PART 2: FSD! Im over add-ons with anti-piracy built in.

[Guest SoarPics]

I understand your points, Tim. I simply don't know enough about this technology at the present time. So my short term solution is to batten down the hatches until I can learn more.But there are other issues at play here. Take my case. A few weeks ago when the Commander upgrade was released I had a world of problems trying to get it installed. You and Steve spent alot of your collective time assisting me, all to no avail. After more than 4 hours (over a couple of days) I finally e-mailed you to offer my thanks for your efforts, and that I felt we had expended enough time and energy trying to get a $7.50 product to install. My question is this: I upgraded my system (entirely, including the OS) since purchasing the original Commander last year. Could the different hardware and OS have been a factor in our difficulties a few weeks ago? If so, what did you and I gain from your security system. I finally gave up, and you guys wasted alot of time trying to assist me without success.Tim, I'm serious regarding my question. I see a chance to learn something here.Thanks,

[Guest TimD]

Sean,Yes, we looked at this system. It is actually quite a bit more restrictive than the one we developed. For example, with our system you can uninstall/reinstall on the same machine as many times as you like, without additional validation, etc. We also allow you to install on a second machine automatically, as we realize many simmers use more than one system.As far as not needing to worry about issuing new keys, etc., there is really no way to avoid that. People don't always save license, key data. So when they reformat, have hard drive crashes, etc., they are out of luck without a replacement.Want a real life example? This past week alone we generated 78 Flight 1 wrapper replacement keys, and processed 62 "lost license ID" requests. That's just last week. :-eekhttp://www.fsd-international.com/team/TD_forum_sig.gif

[MartijnPleines 0]

The problem with this approach (and this seems to be similar to what PMDG are doing), is that the honest user has to worry about it. He/she needs to know and keep track of what conditions would invalidate his/her license keys and maintain a list of titles that will require de/re-registering.Another approach would be to allow a certain amount of changes within a certain time period. The user can make multiple changes within reasonable limits, but every now and then the hardware-baseline gets reset to whatever the system looks like at the time, and the cycle starts anew, allowing the user to make more changes; enough changes to keep even the avid hardware-tinkerer happy, but disallowing a large number of installations over a set of widely different systems within a relatively short space of time. I believe this is how the Windows XP activation scheme works.What's worrying me is that some of these new schemes are way too strict and rigid, not allowing any change at all-even changing HD partitioning or flashing a new BIOS revision apparently triggers a re-activation in some. edit: That sort of change alone would not be enough to indicate a transfer of the software to another machine.Martijn

[Guest SoarPics]

>It is not marginally organised ... it is highly>organised.>>http://members.lycos.nz/sharefs/forum/index.php>>** Edit by Ken Salter - site verified with user name/pwd - see>my reply below **>>Now maybe you'd like to rephrase ... ?>.....>Steve Small>Canberra, AustraliaAlright, Steve, now have have some meat to chew on. Please tell us what you'd like us to do to assist you in shutting down these dweebs. As I'm sure you've realized :-) , we can be a very snarly group when we're PO'd. Let's go have a talk with these boys.

[Guest TimD]

Shane,Now you begin to see the scope of our problem.http://www.fsd-international.com/team/TD_forum_sig.gif

[Joe L 62]

Well to clarify - I was not trying to sustain the arguments you reference. But the fact remains that some protection schemes are alienating some customers. The worst part is some of the newer methods affect people when they are "most sensitive" - new hardware, hard crashes, new systems , reinstalls etc.I manage a store in a non-tech industry. We measure loss in the fractions of a percent - but in my one location alone that would buy thousands of copies of any add on. One thing to keep in mind is that one should not be so focused on curing the problem they alienate the honest customers. One sure way to cure the loss is to become so customer unfriendly that it drives you out of business - loss problem cured. That is not condoning the issue, or turning a blind eye. That is realizing that it will unfortunately never go away, or ever be totally fool proof. In my case one of the biggest points to get across was education. Although most developers don't want to reveal their business specifics (rightly so) more dialogue with the customer over what theft costs in terms of dollars, time, or units lost etc. might help people be less threatened, more aware, and more likely to get involved on the "good side". Even if it "converted" a few from "bad" to "unconcerned" or unconcerned to involved it would help the matter.It very likely that some of the loudest protesters here may fit into your argument ( ... me thinks he doth protest too loudly ...). But there are also many legitimate potential customers that are at the beginning fringes of saying enough. Is it enough for any developer to rethink their current scheme - probably not. But is an issue for everyone to follow.Joe LorencPhiladelphia/Charlotte Hub Manager, Carolina Operations, VN7 Networkhttp://www.vn7network.com/

[Guest Steve Small]

Thanks, Ken.You will, with little effort, find all FSD's files that have been released unprotected. You will find the EagleSoft files, DreamFleet's, RealAirSimulations, PSS ... the list goes on. Anyone who releases software, unprotected, has it compromised in a matter of hours - or days. I cannot claim that the monotony of this does not have a cumulative effect. Even some users can by design or accident finally wear you down. We have to ourselves License part of our Licensing system externally and it costs money to run. Some folks like to swap hardware or reinstall operating systems almost daily : until those folks (like George, for example, with whom we traded thousands of words in emails) can settle on a machine build that is likely to last for months and not for days, then Product Activated Software & Licensing systems are not good choices for them as consumers. We accommodate up to a point but when it is actually costing us money, as with any business, we have to either set either limits or quit.Yours,.....Steve SmallCanberra, Australiahttp://www.fsd-international.com/team/Steve_signature.gif

[Guest Steve Small]

Hi Greg,Thanks for stepping up to the plate and acknowledging the other side of the coin. This (the details, the URL's) usually gets talked about in off camera by developers at the risk of publicising these services.Unfortunately, we are all of us (you, I, FSD and other developers) absolutely powerless to do anything in the face of entrenched corporate inaction by the likes of web host services who support these services. Developers are creative, innovative people and we lose a good deal of heart wasting creative effort developing systems to combat the problem. It may sound self serving given the nature of this discussion, but the only way to deal with the problem is for users to accept (or not) that in the absence of software licensing, the future of choice is destined to be rather bland. We tried keeping prices down well belkow our peers to show users respect, but even that didn't work : the Seneca V we released through was on Warez sites in under 4 hours. Later this week I will buy my third version of the same operating system for a rebuild of an old case. And with the ENTIRELY LEGITIMATE SafeDisc protection system Microsoft employ on the retail FS2004 CD media, I'll need buy three copies of that as well and won't even blink. Best,.....Steve SmallCanberra, Australiahttp://www.fsd-international.com/team/Steve_signature.gif

[Guest TimD]

Joe,We absolutely agree 100%. That's why we do not put any kind of arbitrary limit to the amount of installs/unlocks we will provide. All you have to do is tell us what is going on and we will help you.But the problem here boils down to this: without some sort of machine identification, there is no way to prevent casual file/key trading. You have to use something as a criterea. And unfortunately, it is those components of the system that you mention which will be volitile in case of catastrophic system failures. I do wish we had another way.So what it comes down to is we have to spend a lot more time doing support than we would otherwise. But even given this, we do not have this issue come up all that often. Most folks keep the same hardware configuration for quite a while now. And our system allows unlimited flexibility on the same system.http://www.fsd-international.com/team/TD_forum_sig.gif

[Guest TimD]

Greg,We have tried for quite a while with Lycos to get some action. We have complained until we are blue in the face that they are sponsoring a pirate site. They will not even respond.http://www.fsd-international.com/team/TD_forum_sig.gif

[Guest TimD]

Martijn,That's why we chose not to read the BIOS as part of our machine identification. This paramater is simply too volitile.http://www.fsd-international.com/team/TD_forum_sig.gif

[BobP 56]

I've been away from flight simming for quite awhile and have been attempting to update many of the planes I own. So far, two days have passed attempting to get an update (if any) for the Phoenix Dash 8. My email address of record is no longer recognized. So..... I post a message in the Phoenix forum, and then wait a day for it to clear customs, and then get a reply telling me to email support. I could not get to the support part of the damn website because I was not allowed to log-in. Duh! I clearly understand the reasons developer's use protection schemes and I support them. However, protection schemes waste customer and company resources and it gets tiresome very quickly proving you

[Guest freequest]

Umm i know this is way off topic but can you point me to some info regarding the new load manager for the senaca V :)I think its really neat with the engine hours and stuff but im $2019.56 in virtual depbt and can recoop my virtual losses :) ROFLThanks

[Guest bigun]

SteveThousands of words? Wow I kept all the e-mails and there were a total of 6 between 5/24/03 and 6/4/03. Most of the "words" were from my end trying to justify getting a keyfile. Go figure? One of which was just small talk (excuse the pun) between you and I. All others related to the change to the new machine (the first by the way since 1997). Oh well like I said, chock it up to experience and move on. I do hope however that at some point in the future that you realize that you may indeed be WRONG with the way you handled this. Maybe others will also get a "heads up"George Stoddard

[Guest christian]

Hi Tim,I think one of the big points of the whole thread is that your calculations is simply incorrect.All you have proven is that about 30% of all copies out there are pirated. That does NOT equate into 30% lost sales! You'd first have to prove that everyone that owns a pirated copy would have actually bought the plane in the first place. I would think that a very large number of that 30% would simply not buy your planes for various reasons. Just because they have a free copy doesn't mean they are prepared to spend any money on it. I think, it means quite the opposite, they aren't prepared to spend any money on it.And there is another parameter that is always neglected in these calculations, and that's free advertising. There may be a number of people that haven't even thought about paying money for any of your planes, got an illeagal copy though, liked what they saw, and changed their mind and did the right thing after all and got an offical, paid copy of you afterwards.How big these 2 factors are, noone knows. All you can say is that you have lost UP TO 30% of your sales, but how big the number is in reality, who knows. It could be 10%, it could even be that the advertising factor outweights the pirating factor, and in effect you are making a profit. Without any serious study, you just won't know.I'm not defending piracy, and understand how frustrating that problem must be, but I hope that gives you something to think about. Maybe, after all, the market for pay-ware planes is much smaller than you think it is...Sorry, if this all sounds a bit harshly, I'm just trying to make a point. I'm actually selling payware stuff too (although I don't persue it very seriously, and I'm actually not bothered about pirating at all).Cheers, Christian