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Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!rutgers!ames!oliveb!pyramid!batcomputer!matthews
From: matthews@batcomputer.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: illegal Disk Ranger
Message-ID: <1278@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
Date: Fri, 5-Jun-87 11:31:22 EDT
Article-I.D.: batcompu.1278
Posted: Fri Jun  5 11:31:22 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 7-Jun-87 00:47:21 EDT
References: <1265@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
Reply-To: matthews@tcgould.tn.cornell.edu.UUCP (Dave Matthews)
Organization: Dept. Plant Pathology, Cornell University, Ithaca NY
Lines: 39

> From u-cdmorr%ug@cs.utah.edu Thu Jun  4 21:10:00 1987
> From: u-cdmorr%ug@cs.utah.edu (Cliff Morrison)
> To: matthews@tcgould.TN.CORNELL.EDU
> Subject: Disk Ranger
> 
> It is my opinion that you are being a little hard on yourself.
> Looking at the current version number and features, I find it very likely
> that this program was offered as freeware before Mainstay bought the rights.
> If this is not the case and it was "diddled" with, I would like to hear.
> ...
> Maybe you could post to the net and we all could be enlightened.  I'm sure 
> more people were confused than convinced by your article.

I'm sorry, once again.  I hadn't thought about needing to present the 
evidence.  Exhibit A is a phone call I made to Tom Nalevanko, president 
of Mainstay.  He was gracious and philosophical, but he laid to rest my 
faint hope that it wasn't true.  His philosophy was even sadder to hear: 
because of this kind of problem, Mainstay is getting out of the business 
of publishing small, inexpensive utilities.  They find that many users 
simply refuse to believe that software in this category can cost money, 
their product TurboDownload being another case in point.

Exhibit B is this entry in the current version (dated 4-16-87) of 
<INFO-MAC>SOFTWARE-VERSIONLIST.TXT:
    PROGRAM NAME                    VERSION TYPE    PUBLISHER
    Disk Ranger                     2.1     c       Mainstay
Granted, the current version of Disk Ranger is actually 3.0, but the 
illegal copy's version number was given as 2.1.  Had I taken the trouble 
to consult the VersionList, none of this would have happened.

I hope everybody sees the morals of the story as clearly as I do. 1) Why 
not check the catalog of your user group's software collection against the 
VersionList?  2) Why not help support the VersionList, maintained as public 
service by the Princeton Mac User Group, by submitting to them any 
information about new versions or new software you run across?

- Dave Matthews
  matthews@tcgould.tn.cornell.edu
  matthews@crnlthry.bitnet