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."

Comments

Open Source Worries

[scrubmuffin]

Just to swing the conversation away from what he did, to what he endured, I think that with all the people ranting and raving that software should be free, some people think that it actually is. It takes time and money to develop software. For someone like me, a small independant software developer, I spend all day every day writing software and if someone doesn't pay for it, I will have to go find a real job. I would love to rely on donations but I think that it would be awefully hard to write software out of a tent in my parents backyard. Some software is free, some isn't. Just as with music, just because you think something should be free, it doesn't make it ok to steal it.

Re:Too Far?

[Lord Kano]

I hate to break it to you but sharing is not
pirating. Your Bell Labs to Berkley analogy is broken because they agreed to share their code.

I spoke of those not to justify piracy, but to debunk the notion that it's a recent phenomenon that users want software for free.

If you pirate someones software it is theft.
Pure and simple. No amount of handwaving will
change that.

No, pirating someone's software is copyright infringement, pure and simple. Repeating that tired old mantra will not change that.

LK

Re:How about enlightened self interest (Re:Too Far

[Lord Kano]

It may feel good to pump 12 rounds into an unarmed tresspasser, but comon...

That is perfectly legal where I live.

In fact, I will most likely put 2 into an intruder before I find out if he's armed or not.

Seriously, if someone breaks into your home while you are there, you'd be a fool not to assume that he is armed and act accordingly. Don't issue warnings and threats eg "I just called the cops, you'd better leave", that will only alert the intruder to your location and the fact that you are now a threat to him. If it's within your power, incapacitate him.

LK