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From: cjp@vax135.UUCP (Charles Poirier)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: "Look up a word in the manual" copy protection
Message-ID: <1819@vax135.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 13-Jul-87 19:48:15 EDT
Article-I.D.: vax135.1819
Posted: Mon Jul 13 19:48:15 1987
Date-Received: Wed, 15-Jul-87 02:11:34 EDT
References: <4807@sgi.SGI.COM> <6816@g.ms.uky.edu> <1812@vax135.UUCP> <294@l5comp.UUCP>
Reply-To: cjp@vax135.UUCP (Charles Poirier)
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Holmdel, NJ
Lines: 38
Summary: I still say it's ok

In article <294@l5comp.UUCP> scotty@l5comp.UUCP (Scott Turner) writes:
>In article <1812@vax135.UUCP> cjp@vax135.UUCP (Charles Poirier) writes:
>>equipment.  It doesn't take anything like two minutes if you know where
>>your manual is to start with.  Think of it as a soft dongle (pardon my
>
>Obviously you've never misplaced a manual, or had it sprout legs. "Were is my
>XXX manual?" "Uh, I borrowed it Scott and it's at home, sorry..." Or how about
>you took the manual home and left it there?

I have had to scrabble around for the manual a time or two.  I learned to
keep better track of it.  I don't have any use for the manual elsewhere
than where my Amiga is, so they don't get separated.  I don't lend out my
manual.  They might lose it, or make a copy or something.

If I were running a software company, I'd make allowance for catastrophic
loss of the key manual.  Like, send back the original disk and I'd return a
complete replacement.  Keeping track of the returned disks' serial numbers
would protect me from abuse by potential "manual breeders".

>I obey the law, I have no bootleg software on any of my Amiga disks. Why should
>I be treated like a criminal and forced to pass a litmus test everytime I

Nobody wants to be treated like a potential criminal.  Not you or I,
and especially not the REAL criminal.  Can you think of a non-insulting
way for a dumb piece of magnetic material and a dumb sheaf of pages to
distinguish between us and the criminals?  If you don't test
*something*, the criminals get away clean.  (I'd have said
"scott-free", but in deference to the replyee, I refrain.  :-) :-))
It's like locking your house and car -- a determined thief will get
past those locks, but most people agree that the locks are worth the
trouble nonetheless.

Enough --

-- 
	Charles Poirier   (decvax,ucbvax,ihnp4,attmail)!vax135!cjp

   "Docking complete...       Docking complete...       Docking complete..."