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Ask Slashdot: Copy Protection Advice For ~$10k Software?
An anonymous reader writes I'm part owner of a relatively small video editing software company. We're not yet profitable, and our stuff turned up on thePirateBay recently. Some of our potential paying customers are using it without paying, and some non-potential customers are using it without paying. Our copy protection isn't that tough to crack, and I'd rather see the developers working on the product than the DRM (I'm convinced any sufficiently desirable digital widget will get copied without authorization). Would it be insane to release a 'not for commercial use' copy that does some spying and reporting on you, along with a spy-free version for ~$10,000? I feel like that would reduce the incentive to crack the paid version, and legit businesses (In the US anyway but we're trying to sell everywhere) would generally pay and maybe we could identify some of the people using it to make money without paying us (and then sue the one with the biggest pockets). What would you do?"
you should have posted the spyware one to thepiratebay yourselves before it got cracked. Then nobody would've bothered to crack your commercial version, assuming it is indistinguishable feature-wise.
So just write the software so that it operates in "free user" mode until it finds a dongle. That would get him out of the business of maintaining two versions of the software and destroy most of the desire to crack the software. Besides which, if the dongle calls are interspersed across multiple libraries, it'll be too much of a pain in the butt to remove them all every time he updates the software.
For extra points, build in the ability to remote disable the code based upon particular dongle numbers, have the software phone home with its particular dongle id, and when you see a remotely multiplying dongle spread across the world, just disable that dongle number and reissue a replacement to the legitimate owner.
If you're going to run a software business you need to run it like a business. This isn't hardcore antipiracy. He's just making it easy for casual pirates to play with the software without broaching the reason why people will pay $10k for it.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Doing some of the processing server-side might work for some applications but not for video editing because of the immense amounts of data that would need to be uploaded.
Thats assuming you'd need to upload/download the whole works.
It would be hilarious if the app had no concept of how to create a simple .avi header each time it saved to a new file (made up example). You can't just NOP around that, and its not much bandwidth and its probably too much of a PITA for the crackers to write their own.
The only thing funnier is the support calls when your https avi header webserver is down, or when the paying $10K customer is having a momentary internet outage or firewall issue. ha ha funny.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
How about moving the code to save your work to the dongle? Encrypted, of course. People will be able to toy around, but to actually do something useful they'd need the dongle. You could even give away the software for free and sell the dongle. It will work as long as the encryption doesn't get cracked.
To the already great questions above, I would also add:
How will you feel when your product is flagged by Anti-Virus companies as malicious, and what will the impact be to your reputation?
Some of our potential paying customers are using it without paying
Exactly, how can you prove that potential paying customers are using it? I work at a rather large company and stuff is locked down. You're not going to be installing pirated versions of anything.
One example is Matlab. I pirate Matlab, I don't feel bad about it. I use it for random home projects (Especially since Simulink works with Arduino). I'm not a potential paying customer. I'd never be able to afford a seat. But I can put that on my resume and sell myself to a company. My COMPANY then buys it. That is your customer. I've even talked the powers that be to buy some additional licenses to toolkits that I taught myself to use on the pirated version. I know they have a 30 day trial but you never know when you're going to need that toolbox to experiment with.
A model I can live with is one in which a big watermark is placed over all print, and a pop up is presented occasionally to make the user aware that the copy is not licensed and how to get a license.
Years ago, before the internet was used for verification, I used software in which each copy appeared to be personalized. The company details could not be changed by the end user. Therefore the software could be loaded onto any machine, but it was not practical for another firm to use the software because all prints and interactions wold list the original firms information.
Just some ideas that might not cause the user to hate the software while still providing some incentive to pay for a product that presumable generates profit for a firm.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
I have downloaded software in the past and many times I didn't think it was worth full asking price but really wished I could give them some money for it. Unfortunately there's no way to do that right now, it's full price or nothing, and it's even worse when the item is no longer sold because you can't even pay full price for it, you're forced to download
Have you tried? I've purchased several application from small-business vendors at a discount simply by sending an email saying "I like your product, but it's value to me is $X instead of your price at $Y. Would you be willing to sell me a copy at $X?" You'd be surprised, it works. I think some companies recognize that a sale made at a discount is better than a sale lost entirely.
I have seen setups where the dongle contains a processor and code (quite a library actually) - the software then calls this dongle to perform certain critical calculations. Quite hard to hack if the algorithm is unknown...
You're the ones who are lost in space. As has been repeated many, many times: copying is not stealing. Maybe it's illegal, but if so, it's a different crime, just like vandalism is a different crime. As long as so many of you have difficulty with this basic fact, we can't move on. You refuse to see copying in any other light.
Copying is good! We all benefit from easy copying. But some of you have bought into the dream that you might create something of value yourself, and think you need copyright to protect your valuable work from exploitation. You're so afraid you might miss out on some profit you deserve, you'd strangle all creativity and ignore huge, huge savings just to prevent that possibility. Many also significantly overvalue their work, and feel that those who disagree with their valuation are just robbers, trying to lowball them. You think no one would pay if they didn't have to, that strong protections, harsh laws, and force is the only way to make it work, and that force can make it work. Yet no force can make it work. The current copyright system functions somewhat because there are lots of people who could pirate but choose not to. In other words, they didn't have to pay, but they did. They were not forced. There is another way, and it's called patronage. But you can't believe patronage could work. You believe in copyright, despite the many ways in which it is broken, but you won't give patronage a chance. You think if only we got serious and really clamped down on piracy with even harsher laws, more invasive surveillance, and harder locks, we could make copyright work. Except that can't be done. Even if all that could be put in place, it still would not stop piracy. The cloud is not a silver bullet that can fix all these problems either. There isn't anything that can. We'll all have to continue suffering with this costly, dysfunctional system.
Here on Earth, we obey the laws of nature. You cannot reasonably regulate copying. Copy protection simply does not work. Only has to be cracked once, and protection is always cracked. Software producers have been trying copy protection schemes for more than 30 years, and not one has remained uncracked, not even for long enough to wring all the value out of initial sales.
Intellectual Property is a monopolistic, selfish, and defective concept. It is "tyranny over the mind of man"