I've always thought that adding subtle bugs that only appear in cracked versions would be a good idea as well but: consider the effect on your product's reputation
No! That is not what I'm advocating! Under no circumstances should you introduce faux bugs. The "bugs" I am referring to are incomplete cracks, and they are only bugs for those providing the cracks.
Disgruntled pirates can give you a real PR headache, since they don't self-identify as anything but "ordinary users" when they post comments to forums.
Forums are a bad idea because they take so much effort to curate. The downside is huge -- to the point of creating pernicious fictions such as this.
If you are in the business of selling software, you are probably not making money off of a community forum. Why have it if it has such huge downsides? Have the community meet only in-game.
The scenario you propose is slander and complete falsehood. If your userbase is so corrupt that this works, then I posit you have the wrong customer base. The strategy I am advocating requires that you can control the message in your userbase. This again fits the asymmetrical warfare analogy. Any group of successful guerilla fighters has a well crafted message. If this message can't be communicated properly, then there is no point to the fight.
Here, the message should be: Those warez guys are providing you defective cracks. Just buy the real game -- it's much less hassle. (Then someone else points out that there's a loophole if you purchase the "competitive upgrade" that will work even with the standard version, and only have to pay 50% of retail etc...)
No! That is not what I'm advocating! Under no circumstances should you introduce faux bugs. The "bugs" I am referring to are incomplete cracks, and they are only bugs for those providing the cracks.
Disgruntled pirates can give you a real PR headache, since they don't self-identify as anything but "ordinary users" when they post comments to forums.
Forums are a bad idea because they take so much effort to curate. The downside is huge -- to the point of creating pernicious fictions such as this.
(Laura Roeder's take, is that community forums are most often not worth the effort. http://mixergy.com/laura-roeder-interview/ )
If you are in the business of selling software, you are probably not making money off of a community forum. Why have it if it has such huge downsides? Have the community meet only in-game.
The scenario you propose is slander and complete falsehood. If your userbase is so corrupt that this works, then I posit you have the wrong customer base. The strategy I am advocating requires that you can control the message in your userbase. This again fits the asymmetrical warfare analogy. Any group of successful guerilla fighters has a well crafted message. If this message can't be communicated properly, then there is no point to the fight.
Here, the message should be: Those warez guys are providing you defective cracks. Just buy the real game -- it's much less hassle. (Then someone else points out that there's a loophole if you purchase the "competitive upgrade" that will work even with the standard version, and only have to pay 50% of retail etc...)