I'm surprised nobody mentioned releasing a patch yet. That's all they're doing, right? They're patching all new versions to change the dialog. So release the new dialog in an incremental patch. And if there are complaints about having to download it, put the patch on cd's and ship them out to game retailers to package with the games currently on the shelf, and to give out to those customers who want the patch, all free of charge. The cost sucks, I'm sure, but it would likely avoid any more whoopty-hoo. Personally I agree with all of the other posters about the sanity of the people pursuing this stupid issue, but at least this might satisfy someone.
I know I'm being redundant, but the more voices crying out in horror, the better right? Here's my situation, just as an example. I only have 1 optical drive. I don't want to keep my 1 drive filled 24/7 just because I want the game to actually RUN when I start it up. But if I take it out of the drive and put it back in all the time, it's GOING to get scratched up, and you can't make a backup of it. If you crack some games, they won't run online, even with a valid CD key. So, I make an image of the CDs that I use alot. Ubi, this is a bad idea, because it angers your REAL customers. Virtual drives have uses other than piracy and the convenience factor I mentioned above, and the people who buy the games are the same people who would have a real use for virtual drives. What also should be obvious is the futility of blocking the software - there will be a way around it soon enough. There always is, for better or for worse.
if you use a crack, you modify the checksum of the.exe...which alot of game servers check when connecting to play online. I don't know anything about this game, but I know that BF1942 does it.
Nah, it wasn't meant to be a defense. I'm merely pointing out that there likely exists a subgroup of these "pirates" that would gladly pay money if the availability were higher, so the MPAA should address this issue if they're truely serious about averting piracy. If it's easier to download it than to buy it, that's what they'll do. Not to mention the lack of patience becoming more prevalent in today's society:)
Don't wait forever to release the DVD version of a movie, then. There's almost always a grace period where a movie isn't in theaters OR on DVD/VHS...totally unavailable. So, if it's IMPOSSIBLE to see the movie legally, what do you expect? It doesn't make any sense - what is there to be gained by making the movie unavailable for legal rent/purchase? I'd speculate that this is one of the big reasons for downloading movies before they hit DVD. I personally don't mind paying to go to the theater or to rent a movie, as long as you'll actually LET ME.
As far as I know, doesn't Norton Ghost offer this functionality? I don't have it installed at the moment, but I think it has an option to backup to a CD/DVD.
I'm currently listening to this cd on my pc... works like every OTHER cd I own...tested on a Samsung SW-408B CD-RW drive and a Samsung SD-608 DVD drive. No problems. Are you sure all of them are protected? I tried it in WinAmp, Roxio EZ CD Creator, and even Windows Media Player...if it doesn't crash WMP, I think it's safe to say it's not gonna crash anything:P Perhaps I got lucky? Can anyone verify?
CmdrTaco has just provided us with a new definition of "geek romance"!
Forget the Goodyear Blimp...Slashdot her!
Next thing you know...right under "older stuff" will be "Geek Matchmaker";)
...I don't use their newgroups much. This move by them doesn't really surprise me though, because no matter what they're still a rather large company that's easily targeted by Them. In fact, I thought they'd already removed all the stuff that might be targetable. I mean, we've got http://groups.google.com now, so since I'm not (usually) looking for something of questionable legality (e.g. binaries such as movies, warez, etc - what they're removing) I use Google Groups. In addition to that, I know that Google won't be censoring their stuff (like we all know ISP's have a habit of doing whether they tell you or not).
I never understood why any one organization had control of this stuff in the first place. Microsoft has full control over Windows and its official "components", and in a way, ICANN is doing the same thing. Look up monopoly in the dictionary
(from http://www.m-w.com)
1 : exclusive ownership through legal privilege, command of supply, or concerted action
2 : exclusive possession or control
3 : a commodity controlled by one party
4 : one that has a monopoly
By these definitions of monopoly, that is exactly what ICANN has, is a monopoly on all names on the internet. However, we CAN do something. Don't forget AlterNIC...just switch your DNS's to theirs. I am.
--Strangel aka Jim Morris--
Yes, actually it is backwards compatible with almost all existing GB and GBC games...though they haven't said which games will have problems. That's why I'm buying it...I still have the original white GameBoy, screw the pocket and color....Advance is finally a worthy upgrade!
Unfortunately there are still some people out there, like my mother, that care whether the work gets done. Her job is stressing her to the limit because they put too much work on her and upper management will never do what they are supposed to. She does stuff related to grocery distribution in the southeast. She talks about walking out all the time, but when it comes down to it, she simply can't do it because she doesn't want to leave the rest of the company in a huge mess. It's simply having a conscience, because you know you have a responsibility and you don't want to bail on the other people that will have to pick up the pieces once you're gone. Remember, if you leave it will only make the problem worse for everyone else, at least for a little while.
I don't know about you, but I personally don't want to be in the middle of a movie when all of a sudden I get a GPF...not to mention that Linux is faster anyway...besides, Windows is too tempramental when it comes to drivers: when I want to play a DVD movie I have to swap around my Windows display driver because the damn software is too picky. Sorry, but Windows DVD support still sucks, and once Linux gets there i can free up that (rather large) bit of HD space that Windows takes up.
Is there any chance that such drivers will become available for (almost) every piece of Creative hardware? I own a DVD Inlay (CT7160) and I don't believe this one is for me, but I am DYING for one that would work on mine.
Slashdot Mirror
the xbox has a hard drive for such things, and i don't know much about ps2 but you can't win em all.
I'm surprised nobody mentioned releasing a patch yet. That's all they're doing, right? They're patching all new versions to change the dialog. So release the new dialog in an incremental patch. And if there are complaints about having to download it, put the patch on cd's and ship them out to game retailers to package with the games currently on the shelf, and to give out to those customers who want the patch, all free of charge. The cost sucks, I'm sure, but it would likely avoid any more whoopty-hoo.
Personally I agree with all of the other posters about the sanity of the people pursuing this stupid issue, but at least this might satisfy someone.
and if anyone happens to have a list of such games, please post!
I know I'm being redundant, but the more voices crying out in horror, the better right?
Here's my situation, just as an example. I only have 1 optical drive. I don't want to keep my 1 drive filled 24/7 just because I want the game to actually RUN when I start it up. But if I take it out of the drive and put it back in all the time, it's GOING to get scratched up, and you can't make a backup of it. If you crack some games, they won't run online, even with a valid CD key. So, I make an image of the CDs that I use alot.
Ubi, this is a bad idea, because it angers your REAL customers. Virtual drives have uses other than piracy and the convenience factor I mentioned above, and the people who buy the games are the same people who would have a real use for virtual drives.
What also should be obvious is the futility of blocking the software - there will be a way around it soon enough. There always is, for better or for worse.
if you use a crack, you modify the checksum of the .exe...which alot of game servers check when connecting to play online. I don't know anything about this game, but I know that BF1942 does it.
Nah, it wasn't meant to be a defense. I'm merely pointing out that there likely exists a subgroup of these "pirates" that would gladly pay money if the availability were higher, so the MPAA should address this issue if they're truely serious about averting piracy. If it's easier to download it than to buy it, that's what they'll do. Not to mention the lack of patience becoming more prevalent in today's society :)
Don't wait forever to release the DVD version of a movie, then. There's almost always a grace period where a movie isn't in theaters OR on DVD/VHS...totally unavailable. So, if it's IMPOSSIBLE to see the movie legally, what do you expect? It doesn't make any sense - what is there to be gained by making the movie unavailable for legal rent/purchase? I'd speculate that this is one of the big reasons for downloading movies before they hit DVD. I personally don't mind paying to go to the theater or to rent a movie, as long as you'll actually LET ME.
the more free software, the better! :D
As far as I know, doesn't Norton Ghost offer this functionality? I don't have it installed at the moment, but I think it has an option to backup to a CD/DVD.
I'm currently listening to this cd on my pc... works like every OTHER cd I own...tested on a Samsung SW-408B CD-RW drive and a Samsung SD-608 DVD drive. No problems. :P
Are you sure all of them are protected?
I tried it in WinAmp, Roxio EZ CD Creator, and even Windows Media Player...if it doesn't crash WMP, I think it's safe to say it's not gonna crash anything
Perhaps I got lucky? Can anyone verify?
Jim
CmdrTaco has just provided us with a new definition of "geek romance"! ;)
Forget the Goodyear Blimp...Slashdot her!
Next thing you know...right under "older stuff" will be "Geek Matchmaker"
...I don't use their newgroups much. This move by them doesn't really surprise me though, because no matter what they're still a rather large company that's easily targeted by Them. In fact, I thought they'd already removed all the stuff that might be targetable. I mean, we've got http://groups.google.com now, so since I'm not (usually) looking for something of questionable legality (e.g. binaries such as movies, warez, etc - what they're removing) I use Google Groups. In addition to that, I know that Google won't be censoring their stuff (like we all know ISP's have a habit of doing whether they tell you or not).
I never understood why any one organization had control of this stuff in the first place. Microsoft has full control over Windows and its official "components", and in a way, ICANN is doing the same thing. Look up monopoly in the dictionary (from http://www.m-w.com) 1 : exclusive ownership through legal privilege, command of supply, or concerted action 2 : exclusive possession or control 3 : a commodity controlled by one party 4 : one that has a monopoly By these definitions of monopoly, that is exactly what ICANN has, is a monopoly on all names on the internet. However, we CAN do something. Don't forget AlterNIC...just switch your DNS's to theirs. I am. --Strangel aka Jim Morris--
Yes, actually it is backwards compatible with almost all existing GB and GBC games...though they haven't said which games will have problems. That's why I'm buying it...I still have the original white GameBoy, screw the pocket and color....Advance is finally a worthy upgrade!
Unfortunately there are still some people out there, like my mother, that care whether the work gets done. Her job is stressing her to the limit because they put too much work on her and upper management will never do what they are supposed to. She does stuff related to grocery distribution in the southeast. She talks about walking out all the time, but when it comes down to it, she simply can't do it because she doesn't want to leave the rest of the company in a huge mess. It's simply having a conscience, because you know you have a responsibility and you don't want to bail on the other people that will have to pick up the pieces once you're gone. Remember, if you leave it will only make the problem worse for everyone else, at least for a little while.
I don't know about you, but I personally don't want to be in the middle of a movie when all of a sudden I get a GPF...not to mention that Linux is faster anyway...besides, Windows is too tempramental when it comes to drivers: when I want to play a DVD movie I have to swap around my Windows display driver because the damn software is too picky. Sorry, but Windows DVD support still sucks, and once Linux gets there i can free up that (rather large) bit of HD space that Windows takes up.
Is there any chance that such drivers will become available for (almost) every piece of Creative hardware? I own a DVD Inlay (CT7160) and I don't believe this one is for me, but I am DYING for one that would work on mine.