Ah, first we saw the controversy over software piracy, with public video of CD raids. Then there was music, as the RIAA sued anyone whistling more than three bars of their favorite tune. Now, things are getting ugly, as we turn to game makers suing slackers. When will the madness end?

I’d suggest the first step in ending the madness is understanding that piracy, if managed correctly, is actually free marketing.

Let’s consider software.  In my early days at VMware, we faced a choice: spend significant engineering cycles building a more complex license key mechanism, in an effort to deter piracy, or use the time more productively elsewhere.

Having cut my product management teeth at Netscape, I was a staunch proponent of “elsewhere”.  After all, we wanted more people to use and find out about VMware.  Large companies would always pay us – and for them, the licensing mechanism was more an audit and liability tool. If, on the margin, we faced a choice between an individual user choosing to experiment for free with our workstation product or gaining the $100 in revenue but losing another 5 potential trialists… any marketer will tell you to sacrifice the money.

[How much does marketing spend trying to convince people to try the product and act as an evangelist for it? How many affinity programs do we set up? And yet we’re willing to burn more engineering resources stopping people from trying the product via licensing schemes…?]

Which brings us to today’s stupid marketing entry, courtesy of my field researcher, the blonde bombshell, who has no time to spend on gaming (but nonetheless found this). 

Seems a pair of bright young slackers, who had far too much time to kill working at their office jobs, created an online version of the popular game, Scrabble.

Not being marketers, they named it “Scrabulous” (rhymes with scaberous), but nonetheless attracted a sufficient online following that they were soon making $25k per month just on the online ads shown on the site.

Sadly, Hasbro, who had just licensed the game rights to RealNetworks and Electronic Arts, does not think that piracy is good marketing.

Hasbro has moved to shut Scrabulous down.

What idiocy.

Marketers at Hasbro, cast off your chains.  Call Scrabulous. Make them an offer: for 95% of the equity, they can keep their $25k / month, and be an officially licensed site too (player #3). 

Then embed cross-sales of Hasbro products into the site, as well as information collection – and then sell off shares to AOL, Yahoo, and any other portal desperate for that community. (Heck, I’m betting RealNetworks would pay a few million for the site!)

Which brings us to the moral of today’s story: Again, a (single) pirate is an evangelist. An evangelist is someone marketing for you. For free. Ergo: Piracy = good marketing.

With that, good day to all, I’m off to play some Scrabulous.

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