Princeton Plate

[kritikon]

I'm sorry, but that kind of fault lies with software developers, and customers certainly have every right to complain bitterly when they are barred for no reason from using a product they've already paid in full for. A totally acceptable grounds for bitter complaints to the developers, IMO.

Hmmm...I tend towards blaming the PACE people rather than the devs; I suspect the plugins on their own work seamlessly if PACE wasn't infecting the PC.
Having said that...you're right, in that it's the devs responsibility to ensure their choice of copy protection actually enables the user to use the s/w they bought. So it's maybe 50/50.

[Seaside Music]

Too bad to hear about that. I have the Stereo Room plug. I use removeable mobile racks for my client's hard drives. Everytime I move to a different client's project and insert their drive, I have to re-authorize the $%&!ing 2016 reverb. This is getting old quick.

I don't have an internet connection in my DAW, so I have to copy the challenge, take it to my laptop in another room, email it, wait for a response, save and copy that when it arrives, take it back to my studio and enter it. Last week I had to do this like 4 times.

PACE and other shoddy CP schemes really only punish the honest, paying customer. I will never use another plug that implements it.

[Frippertronix]

I'm sorry, but that kind of fault lies with software developers, and customers certainly have every right to complain bitterly when they are barred for no reason from using a product they've already paid in full for. A totally acceptable grounds for bitter complaints to the developers, IMO.

Hmmm...I tend towards blaming the PACE people rather than the devs; I suspect the plugins on their own work seamlessly if PACE wasn't infecting the PC.
Having said that...you're right, in that it's the devs responsibility to ensure their choice of copy protection actually enables the user to use the s/w they bought. So it's maybe 50/50.

I think fault lies with the developers for, by all appearances, refusing to take many complaints by end users seriously. And when they are sincerely talking about something that can screw up their systems, it's a bit insulting to be blown off. Then again, I guess if you don't want PACE, you don't have to buy products that use it.

I have nothing against copy protection, but I feel they have to come up with something better than this.

[Muff Wiggler]

i blame the users who encourage the developers by purchasing the bad CR products.

if NO-ONE AT ALL bought, the CR would change, and fast.

[shamann]

Which all just goes to show that no one party is to blame exclusively, they all share in the blame. What's strangest to me is that some folk will buy these products as a point of pride, like saying if you balk at bad CR, you simply aren't pro enough.

[Len]

I did get a very polite reply from Tony Agnello
of Princeton explaining that Stereo Room was cracked within 48 hours of release and they haven't sold enough to recover their development costs.

And:

"The non-kernel version has also resulted in lots of
support issues since it relies on many system details. iLok appears to be a good
choice for copy protection and we hope that the industry moves in this
direction. The cost of iLok to us isn't trivial but we felt that it was a way to
give our customers an alternative to a kernel-mode approach. Any new releases of
Stereo Room will continue to be wrapped with the non-kernel version of Pace."

Developers aren't just being difficult for the sake of it, I think.

Len

[Squish]

I have to say, I don't mind C/R, but there is a place where I draw the line. I won't be buying this one.

[eshbal]

Sooner or later all software is cracked (see Cubase sx 3),so it's not an excuse !

[shamann]

I can live with the non-kernel version on Stereo Room. I'm happy Tony listened to existing users by not forcing kernel-level drivers on us. However, I won't be getting Plate.

But, the extra costs mentioned with Challenge/Response highlight the problem with Challenge/Response in general. It is stupid to assume that a system is never going to change. Add to that the overactive PACE way of deeming trivial things as system changes. So every time there is a change, the plugin publisher has to re-issue a code and possibly troubleshoot the situation. Do that often enough and the time wasted has a noticeable extra operating cost.

I feel bad for software publishers, because they can't win on any front. But, if Stereo Room was cracked within 48 hours with the fandangled PACE protection, instead of giving PACE more money to not protect your software, why not scrap them altogether?

Here's a checklist: Challenge/Response scheme costing us time and money; PACE scaring off potential customers; costly and market damaging protection scheme did not protect us at all.

PACE hasn't made good on its first protection scheme, what evidence is there that suggests it'll make good on any other protection scheme? iLok is still PACE, it just isn't system-based Challenge/Response. And it still requires the kernel-level tkpd.sys drivers installed, does it not? So using it, you are still complicating the lives of your users by adding potential system instability, and I can guarantee there will be troubleshooting woes to come.

So if PACE has been useless, why scare away a good share of potential customers by still using it? Makes no sense to me. Also consider, Stereo Room was cracked after 48 hours, and yet still there are people who bought it. Makes you wonder if the people using stolen software reflect any actual market value? And without PACE, I'm sure there were more people out there willing to get it.

[Kraku]

I wonder how long it takes that the Plate has been cracked...

[Muff Wiggler]

maybe they would recoup their development cost faster if more people were buying the product. which just based on this forum, they would have, were the plugins not protected by PACE

sorta circular argument, but there you go huh

i would have bought both (and would be first in line for any other algos they wanted to release) but instead i've bought none.

[pitchdrifter]

I realize that my statement here is pointless, and I wonder why I'm typoing this, maybe out of frustration with some developers' choices. There is the apparently popular futile hope that more units can be sold if the product doesn't get cracked. That's not how it works, though.

Any simple copy protection with a serial number which you have to register on the developer's website in order to be eligible for support does a way better job in preventing 'casual' sharing of licenses.

There really is no need for hypersophisticated copy protection schemes. Entire markets are lost to developers, and not by casual 'warez users' of 12 year olds who try to find something interesting on the internet for an afternoon or two, but by organized crime who have entire business branches built on selling bootlegs.
PACE and similar schemes (the whole DRM fashion as well) doesn't lead to more sales, it leads to less sales, because all it does is making it more difficult for legal license owners to use the products. You can't stop bootlegging unless you take it up with crime rings directly, which hardly is an option for the average developer. So you have to live with it. One way to counter this is to use something like the creative commons to offer software/music licenses at different pricing for residents of different countries. Say you live in a country where the economy is on it's knees, and you never could afford the 'western' pricing - what choice do you have?
Some software and music publishers are starting to go against bootlegging that way, they offer their products at the prices people can afford in these countries - and only to inhabitants of that region. And gee, it actually works!
Give people a chance to obtain licenses legally and they'll do it. Not because you threaten them with jail, but because they want to do the right thing.

[Frippertronix]

That's a good point. Until they develop uncrackable copy protection, the main result of more intrusive/inconvenient copy protection is lost sales, not gained sales.

Show me an uncrackable copy protection and I will show you a potential for gained sales, but mostly what I will show you is that no one will be ripping off your software. That could mostly be people who wouldn't buy it anyway, though.

[frank001]

Too bad to hear about that. I have the Stereo Room plug. I use removeable mobile racks for my client's hard drives. Everytime I move to a different client's project and insert their drive, I have to re-authorize the $%&!ing 2016 reverb. This is getting old quick.

I don't have an internet connection in my DAW, so I have to copy the challenge, take it to my laptop in another room, email it, wait for a response, save and copy that when it arrives, take it back to my studio and enter it. Last week I had to do this like 4 times.

PACE and other shoddy CP schemes really only punish the honest, paying customer. I will never use another plug that implements it.

My studio PC is also not connected to the internet and I had to re-challenge/response StereoRoomVST 3 times due to some PC problems I had. To avoid this in the future, I switched to the iLok version. I thought, now I can get to work and have no more worries, but guess what, the iLok version uses more CPU! I can't even open up 4 out of my 10 album songs. Another 4 open up, but are practically unplayable unless I turn off 1 of the 2 or 3 instances. If you're going to go with the iLok version of StereoRoomVST, you better be working with less involved songs or have a PC speed 3GHz or greater (mine is a P4 2GHz 1GB ram). On Chainer the CPU meter reads 18.4%!!!The plugin sounds incredible, but I just wish it didn't have these copy protection issues. Princeton's support has been good, but I'm still waiting on a response to this. Maybe they're taking the weekend off.

[M'Snah]

I haven't had problems with PACE so far ...

But it's good to have threads like this. It's a stable point at kvr every week