

Intercontinental Ballistic App Store - rfreytag
http://www.cringely.com/2011/06/intercontinental-ballistic-app-store/

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bradleyland
"...it becomes nearly impossible to pirate that software without first hacking
Apple’s data center in North Carolina."

I'm not sure he's correct about this. As I understand it, software downloaded
through the App Store is rather easily pirated if you know what/where to copy
it.

I think Apple is solving the problem from the opposite direction. Rather than
try to prevent users from pirating software, they're A) making software prices
far more accessible, and B) making the purchase and acquisition (download) of
software ridiculously easy.

This is built upon the theory that people generally want to do the right
thing. Apple has (more or less) proved this with the success of the iTMS. If
given a good value proposition and low barrier of execution, most people will
purchase their music legitimately. Having said that, there will always be
pirates, but this same theory says that "pirates will be pirates", and they
never would have bought the software to begin with.

If you can make your millions on legitimate users, why waste time crying over
spilt milk? With the App Store, Apple is trying to bring to Mac software what
iTMS and the iOS App Store brought to their respective markets.

~~~
wccrawford
Yup. The key to defeating piracy is giving value for the money and not putting
any roadblocks in the way of legal acquisition.

Different people pirate games for different reasons. Some do it for the money,
some do it because they just can't get the product, some do it because they
can't get the product when they want it, some do it because they've been
burned in the past and are covering their rear-ends, and others do it just
because.

The last one is never going to be a customer. All the rest can be converted,
if you're willing to flex far enough. (Some of the money-based problems can't
be overcome without pricing yourself too low, though.)

In this day and age, the distribution problems are ridiculous. Steam sells a
LOT of games because they can be downloaded at launch, instead of waiting for
the mailman, standing in line at midnight, or just generally waiting on
something. They even let you pre-load to save the download time as well.

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nickolai
> it becomes nearly impossible to pirate that software without first hacking
> Apple’s data center in North Carolina.

I'm not familiar with Final Cut X in particular, but most centrainsed
"connect-to-our-server" software DRM services for digital downloads failed
rather miserably in terms of stopping piracy. A few hackers will take it as a
challenge and break it, while the so-called pirates will gladly grab their
work for free instead of shelling out $299 for apple.

Assuming a piece of software cannot get pirated strikes me as naive. The only
software that never gets pirated is either a) free or b) useless.

~~~
wccrawford
Exactly. Plus, from the comments there: "There are pirated versions of FCPX
already up, and it’s not too difficult, it’s about switching one file to make
it seem valid."

... That's what he thinks is 'nearly impossible'? Phone-home DRM has existed
for years and only works marginally better (if at all) than regular DRM.

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xtreegold
App Stores certainly won't stop piracy, as cleverly pointed out here and
elsewhere. But that doesn't make the main point of the article invalid, which
is that App Stores have changed and will still change the game even more.

------
joebadmo
These Cringely articles make me see the value in the HN filters people ask for
periodically.

