Author: Daniel Mehrmannn
Date: 14:22:39 09/26/05
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On September 26, 2005 at 16:33:53, Joachim Rang wrote: >Hi, > >I would like to explain a little bit how we have come to the decision to require >a hardware-based activation of Fruit: > >As the commercial idea became more concrete we realized with fear that we have >to bother about protection. Fabien is totally unaware of windows-functionality >and I am totally unaware of any real programming (beside html) so we didn't know >how to protect that thing. However with Fruit being the strongest engine we >expected some piracy-attraction. With an engine being only a few hundred KBs we >feared that a distribution by simply emailing the engine with a valid serial is >very easy and might hurt sales. This imagination together with the sale >expectation of well-informed sources led to this (perhaps desperate) attempt to >prevent pirating Fruit and to increase the sales of Fruit. Whether this is a >wise decision or not I don't know. As someone wrote below you are probably going >to loose customers in both cases. > >I don't like activation either and can understand that people will abstain from >buying Fruit because of this. I just can explain that it is not an attempt to >make maximum profit and get rich quickly but an attempt to increase the chances >that Fabien can hope in future to live on developing Fruit. Perhaps there are >some illusions about the profitability of selling a chess engine today. In the >90ies a new title could sell very well but today it isn't enough to make your >living out of that. > >There are some serious drawbacks of hardware activation but ideally you will >install it on your computer and don't be bothered anymore. Only if you buy >another computer you need to contact us. I know that there is uncertainty for >the user especially since we are not a well-established company but a business >which can disappear any time. I can only promise you that in case we dicontinue >distribution of Fruit there will be a free update with a non-hardware-based >lifetime key. I promise also that we will handle key requests generous without a >n arbitrary hardlimit and only reject if we have substantiated believe of key >trading. In the end it is your decision of trust in us which should determine >your decision. > >I hope you understand. > >kind regards > >Joachim Hi, well, hardware based license mostly depends, not alone of course, on the virtual MAC address of Windows inside or, if possible, on a real MAC-Adress of a networkcard. So it's possible if you're changing such stuff in your system that you're need a new license. Of course there are other ideas, example manufactor ID of the mainboard, and so on and so on.... Well, why not using upcoming TPA chips ? That would be work under Linux too, thanks Linus ;) Is that true ? I assume, yes. Bill Gates is greeting you. But of course, i understand the protection as well. Best, Daniel
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