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Independent Developers Fight Piracy & Lose
An anonymous reader writes "The author of the Echelon decided to take his fight against software piracy to the next level and then threw in the towel. After someone began posting new serial numbers on a well known hacking site, the author took matters into his own hands. With version 1.0, entering a hacked serial number causes the software deleted the user's Home directory. Yes, you read it right, the software completely erases it (aka rm -rf ~). A variety of people have voiced some some strong opinions on this. While some argue that piracy is good for established companies, a few large companies are battling piracy and having limited success. Small, independent developers, however, are recognising this is a serious problem and are generally stumped by what to do about it."
Imagine the developers face when he realizes that he forgot a ! in his if statement, while testing that piece of code.
Instead of deleting the files, they should encrypt the files.
:-)))))))
The decryption key will be provided when the product is registered.
-Mike
Deleting a user's home directory is a bad idea. It's not portable. How about those poor folks running Windows 9x. They don't have proper home directories. Even the ones in WinXP are half-baked. You'd have to build in a routine that'll erase the C:\ drive for those poor saps.
Curmudgeon Gamer: Not happy
Echelon - Redifining the Meaning of BOFH (or perhaps BDFH?)
-dave
http://millionnumbers.com/ - own the number of your dreams
Reminds me of Settlers 3 - in pirated copies the iron-ore melter would only produce pigs (or vice versa - don't remember), rendering the game effectively unplayable beyond a certain point. :-)
Kind of a "trial version"
entering a hacked serial number causes the software deleted the user's Home directory.
This and is be problem could was?
Shouldn't the subject line for this story read "Independent Developer Fight Piracy & Loses it?
Dear Slashdot,
I'm an independent car manufacturer. The cars I build are licensed to be driven only by the purchaser. Sort of like the airline industry selling non-transferable, non-refundable tickets. Recently I have been losing money to transporation pirates who loan their cars to friends. They keep defeating whatever user-identifying technology I build into the cars. Based on one new car purchase per unauthorized transport, I estimate that I lose $400 billion annually to these pirates.
I've already bribed Orrin Hatch to make it illegal to drive somebody else's car. I even got Congress to spend billions of taxpayer dollars to install anti-piracy, I mean anti-terrorism cameras on every freeway overpass, to photograph people driving other people's cars, in case they're terrorists. Transportation pirates soon discovered they could simply wear a paper mask of the car owner's face. Some driver-id protestors even wear opaque, featureless masks when they drive their own cars. I've tried randomly suing people, but the shock value wore off pretty quickly and I barely recovered my legal costs. But at least I proved that I'm right.
Accepting that my business model doesn't work in today's world and going into another line of business is not an option. I don't want to face reality, I want to change the world to be the way I want it to be, regardless of the side effects. I also want everybody to be on my side and admit that I'm right. What should I do?
they are used to spending big $$$ for utter crap that only barely does what is promised.
$20 is hardly big $$$.
Funny, isn't it? People have no problem dropping $20 for a medium pizza, the actual value of which is about $1.19, and 85% of that is cheese.
Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
The X makes it sound cool.
Comment of the year
No, I think in real-world terms, the psycho would, instead, leave you alive and kill all your friends, family and acquaintances.
Any sufficiently well-organized Government is indistinguishable from bullshit.
No, it's not. It may be against your particular Terms Of Service, but it's not illegal. First off, I can't imagine any software company in the world that would object to this as long as you stick to the correct number of seats / connections / whatever. Second, try explaining that to the judge:
Them: "Your Honor, the defendant paid $39.95 to buy this sequence of digits that would allow him to use our software, but he really used that sequence."
Judge: "And he using features that he wasn't entitled to, under the terms of the correct sequence?"
Them: "No."
Judge: "Oh. So, then he sold the 'legitimate' sequence while still using the one he downloaded from Google?"
Them: "No, Your Honor. The thieving pirate went home, printed out the legitimate sequence, mailed it to the customer whose machine he illegally installed our software on, then deleted it."
Judge: "Are you on crack, or does this really make sense to you?"
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Wh47 d1d j00 541, 31337 15n't t3h r0xor5 ne m0r3???
I like the approach of IceEdit (a message editor from the old BBS days). If you registered with a hacked key, then everything appeared to work fine, but it would actually post your message backwards (ie. each line was reversed), causing great humiliation.
In Texas, that would be a yes.
ph33r teh PReDiToR [sic] !!!!!!1
have you invented a new form of trap that magically springs only on the guilty
Well, no, but I have one that springs only on the innocent.
You suspend the 10'x10'x10' stone block in the ceiling over the corridor with a Levitate. Then, when the paladin comes down the corridor with his shiny +5 Holy Avenger that Dispels Magic on the Levitate -- splat. One less paladin. The guilty thieves can walk right under, though.
If only I had a hex inverter.
Did you see the ads? This is how it works.
The alarm is installed in your car, and can detect when someone breaks in and makes a direct connection to start the engine. At this point the car uses a mobile network to relay the fact that it is being hijacked, and sends off its GPS coordinates. This information triggers a loud buzzer in a control room full of trained operators with computer monitors. The operators generally run away from the room screaming, at this point. Anyway, once the signal is sent, the alarm takes over control. First thing it does is it cuts the gas to the engine. Then it starts to flash headlights and taillights. Then it turns the car so it is now riding on two of the side wheels, just before it goes for a tailspin which infalibly lands the car upside down. Alarm locks all doors. Then gas tank gets ignited, often with a flashy explosion, and thief burns, screaming, inside the stolen car.
They claim that one thief will never hit you again.
Quem a paca cara compra, paca cara pagará.
I was getting tired of the CIA monitoring all my communications.
Ideology is for ideots.
The court tends to care a lot about intent, and :-)
if the software developer's intent can reasonably
be said to have been to cause damage to the
computers of copyright violators, then this would
be governed by any number of anti intrusion and
sabotage laws.
It wouldn't help the developer _at all_ that this
is also a clear case of vigilantism. The courts
like to maintain a monopoly on punishment
sigs are hazardous to your health