Site policy about the "No CD" patch.

[beaky]

A thought on the NoCD patch (that I think hasn't BPB here):
The key issue that program creators and vendors have with things like that patch is that it is part and parcel of the whole piracy industry.
Many crackers and hackers are just trying to be helpful, but probably not most of them. Among the many freebies are many stolen wares, available for purchase. It's real competition, just as it is in the entertainment industry.

A movie distributor doesn't care if you buy 100  of their DVDs - that bootleg in your collection was stolen from them, regardless of whether or not you paid for it or it was given to you for free.


The bottom line is that although most people use the patch with legitimate versions of the software, and the patch is freely distributed, in their eyes by using it you are "doing business" with pirates.


Another thought:
A piracy-prevention method that would be more appealing to FS users (and thus more effective) would be effective coding or something; a registered password, maybe... the problem most folks seem to have is that the damned play disc gets damaged, and many CD-burner programs have difficulty copying it in full, even for legitimate backup.

And requiring Disc 4 for play has led to a different sort of crime:
I recently bought another retail copy of FS9, and discovered when I got it home that someone had carefully tampered with the seal and stolen the disc itself; probably a store employee...
 I wonder if it would even work with another copy of the sim?

[flyboy 28]

Simviation was added to the Community Pages over the summer after a few conversations with the Aces team.
After the whole Tdragger incident, we were mysteriously removed  ::)

I vaguely remember this....
Can anyone remind me in full?!  :-?

I seem to be drawing a blank also. Must've been when they weren't giving me my meds.

[Fly2e]

Mike Gilbert from The Aces Team signed up here at Simv to see and hear what people were saying about the FSX Demo.
His SimV name was tdragger.
Here is his blog
http://blogs.msdn.com/tdragger/


During this past Summer, Simviation contacted The Aces Team to be asked to be put on their Community Sites page as they were redoing the entire MS FS sight for the up and coming release of FSX.
After more than a 1/2 dozen emails to them, Simviation was finally "put back on the list".
We were pretty happy about it as we knew that SimV was getting the new server, the new forum and the new look!

Then, 2 months later the FSX Demo came out.
Obviously there was allot of talk about FSX, good and bad.

Mike Gilbert from the Aces Team signed up at Simv under the name "tdragger" to get some feedback and try to help out a bit. Mike got slammed by a few members, some have left and and some are "ex-members". But it does not take much to see why he left. I had sent him an email and he had responded with basically,
"Why should I waste my time with a site that only wants to put down what we have tried so hard to create for this community".


Here is the thread that we assume got SimV removed from the Community pages and put on the "add ons" section instead.
http://www.simviation.com/cgi-bin/yabb2 ... 57236943/0


This was Tdragger's last post at Simv and is taken from that thread. 2 days later we were removed from The Community Pages.
[quote]Posted by: tdragger Posted on: Sep 4th, 2006, 11:12am
A very interesting discussion to be sure. It's a bummer, though, that our desire to be more open has been met with such skepticism. I suppose some of it is inevitable given the official quietness for all this time.

As for all the forum and blog posts being some sort of conspiracy, concocted and endorsed by marketing, that's particularly hard to take, especially to those of us who lobbied management to go along with this more open approach. It was rooted in a desire to share what we've done and to help users get the most out of a very complex "game". And for the most part it's all happened on our own time. For instance, it's Labor Day morning right now and I could be watching Jay-Jay the Jet plane with my daughter but instead I'm trolling the forums, looking for questions I can answer.

But my time isn't unlimited. I only recently started checking SV but it seems like several of you are both prominent members of this community and definitely against this sort of participation from MS. Unfortunately with forums you can't really limit your conversations with just the people who want to listen. Inevitably threads like this arise and draw attention away from the core intent--to help and inform. So thanks for the invite to participate. It's been interesting to "meet" another group of dedicated simmers but as for me, I need to be mindful of my time. Check in with me on a blog when FSX comes out. I hope you really find some things in it you like.

[Theis]

A sad thing to see Rollerball go..
I really liked Roger..

[Souichiro]

A sad thing to see Rollerball go..
I really liked Roger..

me too I was just wondering where he went....

[pete]

I've given up caring aboiut the community sites page. There used to be great guys at MS PR who would go out of their way to see the REAL community sites - not just the ass lickers.  ;D. We got -  info - goodies - competition promo stuff - beta stuff for feedback ... as many prview copies as we wanted.

This time I had to buy FSX. 1st time since SimV started - & why??? (quite probably because we don't censor things here)

In what other business would that happen? Not many for sure.

The really sad thing is that MS actually went over the forum thing - .

& it's true - they did .... couldn't take a little un-censored feedback ...  ::)

Only weekness is knocked easily - & strength comes from within.

Think about it.  ;)

It makes no difference anyway because yahoo, google & word of mouth are king in this age

"Why should I waste my time with a site that only wants to put down what we have tried so hard to create for this community"

He seems to miss the forest - a site DEDICATED to what they have created - for the trees - a small handful of members who are entitled to hold whatever views they want.  [smiley=evil.gif]

[Woodlouse2002]

As long as Google loves us MS can do as they please.

[Hagar]

Only weakness is knocked easily - & strength comes from within.

Thanks for confirming my faith in you Pete.

I'm proud to have been associated with Pete Daly & Simviation since the very early days. I would like to say that I'm disgusted by the way things are in the FSX forum. Some people seem to have a blind loyalty to Microsoft for whatever reason & continually shout down anyone that has a different point of view, however reasonable that might be. Most of these seem to be relatively new members who we don't know. As they use screen names we have no idea who they are or where they came from. Ridicule & verbal abuse has never been the Simviation way of doing things & this has turned many of the old regulars away, possibly for ever. I for one regret their loss.

PS. This is still going on now. You only have to check out a few recent topics in the FSX forum.

[Saitek]

I support MS in their work, I rarely criticise them and I would like to thank them for all their work they put into making the sim what it is. I do feel that it is most childish to behave in such as silly way though as to leave forums just because you don't like certain members attitudes. MS may be the most powerful firm in the world, but sometimes they need to realise they there is such a thing as one's opinion and such as thing as freedom of speech, and they have no rights to be a dictator to individuals own tongues.

I support you Pete on this. Apart from the fact we don't need listings to get attention as any search on google for flight sim stuff proves we shouldn't be bullied and punished for not banning (or simply just having on the board!) members for speaking offhand.

[Mobius]

Only weakness is knocked easily - & strength comes from within.

Thanks for confirming my faith in you Pete.

I'm proud to have been associated with Pete Daly & Simviation since the very early days. I would like to say that I'm disgusted by the way things are in the FSX forum. Some people seem to have a blind loyalty to Microsoft for whatever reason & continually shout down anyone that has a different point of view, however reasonable that might be. Most of these seem to be relatively new members who we don't know. As they use screen names we have no idea who they are or where they came from. Ridicule & verbal abuse has never been the Simviation way of doing things & this has turned many of the old regulars away, possibly for ever. I for one regret their loss.

PS. This is still going on now. You only have to check out a few recent topics in the FSX forum.

I agree that the FSX forum often turns into a shouting match, heck, I'll admit that I was in a few at the beginning, but I've since realized that there are people on both sides of the argument who won't change their opinions, so I only respond to legitimate questions from people who actually want help or want to contribute to a constructive discussion.  It's my opinion that FSX is a step in the right direction, maybe not a huge step, nor a step in the direction that I would like, but it's called Microsoft, not Michaelsoft - I'm not their only customer, but other people seem to think they are, and because of that, they get angry if MS focused more on what they did, instead of modeling their home airport with the new 35 ft taxiway instead of the old 30 ft taxiway, oh well, their loss in my opinion.  I couldn't take it anymore, so I would just ignore it, and post links to the humor (or humour ) forum, but nobody seemed to use them.  Oh well, I still love it here more than any other website, and I appreciate everything everyone has done to make this place the place it is, and if I did/do shout at anyone, I'm sorry, I probably didn't mean it.

[FridayChild]

My opinion on the no-CD patch issue is as follows.
- the no-CD patch can be regarded *in itself* as illegal (albeit not exactly "piracy") because it breaches the End User License. The user is not allowed to alter the original source code in any way. Therefore, the person(s) who actually made it theorically breached the EULA.
- making use of the no-CD patch is not illegal in itself
- making use of an unlicensed copy of FS, instead, is obviously illegal.
So, to sum it up, IMO MS is in its own right when it claims that the no-CD patch was created by breaching the EULA, but users with a legitimate copy of FS do not breach it if they make use of such patch. Software piracy is only concerned when we talk about unlicensed copies of FS; the no-cd patch is "just" a non-authorized "hack" than *can* be used (and matter of fact, often is) by unlicensed users.

[cspyro21]

I've given up caring aboiut the community sites page. There used to be great guys at MS PR who would go out of their way to see the REAL community sites - not just the ass lickers.  ;D. We got -  info - goodies - competition promo stuff - beta stuff for feedback ... as many prview copies as we wanted.

This time I had to buy FSX. 1st time since SimV started - & why??? (quite probably because we don't censor things here)

In what other business would that happen? Not many for sure.

The really sad thing is that MS actually went over the forum thing - .

& it's true - they did .... couldn't take a little un-censored feedback ...  ::)

Only weekness is knocked easily - & strength comes from within.

Think about it.  ;)

It makes no difference anyway because yahoo, google & word of mouth are king in this age

"Why should I waste my time with a site that only wants to put down what we have tried so hard to create for this community"

He seems to miss the forest - a site DEDICATED to what they have created - for the trees - a small handful of members who are entitled to hold whatever views they want.  [smiley=evil.gif]

Well said Pete, in my opinion this T_dragger guy from MS (as you said ) couldn't take criticism and threw a 'tantrum' at SimV just because we have our opinions.

[Fozzer]

I have no idea who designed the "No CD" patch... ...!

...but I will be forever grateful to him/her/them for not having to search through an ENORMOUS! pile of game Cd's for disk No. 4, just to run my legitimately purchased version of FS 2004... ...!

It makes my life so much easier, and increases my enjoyment of the "game"...
...and no annoyance with Microsoft for making "things" difficult for me!... ...!

Paul...A life devoid of complications is a life worth having... 8-)... ...!

[Hai Perso Coyone?]

Mike Gilbert from The Aces Team signed up here at Simv to see and hear what people were saying about the FSX Demo.
His SimV name was tdragger.
Here is his blog
http://blogs.msdn.com/tdragger/


During this past Summer, Simviation contacted The Aces Team to be asked to be put on their Community Sites page as they were redoing the entire MS FS sight for the up and coming release of FSX.
After more than a 1/2 dozen emails to them, Simviation was finally "put back on the list".
We were pretty happy about it as we knew that SimV was getting the new server, the new forum and the new look!

Then, 2 months later the FSX Demo came out.
Obviously there was allot of talk about FSX, good and bad.

Mike Gilbert from the Aces Team signed up at Simv under the name "tdragger" to get some feedback and try to help out a bit. Mike got slammed by a few members, some have left and and some are "ex-members". But it does not take much to see why he left. I had sent him an email and he had responded with basically,
"Why should I waste my time with a site that only wants to put down what we have tried so hard to create for this community".


Here is the thread that we assume got SimV removed from the Community pages and put on the "add ons" section instead.
http://www.simviation.com/cgi-bin/yabb2 ... 57236943/0


This was Tdragger's last post at Simv and is taken from that thread. 2 days later we were removed from The Community Pages.

Posted by: tdragger Posted on: Sep 4th, 2006, 11:12am
A very interesting discussion to be sure. It's a bummer, though, that our desire to be more open has been met with such skepticism. I suppose some of it is inevitable given the official quietness for all this time.

As for all the forum and blog posts being some sort of conspiracy, concocted and endorsed by marketing, that's particularly hard to take, especially to those of us who lobbied management to go along with this more open approach. It was rooted in a desire to share what we've done and to help users get the most out of a very complex "game". And for the most part it's all happened on our own time. For instance, it's Labor Day morning right now and I could be watching Jay-Jay the Jet plane with my daughter but instead I'm trolling the forums, looking for questions I can answer.

But my time isn't unlimited. I only recently started checking SV but it seems like several of you are both prominent members of this community and definitely against this sort of participation from MS. Unfortunately with forums you can't really limit your conversations with just the people who want to listen. Inevitably threads like this arise and draw attention away from the core intent--to help and inform. So thanks for the invite to participate. It's been interesting to "meet" another group of dedicated simmers but as for me, I need to be mindful of my time. Check in with me on a blog when FSX comes out. I hope you really find some things in it you like.  

Dave

Shame to see Roger go...and Nick N too? I thought I saw him here yesterday? :-? :-?

[FridayChild]

It's nice to see how my opinion about the patch developed during the last year.  ;D