremely hard work without paying for it, please take this as a warning:
My programmer and I have figured out a way to locate and identify you. By the way its easy and is very similar to the way music and movie companies are tracking and finding other offenders.
If you have illegally downloaded any of my DVDs, now would be the time for you to go to my online store and purchase a legit copy. Those who have purchased a DVD from the store are completely protected (unless you are also sharing it online). If you still decide you dont want to come clean, we are just going to turn your information over to my legal team as well as the authorities (in this case the FBI if you live in the US) and they will just show up one day with a search warrant, seize your computer and find the files. Something tells me they will find more than just my videos as well. Im not kidding about this, there is a reason we have the FBI warning in the beginning of the video.
If you are one of these people who have purchased a DVD and then put it online for others to view, you are in extremely deep trouble and will be hearing from us soon. Your only chance is to immediately cease this activity. The beauty of the system is that we can only track you if you do it, if not, we cannot, which is the way it should be in the first place.
I believe that the individuals that hurt my business the most are the ones who decide to purchase a DVD and then for whatever reason decide to convert it and upload it on the internet to give away for free. If no one did this, we wouldn’t have any problems at all. If you are one of these people, you are on the TOP of my list.
Piracy is stealing, and stealing never pays off in the long run. It just isn’t worth it.
Way to go, Michael. You should get every penny you earn.
This should be written and shown on each of the DVD you produced or will be producing… Sometimes people are ignoring the FBI warning, some strong message like this will have them think twice…
I get so fired up about this kind of thing too. It just amazes me how much hard work people put into things like this…if they put the same amount of effort into working hard on something honest and a project that was their own…you wonder how different their life would be. Obviously, these type of people have a little bit of computer smart because they know how to convert things and put them on the web…why can’t they use those smarts for something good. See I told you I get fired up. I’m sorry Michael, it really is too bad because you do work so hard on these and they are so well thought out.
Very well said Michael. Thats the way it should be. I dont understand why people buy DVDs and then share it for free. If they want someone to use the knowledge, have them pay for it.
Good for you! The other day, I had someone on Flickr ask about a given photo and what action(s) I’d used. I answered, and got back an e-mail that said, "Can you send me that action?" I was surprised by how common it is for people to just give away the work of others without compensating the the creator(s). I don’t know if I was all that conscious about all this until I met you, Michael. People feel OK about stealing from big companies, but it’s not just some big, faceless THING our there. It’s people. People like you who pour their creativity and hard work into products, and they deserve to be compensated for that. Glad you’re taking a stand!
I purchased 3 DVD’s from you already and I will purchase more in the future. One may ask, "Why would you pay for this when you get it for free "? My answer is that I don’t like stealing from anyone especially when I am learning from them for a fraction of the potential cost. In your DVD’s, you take time out to talk about piracy, in fact more than once. Michael, don’t wait any more and start acting on this. I would think that most of your audience here are following you because we are learning and thus will support you. Examples need to be made and folks will reconsider once they see the unexpected outcomes. It could be a simple call to make things right again. People do things because they can get away with it. Call them out on what they are doing and they will change very quickly………. =0
I have been self employed for 20 some odd years, I have been stolen off of more than I care to think about, from employees, customers, distributors and yes… even family. I know how it feel to be ripped off it is a sickening feeling. I don’t wish it on anyone. I whole heartily agree that people who steal should be prosecuted.
I think people look at software piracy differently and it is unfortunate indeed.
I have bought every program I have of Michaels myself and have not shared them with anyone. I feel good about that!
Copying the work of other people is wrong but I would like to make a point. When you buy DVD’s you can not return them and I have bought some that simply "SUCK" and I feel I should be able to get my money back if I get such a product.
Fortunately Michael Andrew makes the best DVD’s you can get and you get at least 3 times more of what you paid!. I encourage everybody to buy his videos and keep supporting him so he can make more and more videos!, Chau, Luis.
I really appreciate everyone’s support- its only because of you guys I am able to do what I do, and in turn I will always give you my very best effort. 🙂 M
Hi Michael, I just bought a Canon 70D camera and stumbled upon your videos though you tube. I was so impressed that I bought the Crash Course for the 70D. I feel for you about people ripping you off, theft is not OK. I do think that you might want to rethink your pricing policy though … my example for you would be Apple … compared to Microsoft their prices are much more reasonable and people honor that by not downloading cracked software … I think your pricing is a little steep (without trying to undermine your undeniably excellent productions) however, if you state that less than 1% pay for your products, wouldn’t lowering the prices drastically encourage more people to buy??? I’ll admit, your advanced photography course sounds awesome, but 50 odd $ is too much for my psychological barrier for a movie download … for 20$ I would already have it on my computer … wouldn’t your profits go up if you could increase the number of customers by lowering prices and maybe getting the 1% up to 50 – 75% ? I’m not a business guru, but that’s what I would do … thank you again for an excellent product!!!!