Interactive and me - An open letter to ISC.

[Jim Hogue]

In article <1990Jul11.164044.7241 at sco.COM> jim at iggy.UUCP (Jim Sullivan) writes:
>[ ... ]  People steal software and serialization
>codes are an attempt to prevent people from stealing software.  In the general
>environment, they are a good idea.  I have, on numereous occassions, dealt with
>customers who have purchased one copy of the software and then installed it on
>several machines and then called to complain that they are having trouble
>getting the different machines to talk to each other!  We've distributed
>software with serialization codes for years (this was before we became SCO
>Canada), with few complaints, except for the people who were trying to cheat
>us.
>
>Software piracy exists and until the ethics and morals of the software user
>community improve, companies will have to go to serialization codes and such
>to try and prevent software piracy.  [ ... ]

And it will continue to exist.  People have always stolen and they
always will.  A friend once asked if an alarm would help prevent his
car stereo from being stolen.  To which the cop replied, no, but you
will know sooner that it has been stolen and it will be a bigger hassle
for you to get in and out of the car.  So what to do?

I have found that companies often cheat, as you mention above, to try
something.  If what they are trying works (and they get the support to
make it work) then they will say lets go with it and then they will buy
the extra licensees that are necessary.  I have often tried a pirated
piece of software to find out if I wanted it or not (this usually
includes calls to the support people, because that is a big part of
what I will be paying for).  If I don't want it, I trash it, if I do I
buy it.  You should have helped the above mentioned client, got there
system going for them and then passed the info on to sales.  Sales
should try and sell them a multi-cpu licensee or multiple licensees.
If sales fails (the nice route) support should call back to see how
their systems are running and if it is appearant that they are still
running illegally then the accounting people should start the paper
stream.  Legitimate companies (and therefore people) will pay for
something they are using, the others never will no matter what you do.

Remember that support is supposed to help the customers, software
should be easy for the owner to install and use.  Think of a company
that sells a product under SCO and also sells SCO XENIX.  Imagine a few
hundred clients and every time they have to reinstall the op sys they
call support and say whats my serialization number?  I think its
zx234xcx34, hmm that didn't work, well lets see how about . . .  Simple
solution?  Sure!  Only install one copy of the os on all machines (i.e.,
one serialization number for all machines) and just keep all the others
in a vault to prove you paid for a licensee, just in case you get
sued.  Better solution?  Get rid of that security stuff that gets in
the way of the legitimate user and seems to pose no problem for the
illegitimate user!
-- 
It was too wet to go out.  Too cold to play ball.  So we sat in the house.
We did nothing at all -- Dr. Seuss    So they invented computers!
Jim Hogue   hogue at hsi.com or {uunet, yale}!hsi!hogue