Well, another iLok drama unfolding

[Gamma-UT]

It's kind of impressive the way in which PACE, after shooting itself in the foot, then aims squarely at the other one just to make sure.

[robotmonkey]

It's kind of impressive the way in which PACE, after shooting itself in the foot, then aims squarely at the other one just to make sure.

Yes seems that as F-ups and customer abuse is concerned PACE is a gift that just keeps on giving.

[Sampleconstruct]

Despite all the ranting, I don't think many companies will turn away from iLok-protection, implementing a new protection system is expensive, needs a lot of time and man power, so things will just stay as they are after the storm has calmed down. I wasn't affected by this annoying glitch and haven't had any problems with my iLoks in all of these years, but I can understand the uproar.

[tonkatodd]

Despite all the ranting, I don't think many companies will turn away from iLok-protection, implementing a new protection system is expensive, needs a lot of time and man power, so things will just stay as they are after the storm has calmed down. I wasn't affected by this annoying glitch and haven't had any problems with my iLoks in all of these years, but I can understand the uproar.

I haven't had any problems and I also pay for that ILok zerotime but when I first started hearing about this latest "issue" I felt a sinking feeling in my stomach haha. I don't have any second hand licenses but I still felt a bit concerned.

[Gamma-UT]

I haven't had any problems and I also pay for that ILok zerotime but when I first started hearing about this latest "issue" I felt a sinking feeling in my stomach haha. I don't have any second hand licenses but I still felt a bit concerned.

This is the issue for PACE and, from their behaviour over the years, they don't seem able to willing or able to confront it. You never know when PACE will screw up next but you can be sure they will inflict the damage on some section of the customer base and not themselves (well, until the backlash inevitably hits them).

There were numerous ways to solve this latest issue that didn't involve immediately rescinding any licence they thought was invalid. But, because they had the technical means to do it they just blundered on.

Yes, people shouldn't have sold duplicate licences – but there is an assumption there that the sellers knew which licence was the dupe and sold that one, intending to keep the original. But we don't know if they simply intended to transfer licences they didn't use and picked whichever one came up highest in the list (and perhaps wondered why there was an extra one there). With all the others issues in ILM, I'd think it was just a glitch that would get solved later somehow. I've never had dupe licences on one key so I don't know they appear but, unless there's something I'm missing, there's no user-visible code ID associated with them.

Plus you have the issue that PACE's record keeping isn't necessarily that great and they wind up with some false positives in their list. Knowing that this might be a possibility, even if remote, would you blunder on and remove the licences or start going through some kind of remediation process first by email? Yes, you would probably have some cases where people suddenly think syncing is a bad idea and go "missing" but that loss (given the already large losses down to cracks) seems small against the larger issue of eroding trust in your own system. But as it's PACE, the answer is obvious: keep digging that hole.

[dayjob]

it's a bummer that a server glitch caused all this. at least it didn't affect every iLok user. but maybe next time that'll happen.

"server glitch at remote place makes all iLok plugs around the world stop working for _______ amount of time"

perhaps some day they'll really shit the bed that way. oh wait.. didn't that sort of happen already w/the ilok user license application update? hmmm.

i guess all ilok users should keep their fingers crossed when buying/transferring licenses.

hello.. we are pace/iLok and we are unreliable.

[Compyfox]

Again, a thing that only happened to some people. Not all of them.

Those that instantly updated the minute the new software manager was out, shouldn't be surprised if there pops up a problem. Personally I found the transition time too short, so I waited like half a week to update. I was even beta testing a license update during that time. And what do you know - my iLok didn't "crash".


Not saying that there weren't issues still.

[Jace-BeOS]

It's a tool for punishing legit owners, not a tool for music work. That's the difference.

Yeah, and house keys and car keys are a punishment too. Because people are all honest and don't take stuff that doesn't belong to them.

That is a totally irrelevant analogy. You aren't buying security for your software when you buy product that is caged with anti-piracy measures. You ARE buying security when you purchase locks for your house. When you buy anti-piracy-protected tools, you're supposed to be buying the tools. The anti-piracy crap that comes with it is not there for YOUR protection. It is a side-effect of a portion of the world that has nothing to do with you and your purchase (unless you're a pirate). Sadly, the nature of software makes that portion of the world unavoidable. In fact, buying product that requires a dongle actually presents YOU with a susceptibility to software theft that a dongle-less product does not (theft of the dongle).

Disclaimer(s):
i have several dongles in my collection. The first was Cubase. i almost never load Cubase because of it (and because of Cubase 4.5's instability on Mac). i unknowingly bought the dongled version of Korg's Legacy series (luckily they abandoned the dongle when Steinberg bought Synchrosoft), i knowingly bought Lightwave (and rarely use it because it's just as much a disaster as all other 3D packages, and the dongle, which NewTek has recently abandoned, finally, in the latest version), and i own a Receptor with an iLok (which i admit has not caused me any trouble yet, but i rarely connect it to PACE's websites since i only have a few licenses, which are for the Receptor only).

That said... i actively avoid purchasing any further product that uses dongles. i want to in no way support the act of spending money, engineering, creating extra complexity, and wasting resources on punishing legit customers with gadgets and procedures that have nothing to do with the actual tool's purpose.

[ZenPunkHippy]

What I would love to know is when it became acceptable for any company to take control of my own personal computer for the purposes of "license control" i.e. for this company to delete stuff from my own machine.

That is flat out wrong.

As it stands now, turning on my machine and expecting to use the iLok plugins I own legitimate licenses for is a lottery. Perhaps I should pray to the PACE gods that there has been no screw ups today?

Call it overly dramatic if you will, but that is apparently the situation as it stands now for machines connected to the 'net (which is a necessity for most people).

[hibidy]

People are too personal about their possessions (myself included)

Fact, if I bought a license that didn't work anymore I'd be pissed.

@people that got two licenses: Christ. If I had a bunch of new licenses show up in my account I sure as hell wouldn't sell them off like some sneaky bastard. I don't think many (if any) people here would do that. CLEARLY, you didn't get a free license. Wouldn't there have been an ilok fee transfer and having to contact the developer to the SN transfer? Shouldn't it have been taken care of then?

[hibidy]

What I would love to know is when it became acceptable for any company to take control of my own personal computer for the purposes of "license control" i.e. for this company to delete stuff from my own machine.

That is flat out wrong.

As it stands now, turning on my machine and expecting to use the iLok plugins I own legitimate licenses for is a lottery. Perhaps I should pray to the PACE gods that there has been no screw ups today?

Call it overly dramatic if you will, but that is apparently the situation as it stands now for machines connected to the 'net (which is a necessity for most people).

Nope, we see eye to eye here.

Fighting against an injustice is irrelevant. There are always WAY too many people who will take the side of the thieves.

[Jace-BeOS]

Again, a thing that only happened to some people. Not all of them.

Those that instantly updated the minute the new software manager was out, shouldn't be surprised if there pops up a problem. Personally I found the transition time too short, so I waited like half a week to update. I was even beta testing a license update during that time. And what do you know - my iLok didn't "crash".

Not saying that there weren't issues still.

But that's still blaming the customers. The computer industry is the ONLY industry i know of where the general consensus is to EXPECT the product to NOT WORK properly. Why is that acceptable? There is NO accountability in this industry. There's no law to regulate it, nor even many pissed off consumers working to lobby their lawmakers to regulate it. Mostly, the lobbyists are the corporate scum ensuring that this way of doing business remains in place, AND SPREADS to other industries.

When i heard about the "iLokalypse", i had been out of touch with KVR and such news sources for some time. It totally passed me by. When i finally discovered i had to install an actual license manager program for my iLok, i actually rejoiced because i was sick of having a special portable OLD Firefox installation on my Windows machine JUST for occasional iLok synchronization (because the idiots at PACE couldn't be bothered to create a standalone license program in the first place, nor keep their browser compatibility up to date). As i was installing it, i thought "Oh dear, is THIS what all that apocalyptic talk was about? Am i in trouble?" Apparently i got lucky being late to the show.

PS: full agreement with the two posts above me from hibidy and ZenPunkHippy. The people that sold their duplicate licenses knew they were doing wrong, yet PACE turned that scenario into an abuse factor against the unknowing buyers. PACE likes to think it's an innocent middleman, with no need for accountability to license holders, but that's a delusion.

[Gamma-UT]

So I wonder if PACE has refunded any sellers their $25 fee for licences that have now been rescinded? If they try to transfer the licence they still have to the unlucky buyer will they get charged twice? If PACE keeps the money, are they guilty of handling stolen goods or accessory to fraud?

[MFXxx]

PS: full agreement with the two posts above me from hibidy and ZenPunkHippy. The people that sold their duplicate licenses knew they were doing wrong, yet PACE turned that scenario into an abuse factor against the unknowing buyers. PACE likes to think it's an innocent middleman, with no need for accountability to license holders, but that's a delusion.

Unforunately this is the law in many cases.

Buy a used stolen car and it get's ceased and return to the rightful owner if traced or trashed.

The buyer beware, always loses scenario.

However, I do not understand who gave iLok the right to police their own policy in this case. If they know they are transferred illegally. then they should be going through legal channels.

They are not police, judge and jury.

I wouldn't be surprised if they have actually breached a particular law here in fairness.

From : http://www.lawdonut.co.uk/law/commercia ... ren-t-paid

Scenario D: The debtor has sold your goods, in their original state

If your goods have been sold by the debtor, in their original state, your retention of title clause may purport to give you the right to recover your goods from the third party buyer.

Whether that right is enforceable depends on the application of the specific wording in your retention of title clause to the specific circumstances. But it would be unusual for you to succeed, no matter how well-drafted your retention of title clause. Even if the clause is upheld in court, you do not have the right to enter the premises of the third party to recover your goods.

You are also unlikely to succeed if, in fact, you knew the debtor was going to sell your goods before you were paid, even if your retention of title clause forbids this.

Your retention of title clause may purport to give you rights over the proceeds of sale of the goods. To be effective, it must turn the debtor into your ‘fiduciary’ – so they are treated much as if they were selling your goods as your agent rather than in their own right, and must therefore account to you for the proceeds. As a minimum, your retention of title clause must include wording that makes it clear the nature of the fiduciary relationship, and must also require that:

Your goods are kept separate from the debtor’s own stock before they are sold.
The proceeds of sale of your goods are kept in a separate bank account, or are otherwise clearly kept separately from the debtor’s own money.
The debtor can’t use those sales proceeds.

Again, the law is complex, and such clauses are often not upheld by the courts if, in fact, you have not behaved as if you were agent and principal, or other circumstances are inconsistent with an agent/principal relationship.

In actual fact I have to wonder if Pace are on a sticky wicket here. In essence they have done nothing to the original party in which they already have a contract with to reclaim the goods or file a charge for the goods wrongly taken.

It's a complicated one to litigate. As both parties are likely customer of Pace, owning pace accounts and other licenses, they have really acted upon the easy solution for them.

Personally I would see the process as follows :

Reclaim any licenses from the original party receiving the goods incorrectly.
If not possible approach the license issuer(software developer) and offer compensation or establish some resolve in terms of lost potential business.
Accept the loss and make the licenses NFR.
Compensate the innocent parties.

However, I am sure the web of process and deceit in some cases is not as straight forward.

The issue is how these laws and standards translate across international lines and here in lies the problem with internet business.


@Gamma great point.

[audientronic]

So, has everyone who has had a license deleted received an e-mail from iLok telling them that? Or is it just a random discovery for some?