Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!mimsy!oddjob!hao!ames!amdahl!dlb!dana!rap From: rap@dana.UUCP (Rob Peck) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Copy protection: A marketing analysis Message-ID: <197@dana.UUCP> Date: Wed, 22-Jul-87 17:07:45 EDT Article-I.D.: dana.197 Posted: Wed Jul 22 17:07:45 1987 Date-Received: Sat, 25-Jul-87 01:50:46 EDT References: <207@cc5.bbn.com.BBN.COM> <4386@jade.BERKELEY.EDU> Organization: Dana Computer, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA Lines: 32 Summary: personalization is another way? Re copy protection ... I don't know how others would feel about this, but if a company might institute something like "dealer must customize the product on purchase" things might be easier for the customer. For example, lets say there is a copy-protected version of a disk sent out to a dealer who prefers copy protection, along with his orders of real honest-to-goodness program disks, each missing a critical file, that is, the program itself (data files, overlays or whatever, are already on this non copy protected disk). The customer hands over his Visa, M/C, Amex or check, and the dealer runs the personalization program that encodes this data with the customer's name into something that causes this info to appear onscreen each time the program is booted or packed into an on-the-fly-created requester in response to an "about-this-program" request. The personalization file is written to the non copy protected disk, completing the product. Now if the user chooses, he/she can make as many backups as desired. If they give it away to all of their friends, they also give away their personal charge information, which isn't exactly a good idea. The pirate would still find a way to locate and defeat this method, but it could at least make the casual giver-of-software think twice about what was being given away (besides the copy-rights of the originator, that is). Same could go for mail order sales. Yes it requires more work, but maybe it'd be a little better for all concerned? Just a thought. Rob Peck ...ihnp4!hplabs!dana!rap