Slashdot Mirror
SunnComm - Bomb or DRM Success Story?
pacopico writes "The Register has one of best tech feature stories done in a long time on SunnComm - the infamous Shift key problem DRM makers. The story charts the awesome path SunnComm took from being an Elvis impersonator company eventually to creating CD protection technology almost out of thin air. Great read!"
You gave us how much money to make a DRM technology that's able to be over-ridden with a single key press?
Well thank ya, thank ya very much
Sincerely,
SunnComm
LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, SUNNCOMM HAS LEFT THE BUILDING
Of Parasites taken over by Parasites- and searching for a business plan *after* creating the business and selling stock. Amazing that they were allowed to survive at all.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
for getting them to respond to this. . .
.com of technology type investing.
what's scary though is that it's things like this that scare ppl from any sort of
As a shareholder, I'd be mad too to find out you can defeat the copy protection by holding down the shift key. That's ABSURD!
Does it come with a shift-key?
This sig is a test. If this had been an actual sig, you would be reading something quite a bit wittier than this now.
Maybe their plan for downtime reads like this:
In the event of a slashdotting, the plan is to take down the servers.
It's amazing how apt Leia's "the more you tighten your grip..." prediction is coming true for DRM: That DRM systems don't work.
Jacobs' theory that the complaining Internet posters are motivated by making money from shorting SunnComm's stock is nonsense - it's very difficult to sell "short" (i.e. bet that a share goes down) when the share is obscure and rarely traded.
A professional trader *might* be able to find someone willing to go "long" (take the other side of the bet) but it's pretty unlikely. Joe Public has no chance.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
This business doesn't seem to have any idea as to what it really wants to do. The CEO seems like the type of person that could be easily influenced by his surroundings.
*CEO walking down street*
"Hmm... I think I'll have a hot dog. Aren't they also called tube steaks? Steak! Maybe I'll run a steak restaurant. I'll need meat. But I need a butcher to cut it. Butcher shop..."
This guy just doesn't have any focus. If he just stuck to one plan and worked at it, he'd actually have a legitimate business rather than a mirage.
How on earth does a business that lives off shams stay afloat for so long?!?
Live forever, or die trying.
Did anyone else get the picture of a bunch of elvis impersonators standing around a board room coming up with the idea of shift key drm.
given that I'm listening to a mp3 rip of Velvet Revolver right now...
"Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel." - A.B.
CD protection technology almost out of thin air...
From whom does this "protection" "protect" the CD?
And they are not happy.
I don't know what American libel laws are like, but here in Britain, what was said about the Register's journalistic practices would, if unprovable, cause SunnComm some trouble...
'Its funny. No one in the legitimate news community would touch the OurStreet dirt package with a 10-foot pole. Theyve been trying to find such a dupe for a year. Our Oregon friend from OurStreet must be jumping up and down with glee that finally he found his "patsy."'
' Mr. Vance proceeded to mischaracterize the source purposely in the article even after being told otherwise. In other words, Mr. Vance purposely made a decision to carry the water for OurStreet.Com even after knowing of the possibility that his source had lied to him about his standing.'
'he didnt bother to fact-check his single main source'
Needless to say, from a regular reader of the Register's perspective, these allegations seem extreme. However, I must say, the SunnComm director is very reassuring: "SunnComm is NOT a get rich quick scheme" - a Nigerian friend of mine told me the same thing the other week.
I have yet to find any DRM which (even on Windows!) can circumvent the following:
1. Turn off auto-run on all CD drives.
2. While the computer is off, put in a CD in the drive.
3. Upon boot, retrieve the music you paid for using a program like EAC.
Most DRM relies on #1 to begin with.
Now once Longhorn comes about, that's a different story (for Windows users).
Small potatoes make the steak look bigger.
A typical comment on reverse mergers: "It's a perfect setup for a 'pump and dump' stock scam. Take a stock that has been trading for pennies, merge it into a business that has at least the facade of respectability and a presence in a market that is perceived as hot, hype like hell, sell off as many of your shares as possible, and make a run for the border before the price drops like a rock. There have been enough of these to give the whole approach a dubious aura."
A reverse merger, unlike an initial public offering, doesn't raise any money for the company. It costs money, and at the end, you have a publicly traded stock nobody cares about. Which you then have to hype. So they are an inherently suspicious transaction.
Here's an example of a reverse merger involving a company claiming to be engaged in gold mining, biotech, and casino gambling. Reverse mergers tend to be at that level of flakeyness.
Um...didn't Harvey Keitel come into Pulp Fiction to hide the bodies and help the gangsters get away with the loot?
Yes, but the article is 5 pages long. Do you really expect the average slashdotter to get through the first 2 paragraphs.
Well it breaks down like this for my store example, milelage may vary depending on industry and size.
The stores do generate revenue through selling inventory. It's not clearing the shelves, but every day a certain amount of goods are sold, and the money first goes to the employee salaries, 'cause without them we might as well pack up now.
Now if you have no product, you'd have to get outside investment (read: suckers) to keep you afloat. Or you buy/sell parts of businesses.
The really big reason why the creditors don't ram your door down probably comes down to the managers negotiation skills, and power relationships.
The owner/manager I worked for had a heck of a sharp tongue and could deal with all sorts of angry collections people, if he decided to actually take their calls through the secretary filter. Small suppliers need every account they can get and he really takes advantage of their lack of power
Okay fine, if you want, you can bring in the lawyers. But that'll take months to go through the courts, and alot of times the wholesaler just doesn't want to bother and will settle for a fraction of the bill. The business has had time to save up some cash to pay off a settlement so it's clear then.
Now, if you're a large important supplier with hot products, say, Nike, you'll always get paid. Power, again.
This is probably why collection agencies are actually very useful to wholesalers, having 20 suppliers bound to not ship things to you if you get too far behind on the payments gathers up some negotiation power back to the suppliers.
Peter, we the countless masses love your stupendously powerful DRM! We cannot help but spontaneously comment on your awesomeness and the fantastic potential of your company!
Here's to double digit (cents) per share by the end of the year!
Go team go!
Don't forget that Sunncomm also changed their ticker symbol. When the Princeton student lawsuit was filed, their ticker symbol was STEH. Since then, they've changed their symbol to the more appropriate SCMI.
If you don't get it, pronounce it.
But why is the rum gone?
Mod parent up.
Couldn't have said it better myself. If your responsibility is to make money, by hook or by crook, you're living a perverted form of capitalism. Capitalism is supposed to reward people for innovating and producing--not to reward people who pretend to produce and do it well. If your real goal is innovation, you will make your money.
Check out their report on Macrovision CDS-300 version 7 beta.
Your mileage may vary, but mine is constant.
That's what scares me the most about "business" anymore. It's no longer about wanting to run an organization, create or sell a compelling product. It's all about finding and using gimmicks to ultimately make yourself wealthy, whether those gimmicks are patents, copyrights, or semi-fraudulent business practices.
I think a lot of our economy is built this way, and I think that it's largely what they've been teaching in business schools -- outsource everything but your core marketing staff. It makes you a more "pure" businessman.
So if you live in a country where it's legal to torture and murder certain people, and your employer tells you to do so, would you do it? Sounds like you would.
Legal doesn't mean ethical.
I don't care what someone's "job" is, if their job requires them to do something unethical, then their only way of not being complete scum is to resign their job. The investors would be better off losing their money, so they'll learn not to invest in stupid scams again. Rewarding this behavior does not result in a healthy society.
They made a fortune peddling their snake oil resulting from a minimal software development investment. If they don't lose it all in class action suits I'd consider it a success (for them).
Here it is:
Important Notice to Sunncomm Shareholders and Prospective Shareholders
SunnComm International, Inc. is a Phoenix, AZ company whose stock is publicly traded in the Over-the-Counter (OTC) market under the symbol SCMI. Our 4-year old company is currently in the development stage of its life cycle and, to date, has only just begun earning revenues from sales of its CD copy magement products.
It is the intention of management to remain a non-reporting company listed on the "The Pink Sheets" until such time as the company reports significant sales of its technology. It is within the corporation's legal rights to elect this option. However, this means that you, the investor or interest-holder, will not be afforded public access to regular company audits and therefore you must solely rely on the company's press releases, news stories, or other publicly available information.
Not having access to audit detail or other significant reporting dynamics can put SunnComm shareholders or interest-holders, at a significant disadvantage from a risk standpoint. Due to SunnComm's current, legal, non-disclosure status, your investment in SunnComm may carry with it an even higher degree of risk than that of other publicly traded companies which are currently fully reporting.
Because of our non-reporting status, SunnComm's management feels you need to understand these very important facts prior to making a decision to invest in the company's shares, and you should also be totally aware that you run the risk of losing your entire investment should you make the decision to purchaseshares in SunnComm.
If you have additinal questions regarding this notice or anything you may read on SunnComm's website, we urge you to contact the company directly.
Thank you for giving me this moment of your time. Please click the button below to acknowledge reading the above and to access The SunnComm Website.
Thanks for stopping by,
[signed by Peter H. Jacobs]
There is an html form button below that reads "I have read the above statement, take me to SunnComm International".
In other words, you will believe what we tell you and if you buy our stock, tough noogies!
But why is the rum gone?
Hey - does anyone know whatever happened to the rumor about Philips twisting arms over the use of the "CD-ROM" logo. I remember hearing that Philips had invented the CD and companies had to pay to put that little icon on the jewel case that says "CD-ROM". Philips was supposed to be looking in to not allowing people to put that logo on their CD if it was copy protected in a certain way, since the CD no longer complied to the spec. Anyone know anything about this?
"Speculators may do no harm as bubbles on a steady stream of enterprise. But the position is serious when enterprise becomes the bubble on a whirlpool of speculation." - John Keynes (1936)
(although he meant that in a macroeconomic sense and this is the case of one company, I think it's still apt.)