THE BUZZ: Valve boss Gabe Newell believes piracy has nothing to do with pricing but more to with the service that is offered consumers. He told attendees of the WTIA TechNW Conference in Seattle that the best way to stop piracy is to offer a better service than the pirates do.

“One thing that we have learned is that piracy is not a pricing issue. It’s a service issue,” he said. ”The easiest way to stop piracy is not by putting antipiracy technology to work. It’s by giving those people a service that’s better than what they’re receiving from the pirates.”

“You say, ‘oh, we’re going to enter Russia’, people say, ‘you’re doomed, they’ll pirate everything in Russia’. Russia now outside of Germany is our largest continental European market. The people who are telling you that Russians pirate everything are the people who wait six months to localise their product into Russia. … So that, as far as we’re concerned, is asked and answered. It doesn’t take much in terms of providing a better service to make pirates a non-issue,” he added.

EGM’s TAKE: Piracy has always been a hotspot in PC gaming, however with the likes of Steam and now Origin those numbers may start to drop.

What do you think is the main reason for people pirating? Leave your thoughts below.