On Mar 5, 2013, at 11:41 AM, Gervase Markham <[email protected]> wrote:
> On 05/03/13 17:25, Kumar McMillan wrote: >> I think there is a valid use case in protecting source code when a >> merchant is selling an app. If the app can't be protected, how can >> you sell it? > > What do you mean by "protect"? This is the DeCSS fallacy - encrypting or > obfuscating something doesn't stop someone copying it. It' just as easy > to make a copy of the string "FCv46vszgrf" as it is to make a copy of > the string "Hello". I wouldn't say it's just as easy; it's a littler bit harder. However, as soon as one person figures out the hard part and publishes it, then it's just as easy. > >> And if you can't sell an app then you can't build a >> business on offering something compelling to the user. This obviously >> isn't the only business model for apps but it's one that the open web >> should support better than it does today, IMO. > > The open web should support selling apps. And we have copyright laws > (and licensing servers) which are designed, to varying degrees of > effectiveness, to stop people copying paid apps without paying. But the > best way to sell apps is to make it easier to pay for them than to > pirate them. Mozilla should not join the list of companies attempting to > make water run uphill by stopping the Internet from being the fabulously > efficient machine for copying things that it is. > > All obfuscating code does is stop people being able to read the code for > the apps they are already running and have paid for. And that's a great > shame. To a lot of people that's like buying a car and not getting the schematics to the oil pressure sensor. In other words, they won't care, they have a car and they can drive it. I agree that client side encryption/obfuscation is a hard problem and not worth our time to solve. I don't think we should prevent others from trying though. Anyway, I think the ultimate success will come from apps that sell experiences rather than source code. If the game code you copied doesn't come with the ability to play against your friend across the Internet then it may not be fun at all in the pirated version. Building online communities is intrinsic to web technology; it can already do this very well. > > Gerv _______________________________________________ dev-webapps mailing list [email protected] https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/dev-webapps
