I almost don't care if someone who is smart enough figures out a way around
my copy protection as long as they are the only one using it. Considered it
their own particular price of admission. It is when they post the cracked
program on the internet for the whole world to download that freaks me out.
For some reason there is a distinct lack of rabidity on this subject from
this here group. The vibe I'm getting here is that generally it is hopeless
or not worth the effort to fight the piracy, so why bother.
There are big criminal fines for copyright infringement. It's a matter of
convincing the feds to make an example of just one of these jokers. Here is
what I wrote to my congressman.
Dear Representative Castle:
I am a computer software developer in Delaware and I make my living creating
copyrighted works involving computers and computer software. It is very
discouraging to see my work being distributed freely over the internet by
individuals who choose to ignore the laws regarding copyrighted material.
These individuals often justify their actions by claiming that because they
do not charge for the software, they are not subject to the restrictions of
the copyright laws of the United States.
There are now internet web sites where hundreds, if not thousands, of
copyrighted programs are available for free for the price of a few seconds
of download time. We in the software developer community do what we can to
force these sites to close, but it is often the case that the site reopens
at another address within a few days.
I hope there is something that you or I can do that will make it clear to
these individuals that it is illegal to copy and distribute copyrighted
material even if they do not charge for it. Perhaps by making a harsh
example through the criminal justice system, a message could be sent to
others who are contemplating these illegal and unethical activities.
Sincerely,
Mitchell R. Fawcett, Jr.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Aaron Ardiri [SMTP:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Tuesday, June 08, 1999 12:56 PM
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: Re: cracking site - how do we shut it down?
>
> On Tue, 8 Jun 1999, Ryan Minnig wrote:
> > You will never be able to stop people from cracking your software.
> Heck,
> > there have even been times when I had to resort to doing my own cracking
>
> > to use a 'time limited' or some sort of 'shareware internet
> registration'
> > to be able to use the full version. The long and short of it is as long
>
> > as there is software people want to use and it's more cost effective to
> > spend hours downloading (or, heaven forbid, cracking yourself) people
> > will find a way to crack it. If you don't want it cracked (very fast
> > that is) you will have to devote considerable resources to finding a way
>
> > to make it uncrackable as long as possible (i.e. long enough for you to
> > make a profit off of it). Remember there are high school and college
> > students that have many free hours to spend doing this sort of thing,
> and
> > also working people, but just with not as much free time.
> >
> > In my opinion,
> > Q. Is downloading full versions of cracked software wrong?
> > A. Probably.
>
> agreed.. how many of you have cracked desktop software?
>
> > Q. Is downloading full (trial) versions of software from the internet or
>
> > CD provided by the author/company then cracking it yourself wrong?
> > A. No. If a person/company is too lazy or stupid to think through their
>
> > copy protection ahead of time they are just looking for trouble. And
> > yes, it would be foolish to use the same scheme on multiple peices of
> > software to better code reuse (like M$ Office, OS, Bookshelf, Developer
> > studio.......)
>
> thats what i have always thought too.
>
> a) if they are smart enough to crack it.. good on em.
> b) them distributing it is wrong.
>
> > For all you software engineers out there like me. At least perform a
> > checksum on your code before you allow the OS (Palm or otherwise) to
> > execute it to stop the inexperienced hacker from NOPing or changing BEQs
>
> > to BNEs. (and yes, I know it is a little difficult to do this when not
> > in an embedded system, using someone elses OS, but if you don't, be
> > prepared for many crackers of all ages to use you software in a matter
> of
> > minutes, hours or days)
>
> but they can jump over that too. :P
>
> az.
> --
> Aaron Ardiri
> Lecturer http://www.hig.se/~ardiri/
> University-College i G�vle mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> SE 801 76 G�vle SWEDEN
> Tel: +46 26 64 87 38 Fax: +46 26 64 87 88
> Mob: +46 70 352 8192 A/H: +46 26 10 16 11
>
