Obeying the law comes down to whether one feels the law is just. You don't obey laws (well I don't) just because they are laws. I obey them because I either feel they are right, or I fear the consequences of breaking them. No other reasons. To an extent I feel copyright law is well intentioned, but its now on a case…

Yes, its illegal. So? The law is virtually unenforceable, and 99% of the time can be disregarded. The law makes it illegal to pass a copy of a protected work to a friend via a USB stick. Good luck preventing two people from communicating 'protected information.'

In my mind, the question of right or wrong is far more…

Bad laws were made to be broken. When Disney releases their copyrights to the public domain, as they should have already, I'll worry about whether IP laws that can't be enforced should be followed.

We all pay taxes to fund the raids on copyright infringers and counterfeiters, the return for this was supposed to be…

"And something to keep in mind—spectatorship of watching other people play video games is still fairly new, it's not like there's a large body of research that tells what works and what doesn't."

You mean to tell me that competitive video games have only been around a decade? Or are you saying that in a century, DOTA bars will be a thing?

You do know that football isn't the same sport as it was a century ago. And people have been having "video game competitions" since before pinball.

Can't you just accept that…

I was just thinking this as I passed a bunch of drunks coming out of all the e-sports bars during the superdotabowl.

Of course they inform you of the possibility - less work on their end if you don't do the chargeback, but how often have they followed through?

As long as they are paying for its production out of their own pockets or informed investors, they can do whatever they want. But we are still free to mock their idea for trying to make a streaming Nick-Arcade-ish game-show that thinks eliminating contestants is somehow a novel concept. After all, when they hit the…

You've never heard of Starcade? Video Power? Or the illustrious Nick Arcade?

I rest my case. Its niche.

Wait, I'm confused. I thought you were being the patronizing expert. I'm being the skeptical naysayer who is only expert in realizing that 99% of so-called "great ideas" never pan out and fanboyish wishful thinking isn't going to make it so. The vast swathes of humanity don't give a shit about somebody they don't know…

"Yeah, the majority of people watching professional sports are themselves professional athletes."
I never said that. But most people have indeed thrown a ball or played a sports game in childhood.

Ok, you're probably right. I'll just sit back and wait for this to work out the way you say it will.

"Like how much do you think video games cost to make?"

$60,000 a year covers the salary of one mediocre programmer, if that, let alone infrastructure costs to run a server and pay for bandwidth and advertising. But I'm…

Yeah, I got relaxed and let it hold onto my credit card a while ago. Reading this inspired me to go and erase it. I can just re-enter it when I need to add credits again.

But that's all beside the point. The bigger, more fundamental problem here is that the PlayStation Network doesn't have two-step verification—a security method that lets you use an e-mail address or phone as an extra form of protection from account theft—which in 2015 is just unacceptable. Xbox Live has it. Steam has…

I look at rationalizations like this and all I can say is wow, its cute that you actually believe what you are saying.

No, they don't need to make billions of dollars - they need to be able to cover their production costs. I'll leave it as an exercise to you to figure out what those probably look like. My personal…

Its a video game version of most extreme elimination challenge. Which is sort of a cult game show to begin with. I suspect this will have an even smaller following.

There's a big difference between football, which almost everyone is exposed to in childhood and at least understands, and DOTA, which is a niche hobby even among 'gamers' around which most people have no desire to invest in learning the game unless they intended to play it.

Those millions of people watch because they also can play. People who don't play DOTA don't watch DOTA.

Look, I get what you are trying to say, but I told you, if you are a public figure, the only thing protecting you from being fired is your employers good will. You can't force your employer to have good will by saying - oh, I only said it in a game of Call of Duty - I was only doing inane things *with your company…

As a man I despise these shows, they embarrass me - they demonstrate that everyone of my sex is a blundering idiot with no hope of anything more than having their boneheaded foibles humored by their family that secretly wishes they had better.