Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!nuchat!sugar!karl
From: karl@sugar.uu.net (Karl Lehenbauer)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Software Development And Piracy (Spurred By FTL replies)
Message-ID: <3119@sugar.uu.net>
Date: 18 Dec 88 07:22:32 GMT
References: <413@orbit.UUCP>
Organization: Sugar Land Unix - Houston, TX
Lines: 32

In article <413@orbit.UUCP>, swordfis@pnet51.cts.com (Tim Mitchell) writes:
> 1. I finally got a copy of DungeonMaster, from FTL, into my hot little hands.
>  I read the manual, and was all set to waste an evening happily gaming, when I
> found out the disk didn't work. Now, my guess is that the pirates will have
> the game cracked within a couple of months. I am strongly anti-piracy, and it
> irks me that the little buggers will have working copies of the disk just for
> the asking, while I, a paid user, have to return mine. 

1.  You don't know that copy protection is responsible for your copy not
    booting.  It could have been a bad disk or bad dup.  The first batch
    of our game that went out was bad :-(

2.  There is a difference between casual pirates and hardcore pirates.
    Copy protection deters casual pirates.  Little can deter hardcore pirates.
    Presumably, most pirates are casual, so even though hardcore pirates
    break someone's CP, casual ones may not hence they may break down and
    buy the program, which is of course the idea.

> 2. This talk of fines and such is all very nice, but first shouldn't you think
> about how you're going to catch* the pirates?  ...
> Who on here is ready to say: "I've never* taped a song off of an album/CD for
> a friend,"? or "I've never taped a movie off of cable and let a friend watch
> it,"? 

Again, I don't think the entertainment vending companies are as concerned with 
me letting you watch a movie I taped off cable (although they don't like it)
as they are the more wholesale piracy of resellers/counterfeiters, here
too there is a difference between casual and hardcore piracy.
-- 
-- "We've been following your progress with considerable interest, not to say
-- contempt."  -- Zaphod Beeblebrox IV
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