Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: Which Software/Devices Are Unusable Without Connecting to the Internet? (techdirt.com)
New submitter AlejandroTejadaC writes: Currently, most commercial software and hardware manufactures rely on an internet connection for registering or activating their products and providing additional functionality. In an ideal world this works fine, but in our real world the buyer could lose access to internet for months --
such as in emergency situations like the aftermath of hurricane Maria -- and their products will refuse to work because they need an internet connection. Which companies are using their internet servers as replacements for hardware dongles? I want to see a complete list of software and devices that become completely unusable without a live internet connection. Just remember the infamous case of the Razer Synapse.
There is nothing on this planet that I need so badly, that I have to sacrifice it's ability to function if it cannot get on the Internet. If it cannot work on it's own, then it is of no use to me.
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You have a two week grace period, but once it runs out of data and is no longer able to verify your paid account status... you've got an oddly shaped brick on your hands.
#DeleteChrome
You prefered the days of USB dongles, license servers and an inability to rent per-minute licenses? I for one didn't I ask companies to add internet connection based licensing, I'm so sick and tired of managing FlexLM servers, replacement dongles and paying $1,000 a year when we desparately need it for 60 minutes.
I'll take a local license file and FlexLM manager any day over internet-dependent services.
I can handle one license server having issues, impeding work. I sure as hell don't want to deal with all of my license managers going down if I lose internet service.
And 60 minutes a year define your usage requirement? I'd outsource that shit.
One of the biggest problems with software is that the data created with it may only be usable with that piece of software. Adobe software is a prime example: you'll never be able to reuse an After Effects project without a copy of After Effects the same version or later to use it with, and today your only option is a subscription that can run out. When that subscription runs out, the countless hours you invested in using that software are rendered inaccessible. Sure, you can pull up that MP4 you rendered for YouTube that time, but if you want to revisit the project or reuse it in another? Nope, your subscription's out so your data has dropped to a value of zero.
I pay Adobe for a software subscription every month. I also keep the latest installers, AMT Painter, cracked amtlib.dll files, etc. lying around in case something goes wrong. The last thing I need is to be broke and unable to pay for my subscription and lose access to my countless hours of work as a result. Regardless of your position within the ethical arguments surrounding software piracy and cracking, it is good practice to keep a known working cracked copy of any "online required" software lying around just in case the vendor cuts you off for some reason.
Oh, and Adobe refuses to activate old (i.e. CS1) versions of their software, so anyone that "bought" such software and has a computer problem will soon find out that they didn't "own" jack shit. I see no ethical dilemma with using a cracked copy in such cases. Fuck software activation.
Sadly, while I really like the Chumby alarm clock form factor (it's a little padded beanbag you can pound to snooze, very satisfying), it's completely dead without an internet connection at boot.
At one point the company basically went under, but a benevolent soul has kept the servers running for another 5+ years - all of them would stop working without it.
It doesn't have to be continually connected, but periodically. And when it can't connect, you've got a worthless alarm clock, which is very bad for an alarm clock I really should replace it, but I'm not all that reliant on it (set my phone as backup when I have to make a plane), and I REALLY like hitting the soft top to snooze it.
DRM servers have killed the used games market on PCs.
There are lots and lots of games out there that are over a decade old even that you can't buy used because they have been "activated" on an old DRM server and can't be reactivated on another machine.
In several cases, legitimate copies of a game can't be played at all on any PC because the game had demanded to contact a now discontinued DRM server even to start.
"We mustn't be caught by surprise by our own advancing technology" -- Aldous Huxley
One of the professors at my old university once went to a conference and tried to demo an application he had recently written only to find that it would hang immediately upon launch. It had worked flawlessly when he had been debugging it a few days earlier and run the exact same build the day before. Turns out one of the APIs the application used would "call home" as part of the setup function even when none of the network functions in the API were used.
Needless to say he ended up with some proverbial egg on his face on top of what you usually get when you're called "Jerker" (Swedish male surname) and try to present something in an English speaking country.
"Why should I want to make anything up? Life's bad enough as it is without wanting to invent any more of it."
Those small furry creatures, did they groove with a Pict by any chance?
Every end has half a stick.