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Ask Slashdot: What Is a Reasonable Way To Deter Piracy?
An anonymous reader writes "I'm an indie developer about to release a small ($5 — $10 range) utility for graphic designers. I'd like to employ at least a basic deterrent to pirates, but with the recent SimCity disaster, I'm wondering: what is a reasonable way to deter piracy without ruining things for legitimate users? A simple serial number? Online activation? Encrypted binaries? Please share your thoughts."
You could choose to provide life-long updates for those that buy the tool. At least that made me pay for several programs.
The biggest thing you should worry about is not customers ripping off your product, but shovelware firms rebadging your product and stealing your market with their superior ability to reach the customer.
Serial number. "Call home" only on new install to check the serial.
One side wants information to be free, the otherside wants market forcesto prevail. Eitherway you lose as the price will be $0
Just don't. The people who want to pirate will, no matter what you do. Any DRM would only inconvenience legitimate customers. Just make it easy to buy your software for people who want to do so, and provide something worthwhile for the money (e.g. answer support questions, respond to bug reports, etc.)
Proud member of the Ferengi Socialist Party.
Whatever you do, man, make it easy for people doing reinstalls to preserve the install key. A lot of times we redo a computer for a customer and we can't put back some software because there's no way to get the key. Something like an online system where you enter your e-mail address or something to re-register could be nice in those cases, assuming the worst case that whatever stored the registration was deleted.
Don't require online connectivity to run once registered though, that's just asking for trouble.
You can divide people into 3 categories: those that WILL buy it, even if they could pirate it, those that might pirate it or might buy it, and those that will not use it at all if they can't pirate it. The second group of people is going to be the only ones that you might convert from pirates to customers by imposing DRM and that group might be quite small. Don't screw over the first group with overintrusive DRM.
Enlighten us. How should this indie developer release his $5 app the right way?
Seriously. Don't. If your program is any good, people will pirate it. Actually even if your program is terrible people will pirate it, just because they can. And they can, no matter what steps you take. However people are vastly more likely to give money to a indie developer. Pirates can be classified people that are either compulsive/hoarder pirates and wouldn't pay for it anyhow, genuinely need your program but cannot afford it, and people that will pay for it after a "trial run" when the realize you are an indie developer and your program is reasonably priced.
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
If your software actually gets pirated that means people like it enough to want it and need it to bother to pirate it. You should be so lucky to write a piece of software that is that popular. Quit flattering yourself.
One-time online activation seems to work pretty well and as an end-user I find this the least objectionable. Issue a unique code to the user and have them enter that into an online form and give them an activation code. Make sure the user can find this unique code/activation again if at some point in time they need to reinstall the product and limit the number of re-installs allowed to some reasonable number.
The simpler the better. My philosophy on this is that anyone with a moderate amount of determination will pirate your software. This is unlikely to heavily impact your bottom line, and (especially from an indie standpoint) you might not be able to afford the time, energy, and money required to implement a draconian DRM method anyway. Just use serial numbers or something equally mundane and then don't worry about anything beyond that, because you literally can't prevent determined piracy.
Shiver their timbers.
Seriously though... you will get a variety of answers here on Slashdot, ranging from "open source it and give it all away" to "put in ads and give it away". Charging for things seems to be a sin to some slashdotters.
I think a CD key, for PC games, strikes a reasonable balance, so long as you have some traceability (online activation is nice). Have you considered Steamworks? You'd have a distribution platform (though it wouldn't limit where you could sell it), and a proven, relatively non-intrusive DRM strategy.
Of course, Steamworks games get cracked, but you can never really stop determined crackers or pirates. All you want to do is encourage legit buyers to remain legit buyers. Steam is a pretty decent ecosystem for developers and gamers.
You have seemingly already decided that you're going to implement DRM, so the next question you should ask yourself is: "How much am I willing to inconvenience my paying customers?" Also in similar vein is the question: "How much time am I willing to spend on a protection scheme that will be circumvented anyways?" The problem with DRM is that it doesn't stop dedicated people at all, it merely stops the "let me borrow the CD and I'll install it, too" - crowd, nothing else, and therefore it's waste of both your and your customers' resources to use much time or effort on it.
A simple install-time-only online activation is probably the best of both worlds as long as you can ensure that your activation servers are always accessible. Anything else is just a losing game.
That's probably the easiest way to deter piracy: price it reasonably for it's job. Most people would rather get it legitimately than pirate it. Make it easy to download without going to shady download sites like CNet (I say shady because there's no way of telling where what they're hosting came from or who put it there, and I do not trust software where I can't trace it's provenance). Hosting downloads from your own domain will help, and leads into the next item: mark each copy you sell. Encode a serial number and buyer identity into each copy, making each one unique to the buyer. Make it clear when they buy that the copy's been stamped with their identity, and do the same on the initial splash screen if any and in the About dialog. This won't be seen by most people as anything particularly objectionable in itself, at the same time it'll make them skittish about just handing it out willy-nilly knowing that if someone they give it to uploads it to a torrent site or something it'll be them clearly identified as the source. It won't stop the hard-code pirates, but then very little will. It won't stop people from installing an extra copy for family. But it should be enough to convince the majority of people to tell their friends to just shell out the $15 for their own copy.
You may not like it but it works for a lot of things. It's just annoying enough to deter most casual pirates. For most people, walled gardens provide a safe and simple installation process for little utilities. And given the fact that you're a small developer it may help your exposure since most of the desktop walled gardens (Windows Store, and Mac OS Store) aren't overflowing with applications. Given your price range it's going to be very hard to justify marketing cost on your own.
Deterrent is the wrong goal. Give up on the folks who choose to steal it. They aren't worth your time or concern. Worry about making it both easy and encouraging for the folks who are inclined to pay you to do so.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
You're already on track to the best solution. Charging $5-10 for an a useful application (which seems pretty fair to me depending on what it does) is a great deterrent. As others have said, there are those that would pirate it if it were 25 cents, those that would buy it at 100x it's list price (or not use it) and those in the middle who will pirate when the price to value ratio is out of skew or the price point is simply too high for their budgets.
Assuming you have a good product, the best way to deter pirates is to set a reasonable price so that people feel they are getting value for their money. The lower the price, the less people will want or need to evade the cost. There are studies showing the price points where you tend to meet increasing resistence, although I don't think they have much data on the sub-$10 field.
Having a free trial period with limited time or limited features would probably help to ensure people can feel good about spending their money.
Offering support would help also.
Free updates would also be a plus.
Any sort of serious DRM will turn people off for low cost products, but some sort of protection (serial number tied to user name?) will be necessary if you offer a free trial.
Trying to deter piracy with DRM is a losing battle. If people don't want to pay you, they won't pay. The trick is to get them to want to pay you.
The first step is to learn the art of asking: http://www.ted.com/talks/amanda_palmer_the_art_of_asking.html
Ask for money, don't demand it. Let them pay you whatever they think is reasonable, but communicate how much you want ($5 in this case) as a default.
And for all those freeloaders who decide not to pay you, and there will be plenty, show them some ads to recoup the cost. Better they see your ads than piratebay's.
You're right, I wouldn't steal a car. But if it were possible, I sure as hell would download one!
then ask them to do it.
Many will, if it's valuable to them. Those that won't likely wouldn't have done so anyway.
There was a recent TED talk, "The Art of Asking," that made an argument along similar lines, though it was more concerned with digital music.
I pay for stuff I like if I feel that the price is fair. Most others are the same way.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
as long as the bottom line matters more to the company than the people, you're not going to get an argument focused on keeping customers, rather litigating additional revenue. treat your potential customers better, you'll generate repeat business and customer base to comfortably provide for everyone, everything AND the bottom line. You loose your customer base to a certain point, and then you have to resort to the new 'fee schedules', 'litigation revenue' etc. which will only serve to push more people away.
There are three kinds of people in the world. Those that can count, and those that can't.
A lot of games released on consoles today are priced 60 dollars on day one, deritive titles with stale formulas - the kinds that force publishers to shut down. Often these games find a second life during a Steam sale. Figure out what your pruduct should cost after seeing people's reaction to it. If people think it's a fair price, they'll be much less likely to bother prirating and just just click the paypal button instead.
An idea I had was to try to figure out a way to make pirating difficult enough that people would prefer to purchase the real version. I'd also like a way to do this that doesn't overly inconvenience legit users - and allows them to continue using the program even if the entity that created it in the first place went out of business. Note that I haven't actually tried this method in practice - it's at the idea stage right now.
The idea is that each download comes with some sort of keyfile that lets it run. When started, it contacts the server and asks for permission to run. If the server denys permission, the program deletes the keyfile, and refuses to run in the future. If it can't contact the server due to network problems, it waits several minutes and then runs. Otherwise, it runs normally.
The developer would then monitor places that may host pirated versions of the software. When he or she sees a pirated key, he adds it to a server-based block list. This causes the top of the google rankings to fill with broken versions of the software - making it increasingly more difficult to find an illegitimate copy - and hopefully pushing people to buy the legit version.
On the other hand, if the creator of the software stops monitoring for pirated copies, then those copies continue to work. This is, I think, a good property - it allows the software to become abandonware once the creator is no longer interested in making money from it. What's more, this method gives legitimate users the ability to run the software they paid for indefinitely.
I worked on a tool to be used by consultants. These people have very sticky fingers. Are issue was how to we prevent consultants taking the software to another firm?
We compiled a build for each customer with there logo inserted into various places. So when you run a report, no matter what there user entered, the embedded logo would appear on the reports.
Going to another accounting firm, and then generating reports for your boss with your previous companies logo on it tend to get you frowned upon.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Honestly, the best thing to do is look at your business plan and determine the best price - the one that yields the maximum sales for you in the market you are trying to target and the minimum piracy that you are comfortable with. Just realize that piracy will be non-zero as people who want to pirate will no matter what you do - no matter how much or how little you charge. So find the price point that maximizes your potential in the market you are aiming to sell into and don't worry about the rest.
Unfortunately, you need to do a market study to determine that price - so as always you have to spend money to make (more) money. You may be surprised that what you thought was only a $5-$10 app may be a $50 app; OTOH, it could turn out to be a $1 app too.
Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
A $5-10 dollar utility will probably not get widely pirated to be worth the headache for paying customers. That being said, a one-time online activation seems reasonable to me. That's what I've used at my company, but our software costs a lot more than $10
The answer is to make it easier to buy your product then it is to pirate it.
Price it right, make sure ANYONE can download it (in other words, make sure you have a way of getting money from someone in the US and UK just as easily as you've got a way from a guy in China or India to download your game) and make it easy to find where you can buy it.
If someone really wants to pirate your software, they will. But make sure that the pirated version isn't a superior version to what you offer.
But above all else, you want users, its a whole lot better to be known for a game that everyone's heard of and played and 75% of the people didn't buy then it is to be the creator of a game that no one's heard of and played but the few users who did play the game bought it.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Make sure you have a working link to the payment page. I actually went to buy WinRar because I thought "hey this is so much better than winzip and i want this dev to get money to keep doing this work" ... payment page 404'd everyday for like a week. I just didn't even try anymore...
You could take the Microsoft approach. Don't worry about piracy, and let the unauthorized user crowd ramp up your user base, and therefore your usefulness.
That's certainly one approach; but I wouldn't advise it.
Ask yourself why Wordperfect, which was the standard, got blown out by the vastly inferior Word?
there's an anti-trust case against Microsoft on that - related to misbehavior of Microsoft during the release of Windows '95. It had little to nothing to do with piracy, and nearly everything with Microsoft crippling the ability of Novell (or their predecessor) to timely release a compatible version of Word Perfect for Windows '95.
Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
Basically, people don't like to let others copy their software when the splash screen says "Thank you for your purchase, <customer>!".
Checksum the name so that someone editing the binary will be met with a crippled or nagware version, telling them how to get a fully functional one.
In any case, don't sweat it much. If someone is intent on stealing it, nothing you can do will prevent that. But accountability will prevent casual piracy because the mostly-honest person will not think it's harmless when someone asks for a copy.
Apple proved the business model and android is supporting it as well now
release an app with base features for free and charge for add on features
I say this because your price point alone makes it very attractive to simply purchase the thing. I would just leave it at a serial number that maybe phones home for validation on install. Copy protection inevitably only hinders legitimate users.
I am curious though as to what your program is and what it does as I am a graphic designer myself as well as faculty attached to the graphic design program at the local college and I am always looking for new/cool stuff both for myself and to share with students.
Anonymous Cowards generally receive no replies because you're a coward and I'm a bitch
Read this. Memorize it. It tells you everything you need to know as a developer:
http://tommyrefenes.tumblr.com/post/45684087997/apathy-and-refunds-are-more-dangerous-than-piracy
I started and worked on a very successful iOS game with over 9,000,000 users (and now over 1m on Android).. In the earlier days, we saw that it's piracy was 3 to 1 (so there were at the time about 3m users per 1m paid).
We don't care. Every user who doesn't pay but enjoys the game spreads word about the game, which will work well for the sequel or for branded toys. Those who don't pay for it probably weren't going to, at least they've now heard of your brand and your game. Free marketing.
1) Make a game that's worth buying.
2) Sell it at a price that people are willing to pay.
3) Don't make piracy a better experience than buying the real thing.
4) Give your customers a legitimate way to try the game for free.
Sure, there are and always will be people who pirate games just because they can. There really isn't a way to stop this.
The vast majority who do pirate usually fall into one of these categories, though.
For me, the only reason I've pirated since graduating HS is #3, and even then I have only used pirated versions of games I own, or for games that I legitimately can't find (especially Dreamcast games).
Seriously. Call the program
"screener-720p"
Your first challenge is fitting "reasonable" and "piracy" into the same mental model...
Maritime nations through history have sought to deter piracy by displaying the miscreant's remains at harbor entrances.
Think of that as a way to show increased risk.
But software piracy? What's the risk? If you look at eliminating the gain from piracy, then you need to ask, what's the "gain?" To some, the gain is saving a few bucks. Pricing your software low works to eliminate that gain. Or providing support and/or upgrades to legitimate users. But to some, the "gain" in piracy is playing the game, and that gets back to a rational relationship between your goals and a pirate's: there may not be one. Someone engaging in piracy as a way to get their rocks off isn't likely to be motivated by pricing, support, upgrades, or much of anything else, even the lack of a technological challenge.
Is piracy something you can more or less ignore in your target market?
But "fighting" piracy? Old adage: never wrestle with a pig; you'll get filthy and the pig will love it.
First thing to acknowledge is that piracy will happen, and it is not in your interests to spend a million dollars to save a few (eliminating the last 1% of the pirates). Accept that a certain amount of piracy is 'unstoppable', and you can implement a far more pragmatic scheme.
Ours is simple. We distribute our software as v1.0 (regardless of the build). Inside code, we apply a countdown timer that will crash the application after 50 starts. We make it a kind of 'nagware', but a fairly mild one. We don't use those annoying 5 second delays before you can click OK or any of that crap.
The countdown timer can be cancelled when someone patches to any version that doesn't have a '.0' on the end. However, to upgrade, they have to register (which is a semi-automated process). It costs us about 5 seconds to approve someone's registration.
Once again, remember that this is easily hackable. Anyone with an ounce of IT skills could reset the timer, have the version identifier in the exe, etc, etc - but the point is that 98% of people wont, and 1% of people will try unsuccessfully. Every once in a while we discover someone who has pirated the software, and we send them a dirty letter, and most of them true-up at that point too.
Stay pragmatic, and don't let it annoy you. Good luck!
Like every other business, set a fair price for your product. If you don't know what that value should be, take a look at what similar software sells for. You may think that 5 to 10 dollars is fair (it may be completely fair) but if similar software can be had for a dollar or even free, you're going down a dead end.
Then, don't worry about the pirates. Piracy is a function of the popularity of a product, where the popular software and media gets pirated more often. Take pride if your product gets copied 100 million times because you have made a great piece of software.
Remember, freeloaders will always seek to pirate software but honest people will remain honest if you give them a reasonable way to purchase and use your product. You don't need DRM or license servers to keep honest people honest. Make it easy to buy your software and give good support to your paying customers. Listen to their complaints by fixing bugs and providing frequently requested features in new versions.
Embrace the Pirates, for they may be your salvation.
Release two versions, paid and pirate. Call them that, and have fun with it (pirate skin). Give them a reason to "buy" it, something emotional, tied to being a pirate (enhanced pirate skin, which they will pirate too). Tell the pirates you don't want their money, you want a Starbucks Gift Card (or whatever). Tell the Pirates you want them to tell their friends that you embrace their actions, as a means of publicity.
IF you product, service or whatever is good, then publicity is your friend. Then ask them to pay for it when they use it, just don't nag. Perhaps a reminder every month (30 days) of "hey, you like this app, please consider buying the Pirate version with the all new pirate skin".
If you fight the pirates, they will route around any attempt to block them. It is a fool's game of whack-a-mole.
And for those people that pirate apps, do you really think you're all that clever for going to Google and typing "Pirate Bag Android Apps". I really hope you all find hacked versions that steal your identity and money. Pay the damn $1.99 already.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
If your software is at all popular, people will remove your phone home check, and distribute this cracked version of the software instead. Furthermore, if you have any sort of bug in your phone-home software (say date comparison that starts failing in the future due to incorrect leap year handling), then you open the possibility of your legitimate customers being harmed even though you didn't mean to.
IMHO, the best approach is to have no DRM at all, but to seed all the major torrent sites with legal shareware versions of your software that include infrequent and unobtrusive requests to upgrade to the full version if you like what you see. Some people will still pirate the full edition, but you'll up-sell to a few of the downloaders, which is more than you would have gotten otherwise.
I'm ok with the time-limited trial; say 30 days. I download the odd piece of time-limited trialware to solve a one-off problem and then if it looks like I'm going to need it more, I'll buy it. Or if I'm using the product to make money (like my billing/invoicing software) then I'll try it out and buy it if it will do everything I want. I can get activation codes for my billing software but it's adding value to my business so I don't mind spending $40 on it.
But don't artificially restrict what the software can do. Make it fully functional until a certain day... Sure, people will keep reinstalling new eval versions but if they want to do that once a month, it's up to them...
if you invest as much thought on how to improve your program than you do now to prevent piracy, you would gain at least as many paying additional users as you now lose through piracy.
A word many forgot. Value. If there is value in buying a game or service then people will buy it. I didn't buy Batman A.C. until it was $10 bucks. Why? That's what it is worth to me. $60? No game is worth that to me. There isn't any value in it. It's that simple. I played Eve Online and paid $15 a month for it, it was worth it because the service they provided (uptime, patches, content, etc.) was worth it. It had value.
"Why pay for it when you can copy it?" Because it isn't worth my time. I go to Steam, see if there is a deal for something $10 and if there is I buy it. IT's not worth my time running around digging through spyware infested Torrent sites to sit around for 6 hours while I try to download it only to find the last 5% of it is only being seeded by 2 peers. I get patches, content, dlc, multiplayer, etc through steam and what is even better, I don't have to do a damn thing beyond click Install and maybe, maybe once in a while fill in some info.
Gates was right, the future is Software as a Service because people don't want to pay for software but they will pay for service. Much like people eating at a Denny's\Embers: you aren't there for the food. Everything there you could make yourself (copy). Rather, you are there for the service. You want someone else to cook it and hopefully someone competent and cute to bring you said food.
-=[ Who Is John Galt? ]=-
in a transaction that they don't believe to be fair?
That's a losing proposition for any business. Like it or not, DRM or no, a business is ultimately at the mercy of its customers and what they believe to be fair—right or wrong, however that is measured.
Unless there's a plan to wrestle a monopoly on an absolutely necessary-for-life good out of a $5-10 app...
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
Piracy is a tax on being popular.
The less popular you are, the less of a tax it is.
It costs goodwill, it cost money, and it is for the most part not effective. What is effictive is to find a way to make money even with pircacy out there.
Read some posts at TechDirt. Find out if freeimum, or posting a comment or a product at thepiratebay or something else would work for your business.
There was an article about a director who made $60,000 last year on a project and spent $30,000 if it trying to deter piracy. She could have doubled her money by doing nothing. That was a case study. http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/1999-12-29/
vi +
Give the software for free and charge for support. It's a proven model that allows plenty of folks to make a living.
Not everything needs 'paid' support. A $5 application for graphic designers should be easy enough to use without having to pay to ask questions.
A full server OS with a large support team, yes. A small graphic app? No.
Seriously, people will buy in if you make them love you and your product. Anyone that has any chance of ever paying for something will reward stuff they love. But you have to make them love it.
On the other hand, as a business, that should be your goal anyway. Anything less isn't good business.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
"I'm an indie developer about to release a small ($5 â" $10 range) utility for graphic designers.
Here's the problem. You are competing with app stores now, on both Windows and Mac. They make DRM pretty much invisible to the user in most cases.
That means that ANY protection you add not benefitting from this framework annoys users way more than it will do anything else.
If you are not releasing though an app store then you may as well not even bother unless your app is DRM free, or so amazing that people may in fact go to the trouble of entering a serial number.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I have no problem paying for software that is useful, especially if it reasonably priced. However, there have been many times where I needed to get a job done and was hindered in doing so because of the hoops I had to jump through to get software activated on an offline machine, or didn't have access to the serial number at the time. This has burned me enough that I won't buy any software that requires activation, and am even leery of simple serial number activation.
Nearly all the software on pirate sites has been cracked, so the pirate's version won't require the user to enter a serial number or be calling home on the first install anyway. Even these simple anti-piracy methods hurt the user and not the pirate.
I like simple one-time online activation (if it's an open download), or put it up on app stores with a price but no other measures. It's not much of a barrier to a pirate, any more than the lock on my front door is a barrier to a thief, but it sends a clear message: "this isn't free software, you're supposed to pay for this". That message will deter almost anyone who can be deterred.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Charge a reasonable price. Provide updates as necessary. Don't plan for you and your kids and grandkids to retire on this one application; rather, use the profits to keep yourself in cheese nips until you build your next application. And the next one after that. In the meantime, don't worry about piracy. It costs more to pursue, in stress, money and goodwill, than you'd ever get back in additional licenses.
Decades ago, I wrote a content management system back when they weren't as common as dirt. I wanted to distribute it in a fashion where it would do the job but the code wouldn't be directly copyable. It's obvious in retrospect how stupid that was. It was all for nothing , and all that time spent could have been spent on my next product instead.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Charge enough for the game before you make it that you won't lose money if all the copies after you make it are pirated. That's the very best way to handle piracy. As a bonus for this strategy, you can make sure people who pre-paid get something nifty (but preferably not gameplay unbalancing) for their faith in you before you even had a product.
Barring that, just ignore it. If you can't make enough money on the game, tell people that you weren't able to make enough money to pay for your time and are thinking of leaving the business. Give figures on how much you made (not on what percent you think was pirated) so people can see that you made squat on making something decent and useful for them.
If you want to, you can try offering people who can prove they don't have a pirated copy stuff that isn't necessary to play the game, but is nifty and shows off that they bought it. This works especially well if your game has a strong online component. This works even better if there's some sort of way to allow people to purchase this item in-game for the cost of the game.
Charge for access to the server if it's an online game.
Set it up so players are solving some random problem for you by playing the game. Make money selling that solution.
Stop trying to force people to give you money. Trust in them to give you money if you make something good enough. People know how it works. And a gentle education is usually all that's needed if they forget.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
have everyone pay by credit card and embed their credit card details in the executable steganographically (it has to be possible in code too !) and tell the buyers you've done it. It should stop them passing the .exe around anyway.
Nullius in verba
imho, if the app is worth using, 5 bucks isn't enough pain to make me take the time to find a pirated version. If it's not worth using, it's not worth taking the time to find a pirated versions. Of course, that threshold is user-dependent.
I have found that the less you worry about piracy, the less of an issue it will be for you. The people who are going to pay for your product are the ones that value it and can afford it. The rest wouldn't probably pay for it regardless if you setup some kind of drm or not.
I really like TextPad. You can download it from the developer and use it right away if you need to. It will ask you to pay for it. One license seems to work forever for all versions. It doesn't need internet access or any other fancy bullshit to get it working. Thinking too much about your protection is going to cost you more money than it makes you.
Keep it simple. Don't spend too much time and money on your solution. If people want to pay you then they will. You can't force people to buy your product.
Can you create an ad supported version? If so, create an ad supported version and seed it yourself.
The people who want to buy the software will come to your site and buy it from you (requires serial #). Those who go to your site and say "$5? F that noise, yo!" (because that's how pirates talk) will go start looking for torrents. Seed the ad-supported version yourself. Make sure it's the most popular torrent for your software. Anybody who decides they'd rather torrent it than pay you gets the ad-supported version and is probably none the wiser that the paid version doesn't have ads.
Now you get $5-$10 out of the people who were willing to pay for it, and you make some off the ads for the people who weren't.
Yes, somebody can crack the no-ads paid version and torrent that. Every month or so, look for it. When that happens, either try to out-seed them (so people who don't know the difference download your version) or just release a "patch" and seed that. So the currently cracked version might be 1.5, but you just released 1.6 ("now with more graphicals and improved performances!") and most people are going to download the most recent version. Now you're ahead until they crack 1.6.
Alternatively, you could also seed it yourself with a message that says "hey buddy, I know you got this off Pirate Bay, but come on, it's $5 and here's a picture of my starving kids. Help me out!" and a link to buy the full version.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
the right question is "what services can I provide that my Customers want". Your never going to get pirates to buy your game no matter what you do.
Hahhah, good one!
On the other hand, I think the Leisure Suit Larry 1 hint book sold more than the game itself...
In business there is no good or evil, there is only money. Don't let yourself fall into the ideology trap that pirates are evil - that's a question for a philosophy class in college or a million arguments on the internet - but all that should matter to you as a businessman is the money.
The best possible case of DRM is to convert potential pirates into customers. There are lots of not-so-great cases, they generally involve pissing off your paying customers, something that should be avoided at all costs because paying customers who are unhappy will tell the world how unhappy your product has made them and that will discourage any new paying customers.
So, I am going to suggest that instead of DRM to punish pirates you should look for ways to identify pirates and upsell to them. Give them the carrot instead of the stick, that way you never have to worry about accidentally hitting a paying customer with the stick - worse case is just more carrots.
One option is to let the software run just fine without a serial number, but after some number of launches without a serial number, like maybe 20, start putting up a click-through start-up screen. On that screen you can nicely point out that they've used the software 20 times now and it is only fair that since they are getting so much value out of it, they should pay for it - remember you catch more flies with honey than vinegar. Then give the user three choices:
1) Enter their serial number
2) Go to a web page where they can buy a serial number
3) Click through and use the software anyway
If someone is inclined to pay this helps them to remember, if they are already a paying customer and they lost their serial number or whatever, this won't stop them from getting their work done and so won't piss them off and if they are a hardcore pirate who will never pay, you still haven't lost anything anyway.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
After all, do you see anyone pirating slashdot? It is a fool-proof strategy that has worked for taco and the rest of the employees of this site for a long time now!
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Simple Serial numker/License Key
If you want to go one step further you could make it register with a central location to make sure the user is only using the key on one device. If it isn't out of your price range, there are services that will do this automaticly.
This is enough to work for any mostly honest user. I'm sure it can be circumvented by someone who is determined to bypass it, but its enough to prevent most users from buying 1 license and installing it on 100 devices.
I recommend no upfront enforcement. But delayed enforcement mechanisms, where you seek to detect piracy rather than prevent it. Detect it as covertly as possible -- arrange for the pirated version to stop working or fall into a degraded mode of operation suddenly, after a sufficient period of time elapsed, or at a new release, while you make as certain as possible that legitimate customers are not impacted. Don't tip your hand in regards to what all your defense mechanisms are; instead of seeking to block pirates, seek to make their use of your software unreliable or full of annoying surprises.
Normally when there's an upfront enforcement mechanism such as a serial number, the defense is easily detected and subverted.
On the other hand; if your defense is broader, and the code less identifiable, you may frustrate pirates into confessing and buying.
I see the goal is to convert pirates into customers, which might not always be possible --- but by frustrating them, and then offering them a "discount" to come clean, you may profit from the pirates.
So, instead of serial number locks.... Just embed the customer's name and address information in non-trial executables "This software is licensed to: John Doe"; Display the last 4 digits of some personal detail; store in the executable a private encryption key (Client SSL certificate), for securing communications with a remote server, trusted remote public key, and installation ID. No big serial numbers entered by the customer. No activation codes; possibly just an order number pre-populated with a number unique to the order. Customer-specific media.
Display the customer's information, with a copyright warning, when they start the program.
Have the installation process, also involve downloading an encrypted data file that will be used by the client.
Digitally sign the production executables using authenticode; or other code signing technology for your chosen OS.
Implement your server, such that all communications from the client must be digitally signed, with the private key (or authenticated with client certificate); that is unique to the customer.
Have clients periodically check in with the server; and provide a mechanism where the server can lock out a specific installation of the product, eg by quietly updating the data file to indicate ["As of 90 days from the date this new data file revision is delivered, this product will cease to function, until the customer answers our calls and gets a new license for this installation, or a piracy unlock"].
Include features in the software that subtly integrate services from a remote server. ("Cloud-enabled features").
For bonus points, include freemium features available for no charge, and other cloud-enabled features requiring a monthly or annual fee.
If pirated software is detected, the free features are shut off at the remote server.
You detect "innocent" piracy; when you over an extended period of time see a few; two or three more than the ordered number copies of software active under a customer.
If it continues for a sufficiently long amount of time; possibly you send the legit customer a polite e-mail, or you arrange for all their installations to prompt for a username and password next time the program starts, to confirm that it's an installation authorized by the customer.
Obvious abuse occurs when you detect 100 or 200 extra copies of the product... well, in that case, you might still go through the same process; or you might push out deactivation in 180 days, for all that customer's software; and requirement for compensation, before that specific person is allowed to purchase more units.
Reasonable prices, a decent program and respect. a lot of times I pirate just out of spite, but companys that i respect ill buy from if i am interested in the product and i have the funds to do so.
Also, focus on your customers, not on the pirates.
Add DRM and your basically challenging people to pirate it.
I found this answer on SO a couple years ago and flagged it as a favorite because I figured I might need it some day.
The short version is a lot like what people have already said, have cracked keys be detectable and then decide from there what to do.
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3550556/ive-found-my-software-as-cracked-download-on-internet-what-to-do
This guy decided to redirect the users to a website to inform them that they're using a cracked key and that they should really purchase the software.
His studies seem to indicate that it works well.
Make it easy to buy (paypal, or similar), install, and use. Make a custom binary which fills in registration data, which comes on the title/bootup screen, saying "This software is licensed for the exclusive use of $customer, all rights reserved, copyright $year". Hide it in the binary (make it hard to find and edit with a hex editor/ decompiler), but don't spend too much time doing so. You have the right to be paid for your work, but being a dick in protecting those rights is just not worth the effort.
DRM exist only to make your customers suffer. No pirate will have any trouble with your DRM. If a customer don't want to pay you, they will not pay you. It don't matter if you add DRM or not. Either the DRM will be broken, and then you can download it anyway or your DRM will not be broken, but than nobody will use your software.
So don't matter how you look at it: DRM exist only to make your customers suffer.
Furthermore, DRM is Fuck You to all your customers. Not only it will make them suffer, but it takes their rights away. The right to create backups, fair-use rights, re-selling rights, etc. In my opinion anyone who uses DRM with the product should lose any copyright protections. Because DRM take away any rights it should also deny any privileges.
http://www.mueller-public.de - My site http://www.anr-institute.com/ - Advanced Natural Research Institute
A simple nag screen on application startup should be sufficient.
Do not reduce any functionality from the application; there is no point, it will only drive the users away.
The nag screen can be legally removed by entering a simple combination of username / checksum (bob / 2013-028819)
Don't do anything cute like checking for time elapsed since application install, simply have it from the start.
Do not give the disassemblers any satisfaction by trying to implement a sophisticated protection mechanism.
Compile a string named "TO CRACK, PLACE AN X IN THE BRACKETS [ ]" and then check the string for [X] to skip the nag screen.
Then implement a crack by doing a simple search replace across the binary so that you do not screw up future releases.
Upload the crack for your own program to the PirateBay and place a comment in the crack stating that
you are the owner of the program and that you understand that not everyone can afford to buy your program,
but that perhaps they would reconsider once they use it for a while and start loving it. Be short and sweet.
That's not the reason to not want one's work pirated.
The reason a copyright holder should have reasonable objection to somebody pirating their work, whether or not they were ever going to pay for it, is because it encroaches on the copying rights that are supposed to be exclusively at the purview of the content maker.
Revenue is completely irrelevant to this point. When somebody pirates a work, the value that the content maker might have otherwise had in their exclusivity (which is what copyright itself is supposed to entail) is compromised, and there does exist at least some merit in the notion that they ought to be financially compensated for that loss of control.
But the matter with regards to content publication has always been about distributive control. As copying technologies have advanced through the ages, however, the mere social contract of copyright since its inception, which essentially amounts to the notion that society will honor the content maker's desire for exclusive control over copies in exchange for access to the work, has been breaking down. Society began to stop respecting their side of the contract, and ignored the content maker's desire for exclusive rights on determining who should be permitted to make copies. Publishers, in response, began artificially contriving schemes which made their works arguably marginally more difficult to copy, but would have an unforseeable impact on the work's availability, as legitimate consumers may find they cannot utilize the works as they intended because of copy protection being in the way.
Copyright is dissolving... which is unfortunate, because at least it was a contract that society had some control over. What is replacing it now, however... is something which consumers will have no control over... DRM and other types of censorship that keep consumers from accessing the content.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Just buy an off-the-shelf copy protection solution, like AsProtect or Armadillo ( http://www.siliconrealms.com/ ) - it's cheap enough and will provide some protection against amateur crackers. Just don't turn on remote activation crap. Should be good enough for a small utility.
Ask all the shareware developers that made money without it. It's been normal to NOT DRM your software for longer than you have been alive. Worlds best audio program, http://www.reaper.fm/ Reaper, is released 100% functional trial version and the paid version removes the Nag screen.
get off your lazy butt and research what works.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
instead of charging a typical amount for your software (say $70) and trying to lock it down yourself and go direct to customers, get on a store (like Apple's AppStore) that has a very reliable, unobtrusive, standardized, and reasonably effective (i.e. "friendly") DRM. Drop the cost, (down to say $20-25) and make up for it in the volume due to the lower cost AND due to being on a friendly store.
Software distribution is going to be almost exclusively digital download soon. And most people just aren't willing to shell out big dollars for a double-click, regardless of what it is. But if you can get your product in front of many eyes, and make it uber-easy to buy, you have a good shot at getting the volume to make up the difference.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
Give it away for free. With a cryptic UI and no documentation. Make your money by writing O'Reilly books on how to use it.
Have gnu, will travel.
Keep it DRM free, maybe a basic serial number registration system.
Add on your site and in the app "please be honest, I'm just trying to put food on the table"
Those who want to crack it will crack it. You cannot stop that, so there's no point in even trying to encrypt the registration key to the nth degree. Anything more than a basic registration system will just
a) take more effort on your part
b) inconvenience legitimate customers of your software
yeah hi, as a potential customer, 'web apps' are worth precisely $0. Why? I could wake up tomorrow and find that it's gone, or altered such that a much needed part of my workflow has been obliterated by your marketing department. No thanks.
Best method I've seen is generating a license file which has the users name and email address in it. That will at least make them think twice before throwing it up on TPB, assuming you've got a manual check to make sure people aren't putting in blatantly bogus information. It also makes it easy to blacklist a serial when a new version is released, and you can refuse to sell to that person if they come back again. Obviously there are ways around this, but at some point it's a mutual respect between developer and end-user. The most draconian I would get would be to have it phone-home when a license is applied. Apply the license whether they're online or not, but just have it keep retrying until it finds a connection.
No?
There's a Mac App Store: http://www.apple.com/au/osx/apps/app-store.html
There's the iOS App Store - available from iTunes and on iOS devices
There's the Windows Store: http://windows.microsoft.com/is-is/windows-8/apps
There's Google Play: http://www.android.com/apps/
They all handle DRM for you in a relatively unobtrusive way, plus they handle payment processing and distribution. The end user doesn't need to worry about you going out of business, your authentication servers going down, your serial numbers not working etc or dealing with another payment processor.
The advantage of something like the Mac App Store is that if I buy apps on here, Apple keep my purchase history. When I get a new machine, I sign in to the App Store and download all my apps from one place, and don't need to keep track of serial numbers or activation keys or anything like that.
This leaves you to handle doing the coding and the promotion of the app. Yes, you give up a cut of 30% or so, but if that's a big problem for you, put your price up slightly to take this into account. Or, give up the 30% cut knowing you don't need to handle any payment processing, hosting downloads, going over your bandwidth cap on your hosting plan because your app became popular, DRM, activation, providing lost serial numbers to users etc...
Specialist Mac support for creative pros, Melbourne
I read all the above comments, and here are 2 new ideas:
1) give it freely !
Work hard on improving your tool, and ask for money if you want.
Once your tool reached a critical point, just sell your company.
Hey, it worked for Instagram !
2) give version 1.0 freely.
Improve your program for your paying customers, and publish a list of improvements of every version.
This way, people will try your program, and if they find it useful, they'll pay to have the latest versions.
Don' worry about pirates if you upgrade your program frequently.
Well, aside from the semi-phonetic use of the language - this is actually the best suggestion. If you can customize the version, that's the best idea. In fact, if you want to distribute a trial, make it a fully functional one and put a tasteful "Trial version - not for commercial use" on it. People who are just dinking around will probably not care - and probably won't buy it anyway. A reasonable fraction of those who might not otherwise pay for it, but who use it for "work" will be shamed into buying a copy.
If it's really useful, and only $5-10, you've really done all you can. I'm not going to claim to be the most ethical software user on the planet, but I do have about half a dozen shareware licenses I've paid for. Those are the utilities which are so straightforward and timeless that I reinstall them on every machine I get. Usually I "try" software for a year or two. I know, that seems long, but I may only get to use it a couple of times. I know that if I reinstall it on the next new HD or machine, it's worth my while and worth paying the developer. I feel better sending someone like you $10 to register a great utility than the $1000/year extortion I pay to Autodesk.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Why not go the Steam way? Since I got it I never got a game in another way.
So you want to stop free riders, huh? First of all DRM can work, but only in some situations and some element of luck is involved. Not that the purpose of these techniques is not profit maximization. The purpose is simply to reduce or stop free riders.
---The DRM Option---
1. Code the DRM yourself. Make sure that a cracker at last would require knowledge of assembly language to crack it. Anyone can use a hex editor. At least make sure that your cracker has to be somewhat competent.
2. Don't advertise the software too much. Try to keep it from getting too popular. As soon as a competent cracker sees it and thinks your software seems useful he's going to put your code on his to_disassemble_list and a crack could be released in just a few days.
3. Don't make the software too good or too useful. Ideally it should not do anything better than other software in its category. it should not be a best-in-class sort of thing. If it seems to be getting too popular introduce some subtle but annoying bugs in the next release.
---Bait and Switch---
With this method you introduce the software initially as freeware but not open source. Build a following. Let people get dependent on it. I'd recommend giving it a full year or two so that people basically think of it as free software.
Then go commercial. Give as little warning as possible. Quietly remove old versions from your web site beforehand A good time to do this is just before you fix an annoying bug. If you have to, leave a bug unfixed specifically for this purpose. Even introduce one if you have to. Just make sure to add a new feature when you do so.
At this point introduce the above homemade DRM and try to keep a low profile as noted in the first strategy. The delay between initial release and the implementation of DRM will discourage a large percentage of crackers. It just won't be on their radar anymore since it is old software at this point. Of course if your software has already become too popular then it is still hopeless, but you have to prevent that.
The basic idea behind these strategies is not to try to defeat the crackers. They are way smarter than you are. Just forget it. The idea is to stay below their radar and make your DRM just hard enough to stop the easy search and replace hex editor attacks.
Eventually your software may indeed be discovered by a competent cracker and then the game is over. Go work on some new software. Rinse and repeat.
---divide and conquer---
One tip for staying obscure is to break up your software into many smaller applications. Not only does that make more targets for the crackers for the same functionality, but it makes the software less useful which remember is a good thing. You don't need to get every customer in the world. Just enough to make some money. Don't get greedy or you will certainly fail.
If your software has a menu take a look at the different options and see if you can split them out into different applications.
---keep prices low---
A cracker is less likely to target you if you are only asking $5-$10. I see that this is already your strategy. It is an excellent way to both deter crackers and to deter potential pirates from even bothering to search for a cracked version. Cracking a $1000 application gives way more prestige than cracking a $5 one. Note that this merges quite nicely with the above divide and conquer strategy.
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
It's something big studios don't get, but some indies got that one right, so you might want to try it too.
What's the big reason people buy "normal" goods in stores instead of, say, from the back of trucks for a fraction of the price? I mean, you can get a big screen TV for a few 100 instead of a few 1000 bucks, no really. Here it is, don't ask, don't tell. Don't want it? Gee, why could that be?
Could it be the warranty you get when you buy it in a store? Or the additional goodies that come with it?
Make sure that people who buy your software get MORE out of it than just the software they'd also get from a pirated copy. When they register their copy, how about gaining access to you for support? Certainly not full time and 24/7, but even knowing that I COULD mail you my problems is a big psychological issue. How about offering that you will hear their suggestions for future versions and the promise of some updates free/cheap when they are implemented? Having the ear of the maker of a tool I enjoy using and feeling my input is valued sure is worth 5 or 10 bucks. And you get free suggestions for improvement of handling for free, too.
One of the biggest assets for you (and it's amazing how many ignore this): If that tool allows the creation of plugins, offer a place where people can showcase and offer their plugins, or if it is used to create something these people could probably want to publish, offer them a place to do that. Of course only if they are paying customers. Webspace is cheap or even free, what's problematic is to get people to VISIT yours, and you having a customer base for this tool means that you're a hub for your customers when they are trying to reach like minded people.
YOU are the center of this tool, wherever you make this tool point everyone using this tool WILL know, whether they like to or not.
Even the ones that didn't pay for it.
This makes whatever webspace you offer (even if it's merely some sort of linking hub) critical for anyone who wants to publish what this tool creates, unless he has a better platform. It is very unlikely that they do, though.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I like serial codes being used to authenticate software because they're relatively painless, particularly if stored in a text file and copy & pasted when required. They should be locally-validated however - I don't think it's fair to deny people access to their software if the vendor goes out of business or the licensing servers are down.
You might say "well with local validation serial codes are easy to pass around", which is true. But I know for example that with Neverwinter Nights, Bioware had the smart (and I genuinely mean smart instead of sarcasm) idea of having the user add the game serial keys to their forum profile. Once a key is added, the user is identified as owning the product and is granted access to further NWN-specific forums that require at least one of the appropriate keys. I think you also get access to more avatars relevant to the product keys you add.
Basically you can stipulate that if a user wants support, they require a legit key. Perhaps think of other benefits one could provide to people with legit keys as well.
I've always liked it when a product was released free for non-commercial use, and a low price for commercial use. Since this is targeted at people in graphics design, you've got people that just like to design for fun, and people that make a living out of it. Give it away to people to play around with, and if they decide it can help them in some type of commercial venture, you're there for them with a product they're already familiar with.
Did anyone else read it that way? Might not work, but I like the sound of it...
One concept that I've always given Brad Wardell (CEO of Stardock) kudos for is realizing that pirates are not your customers. They aren't even potential customers. You then have to keep that idea in mind when you do your market research to see if the price your customers are willing to pay are enough to justify your production costs.
pirate the app. I wouldn't. I simply wouldn't buy it or use it if I didn't think the price was fair.
But the evidence I've seen says that piracy is basically people that wouldn't pay for software anyway—given an enforced choice between nothing and paying the asked price, they'd choose nothing.
So you have two choices:
1) Reduce the price more to turn some pirates into paying customers.
2) Leave the price as-is and either fight piracy (and possibly lose paying customers due to annoyance) or don't (and end up with some people that wouldn't have paid your asking price using it).
Either way, you're not likely to increase sales significantly with anti-piracy measures. And more and more tech and software and the 'net in general are goodwill markets in which people want to want to pay. It's part of the value of a product/service, and when it's lacking, you're missing the best of your marketing potential.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
the price range being talked about here is hardly a major expense. It's the price of a burger.
I buy apps routinely in this price range, sight unseen, based on the customer reviews in the app store.
Anyone that can't get people to shell out $10 for a product based on its description is not making a product that sounds very useful to the intended audience.
At $10, I can't see how it would be worth a software pirate's time to track down and/or crack a piece of software, apart from people that are in it just to be able to say they did it—and no anti-piracy measure will stop anyone like that; quite the contrary, it will simply encourage them.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
To paraphrase another author -- your biggest problem is not going to be piracy, your biggest problem will be obscurity. Being well known that piracy numbers are significant will be success, as it implies your software is actually well enough known for someone to put in the time for a keygen.
Min
On the whole, I find that I prefer Slashdot posts to twitter ones because I don't get limited to 140 chars before
..or maybe it's because false scarcity is not sustainable..
of course, because we all know the 'right' crowd is? who exactly?
That will do it.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Look at how others do it.
One of the few pieces of software I have bought, enjoyed and thanked myself for buying it many times is Circus Ponies Notebook.
http://www.circusponies.com/
They do a 30 day trial. I don't remember if there is any other DRM but I doubt it since I really don't like having DRM, phone home, etc.
I do use two other pieces of software that phone home on each launch without asking you (my firewall picks it up) which is extremely annoying. Don't do that.I tell people about them or consider buying more copies. The developer responds quickly and gives free updates.
I am also extremely happy with linode.com and they give free upgrades periodically. That is a different service, and I am quite against you forcing the user to be online or phoning home, but you can see the kind of enthusiasm and increased users you get from good service.
As for piracy, it happens. I would be against spending so much time on DRM that it jacks up the price. Figure it is free marketing and get on with it.
Where have you been? Clearly not readings articles and comments on slashdot. Because if you were, you'd know that open source is the only way to go. Not just that, but information wants to be free, besides which, piracy impliesv"theft" which can only occur if you deprive someone of their bits when you acquire those bits of your own. So if your tool is any good, it will be copied rampantly. The drm mechanism will be cracked, and 9 out of every 10 users will be using copies for which you'll receive zero compensation. That leaves providing support as your only option. Which is useless for a simple tool that presumably would y need much support.
That leaves your best option as making the program incredibly complicated, so that e en If someone gets their hands on your program, it'll be useless without a support contract.
Because everyone here knows - those bits you create are just bits. App, music or movie, the creator of them shou,d expect no control or compensation once they go on the Internet. Right guys?
Some time ago I wrote a handy software to do something that is specific to electronic manufacturing industry. It's nothing major or groundbreaking. I just used it to learn WPF. But in the end it was a lot of code, and I didn't want to just give it all away.
Naturally, I was also too cheap to pay for any external licensing software (and besides, it's all mostly junk.) So I wrote my own, using this as an excuse to learn MS Crypto API. It ended up being also pretty large, but it works well.
I wanted to tie every license to a specific hardware, and to make licenses permanent (to that hardware.) If the hardware fails then the customer can negotiate a new code out of band. (In other words, if you ask for a new key once in every few years it's OK, but if you ask for a new key every day it's not.) This instantly closed a bunch of loopholes that relate to backup and restore. I did not want to use online licensing, though this is something I'd like to do one day, for educational purposes.
So the software starts, and in background it collects a ton of hardware descriptors - m/b, HDD, video card, MACs of all NICs, and so on. This gets encrypted to a public key of the publisher (me) then ASCII armored and saved into a file. This becomes a license request block. User sends this file to the publisher.
The publisher is the only person who can decrypt this block. He does so and sees a lot of hardware information. The publisher deletes unwanted hardware tokens, adds his own tokens if he wants, and then he signs the modified plaintext and encrypts it to the public key of the application. (Each software has its own key.) After ASCII armoring this becomes a license file. It is sent to the user.
The user then starts the software. It decrypts the license file and compares those hardware tokens that the publisher elected to keep with those that are fetched from the hardware. If they match then the software runs. If not ... too bad.
This solution has several vulnerabilities, of course, and it can be defeated by a single jump instruction - as long as you know where to insert one. That is not obvious. There are other ways to attack this system. But I did not want to build an overly complex protection scheme; my software is not that popular anyway, being very special (it's useless to anyone outside of the industry.) I just wanted to see what I can do :-)
As it often happens, this software was built to scratch a personal itch. I'm running it myself, and all these instances are carefully licensed with proper license files. I started this software many times, and I use it pretty much every day. I had no failures (after a couple early bugs were found and fixed.)
There's an application that extends usability of trackpad functions on Macbooks running Windows, called Trackpad++ (Link)
Upon downloading for free, it is fully usable, but the owner updates the product with bugfixes and sometimes features once a week. If you don't register the product by sending the owner a donation to receive a license key, it is disabled every week (and doesn't download updates automatically). You can continue using the product, but only if you go online and download the latest version.
This has the benefit of showing off other potential goods you have on your website, giving you free advertising, in addition to forcing users to see the "purchase" button over and over again.
If a consumer doesn't like or need your product, it stops working, no loss. If he wants to test it a little longer, he can keep downloading it, until he decides to purchase or not. When he buys it he is guaranteed updates and a usable product.
is as effective as the War on Drugs, Prohibition, and Theft Prevention. You will undoubtedly end up spending a significant amount of funds on something that will get defeated within a week. You will end up on the losing side.
Defender of Microsoft and Communism!!!
Rather than creating DRM concentrate on creating a community of loyal users. Have an open beta. Reward bug reports with credits.
Let users suggest new features in a forum. Keep up a dialog.
DRM is much less effective than perceived value. If the consumer believes your product is worth it they will buy it.
The ones that don't didn't intend to anyway.
Make it easy for me to buy (either in store availability guaranteed, or digital download - the latter is a lot easier to achieve) and PRICE APPROPRIATELY.
If you still have piracy, they were never going to be customers anyway (i.e., if it was too hard they wouldn't have purchased), but may encourage others to buy, by getting you free publicity.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
Quit thinking about it like piracy, and the problem disappears. "But wait!" you say, "how will I feed my family?" Rather than discouraging piracy, you should be encouraging support from your audience. Add in a splash screen that can be disabled by the user once they paid/donated that encourages the purchace of a license, and what the support will go to. Throw your code up onto github or some other service and solicit for input from your audience, thus building a relationship with your audience, and even opening the doors for contribution in the form of code. It is far easier to give money to people who you actually have some form of relationship with. Things that don't bother people, but remind them, and encourage them to give the support you need is how you grow your body of support. Doing things to annoy people, will result in them not cooperating with you, and thus, doing things that one might consider piracy.
Here's my take: If I find value in a tool, I'm quite willing to pay for it to use it.
If I find no value in a tool, then I quit using it and delete it.
People that use your tool but refuse to pay for it are willing to invest a lot of effort in to circumventing any kind of DRM you might wish to use.
Consider their time and effort as a non-fungible expression of the worth of your tool. Simply take the high road and ignore them.
For an example, see the "Audio-Grabber" project.
At worst, limit updates to only paying users. As "haters gotta hate", deadbeat users are just another fact of life. It isn't worth worrying about them. Put your effort into pleasing those that pay you.
Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.
If your customers respect you and the work you do then they will go out of their way to help you.
Treat your customers like your friends.
Don't listen to the people who say "don't bother about piracy" or "pirates will pirate it anyway". I'm saying this as an indie developer myself. But slashdot is not the right place to ask such questions. Better find a specialized forum
Don't ask how to deter piracy. Ask how to increase sales.
You care about the number of sales you make. That affects you. The number of people who rip you off is totally irrelevant except as a proxy measure for sales impact -- but it's an awful measure for sales impact. If some of the people who rip you off end up buying your stuff later, or showing it to people who buy it, you might come out ahead.
Start by clearly understanding what you want. Unless you are very petty, "maximize sales" is more important than "minimize piracy". If you have a choice between:
1. 100 people buy your program. 0 people pirate it.
2. 101 people buy your program. 1,000,000 people pirate it.
The second is a better deal for you, because it's got more sales.
Also, consider "value to people who buy it". A thing that won't screw them by failing to run under some future circumstances is worth more.
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
You could add a picture of yourself and a couple of lines describing why you made the program to the manual (without turning it in a TLDR), so that people realise that is not some big company's clueless fatso CEO who's Mercedes they are powering by paying for the software, but just a normal programmer paying his rent/mortgage/food etc.
You stop it the same way you stopped people stealing car stereos; Don't sell your product at exuberant prices just because a large enough part of the customer pool is willing to pay for it for you to break even. No one steals car stereos after the chinese flooded the market with 50$ stereos. Now people will break your car window for a pack of cigarettes, but leave your stereo.
If you want me as a customer, offer a freemium version with the limited functionality (but no time limit) and a premium version with enhanced functionality. Keep the price for the premium version in a reasonable range (people are used to lower prices now with all the app stores) and make unlocking simple (register and pay on website, get a key by email. Entering the key instantly unlocks the premium features). Make a simple webpage where I can compare the two versions and give some information about yourself and your business to make me feel more emotionally involved. A blog and a forum can help as well.
I'm writing a one-man game at the moment. I don't imagine it will be anything more than an obscure indie game at best, but it's nice to pull out of the game programming and give thought to "what might happen" if it's popular and sells millions, and write some code for things not directly related to the game itself. I actually ENJOY planning things like that and at what point I'd have to pull in cloud servers and this and that, and how I'd get one proper "retail" boxed copy made of it, just for me, even though boxed copies are basically dead nowadays.
As such, I've thought through things like scalable storefronts, download capacity, selling it on Steam, etc. and even things like DRM and how I'd sell it by myself.
To be honest, it was only a side-distraction but as someone who has 500 Steam titles on their account and myriad other indie bundle games and GOG.com games, I have to say that - pretty much - my buying tastes affect my programming tastes. As I got to the point where I thought "I wouldn't tolerate that on a game I bought, especially an indie game", I stopped and did something else. Hell, I ended up recreating a Steam-like achievement system rather than code on the DRM once I thought it had gone "too far" (the fact that I made it so I can drop-in a real Steam library system with minimal changes just reflects my insane optimism!)
My game has code for DRM. I have a single define in the code that removes all the DRM, throughout every file, check and build process, so it's literally a single switch to compile a version without any DRM or with. I honestly expect to never have to turn it on if I ever finish the game and the DRM code I have put in will languish in my SVN repos forever. But it was a fun intellectual exercise to code.
My DRM works by embedding an X509 public key certificate into the game, and giving an X509 certificate to each user, signed by the corresponding private key (which, obviously, I keep secret and do not distribute anywhere). Users can download the game from anywhere but need their "key file" to activate it properly (which works nicely for "demo" versions too - anyone can download the same game but the key turns it into the full game). It should, thus, be impossible to fake a valid, signed key without actually changing the code of the game itself. No "keygen", as such.
The code itself does various checks to make sure people aren't fiddling the certificates (the ones embedded into the game, or supplied to paid users), and the details on the certificates can contain things like their address or even credit card number quite easily. This, I hope, would deter the casual user from sharing their key with other users and/or present enough of an intellectual barrier that they think "Oh, I won't try to fiddle this, then". There's also a quick DNS check where I query a remote DNS server under my control which returns some custom-formatted records that tell me whether or not the underlying game key matches the one that the DNS is providing (so a primitive revocation / demand a certificate update facility).
I don't FOR A SECOND think that any of this will stop a determined pirate. I think it will deter kids from sharing their copy of the game with their mates, or running 20 copies at home, and amateurs poking around seeing if there's a way around it. Anyone smart enough to look into the code with a debugger, or run Wireshark is going to defeat anything I do, I'm under no illusions, and the worst I can do is make it tricky for them. It's the balance of that trickiness versus the likelihood of affecting genuine users negatively that's the ultimate question.
When I was younger, I did a bit of all levels of "hacking" programs. I pulled Desert Strike through MS-DOS's debug command and - with a copy of Ralf Brown's Interrupt List and a knowledge of x86 assembler - defeated the "must have the CD in the drive" protection. I never distributed my crack (hell, there were better ones out there already, I just didn't have an Internet connection to know about t
[x] none of the above
I've been in your shoes, releasing and selling an add-on tool for a 3D engine. My approach was no copy protection whatsoever. Instead, I offered my customers a fair deal and appealed to their good nature by offering them the same package for 4 different prices (10, 20, 30, and 50 US$). While that sounds weird, it worked. I added descriptive labels ($10 student/amateur, $20 indie, $30 big indie, $50 pro) and told them that if they don't have much money, they are free to pick the lowest price, that's totally ok.
It turned out that half of the customers voluntarily pay more than they have to. And I'm not aware of any piracy. There's probably the odd guy who gave his copy to his friend, sure. So what?
In the area you and I are in, piracy isn't that much of a problem, I believe. Contact is more personal, we aren't faceless corporations, and frankly, spending two hours on improving the tool will very likely do more for your bottom line than adding even a serial number check (which is also code that needs to be written, tested, etc. etc.)
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
I released games and applications for the Amiga in the early 90's and it helped me pay for college. One game even got on a cover disk. I think it is as true now as it was then. The games I released that had no limitiations made some money. The only thing I had to bug users was in the readme and it stated that if they liked the game they could send me whatever they thought it was worth. Sometimes I'd get 5 bucks, sometimes it would be 20. The only game I didn't make squat on had the last third of it locked down and would only work if paid for and registered. I only sold two copies of it and it was my best game.
The other thing that was cool was the letters I would get for the games and apps from countries outside the US. People would go to the trouble of converting local currency to US bills, write a letter that was obviously composed by using a 'some language' to English dictionary and tell me about how their kid or wife or husband had been playing the game all days and nights so money for you should have to make better life.
I'm sure tens of thousands of people played the games or used the apps. Hundreds paid for the 'pay whatever you want' software. If I were to go back I would have had more to offer on all of it and approached it as additional features instead of punitive.
I've been in an out of the piracy game since irc times but there was one approach that really worked for me.
The author of Lux (a java based Risk game) had a nice system for detering privacy:
1st: The game was free to play for 10-20 times and then it required registration (simple key code)
2nd: The author had set up a website so when you searched google: lux warez, serialz, serial, keygen, his website was the first site you got to where he asked crackers to respect his tiny cottage industry (I think it was 5-15$ for a lifetime key), and at the same time pointed out to users that by stealing his software they were poisoning his part of the ecosystem.
It seemed to work. I never found keys to the software (this was 6-7 years ago), and we didn't pirate that piece of software. I stopped looking for keys after I'd read his page and that was the important part.
On the other hand I have very little problem pirating professional software to play around with 3DStudio and Photoshop, however once I got into photography (and had spent much more than the cost of software on gear) I've had to change my approach. I pay for my Raw software (Capture One Pro) and I use gimp or open source tools instead of PS. Sometimes I want to dick around with CAE software and I have no problem pirating that since I'm interested in demo-ing it and not using it as a tool in my business. I think reminding users what they would be paying for (its your time not the tool) is the best approach.
The more popular it is the more legitimate sales you have. But without a doubt it will be cracked within a week if it's popular. And never underestimate how pirates, at least in the beginning, for an unknown publisher, actually promote your game for you.
So your best bet is to update the software with token features or items every week and keep it fresh. Those that really find your software worthwhile will pony up just to have the updates ASAP.
asking customers politely to buy the software after trying, providing an unlock-code for those who do, or limit your demo in an insignificant - but in the long run: annoying - way. (e.g., disable drag 'n drop - import). don't use any copy-protection. this way customers can try your product, but will get annoyed by the friendly "buy me"-pop-up if they like it and use it on a regular basis. pirates on the other hand probably won't bother removing only the pop-up/slight limitation if the product is otherwise fully functional.
You could just simply publish your source code with your binaries with a free software license. Announce a donation scheme that would classify donors as customers and deal with their complaints and feature requests. If you product is really useful, people would copy it and use it, whether you like it or not. But getting new features means work for you, and if there are people who really want to use those features, they would pay for them.
I saw a site develop basic functioning software and then selling it with details of future updates when $X amount was reached. The main product was useful to get people to purchase just for the initial software, but the updates were very tempting to be had. This way the company can also contract work when funds become available and then need less initial investment as well. Genius idea if you ask me! Plus have updates require downloads which would then have a new encryption to be paired with. The verified and working serials can also limit duplicate redownloads, so if a pirated copy gets out, it gets blacklisted quick and stops updates from being performed. To take it even one step further, you could put an encrypted piece of code that fails after a certain flag or starts to degrade in quality. But in all reality, it is truly a cat and mouse game. As long as someone tries hard enough, they will reverse engineer the software. A second option I thought of after writing the above... Instead of selling software that users can download onto their computer, put it in the cloud. You could have the application be hosted on your own servers(software developer), and have a VNC style interface where you can only use the functionality of the program thru a web interface but not have access to the actual files for the applications. For dealing with large files, this could currently be a major pain, especially dealing with HD video. Another downside could be that you would need to host servers and if your application is processor intensive, you would need the horse power to run these which might add substantial costs. Another major downside of copy protection; if you have great software with good copy protection that is costing the consumers a good chunk of change, someone else can just see your work and copy. They then release it at a cheaper price without ever needing to design, only write the code. So balancing your software's price to deter this from happening should be considered. Probably part of the reason prices on new released software is expensive then usually falls shortly afterwards.
AutoCAD was very expensive and you needed a dongle to run the software. No dongle, software won't run.
Hard to pirate around that.
Not impossible. But hard.
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
unless you're talking so far back that people didn't really think of software so much as the product as the reason people bought your hardware
How is that not still true of Macs and iDevices and to a lesser extent Nintendo game consoles?
Ok.. I am a (kind of) graphics designer myself. What I mean by that, is that I'm more of a video guy, but for that, I need to make graphics.. also I do other stuff, like web design. I'm also a gamer.. and a pirate. So you want my money do you? Here is how you'll get it:
1) Make something good (this seems obvious.. but as they say, common sense isn't so common. Remember GI Joe - the movie? Yea....)
2) Offer a full, time based trial (expires in 3 months). Depending on your software / plug-in, there may not be enough time in a single month to test out the features / uses for it. Most of my single projects themselves take at least a month.
3) Keep the price point to what the software offers. The features should = the cost. For example, if you make a plug-in that gives a radial blur effect to a picture (isn't that built into.. every single graphic design package?).. don't sell it for $500.
4) Activatation via online. Yes, this is DRM.. so what? If you're a serious designer, you shouldn't give 2 cents about having to activate your software. It also makes it easier for your customers (rather than having them re-install a full version or replace files).
5) If you want to go really sweet, offer what Fraps does.. free upgrades for life. Even major releases. I heard about Fraps.. I pirated Fraps.. I said, wow, this is a nice program.. and I went to the website. "It's only $25(?) bucks?!?" I clicked on Purchase and bought it.
In short.. don't make it over-priced, make it a reasonable purchase. Give it great features. Make it easy for users to install, activate, register, use. Offer a trial of the full release so people can see how to use it. That is how you'll get a Pirate's money.
My captcha is villains... rofl.
Long range missile armed drones flying over that part of the Indian ocean off east africa to sink their shios.
A Predator is probably too small, you could modify a P3 Orion to do the job, Or use a Global Hawk to spot them and smaller drones operating from a carrier...
Many suggested an easy way to pay, so put in the apple store and play store an 5$ app that gives the registration number based in the identity of the buyer.
This has several advantages, easy to pay, ubiquitous, trusty, and if the buyer loses the key, he can always re-download the app you already purchased.
Host yourself the app and dont ask for any info for the download,
Deter privacy is easy: make a really good product that people want to pay for.
No DRM, no online activation, no nonsense.
If it's worth having, people will pay for it.
Yes, some people will pirate it: only the MAFIAA is stupid enough to think that those people are lost sales. They're marketing opportunities. They wouldn't have bought your product anyway, but if you have a great product that they pirate, they might tell their friends.
Destroy the incentive to pirate with a low price and no DRM. You've already got the low price part done right.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
This depends on what view you want to take. If you want to view piracy is wrong and immoral then you do whatever you feel best.
If instead you want to view this as a transaction in which you have made something for which you are looking to get compensation to provide more benefit.
I state this to focus on the goal. You have made a product which you are charging a modest fee for ($5-$10). You want to maximize the amount of folks who use the tool and will pay you that compensation. So focus on the following:
Positive means more than negative. (We grouse at taxes but fail to realize the benefits and large penalties without the system it supports. Communicate your benefts)
Folks will pay what they can pay. Preventing piracy is an all or nothing proposition, it's a deterence. Through negative consequences you are seeking to provide incentives to pay for your product. Put yourself in your custom shoes, would you (the customer) really want to reward a bad actor (you the business) by giving them money if they make it more difficult to get what they have paid for?
My recommendations based on the above is a tiered payment structure.
Tier 1 - Basic tool, cheap.
Tier 2 - Additional features (avoid crippleware or nag ware just have a low cost and premium version). Focus on money vs. time as they will in making the choice.
Tier 3 - Support Manuals and forum access
Tier 4 - Premium cost for premium value.
A tiered support structure (without DRM, just more benefit for more money) will allow you to maximize your profit by providing incentives for folks to pay the most they can. Folks with more money than time will seek the higher tiers as long as you construct it effectively. Bundling multiple tools is a good way to add value for higher buy-in as well.
This is how grocery stores and boutiques do it. Focus on the value you are providing at the appropriate monetary level they are willing to pay.
TLDR; No DRM. Tiered pricing to take effect of what folks can pay based on their own time vs. money assessments. DRM is a stick. Look for a carrot.
"Don't fear death... fear not living..." -me
Have the app phone home at startup to nominally check for new versions. Any serial number that checks in from more than a dozen different IPs in a day can be presumed to be pirated. Give them a little nag screen that says, "$10 to register this program is a lot cheaper than a $5000 copyright infringement lawsuit. Don't be a dick, this is how I feed my family."
The goal, of course, is to have your software widely used and then convert as many pirates into paying customers as possible.
Instead focus on making your app so valuable as a graphic utility that people *need* it. Then price it low so that you can make revenue but not BP style revenue. I've done this a lot and always found people who really *really* like your software are willing to pay for it, when they find out it's $10 or so then it becomes a no brainer and they buy it. Pirates will pirate no matter how deep down the DRM rabbit hole you go. The only thing you can do to stop it is embrace it. A good way to do this is make your software able to detect if it's valid or not (via CD key or something as mentioned a hundred times already) and if the same key was used more than 5 times from more than 3 computers, it was pirated. In which case your action should not be to batten down the hatches and make it restrictive, but rather, offer a discount on the purchase and provide those pirates an easy "no repercussions" purchase path. A 50% discount would get you a lot of money that otherwise would have been lost to pirates. Just a thought and is how most "indie" developers see pirates anyway, as free advertising. Sure there will still be people who don't pay, but by providing them an easy path to purchase for a discount to make their copy *legit*, you'll find if the price is right that people would flock to it.
The right question is how do I make money.
What you need to do is list your potential pool of customers and then see how you can make money from them.
Hobbyist and College kids toying with graphics:
They're not going to pay. Accept it as a reality. They will hack your tool if you try. At best, use them as means to make your tool popular. Some might buy it, but most won't.
Large graphic shop: :P The lawyers will make sure a legit copy is made. I've worked for numerous software companies and the large ones have a team of lawyers running around. Now, a lot of the time people do use random software, but more often than not, the company will buy licenses. Really whats $10-$20 expensed for the company? I don't know what kind of deal my company makes with them, but we have legitimate versions of many pieces of 'shareware' products.
They will pay as long as it is illegal to use it otherwise. So don't release your product for 'free'. If you want, have a free version for non-commerical use and emphasize it in the tool that if it is used in a commercial setting, they must pay. Alternatively, have a simple serial number thing. It adds more authenticity to the agreement where you are purchasing licenses
Small to medium Graphic Shop:
These may pay and some may not. What can you do to help bring them over to the paying side?
1. Make it easy to pay. Sign up for a reputable app delivery service. easy for the smart phone market. Harder on a pc.
Another thing that often happens to me is I'll download and install an app, play with it a bit, or just look at the menus, and forget about it for a couple of weeks. Then when I come back to it, even though I've only opened it once, the trial period is over. And if I'm now ready to check the app out, the fastest and easiest thing to do is paste in the serial.
Some people will never pay, and there's no sense making it difficult to get around the DRM. It's been tried, and always fails. But a good app at a reasonable price will sell. Take note, Adobe!
-- sudon't
Air-ride Equipped
Why steal when you can borrow? If you offer an avenue for people to acquire your product and pay what they can until they've bought it theft from necessity will be, well, unnecessary.
It's that simple. Make your business model and services and support so bullet proof and customer-oriented that piracy is pointless, and you won't have a problem with piracy.
Arguments that piracy is a popularity tax, piracy is just the cost of doing business, piracy is an inevitability, all these arguments are only a partial consideration.
Yes, SOME things will always have a degree of piracy, that's a given. Work with it, since it's a fact of life. Instead of making your product something that people feel morally compelled to pirate, create a product and service and support model that's comprehensive and unique enough that piracy of it is pointless. In other words, sell a product that isn't just a one dimensional product. Sell a product that has a future, that purchasing includes so many perks and so many benefits that only an idiot would pirate it.
You know, a modern business model that incorporates the best of the things of the past, like excellent customer service, reliability, genuine product support, and innovation.
This, as opposed to something shiny and destined to be completely obsolete within months/a year.
The 10% of pirates you will NEVER stop. Don't spend time or money trying.
The other 90% need access to your product in way that is useful to them. NOT YOU.
As well, they will tell you the value your product. NOT YOU.
A product that is delivered in a customer friendly way and is the value the market supports will not run into wide spread piracy.
Conversely, if you limit delivery and over charge expect rampant piracy.
Display ads for the free version and take away the ads and add features for the non free version any other tricks will only inconvenience the legitiment user
Price your stuff so it' not worth the hassle to pirate it.
Audio and video files? Your distribution costs are close to zero these days. Let your prices reflect that and watch your volume explode. Put down the buggy whip, already.
Software? That's a bit of a different story. Depending on the work, it's much more expensive to produce, though the distribution expense is here also trivial. Sell the current version of AutoWord-DB-Pro for what you think is fair. Sell the older one's for cheap. Dirt cheap. The people who actually need the latest and greatest features will gladly pay, the rest will pay for the older version and maybe even become paying customers of your current one. Meanwhile, you're still capturing revenue from your old versions.
Start thinking in terms of total revenue, not how much "a copy" is worth. You are not losing sale when someone pirates a $400 program. You most certainly are losing a sale when you don't sell a $20 program that would have met the pirate's needs and for which he would have paid.
That'll encourage me to buy and will take care of the DRM bit.
Your CPU is not doing anything else, at least do something.
Have at least part of the functionality be implemented on the server and require a login.
It's simple, and the only thing that so far has shown to be a real detterent to hackers.
I have no advice for the game industry. But for a utility for graphic designers my suggestion would be to let me demo the software. Not for a limited amount of times but for a limited number of uses. I recently got a demo for a drawing application. It's limited to 30 days. I only sometimes need to draw anything. So in the next 30 days I'll maybe only have 4 real reasons to open it and will make time to play around with it in my spare time maybe 3 times max. But if I were given a limit of say 100 chances to run the program within a time limit of 9 months, that would definitely give me enough time to really evaluate, utilize, and possibly become dependant upon the software.
A simple serial number? Online activation? Encrypted binaries? Please share your thoughts.
Serial number user needs anyway - for support and such. (Or you provide no support?)
Allow users to run it in "demo" mode, until the serial is entered. Demo means:
- Couple of weeks of interrupted work with the program. (Best of all of you would actually count the time the program is actually used.)
- After the time has passed, once per day (or once per N uses per day) a polite reminder that the user should buy it, since well, develop has to feed his family. Politeness is important!
- If you are really really against the freeloaders, as time goes increase number of reminders.
Do encrypted/compressed binaries, if you can do it on the cheap/for free. Not really a deterrent to a pro, but just to prevent trivial tinkering. I have had cracked (and debugged) some programs (in the MSDOS/Win95 past) with a plain hex editor. :)
Overall, treat potential customers with respect and politeness. Do not annoy or eliminate - but remind to pay money.
All hope abandon ye who enter here.
...is to release it under GPL.
I hear what you're saying old man, some of my favorite people are Americans. ;)
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
This is Slashdot. Most of the people here will say there is no reasonable way to deter piracy. Many will believe you are wrong for trying to guarantee you make money from your effort solely because your effort is in the digital realm and "information wants to be free!"
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
Yes, 30 cards. And again, in case you missed it, the cost to me personally was ZERO, other than a small bit of time.
Not insane. Just a side effect of having many credit cards and spending lots of money both personally and for business. My credit history goes back 20+ years as well so again, this is not as unusual as you make it out to be. Cards get nicked all the time through no fault of the user. I buy a lot of goods online and logic would tell you that some of those vendors will eventually be hacked and give up the ghost.
If you have a problem with my "zero cost", then take it up with the fucking banks that issue the credit cards. That part isn't my problem Mr Iwantyoutopay. I don't give a flying fuck about YOUR interest rate or YOUR fees. Why on god's green earth would I care about your issues with fees and interest rates?