Final Cut Pro anti-hacking protection

mymemory · Apr 23, 2002

A few weeks ago a friend of mine got a disc image of Final Cut Pro 3. The instalation from the disc image (to make the story short) is impossible, the computer will ask for the original CD.

I know there is always a way to get around this issues but... what if Apple creates an anti-hacking system and them spread it to Macromedia, Adobe, etc???

After the social-political situation of my country this would be the most terrifying thing to think about right now.

What do you think?

D0ct0rteeth · Apr 23, 2002

<mentalbreakdown>

software piracy bad... aghhh.. cant think straight.....

must come back later.....

(hysterical screaming and yelling)

</mentalbreakdown>

C-

Mr. Anderson · Apr 23, 2002

Last time I installed photoshop and illstrator they were upgrades, and the installer asked me to put in a adobe cd with the full program on it. For me that was ps4 and ill6.

I'm sure you'll be running into that a lot more, these guys are in the business to make money.

jelloshotsrule · Apr 23, 2002

i think the best thing graphics (and other types) apps companies can do is offer big student discounts.

just as apple has with fcp, a/w with maya (ple), etc.

if someone who wants to learn say, fcp, after effects, and lightwave wants to do so (without high discounts) they would either resort to piracy or not do it and thus not be needing future upgrades and stuff... so it's good for both parties in the end.

as for the fcp thing: i got the educational fcp 3 recently and made a backup cd of it that i brought with me back to school (left the original at home). i erased my drive at some point and tried to reinstall from the copy disc. it didn't work. i finally found out how to do it, but it was kind of a pain. in this case (and probably a couple others at most) i think it's a legitimate concern that the cd is protected in such a way... i mean, there is the backup copy allowed right?

mc68k · Apr 23, 2002

Re: Final Cut Pro anti-hacking protection

Originally posted by mymemory
A few weeks ago a friend of mine got a disc image of Final Cut Pro 3. The instalation from the disc image (to make the story short) is impossible, the computer will ask for the original CD.

I know there is always a way to get around this issues but... what if Apple creates an anti-hacking system and them spread it to Macromedia, Adobe, etc???

What do you think?

A disc-image is a block for block copy of the "original" which makes it an EXACT duplicate. FCP3 has built in read-errors like a original PS disc. This is the only anti-piracy mechanism that should be a problem.

If you burn a CD from the image, it should not ask you for a CD since it is, for all intents and purposes, the same unless someone pirated it wrong. I will not say any more than this.

People will ALWAYS and have ALWAYS found ways around the rules, and will continue to do so no matter who shares anti-piracy ideas with each other. Nothing to worry about there 'cept your own view of piracy.

D0ct0rteeth · Apr 23, 2002

http://www.journeyed.com/

they have cheap software.

Pirating just makes companies waste development time trying to protect their software. In addition it reduced the likelihood of getting good products ported to OSX

Im done...

good luck with your FCP dilemma

C-

blackpeter · Apr 23, 2002

If I'm just using tools for personal use or to "learn" a little more about an application. I think it's perfectly fine for me to put a friend's copy on my computer. I'm not making any money off of FCP, Photoshop, or QT Pro. Therefore, I'm not getting any benefit form the products as they are intended. I'm really just ****ing around...

Now - If I get any good and start using these apps as a professional, then I'll have to go out and buy them. The software makers will benefit from my being able to freely test such pricey apps like FCP. Maya (who've actually taken the step of making free version available to all) figured this out.

mc68k · Apr 23, 2002

Originally posted by tfaz1
If I'm just using tools for personal use or to "learn" a little more about an application. I think it's perfectly fine for me to put a friend's copy on my computer. I'm not making any money off of FCP, Photoshop, or QT Pro. Therefore, I'm not getting any benefit form the products as they are intended. I'm really just ****ing around...

Now - If I get any good and start using these apps as a professional, then I'll have to go out and buy them. The software makers will benefit from my being able to freely test such pricey apps like FCP. Maya (who've actually taken the step of making free version available to all) figured this out.

That's a silly excuse for an argument. Yes, they charge a lot of money, but this is a professional level application. It costs a premium becuase it's developed for professionals and therefore, if professionals are the target audience, then everything from development to licensing will be expensive. The end product is a quality app.

What you are doing is undermining the application by using it w/o paying for it. If it is not a demo/shareware, and you are using it, then you should pay for it. Does one have to make $ off a program to justify piracy? Are you getting a benefit from learning the application even if you're not making any $? Sure, you personally don't hurt the developer one way or another by pirating the app on a small scale since you never intended to use it professionaly, but it all comes down to ethics. But lame arguments will only justify your criminal activity to yourself.

Beej · Apr 24, 2002

Re: Re: Final Cut Pro anti-hacking protection

Originally posted by mc68k
People will ALWAYS and have ALWAYS found ways around the rules, and will continue to do so no matter who shares anti-piracy ideas with each other.

That is 100% true. People will always be able to get around anti-piracy measures.

Has anyone seen the seven lines of Perl that decrypts the encryption on DVDs? It's pretty funny that it can be undone in seven lines of code. I'll post it up if I can find it...

[Edit:]
Found it. Here's the whole script:

Code:

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
# 531-byte qrpff-fast, Keith Winstein and Marc Horowitz <sipb-iap-dvd@mit.edu>
# MPEG 2 PS VOB file on stdin -> descrambled output on stdout
# arguments: title key bytes in least to most-significant order
$_='while(read+STDIN,$_,2048){$a=29;$b=73;$c=142;$t=255;@t=map{$_%16or$t^=$c^=(
$m=(11,10,116,100,11,122,20,100)[$_/16%8])&110;$t^=(72,@z=(64,72,$a^=12*($_%16
-2?0:$m&17)),$b^=$_%64?12:0,@z)[$_%8]}(16..271);if((@a=unx"C*",$_)[20]&48){$h
=5;$_=unxb24,join"",@b=map{xB8,unxb8,chr($_^$a[--$h+84])}@ARGV;s/...$/1$&/;$
d=unxV,xb25,$_;$e=256|(ord$b[4])<<9|ord$b[3];$d=$d>>8^($f=$t&($d>>12^$d>>4^
$d^$d/8))<<17,$e=$e>>8^($t&($g=($q=$e>>14&7^$e)^$q*8^$q<<6))<<9,$_=$t[$_]^
(($h>>=8)+=$f+(~$g&$t))for@a[128..$#a]}print+x"C*",@a}';s/x/pack+/g;eval

...and here is an article about it.
[End edit]

mc68k · Apr 24, 2002

Silly and amazing how it's just 7 lines of perl. Wow, so simple yet so powerful.

I remember old games used to have anti-piracy where you would have to read/input a letter/word out of the manual. Then we'd just copy the manual and give it to friends.

Or PS discs that have built in read-errors so that drives/programs will error. Got around that with ignoring read errors and mod-chips. It's almost more of a challenge to aquire/hack it then just to buy it. I guess that's one reason I do it, besides the fact I'd rather spend $ on hardware.

Where there's a will there's a way...Just like running X on pre-beige g3

Beej · Apr 24, 2002

Originally posted by mc68k
Silly and amazing how it's just 7 lines of perl. Wow, so simple yet so powerful.

And so ugly! Oh well, that's Perl for ya. I love writing Perl, but I hate having to read it

wsteineker · Apr 24, 2002

Student discounts

i think the best thing graphics (and other types) apps companies can do is offer big student discounts.

I agree totally. I am undertaking a redesign of my fraternity's webpage this summer, and I know precisely **** about html. Instead of learning it from books and pulling my hair out or stealing some WYSIWYG software, I tried GoLive for free and then ordered the GoLive/Livemotion bundle from my school bookstore for $89. You can't beat that! Adobe got a new customer and I got my needs met at a price point that didn't make me want to weep uncontrolably. I honestly believe people don't mind paying for great software as long as they can afford it. Dramatic student discounts are a great tool for companies to gain marketshare and minimize piracy in circles that are traditionally the largest malefactors.

blackpeter · Apr 24, 2002

Originally posted by mc68k

That's a silly excuse for an argument.

Is it really? I bet you don't borrow anything without paying for it...

-When a friend lends you a CD, you make sure to send a royalty check to that artist.
-When you borrow a shirt, you send a kick-back to the Gap.
-When you find out that a school has unregestered versions of Windows, you call the authorities.

Makes sense, in an MS sort of way...

mymemory · Apr 24, 2002

The funny thing of this is that the guy that told me about di Final Cut 3 thing did it in the middle of a riot a week a go when we had the coup in my country, we saw each other and he told me about it. Thinking about Macs between gunshoots.

Any way, piracy is a way to test/get software any way. For example: About a month an a half ago I was searching for VJ software (Software to edit video in real time for dj's), I got about 12 different softwares and right now only 2 of them works fine. Can you imagine if I had to buy every single one of them for an average price of $200? For get about it, even I wouldn't have them all of them yet because of the shipping, etc.

Piracy (even saound as a ugly word) was my only way to test all this softwares. The same with Final Cut Pro 2, I didn't like it that much, I preffer Premiere, does that mean I have to buy FCP to test it? specially when there is not trial version.

I think the trial versions would be the perfect excuse for developers to attack piracy.

jelloshotsrule · Apr 24, 2002

Originally posted by mc68k
I remember old games used to have anti-piracy where you would have to read/input a letter/word out of the manual. Then we'd just copy the manual and give it to friends.

Or PS discs that have built in read-errors so that drives/programs will error. Got around that with ignoring read errors and mod-chips. It's almost more of a challenge to aquire/hack it then just to buy it. I guess that's one reason I do it, besides the fact I'd rather spend $ on hardware.

it seems like you're implying that you would "acquire/hack" software to use it and then spend your money on hardware. which goes very much against what you said a few posts up in response to someone else talking about using pirated software to learn it..

unless you were just pointing out that their particular reasoning was faulty and you feel they should have just said "i don't see a problem with it" or whatever your reasoning might be.

Hemingray · Apr 24, 2002

Originally posted by tfaz1

Is it really? I bet you don't borrow anything without paying for it...

-When a friend lends you a CD, you make sure to send a royalty check to that artist.
-When you borrow a shirt, you send a kick-back to the Gap.
-When you find out that a school has unregestered versions of Windows, you call the authorities.

Makes sense, in an MS sort of way...

I'm sorry, but that's even lamer than your first argument.

You're not duplicating the shirt, are you.

mc68k · Apr 24, 2002

Originally posted by tfaz1

Is it really? I bet you don't borrow anything without paying for it...

-When a friend lends you a CD, you make sure to send a royalty check to that artist.
-When you borrow a shirt, you send a kick-back to the Gap.
-When you find out that a school has unregestered versions of Windows, you call the authorities.

Makes sense, in an MS sort of way...

The only people whose best interests are to stay completely legal are professionals and educational institutions.

Everyone else has stolen/steals software (me included), it just comes with the territory. We don't all have $ to burn on every new upgrade.

I'm just not trying to make excuses to cover up the fact that I'm doing something wrong. It all comes down to personal ethics. I think you're confusing borrowing with stealing to make yourself feel better about your illegal activities.

To answer your statements:

- 90% of my iPod is legit (The rest are radio songs that I didn't want to pay for an album just to get)
- Why would I feel obligated to send $ to Gap? The borrowed shirt has been paid for and is the original. Borrowing the shirt in this sense would equate to giving someone else your license in the software world, since the shirt cannot be duplicated.
- Maybe if it was my HS.

Otherwise, I work at a university and all the techs I know have no reason to cut corners. Besides, we have a university license for Windows, as do most other schools.

mc68k · Apr 24, 2002

Originally posted by jelloshotsrule

it seems like you're implying that you would "acquire/hack" software to use it and then spend your money on hardware. which goes very much against what you said a few posts up in response to someone else talking about using pirated software to learn it..

unless you were just pointing out that their particular reasoning was faulty and you feel they should have just said "i don't see a problem with it" or whatever your reasoning might be.

I'm saying software is overpriced and the hardware to run it is expensive, so I take the money that I would pay on software and spend it on hardware. I think we would all like to give our money to the people who deserve it, the developers, but the fact is most of us do not have that capacity.

To clarify: I'm just trying to point out faulty arguments about piracy. I'm no better than the next guy about stealing software I'm probably worse. At least I 'fess up to the fact and don't go looking for support for my faulty logic/ethics.

jelloshotsrule · Apr 24, 2002

Originally posted by mc68k

I'm saying software is overpriced and the hardware to run it is expensive, so I take the money that I would pay on software and spend it on hardware. I think we would all like to give our money to the people who deserve it, the developers, but the fact is most of us do not have that capacity.

To clarify: I'm just trying to point out faulty arguments about piracy. I'm no better than the next guy about stealing software I'm probably worse. At least I 'fess up to the fact and don't go looking for support for my faulty logic/ethics.

that's kinda what i figured. but i was confused when i first read your second post, and then saw that it was the same person who had said the things in your first post....... anyways, enough confusion

blackpeter · Apr 24, 2002

Originally posted by mc68k

Everyone else has stolen/steals software (me included), it just comes with the territory. We don't all have $ to burn on every new upgrade.

I'm just not trying to make excuses to cover up the fact that I'm doing something wrong. It all comes down to personal ethics. I think you're confusing borrowing with stealing to make yourself feel better about your illegal activities.

Oh, OK. This is starting to make more sense. So the difference is that you sort of, what - get into stealing, right? Please... I know full well what dynamics are at play here.

I could have guessed that you were in college. I remember when I used to pontificate just to hear the sound of my own voice.

blackpeter · Apr 24, 2002

Originally posted by Hemingray

I'm sorry, but that's even lamer than your first argument.

You're not duplicating the shirt, are you.

I'll agree that I'm asking to you make a leap with me, but I don't think it's lame. You are getting benefit (however brief) from the shirt. My point is that there is such a thing as legitimate borrowing (I'm not including MP3 swapping here - so let's not open that can of worms).

I have full-paid for versions of Office 2000/v.x, Norton Utils, Antivirus, LaunchBar, etc, etc. That's because I get a benefit from all of these programs. So much so that I took the trouble of going out and getting them. But if I borrow a shirt and it dosen't fit right or look good, then I'm going to choose to stop wearing it and I definately won't go out and buy it.

Hemingray · Apr 24, 2002

Alright, I'll explain:

When you purchase Adobe Photoshop, you are paying for one license. That program is copyright of Adobe. You own the serial number, which allows you to use that program. But you don't own the rights to distribute the program as you please. You've paid for one person to use it, and that's it.

On the other hand, when you purchase a shirt, you own that shirt. There's no License Agreement that you have to agree to when you buy the shirt; it's not copyrighted. That's it, it's yours. You're free to do with it what you want: loan it, burn it, wear it, fly it as a flag, cut it up into tiny pieces, whatever.

You're comparing apples and oranges. What applies to necessary wares does not apply to copyrighted works. Whether you're making money from it or not, you and the person that "loaned" it to you have violated the license agreement.

blackpeter · Apr 24, 2002

You don't have to explain - I already understand that it's an imperfect analogy. If you could get away from the shirt thing (I know, I know - I started it) and follow me on this one... because I believe the spirit of the rule applies to any ethics debate. We're talking about something more specific than written law here - we're talking about getting money to the people who truly deserve it, right??

So, who has the money to buy these high-cost apps? Professionals. Who do they think are buying these products? Professionals. Why do they have the money? Well, for one - they don't really have a choice. Once their work enters the professional world, they'd better have their asses covered. If they are making money on pirated software - they are in serious legal trouble. But really, because apps like these are priced based on the market (theirs being the pro-user market). The program pays for itself over and over when it's applied as it was intended: to make money for the user. If you don't think that's what these apps are there for, then grow up.

My point is that I wouldn't feel that uncomfortable writing these companies directly and telling them that I currently have illegal versions of FCP and Photoshop on my computer at home. That I am currently a non-professional learning the in's and out's of the software. That I hope to someday figure out even 10% of these apps. I might even get a letter back telling me to uninstall these programs or informing me that I was "stealing" or whatever.

But when it comes down to it (law or no law) these companies aren't going to come after me. Because they know I'm bone dry. Because they know that in spirit, I'm not "using" them. They aren't missing out on making money from me. They know that, if anything, they're gaining an oppourtunity to turn me into another money-maker for them.

Hemingray · Apr 24, 2002

Originally posted by tfaz1
My point is that I wouldn't feel that uncomfortable writing these companies directly and telling them that I currently have illegal versions of FCP and Photoshop on my computer at home. That I am currently a non-professional learning the in's and out's of the software. That I hope to someday figure out even 10% of these apps. I might even get a letter back telling me to uninstall these programs or informing me that I was "stealing" or whatever.

And Adobe's answer will be, "That's why we have a trial version of Photoshop available for you." The difference here is, you're reaping the benefits of the program (i.e. saving an image you've created) without paying for it. Whether you're using that image for profit or not, you're using the program, unrestricted, using someone else's serial number, for free. I'd like to see you write Adobe. I guarantee you they'll take action. That's like a guy walking into a police precinct, turning himself in, and expecting them to ignore you.

blackpeter · Apr 24, 2002

OK, I'll follow through. But before I write Apple and Adobe, I'd like to hear what you think they're going to do. So tell me, what "action" do you think they'll take? Do you mean to tell me that you actually think they are going to succeed in getting their app off of my HD??

When it comes down to it, we just have different ideas about these things. I'll point you to another topic/thread we disagreed on:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/3938/&apple+happy

Final Cut Pro anti-hacking protection

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