Balsamiq's thoughts on software piracy | Hacker News Reader

Balsamiq's thoughts on software piracy

balsamiq.com

46 pointspchristensen18 comments

the win on this article is the comments: he posted the article, someone cracked the license generator, posted the source. there was a brief, friendly discussion about this.

if it were one of my previous employers, they would've immediately sic'd lawyers, the fbi, homeland security, and anyone within shouting distance on the commenter. (the head of the legal department once got up at a quarterly meeting and ecstatically announced how many people had been prosecuted that quarter. there was an uncomfortable silence that followed, as everyone began expecting security cameras installed in every room. they started appearing shortly thereafter.)

the authors sense of humor about this and pragmatic outlook is appreciated, and in my mind, correct. do what you can, make it easy to buy, make it uninteresting to break, have free versions available for people who need them.

The comments really show how Peldi thinks:

In the article he stated why he sees no point in making it hard to crack the code open, then someone posts this code and mentions that he is no pro hacker, but just was able to use his newbie-skills in flash because there was absolutely no obfuscation or something - and now Peldo is researching and asking for ways how he could do better.

Well that's fast learning. Im really impressed.

Hi there, this is Peldi. A little update: I will be trying out SecureSWF tonight, after a twitter friend recommended it: http://www.kindisoft.com/secureSWF/ - we'll see. :)

From the article: "I don’t do anything to protect against decompiling, and I’m not worried about it."

So I assume you've changed your mind a little, and you're now at least a little worried about it ;)

Yes, a little. The guy made a good point that making life harder to beginner-level hackers is a good idea, so that's what I think I'll do. I'll update the post after the dust settles a bit. :)

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You can put ASCII on a pig...

Well, at least the "bad guys" are "hackers" ;)

I must be in some other group; I buy software based on the value of the software to me. If it's valuable, I will pay for it; if it's something I already know I'm going to use once and never touch again, it's highly unlikely that I'll pay for that privilege. I think providing a fully-functional limited-time demo would deter a lot of cracking and redistribution that goes on.

I think the fact that I paid for Adobe Web Premium CS3 or whatever the hell it was called shows that I'm pretty open to paying for software I'm going to use a lot.

"The fact that the key has a name in it is a big psychological deterrent to sharing it. If I found a key on a cracked site, I’d be able to immediately trace it back to the owner."

This is awesome and going in my toolbox.

It's a good idea, but like any scheme, can be worked around. If it's a standalone application (i.e. not perpetually online), a keygen could be written, and thus the names that are used to create the keys are garbage names / gibberish. In either case, people could buy valid copies of your software with fraudulent or stolen credit card information and share those keys. Only the crackers (red zone) have the emotional burden of performing credit card fraud, while the more moderate pirates still benefit.

Unless you figure out how the key is generated, then you just create a name "John Smith" and apply the code to create the key. Now he's looking for a John Smith, so I'm not sure this is really the best way to think about it.

Or, just run it as a webapp which people do not download.

With desktop software, they download it, and you usually have no means to shut off access etc unless you build in some callbacks etc.

Webapps on the other hand, you have complete control always.

Webapps have their own host of issues.

Besides, Balsmiq clearly works better for people as a desktop app, as shown by his sales.

I agree, with a mockup tool it's probably most useful as a desktop app so you can use it anywhere.

However, it does seem like he vastly underestimates how simple it is to pirate if anyone wants to.

I'm not going to make an application that is a good desktop app a web app because I am afraid of it being pirated. Make a good product, don't let fear of 'what if' make decisions for you.

Don't let "details" like "making money" distract you from building a "product".

Meanwhile, back here in reality, monetization models do play into deployment strategies. :-)

It's sell it and forget it or host it and regret it. Hosting a web app and peoples' data is a whole different business model.

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