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Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:32 am
by Syranide
malcolmboston wrote:lol, no offence but that BS to be honest, so someone goes and gets a copy of my project illegally they use it think its good and think "hmmm, i might buy the next version"

i highly doubt it to be honest, they'd be trawling google for all those "nasty" sites for the brand new version for free. Granted im building this application for myself as much as anything but the stuff im adding into it are more of a "hub" and not required by me as such.
yeah, then could you consider the fact, that someone would crack your great project anyway, anything that is widely used always become pirated more or less.

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:37 am
by malcolmboston
i know it will if its a major app (which it isnt going to be, this is PHP we're talking about) i just want to try and make a buck from a nice utility for you guys, i dontr want to have spent 1000+ hours on it to get $100 back from a few paying customers when 100's / 1000's are using it.

in regards to the previous example, i may not be microsoft but i have the same principles, i want to be paid for the hard work i do.

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:37 am
by Syranide
patrikG wrote:Let's stay on the problem at hand, shall we? If malcomboston was Microsoft one could develop valid points about copyright and copyleft. As it is, malcomboston is a guy who wants to earn his living. It's economies of scale, Syranide. No food on the table and being morally right will let you still starve.
As I said, copy protections don't necessarily increase the amounts of sold versions... that's what you need to consider, being a PHP-project it is extremely easy to hack, sure, have protection but make it cheap if you ask me, that way you will get rid of "hobby" people and with only minor performance hits. in my eyes a mroe advanced protection would get hacked anyway by the very same people but with greater performance degrading and angry faces.

that's my opinion, just to clarify my opinion I wouldn't ever buy his project if he where to implement all of the strategies, not ever, and there you see, you have lost a customer, perhaps gained another one... it's all about weighing.

(if you missed it)
EDIT: there was a great gamecompany that actually started out like this back in the old days, a really really awesome 3d-game, it wasn't bad at all... what did they do? they gave it for free, what happened? next to every single person with a computer in the world played their game... thus giving their name huge amounts of respect and widely known over the world, giving them unlimited opportunities for their "first" game that was being charged for.

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:41 am
by Syranide
malcolmboston wrote:i know it will if its a major app (which it isnt going to be, this is PHP we're talking about) i just want to try and make a buck from a nice utility for you guys, i dontr want to have spent 1000+ hours on it to get $100 back from a few paying customers when 100's / 1000's are using it.

in regards to the previous example, i may not be microsoft but i have the same principles, i want to be paid for the hard work i do.
final comment for now (going home)

consider this
- instead you earn $100, and have the same amount of users? which one is greatest?
ok, that was evil, take this instead
- instead you ern $200 the first month, and no copies, but on the other hand, if 10000 copied it, it could have been widely known, thus resulting in more customers, don't forget the advertisement power of piracy which is commonly used in nowadays games, make it easily hackable, but after a month restrict the use of online play. (not applicable for your project though) ...

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:44 am
by patrikG
You've made that point abundantly clear, Syranide, let's move on and stop derailing this thread by injecting the same point over and over again.

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:44 am
by malcolmboston
if i were to release it for free, then i would release it now, without all the cool features i have planned for it,do you really think i should spend 1000+ hours on a project that i wont make any money from? i dont want to release a 3rd rate product, if im gonna release it, im gonna try to get it to "commercial quality" which takes time and time = money, i have a full-time job, lots of freelance work (which i get paid for all of it) why would i spend more time on this than all of the freelance projects put together and release it for free

and in regards to version 2, as you mentioned it may entice people to buy it, if im releasing v1 for free, imagine the improvement i would need to get for version 2, 1000+ hours at least this is going to take me, never mind adding the improvements that v2 would require....

believe me mate, i value your opinion and i can see where your coming from with the "release v1 for free to entice people for v2" in a sane world this'd be a cool idea, but the fact of the matter is, piracty is on the increase and if people can save £20 by downloading it, they will.

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:45 am
by malcolmboston
anyway :lol: back on topic,

any other protection ideas, best ive heard so far is the build your own php module / extension

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:49 am
by Syranide
I didn't say you needed multiple versions for it.

What I said was, piracy is a great great advertisement market, all games from the worst to the best gets cracked... all the best games don't get bought, why? because no one knows about them... suddenly when 10000 copied it instead of 10 having it... it appeared to people, this is a great game, really really great, let's tell my friends... and in the end, the market for your product is much greater, and they end up 100000 copies, and let's say 100 sold.

PHP-projects don't gain much attention, they need to be huge if they are gonna be visible on the internet.

But I feel like dropping this now as I've made my point more than clear, and you apparently want to make it uncrackable at all costs.

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:53 am
by malcolmboston
Syranide wrote:...and you apparently want to make it uncrackable at all costs.
last post about this because i want to move on with some more productive idea's.

i do not want to make it uncrackable, i want you lot to be able to change the base source code, i am going to be encouraging that, build new modules for it etc. I just want to make it much much harder for you lot to crack

as i mentioned in an earlier post, if i was to encrypt any code in this app, it would purely be the "CheckValidKey ()" + "EncryptDecrypt ()" functions not the actual classes and functions that handle what the site can do, i dont like software like this either

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 8:53 am
by patrikG
Syranide - let me be clear: stop re-iterating your point or I will start moderating and you won't like it.

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 9:12 am
by Roja
Syranide wrote: yes, that is what you do all the time, you have to rely on that what you get is what you should
No. Thats not what I do all the time. In fact, I do just the opposite. I run Free & Opensource software unless I have no choice (like during my dayjob). That allows me to review the software I run - and I do.

For software that is too large to audit, I look at the wide install base, and find trusted sources (Apache group, Fedora community, etc). I check the checksums to ensure it really came from them before installing. I monitor its behavior.

Notice that at no point do I just "rely on what you get is what you should".
Syranide wrote: , I mean you run windows, for all you know it could be a great great virus (which some thinks)... something you in some manner has to trust.
As I said, the only time I use non-FOSS is during my day job, when I am required to. At that point, its security or insecurity is out of my hands - so its not a relevant comparison.

I don't install and run webscripts that I can't look at the code for. Why anyone would choose to is beyond me.

I understand the need for profit. There is nothing stopping Malcolm from copyrighting his code, and requiring people to pay for commercial use.

If the fear is that people will break that law and use it in violation of that requirement, then the simple fact is that there isn't much to be done. If people will break the law, they'll do many things that you can't stop.

Use an encoding program, or use copyright law. Simple choices. Both are effective, and there are affordable implementations of both.

Whats left to discuss?

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 9:31 am
by malcolmboston
differing methods of doing what i requested? :roll:

as a side note to the copyright stuff Roja mentioned, obviously im going to be using a DB schema for this, what is the stand on using MySQL as im sure they brought out some new laws...

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2005 9:46 am
by Roja
malcolmboston wrote:differing methods of doing what i requested? :roll:
That was my point.. You can:

1. Close the source (use an encoder) or not.
2. Require a web connection (to validate before it runs) or not.
3. Make the license restrictive to possibly earn more profit - or not.

That, as far as I can tell, covers every potential solution to your question, and we've discussed all six.

If I've missed another solution set, please - expand my mind. :)
malcolmboston wrote: as a side note to the copyright stuff Roja mentioned, obviously im going to be using a DB schema for this, what is the stand on using MySQL as im sure they brought out some new laws...
First, a clarification "on using MySQL" is confusing.

If you mean MySQL specifically, the only impact for developers is if you embed mysql itself (or the client libraries) in your product. No one does that except maybe a Redhat or Oracle.

If you mean SQL, thats a much better question, and unfortunately, right now there isn't a general answer. Numerous court rulings (including binding appeals court decisions in multiple parts of the country) have found that a unique *collection* of data can be copyrighted.

However, for schema's specifically, there haven't (to my knowledge) been many rulings.

As a general statement, copyright is easy to get, possible to defend, and near impossible to enforce (without lawyers or decent quantities of money).

So, for each release, get a poor man's copyright - print the code, put it in an envelope, send it registered mail to yourself. Put the (not opened!) envelope in a safety deposit box, and if it ever becomes an issue, you have the proof that its your code (and that you did it first).

Additional protection that helps is registering your copyright with the copyright office, which has a small fee, and is extremely beneficial legally.

Finally, keep in mind that most users/clients want to do the right thing. The only relevant question is how hard you make it for them to do so.