Winstep sued by Nemo.ru piracy group!

April Fool's

If not, I apologize......

OK, Jorge...April fools!!!   Good one!!!!  

"May a flock of migrating Barbed Wire Flying Penguins visit their patoots!" - Ancient Bedouin curse

*as told to Doc ages ago by Bedouins in the Sinai desert.

Kick em in their little Rubles JC!

Yeah! In their Kopeckers too!

There is actually a bit of truth in the history above.

Let me start by saying that I really hate with a passion the type of protections that inconvenience legit users (e.g; hardware locking, online activation, etc...), but I wasn't born yesterday either. So the protection I build into the code, although home made, is strong.

Many years ago, when I still used serials numbers that were really easy to make keygens for, a well known and competent Russian group of crackers came up with a keygen for Winstep software. I wrote them an email explaining that Winstep was NOT a large company but, in fact, a single person trying to make a living for himself. Believe it or not, they apologized, said their intention was not to hurt anyone, and promised never to crack Winstep software again.

They kept their promise *to this day*, something that restored my faith in humanity.

In the mean time I wised up and started using some *real* protection. Stuff like code self-integrity checks, PGP encryption of license keys, which makes it nearly impossible to make a keygen, etc...

As a result, for years many tried to crack Winstep software and failed. There was always something they missed in the protection (as I said, it wasn't easy, I kind of know what I'm doing).

Then, a couple of years ago, I had this promotion of Nexus Ultimate on Give Away of the Day. The problem with GOTD is that crackers are like flies all over it. So this Nemo.ru group started working on cracking Winstep software.

What they didn't know was that I was actively monitoring their attempts. They tried many times and, each time, they missed something. The software would work for a while and then it would become unregistered again. I guess it became a question of honor for them, or something like that, and the truth is that no protection is unbeatable. Eventually all protections get cracked.

When I noticed they were about to really accomplish it, I left a public message right in their web site, once again explaining the situation like I had done with the other group of Russian crackers all those years ago.

My message came down on them like a bomb, they had NO IDEA I had been tracking their efforts. There was shocked talk about the author of Winstep software contacting them in public in the Russian crack forums, apparently something unheard of until then.

But alas, unlike the other group, these are just common criminals, obviously no honor or common decency in them. They refused to dialogue and banned my account there after replying to my message with some self-serving argument.

So this became a cat and mouse game. There will never be any winners, but I like to have fun with them from time to time by changing something in the protection that I know they will miss, especially when they are feeling comfortable and least expect it. People like these are not worth investing more time or energy on than that.

Too bad you can't add some code that will hack their OS's to diced carrots and short out their machines (taking a few of them out as well). I have no patience with their type.

I actually can, but I won't. At one point I even had the cracker's IP address, in fact. From that, you can imagine all havoc I could create in his machine if I wanted to (assuming the guy is not using a VM when cracking software). Not worth the time or the risk, I only use my powers for good (tcham tcharam, insert appropriate super-hero music to match my current Avatar).

I knew it!

You are Batman!

Borat's national anthem of Kazakhstan?

How can the Russians ever keep up with the Chinese with such restrictive trade limitations?    That sort of thing takes all of the free out of free trade.

Is it just me or does that not look like a mouth in need of some serious dental work? ....;p

lol...Yes, Jafo. It does.

Must be British

I'm quite offended . It is truly a stereotypical thing to assume British people have bad teeth. I for one don't. Now for the tea thing yeah that's true most British folk drink tea . Sorry to go off topic.

Hey, I'm offended too! The British are not the only ones entitled to have bad teeth! We want them too! If they can have them, why not us?!

Why does the word redneck come to mind.....

Heck, even my dogs are offended!!

I bet!

LMAO!!