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FIDONEWS -- 15 Jul 85 00:00:42 Page 2
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NEWS
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Mike Ringer
Fido #437 in net #117
Remeber the days when the only people we
really had to worry about where the Apple
pirates? Now we (the users of Fido) must
be on The lookout for are own type pulling
cute stunts! Starting about three issues
back we had a message yelling help we've
been robbed someone has taken a newly
written program and put a a new name on it
and called it "Public Domain". Another
goodie is the idiot who wrote a program
that does a "kill *.*". The only one that
really makes me mad is the one that states
"All Atari games such as Stargate, Robtron
etc are pirated!" this made me a slight
bit mad! Why? Because I got Stargate from
my friend who got it from a board in
Austin. Oh well It looks like we are all
subjects of life. I would like to know
what motivates these people that do this!
Did a sysop make them mad? Did a company
make them mad? I just wish they would
keep their trash off of the public boards
so America won't lose part of it's dream
"Freedom". Starting now it's going to be
alot harder to run a Fido or anything else
unless you're already running a pirate
board. Now on the subject of pirate boards
I have called some of the local ae lines
in my city and asked one pirate what he
thought of Public Boards and said "I think
there childish" This my friends comes from
the sysop (so they call their selves) of
two pirate boards and also a High school
dropout. Who in this case is being
childish? There is another pirate sysop in
the local area whom I went to school with
and he uses the public boards because he
can't find a comm program he wants. He
wants an Apple version of Modem7 I guess
he can't find something pirated that works
just as well! I don't think that public
boards will ever be done away with or
completely safe from computer rapscallion
But the longer we stick together the
better off we will be.
I have always had the complaint that you could not goto
another batch file and return where you left off in the
first one. Well lo and behold while poking around on
someone's computer the other day I found a file called
BAT_NEST that gave the following hint. From the first batch
file issue the commmand
COMMAND /c batchfile
this will open and process the batch file indicated. When
it is done processing will continue at the next line after
the COMMAND line in the first file. This can continue for 7
levels of batch files. I've tried it as far as four levels
and it works great.
One word of caution, you remain logged on to the
drive/directory where the origional batch file resides.
FOR DEC RAINBOW SYSTEMS
In an earlier article I described the process necessary to
get COMMAND.COM to reside successfully in RAMDISk. Recently
I purchased DOIT and had problems with installing it and
dropping to another lever of COMMAND.COM. After removing
the COMSPEC program from the AUTOEXEC.BAT everything works
smoothly. Turns out DEC finally did a good deed and fixed
the SET COMSPEC=?????????? command in 2.11 MSDOS. The
system even seems to be a little faster in program to
program switching. So anyone who has upgraded to 2.11 and
uses COMMAND.COM from ramdisk I would recommend removing the
COMSPEC program from the AUTOEXEC.BAT and from the system.
Leave in the SET COMSPEC=?????.
This is simply a request for information. I
am simply wondering how many Fido Sysops would like a
utility that emulated the Fido message system. This
would be a standalone program separate from Fido (and
hence much smaller), that could be used to peruse the
different message bases, and reply to messages in any
of them. I know that a program called READMSG exists,
but that is really just a simple program that you can
use once you change directories to the proper place,
and you know what messages you are interested in, etc.
What I am proposing is a Fido emulator.
Currently I am working on such a beast (I sort
of needed most of it to implement my link to USENET
anyway). With a little bit more massaging for the case
of the FidoNet message area, it will be complete. If you
are interested in this program, send me a FidoNet message,
and when it is complete I will send a copy to you to test.
It is written using all DOS calls only, so it should run
on any machine, but who knows...I only have an IBM PC, so
someone else will have to let me know what happens on a
Rainbow, or other system.
Now for the logical conclusion to this article...
Since I have written the message base section of Fido in
C (MANX Aztec C-86 version 3.20c), is anyone interested in
helping write the rest of Fido in C? Bob Briggs (the sysop
from 15/464) was going to help me out, but he has to sell
off his PC, and will no longer be a Fido node. I know that
there are apparently versions of Fido that are written in
Turbo Pascal, but the version that I am working on will be
in C. Since MANX makes a line of compilers that covers
almost all machines and operating systems, I am using them
for the development. I have been assured that if it runs
under one MANX compiler, and uses no system specific calls,
then it will run under another MANX compiler. If this is
so, then suddenly Fido can blossom to CPM systems, as well
as other types of hardware. We shall see...
After reading views on piracy and copy protection, I
couldn't help but get my two cents worth in. Being an
experienced computer user of more than 8 years, and
programmer who has been fortunate enough to have his ware's
marketed. I feel I've enough experience to converse on this
matter. Since I have purchased alot of software, and have
also pirated alot of software. First, I have to say I have
paid much money for software that isn't worth the media it's
saved on. All these beautiful ads! and nice write ups really
grab us, and shake us until the money falls out of our
pockets. "I have to have it!" we murmur, while hoping the
wife didn't over hear. Two weeks later, we rush the freshly
packaged disk into our machines, just to find its utter
trash.
True we should check out what we buy, but those of us who
live in the more rural parts of the country don't have the
computer stores that stock all the latest software packages.
Second, MOST software is WAY over priced. as someone said in
a recent newsletter, "The price of a wordstar wouldn't buy
his services for a day" let alone the months is takes to
write a WORDSTAR. Well we're talking about more than one
sale here. And 300.00 for Wordstar is quite ridiculous! I
for one would NEVER pay such a price for software of ANY
kind. (At least not for anything I've seen on the market)
These software companies put these way out prices on this
software because the large corporations don't blink an eye
at spending several thousand on a handful of wordstar, or
symphony packages. But us small business, and hobbiest's
types flip at the thought. This is why "I PIRATE".
I've heard quotes that we pirates would still pirate even if
the price was right. Not at all true! I have just about
every piece of software imaginable for my machine. Which I
need since I spend hours at it, and I get bored with things
easily and want to move on and see what else is new. When I
get tired of a package, I toss it in the box, never to boot
it again. (Imagine 300.00 a shot for this habit!) The reason
I say its not true, is I was given a FREE copy of Borland's
TURBO PASCAL. This I learned and toyed with for about 6
months, before I found it to be a truly astounding piece of
work. With the disk already in use, I ordered from Borland,
an "ORIGINAL" (perish the though!). And found the 39.95 tag
to be VARY FAIR! Even the 3.0 version with its 69.95 price
tag.
Another good example is, I had read and seen ads for the
newly released "GEM" operating system by digitial research.
I've pirated their stuff before, I have Concurrent PC-DOS,
that I was impressed with, and ALMOST BOUGHT after seeing it
demo'ed, I wanted it, but the 395.00 just couldn't be
justified. (If it was 89.95 Digitial Research would have
made the sale!) I finally found a freebee, played with for
FIDONEWS -- 15 Jul 85 00:00:52 Page 6
about 2 weeks, until I found its many short comings, (thank
god I didn't pay it's 300.00+ price tag! ) Then tossed it
too in the bone pile, and haven't booted it since. But GEM
was another story! A fellow pirate called and said he just
got a good chunk of the entire GEM package, which included
the GEM OS, the GEM PAINT, WRITE, copies of the doc etc. I
asked him to ship it out to me. Later the next day, I
stopped into the computer store, and low and behold they had
GEM too! I watched a brief demo, and asked the price. (ready
to hear the typical $$$) But no! $49.95 the salesman said!
Even though I KNEW I had it coming any day in the mail, I
BOUGHT the package because it was their when i wanted it, I
thought it looked like fun, and I'd rather have the more
colorful, original, documentation. This fair pricing was for
the OS ONLY! after seeing that the supporting PAINT, WRITE,
and others were near 200.00 each, I declined on those!
(again if they were 49.00 each I'd have taken one of each
without hesitation) I waited and received them in the mail
for free. But Digital, again, LOST THE SALE!
Games too are over priced. Another example, I pirate every
game I can find, since none have held my attention for over
a couple hours. And I`m not about to pay 39.00 for 2 hours
worth of fun. Until a store was going out of business! They
offered my AtariSoft games, at 9.95 each! and I bought
THREE! (the only 3 I didn't already have) Oh there was one
exception. The MS flight simulator! Even though I already
owned a pirated copy, I did order one mail order for 29.00.
This was because it is worth the price, as is Sub Logics
flight simulator called "JET" which is due out any day. I
have already placed an order for, since I've seen it at a
recent computer show.
So If I was a software company I would do what I could to
cut costs, and lower prices, and above all DUMP THE
PROTECTION! It doesn't hinder piracy at all, we still copy
everything we want, and crack the rest. But it would be
nice to buy ZAXXON at 14.95 already in file form for hard
disk storage, rather than having to break it down myself.
True not all piracy would be stopped, Kids would still run
around trading games, but the piracy what would continue
would be software that the pirates would not purchase
normally anyway! Even freeware can be over priced, I've seen
requests for 50.00+ for something that's not worth a dime,
although the idea is promising. But I can honestly say I
have only paid for one piece of freeware... John Friels
QMODEM! He's asked 10.00 (for the 1st version) which was
refreshing, since I would have paid up to 79.95 for it.
A good example of pricing again... I read about Borlands
SIDEKICK when it was new, I was hot for it! I found it at
the store, but they only had the "UNPROTECTED VERSION" which
for some reason was double the price of the protected
version. ( QUITE UNFAIR! even for Borland) Well I wasn't
about to pay 89.00 for a program that sells for 49.00 with
protection! And since the store didn't stock the protected
49.95 version (I couldn't get it to crack it) AGAIN This
FIDONEWS -- 15 Jul 85 00:00:55 Page 7
time, Borland would have made the sale!) But they had to be
greedy and charge us more, just so we could use it from our
hard drives. As it turned out, I got a pirated copy, played
with it for a week, then tossed it in the bone pile, never
to be booted again.
So in closing, you can all voice your opinions on whats in
the mind of a software pirate, but the above insight is
coming from a pirate, which is not the thoughts of one, but
of 99 percent of the software traders that I deal with. You
can say what you want but...
Having been a sysop myself a few years ago, I can
understand how a sysop may feel. Users will EXPECT that his
board is up and running. They will EXPECT that they can
download everything and contribute nothing, if they so wish.
They EXPECT that they have the right to drop carrier in the
middle of their session, or tie the board up for hours.
As I said, users EXPECT. Maybe I'd better add the
word SOME in front of the word "users". Infact, a great many
users express a great desire to not only use the board but to
help it grow. I say more power to them.
Now, back to being a sysop. If I wish to dedicate my
computer, phone line and personal time to run a board, then I
should be able to DICTATE what is permitted on my board. After
all, I'm the guy paying the bills to run this contraption.
It's MY hobby! If I don't want you to post the latest patches
to break Symphony's copy protection, that's my business, not
yours.
So it's pretty much agreed and understood that a sysop
can do whatever he or she pretty damn well pleases. On their
board. Anytime they want. And no explanations needed, thank
you very much.
However, don't users have a FEW rights too? A user
doesn't have many rights on a local BBS; we've agreed he is at
the mercy of the sysop. But, let's consider for a moment what
would happen if a BBS was also a local host system for FIDONET.
Does this sysop have the right to censor any private FIDONET
messages?
Let's give an example. I am a sysop of a FIDO that
happens to also be the local host system for my area. All
FIDOMAIL passes through my board. Now, I also have strict
rules that govern my BBS. I own a computer store, and will not
allow any messages to be posted that would directly compete
with services my store provides. So far, so good. I'm within
my rights as a sysop to censor all messages for this material.
After all, I'm not going to help my competition.
Now, here comes the problem (you knew there had to be
a problem, Life's just a bowl of cereal). A friend of a user
sends FIDOMAIL from his node in New York state telling his
friend of an exceptional hard disk drive deal. 10 megabytes for
$250.00 complete! So, he sends his friend FIDOMAIL and pays
his money to do so. Money is deducted from his account, and
all is well.
That is, until that message hits my BBS. This message
competes with my business. So, therefore, I will delete it.
FIDONEWS -- 15 Jul 85 00:01:03 Page 9
It will not be passed through my system, since I too sell hard
disk upgrade kits. I'd be shooting myself in the foot. I
delete the message, and no one knows anything.
The question here is, doesn't the user expect to have
the right to receive FIDOMAIL? Isn't this particular sysop
imposing HIS set of rules upon the entire local FIDO community,
since he is a local host system? Doesn't the first amendment
operate in this case?
To make a similar example; I am a Shiite working as a
mailman for the Postal Service. Do I have the right to deny
mail delivery to a Christian based on my religious beliefs? Of
course not!
But what about this sysop? Does he have the right to
censor FIDOMAIL, even if it's a private message?
My own thoughts say that the sysop has NO right to
censor FIDOMAIL. If he has problems with any potential message
being routed through his system, other than those that promote
illegal activity, he shouldn't volunteer to be a host system.
Let some other board handle the duties, or remain outside of
FIDONET altogether.
Radio Free FIDO was founded on a belief that it is the
users who make the board, and it's up to us to continue to keep
it's quality high. We've formed a FIDO Users Group (FUG).
We're all a bunch of Fuggers. The sysop guides the board, and
lends a hand when needed. We're fortunate to have such a
sponsor. I can't help but feel the boiling blood of my
revolutionary ancestors when the word "censor" is spoken.
Thoughts?
To sum up my position, I appeal to anyone who cannot
allow free flow of FIDOMAIL traffic through his system to NOT
consider becoming a host system. To do so would go against the
grain of the FIDONET community, and prostitute the dream of Tom
Jennings. LONG LIVE FIDONET.
Mind if I talk a bit more about software piracy? Thank you.
We have an article this week about piracy, as seen from the
pirate's point of view. I appreciate his viewpoint, and I'm
glad he wrote to tell us how he feels. I'd just like to say
a few things about how it looks from my side of the fence.
First of all, let's explode a myth. Copy protection doesn't
add all that much to the cost of making software. The
outfit that does our disk duplication adds copy protection
for a very modest fee. Of course, you can go out and lay
down a bundle for Prolok if you want, but it's your own
fault if you do. Copy protection is software, just like any
other. It doesn't cost anything to add a few lines of code
to a program, and it doesn't cost much to add a key to a
disk.
So what does cost? Well, disks don't grow on trees, for one
thing. And it does cost a bit for disk duplication (you can
spend an afternoon making 200 copies on your PC if you want,
but I won't). You also need a manual, or nobody will be
able to use your product. This can get very expensive if
you want professional typesetting, but let's assume that you
are willing to settle for a cruder, "home-grown" look, so
you'll run it off on your printer and call it "camera
ready".
Then of course you'll need some sort of packeging. Silk
screened binders and printed boxes are expensive, so let's
settle for the ubiquitous vinyl folder (now you know why
it's so common).
Don't forget that all this doesn't come prepackaged. What
you'll get is a box of folders, a box of disks, and a stack
of manuals. Be prepared to spend a couple of afternoons
putting it all together.
By now you've already spent a fair chunk of cash out of your
own pocket. (Don't forget that, for a professional
offering, you should expect to spend ten times as long on
debugging, polishing things up, putting in on-line help, and
so forth. Once you've sent the master disk out for
duplication it is too late to fix any bugs.) Assuming you
were putting together a run of a hundred, with all the
software fitting on one disk and with a modest manual,
you've probably spent on the order of three or four hundred
bucks. You may think that your troubles are over. Hardly!
FIDONEWS -- 15 Jul 85 00:01:08 Page 11
What you've bought for your money is a stack of packages
piled on your kitchen table. Now you've got to get someone
to buy them. You could take out ads in a few of the trade
journals, but be prepared to spend upwards of $50,000 doing
it for a month. You can mail out review copies to all the
magazines, but they get hundreds of packages a month and
will probably never even open yours. You might get someone
else to distribute it for you, but that's hard to do if you
don't have a proven track record for marketable software
(the old chicken-and-egg problem). You can probably find a
few local software stores who are willing to carry it on
consignment, but don't expect to sell more than a half dozen
copies that way.
So you are now in the realm of MARKETING, and that takes big
bucks. So you mortgage the house, the car, the wife and
kids, and spend it all on advertising in the whistful hope
that your package will catch on and be a success. Or
perhaps you go find some venture capital, hire a marketing
consultant, and lose control over your own product.
Is this dream of being a major software company overnight
starting to tarnish a bit? Wait, it gets worse!
So say you "over" price your product at $100. If your
initial run sells out completely you will gross ten grand,
which is not enough to cover your advertising costs, not to
mention paying the mortgage and putting food on the table
while you pursue your dream.
I'm told that a "hot" product sells ten thousand copies in
this business. Granted, Lotus and Borland both do better,
but not much of anybody else. A more reasonable figure for
a typical package is probably under a thousand, but let's
think big. Ten thousand copies at a "reasonable" cost of
thirty bucks a piece comes out to $300,000. Looks like a
lot of money, doesn't it? Now figure you spent, oh, half
that much on marketing costs. Another thirty grand goes to
physical costs (disks, jackets, manuals; we'll ignore the
high school kids you hired to help put it all together).
Unexpected costs (there are ALWAYS unexpected costs) will
take a big chunk, but let's call it twenty grand to make the
numbers simpler. Your net is then $100,000. Uncle Sam will
gladly help himself to half of that, leaving you with
$50,000 for yourself.
Now consider that this is only true if your product is a
bona-fide winner. If it falls flat on its face (which it
easily could, through no fault of your own), then you are
out a couple of hundred grand, and get nothing.
It's a gamble, no two ways about it. You put everything on
the line in the slim hope that you'll come up with a winner.
I've been writing and selling software for a long time now.
I do this stuff for a living. I, too, have the dream of
FIDONEWS -- 15 Jul 85 00:01:10 Page 12
coming up with a winner, something that everyone will want
and use. Now people are coming along and telling me that I
charge too much, that I should shoot the works and gamble
everything I own for peanuts. Nuts is right! Why should I
take that risk if the payoff isn't worth it?
FIDONEWS -- 15 Jul 85 00:01:10 Page 13
============================================================
FOR SALE
============================================================
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G R A P H I C S B O A R D O P T I O N
A N D G S X - 8 6 S O F T W A R E
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
I have one dozen PC-1XX-BA graphics
options for the DEC Rainbow available
at up to +25% off. These are brand new,
in unopened boxes. Pricing:
Cashiers checks or Money orders may be
sent to Advanced Software Applications
5258 Vickie Drive
San Diego, Ca 92109
(619) 488-5258
Decus members must include your member-
ship number. Orders will be taken on a
first come first served basis and will
be shipped the week of 29 July 85.
