Well being long time active on ubisoft , glop.org and here in the benelux locally i can say that we are really more than some that are keeping track if a game is released with sf and keep our money for other games that don't have sf thus boycotting starforced games.

On you stardock sentence i reply you by : if stardock can manage without cp why than use a rapacious form of cp like sf ?
The retail customers will be the ones most hit with problems caused by sf.
And do not forget any and every game gets cracked and pirated one time or another (that's the sad truth and i condemn openly images , torrents , no cd cracks , cheats ...)
Strange thing is why does sf then place themself links to torrents for stardock games ?

GrayGhost, Beelzebub,

Throttle back, take a deep breath....................... exhale

....please enlighten us as to how this would be achieved?
You cannot get equivalent samples. You don't know in advance how many sales would be lost in either case.
You can't compare two different games because they will always sell different and unpredictable amounts

Those who care about their sales disagree with you, quite obviously

Sales forecasts are based on previous sales of the same genre, not the perfect sandbox of university physics/chemistry/math labs.

Greyghost, please stop putting words in others mouths. You claimed that testing such things is simple. I point out that it isn't and you act like I'm the one claiming I can test it!

Stardock cares about their sales and have found that they have gained more sales due to not using pointless and user-unfriendly CP.

I didn't put any words in anyone's mouth. I made some very simple statements; if they fail to communicate to you, then I'm sorry.

What I wonder with ED's sales plans are: How can they actively WANT to alienate so many customers, when the military market for DCS: Black Shark or variants of it is minimal?
As far as I know Russia is the only country in the world fielding the Ka-50, and they have what, roughly 32 of them in total? It is not like there will be many simulators needed to keep the pilots for 32 helicopters in training, and even if they inlcude the Ka-52 that's only about 30 more the coming years, if Russia buy as many as planned.

It is just very difficult to see how ruining one's reputation (even more, in this case) and losing a lot of sales (I very, very, very much doubt that there are more lost sales in piracy, than there are lost sales because of StarForce) is a good business plan for earning money, which in the end is the root of a successful company.

Wow... this is still going on...

Let's see...

From this 35 page thread that has evolved over weeks I'd guess there are less than 25 people who have stated they will not buy Black Shark because of Starforce. It's mostly been the same people saying the same thing over and over and over. That's 25 people on SimHQ, the premier simulation website. As much as Eagle would love to have you buy Black Shark can you see why they are using the copy protection of their choice?

On another note... how many of you installed and ran Microsoft ME? Did you boycott M$ because of it? Guess not since you are probably running XP or Vista now.

How many of you went through the incredible frustration and agony of the original Falcon 4? Did you vow never to support Hasbro or any of it's subsidiary company's after that?

How many of you bought a vehicle from GM, Chrysler, or Ford that ended up being a piece of #%&*$#? Did you vow to never buy anything from the manufacturer again?

A piece of electronics that died?

A spoiled food product from a grocery store?

A Big Mac that was stale and old cold fries from McDonald's?

Did you vow to never buy from them again?

I doubt it!

You're making a huge issue over a CD or DVD player that stopped working while SF was installed but have no factual proof SF caused it. Maybe it did and maybe it was purely coincidental.



2 weeks... so you are saying that SF slowly caused it's death? If SF was so vile wouldn't the drive have died the instant it was installed or is SF a time released killer? Did you install anything else within that 2 week period? Maybe the drive was a lemon. How can you honestly prove that SF caused your drive to die in a 2 week period?

I have used 4 different CD/DVD drives with SF installed and had a problem with one of them... the tray open/close button stopped working. I put that down to a faulty drive and poor workmanship... how could I possibly prove it might have been killed by SF?

Do you guys think SF killed it?

You need to look at it from a brouder perspective , you have simhq , other sim and games sites , email , chatrooms , mouth to mouth , here locally i send a email to my relatives and my friends and they on their turn do that and so on and on and on ; getting reponse/feedback from them, we are at around the 95 copys that won't get sold mark.Plus the people that aren't aware what kind of compagny starforce is and what kind of rapacious and intrusive cp are getting informed.



Wel the fact of the matter is for some games , OS and applications it's better waiting for objective reviews (not those from the official forums or their affiliates)
I went from 3.11/6.22 to 98se to Xp



I also had some problems with stock Falcon 4 but by reading though forums i managed to get rid of the largest hickups and with the coming of the superpacks/bms/freefalcon falcon 4 got even more enjoyable.



Buy japanese cars they tend to be more reliable i now this from experience going from ford to nissan...



Electronics stores don't call you a thieve when you ask for help or claim you have problems with the product.



You bring it back to the store manager and if he makes a problem about it then you raise your voice so the other people in the store can hear the discussion.



Some people are vegetarian like myself



You can't compare one thing with others , starforce is game related , and in most countries i like to see you return the product to the store because it's has got starforce on it.



i'm to old to still believe in santa or the toothfairy or in coincidences...And what you call a huge issue is just to inform people of the dangers of starforce , google some , youll find that i'm not the only one.
How can you prove it wasn't starforce that was the culprit?



Yes it could be.
How can you possibly rule out that it wasn't starforce that killed it ?

Unfortunately, you have the relationship reversed. ED has been successful enough in the military market to be in a position to question whether further development for the entertainment market is worth the investment (and frankly, the hassle that often goes along with it - including right now). Besides the public information already available on www.thebattlesim.com, which includes work for USAF contracts for the A-10C and AC-130 simulations, as well as a licensing agreement with the UK MoD, there was also Russian TV news footage of a military version of Black Shark being used in Russia as a desktop trainer for the military. In general, there are a number of other products ED is currently developing in the military line for various clients in various nations, but there have not and may not be any more details on any of those, depending on client requests. From the beginning, the idea behind DCS was to co-develop the two product lines - military and entertainment. The military side has been going very well and we should hope the entertainment side does as well.

And so I ask again as I did earlier in this thread - should ED opt out of the entertainment market, whose loss will it be?

ED is certainly not interested in alienating anyone and to think so is irrational. ED has concrete experience with other similar products in the industry, including Lock On and Flaming Cliffs. They know what the target audience and sales volume are and they have data on the impact of piracy in both cases, although we can probably argue about the methodology used in obtaining these. Still, I think it's reasonable to assume their information is better than ours. IMHO, the decision to use SF is simply a result of this experience. Unfortunately, it didn't prove itself in the Russian release of Black Shark, but ED is doing what it feels will be best to make sure that doesn't happen again. If it does, I personally fear it may be the last sim we see from ED. This would undoubtedly make at least some people happy, but for the community at large it would IMHO be extremely sad, because the potential in DCS is enormous.

Opting out of the entertainment market would be a very good option indeed.I rather have no game at all than a starforced game.There is enough retail games and freeware mods out there to keep one busy.
It would make more than some happy i expect and certainly there is always the hope that you'll go down to the deep six.


-----------------------------------------------------
BB
anti-starforce veteran
once banned on ubi forums , curently banned on ED forum , Life long ban on starforce forums
http://groups.google.com/group/boycott-starforce/web/games-list

Its your right to abstain from buying a Starforced game, but you have absolutely no right to want to impose that lack of opportunity on the rest of us!
Such an attitude is beyond comprehension and clearly no longer worth consideration.

Keith

I think you guys are lucky this discussion hasn't moved to where it would really get a wider audience.



I very much doubt that ED would opt out of the entertainment business - and who whose loss it would be ?

I grieve to this day the closing of Digital Image Design, they closed and I moved on to Lock On, ED closes, we will move somewhere else.




like there are no better ways of protecting a product without alienating costumers, which is what we a are discussing here.

I'm imposing nothing i'm saying my word , it's not because you don't like my words others don't.
your uber attitude is frighteningly uncomprehensible and it's not worth more than fog in the sun.

And i say again it's better to have nothing than a starforced thing.

ADMIN EDIT: Picture posting policy.
It's right what you say.
Not that even "some don't like your words and some don't" as you said, they don't even make sense to anyone of us.

That's why Bush on the picture is looking and thinking "Umh, I thought I was the only one i.o.t.w."

Haa!

Lol , I could also post a picture of on of your great leaders , you know , but i'll leave it at that

Shepski

Have you read nothing of Starforce?

It is widely documented that it causes issues with your writer and, in doing so, Windows believed there to be errors and drops the speed of the drive down until it eventually becomes slower than a floppy.

If you're going to come on here and take part, try and do some background.

I've already given you a prefect example of what Starforce did to me and my system. You either skipped over (as you seem to have for most of the posts on the thread), or you choose to ignore it. Either way, I gave you the knowledge you seek and every now and again you come back in and ask again.

Go back and read the posts. All will become clear.

oh and one more thing. The absolute luaghable situation we have here is that the ONLY thing keeping this thread alive is "the last word" syndrome. If you pro starforce bunch didn't actually reply to any of this "apparent" nonsense, then this thread would die a death...very, very quickly. Then it wouldn't be in the limelight....then it wouldn't be a "potential" risk to your genre...

There are people on here who do not want starforce to protect this game or any other game and the idea was to put that word out in the slim hope that it might affect the decision of the publisher. You say it doesn't work. It did for Ubisoft and I believe there is a class action lawsuit against another big company (albeit a different protection system). So it does work. It might not in this case, but the proof is speaking out about something is worth it.

And by the way, noone knows, as has already been said, but Starforce DID NOT protect the game...as already acknowledged by DCS. So they paid for something (and handsomely I suspect) for absolutely one thing....to piss off more than half their target audience. Well bully for them.

Oh look at the pretty butterfly! Guys, again, discuss the topic, keep it to the topic. Keep from poking at each other. If it keeps up, this noteably long thread discussing copy protection will come to an end like many others have in the past.

Nuff said.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmkay?

I apologise

Sorry to disappoint your now planely stated agenda, but ED is quite solid and I would confidently say is stronger than ever. The only question is whether we too get play any more of their sims or will they be limited to various military clients.

Happy to have you banned,