Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!husc6!think!ames!lll-tis!lll-lcc!unisoft!hoptoad!academ!killer!elg From: elg@killer.UUCP (Eric Green) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Copy protection: boycott it! Message-ID: <1121@killer.UUCP> Date: Fri, 10-Jul-87 02:36:35 EDT Article-I.D.: killer.1121 Posted: Fri Jul 10 02:36:35 1987 Date-Received: Sun, 12-Jul-87 18:02:05 EDT References: <2470@husc6.UUCP> Organization: Bayou Telecommunications Lines: 48 in article <2470@husc6.UUCP>, hadeishi@husc4.HARVARD.EDU (mitsuharu hadeishi) says: > > In article <4259@jade.BERKELEY.EDU> mwm@eris.BERKELEY.EDU (Mike (My watch has windows) Meyer) writes: >>Very small? Gee, that's odd. As long as I avoid companies that sell >>games as the bulk of their products, I don't have problems with things >>being copy protected. But I tend to stay with programmers & CLI tools, >>and not business applications and games. > > That's fine for you (and me) Mike, but if you are interested > in getting software out to the masses, which I am, then I'm afraid > we're all going to have to live with copy protection. I must agree that copy protection IS necessary for consumer software. HOWEVER, in most instances of non-trivial software, disk-based copy protection or "keyword"-type copy protection is not necessary. Any software package with an 80 page or larger manual will be, via the vagarities of the software pirating industry, "protected" (assuming that the manual actually is necessary for the operation of the program, and isn't just "glitz"). Most people, when they want to copy something, are quite discouraged to find out they'll have to place each and every one of these little sheets of paper on a little glass plate and feed nickels to it for half a day (assuming, of course, you're not the print shop manager -- if you are, you just plunk it into the automagical document feeder, and whiz away!). The most popular BBS program for the Commodore 64 is named "C-NET". I know of at least 30 C-NET boards in Houston, Texas. Maybe FIVE of them are legal. This is how bad things are in the consumer market, where the big volume is -- for every 5 you sell, you have 30 pirated. How effective is manual-based protection? VERY. I know of several pirated copies of Bayou Telecommunication's latest product in Houston. Legal ICE owners have reported that they get calls from users who ask them "for help setting up the program". You see, there's several charts in the manual, where you must read numbers from for various modem types (heheh)....... anyhow, NONE of those pirated copies have yet to appear on the carrier waves, and probably won't until some kid gets the bright idea of getting the whole gang together for $5 apiece and going into the manual-copying business.... which I suspect they'll tire of immediately (nothing more fickle than a kid -- sitting in front of a copying machine feeding nickles into the thing is enough to get ANYONE impatient, much less a 15 year old!). I agree that programming tools should not be copy protected. But consumer software and games are a different story indeed. -- Eric Green elg%usl.CSNET CS student, University of SW Louisiana {cbosgd,ihnp4}!killer!elg Apprentice Haquer, Bayou Telecommunications Snail Mail P.O. Box 92191 BBS phone #: 318-984-3854 300/1200 baud Lafayette, LA 70509 I disclaim my existence, and yours, too.