7 ms·

In the 90s I used to make money off shareware, and every time I release a new version hackers would release "cracks" for the license key. Eventually I figured o

In the 90s I used to make money off shareware, and every time I release a new version hackers would release "cracks" for the license key. Eventually I figured out that these cracks are coming from Russia. In the next version of my program, I added a check for system language, and if I detect Russian then I bypass the license key checks, and the program is free to use. This stopped hackers from releasing cracks.

PeterisP 5y ago
Hah, it reminds me of a shareware program that had two options for registration, one required you to pay some dollars to get a registration code, and the other, labeled as licence for CIS countries (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_Independent_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_Independent_St...) simply required you to enter the name of the current day of week in Russian cyrillic alphabet.
- Lex-2008 5y ago
  I believe I saw it in the FAR file manager.
- orbital-decay 5y ago
  I believe it's not related. When the shareware model was popular, a lot of the programs made by developers from exUSSR republics were either free or sold at the significantly lowered price to native speakers, so such tests were common. (I've seen Russian folk riddles as tests, for example). The developers were doing this because they were keenly aware of the economic situation in their home countries, and because the software would have been pirated anyway. So there was less incentive for russian speakers to crack it as it was free for them. It was a completely different time as well, nobody was thinking about legal action.
  - gowld 5y ago
    > I believe it's not related. Not related to what? Law enforcement risks are probably not related. Discouraging piracy outside of Russia, more likely related.
  - nzmsv 5y ago
    Not sure why this is downvoted. An exUSSR license was very common in shareware whose authors were themselves from the region. WinRAR and FAR are examples, but there are certainly more.
    - wildmanx 5y ago
      Maybe because it claims "they are unrelated" and then spends some time describing the relation? That is, between cracking shareware and its language filter to avoid said cracking.
      - nzmsv 5y ago
        And I think what the comment meant was: the special license was driven more by consideration of the fellow countryman's economic situation than by appeasement of crackers. In reality it was probably a bit of both.
at_a_remove 5y ago
Even more amusing -- if Russian, then use a different license scheme.
- ma2rten 5y ago
  They would likely notice once they fire up a disassembler or debugger.
  - jonny_eh 5y ago
    Plus, I don’t think anyone in Russia would pay anyways. So it’s not like making it free would lose sales.
    - konart 5y ago
      >Plus, I don’t think anyone in Russia would pay anyways. Not in the 90s, that's for sure. Steam change this for games market though when they case to russian market with local prices.
      - tick_tock_tick 5y ago
        I wonder if we will see a surge of eastern EU countries cracking again since the EU is banning local pricing in the region.
forgithubs 5y ago
Wow, make them become lazy
grishka 5y ago
Am Russian. This made me smile.
- matthewmorgan 5y ago
  Coming from a land of thieves makes you happy?
  - grishka 5y ago
    Piracy is not a theft because it doesn't deprive anyone of anything.
    - astrange 5y ago
      It deprives you of future work from the developer. Costs are real even if they're not marginal costs.
      - NaturalPhallacy 5y ago
        Non-sequitur. Many developers have and always will contribute for free to open source projects, and freeware.
        mycologos 5y ago
        Sure, and other developers want to get paid for their contributions, so they use copyrights. Pirating those pieces of software is only not theft in the narrow sense of not literally taking an object that can only belong to one person. But it's clearly breaking some sort of agreement of exchange that the creator tried to build into this process, which is some kind of immoral. That's not to say that every copyright is good or makes sense, but blanket statements like "piracy is not theft" are either so narrowly scoped to be useless ("it's not theft, it's some other unethical action") or ... wrong?
        astrange 5y ago
dmitrygr 5y ago
I used to sell a lot of shareware software, priced around $15. For Russians it was much cheaper: 200 RUR, sent by postal mail transfer to my grandma who still lived in Russia. She got a small stream of income from it (negligible by USA standards), to augment the laughable pension.
- shard 5y ago
  That's smart and sweet at the same time.
- zrobotics 5y ago
  What an absolutely awesome idea! Sacrificing a (probably negligible from a western perspective) income stream to help your grandmother and help your countrymen simultaneously. Plus, avoids fees from sending money back to your grandmother; and any dollar that middleman remittance companies don't get is a net positive for the world.
slim 5y ago
It's fair because russians don't have any means to pay in dollars. That's why they crack
- hvis 5y ago
  That was more or less true in the 90s, at least.
- AussieWog93 5y ago
  I sell open-source hardware and get plenty of sales to Russia and even occasionally China in USD. I think they appreciate the fact I don't charge stupid shipping fees to people in smaller markets.
- selivanovp 5y ago
  Russians pay in Rubles, but banks/payment gateways convert them to your currency, so for you Russians will pay in dollars.
huhtenberg 5y ago
The earliest I've seen this trick was in Far Manager [1], back when it was a commercial software. Made by Eugene Roshal, the author of RAR format and WinRar, Far Manager distribution included a text file in Russian that explained how a comrade can do a full unlock in 2 easy steps. Don't know if it helped with sales, but I don't think it actually solved the cracking problem, because Roshal ended up open sourcing it despite of it having a very sizeable following. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far_Manager https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far_Manager
iDisagreedEar 5y ago
I have a similar situation, most of my paying customers live in the united States, a few in Europe, and a rare 1 person outside those areas. I give away free content, so I don't mind if people use the website, but I have no incentive to create topics specific to (third world) users. They have never paid, and from interactions with them, they can't afford their own lives, let alone buying my products for under $10USD.
- ptr2voidStar 5y ago
  > ... from my interactions with them, they can't afford their own lives ... That's a tad condescending.
  - iDisagreedEar 5y ago
    My website is about personal finance and they openly tell me this stuff
EastSmith 5y ago
IBExpert (firebird GUI), used to have something like this in cyrilic in Help -> About: "If you can read this, this program is free for use for you. Have a nice day."
devenvdev 5y ago
This is some two-steps thinking which is not the default mode for most humans AFAIK. The "Russians won't pay for this but that means there won't be a crack for the rest" line of thought seems like an easy insight, but it's not IMO.
ptr2voidStar 5y ago
Brilliant move. I must admit, I wouldn't have thought of that ... (would be more hellbent on fighting ...). There's a life lesson in there, I'm sure.

PeterisP 5y ago

Hah, it reminds me of a shareware program that had two options for registration, one required you to pay some dollars to get a registration code, and the other, labeled as licence for CIS countries (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_Independent_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_Independent_St...) simply required you to enter the name of the current day of week in Russian cyrillic alphabet.

Lex-2008 5y ago
I believe I saw it in the FAR file manager.
orbital-decay 5y ago
I believe it's not related. When the shareware model was popular, a lot of the programs made by developers from exUSSR republics were either free or sold at the significantly lowered price to native speakers, so such tests were common. (I've seen Russian folk riddles as tests, for example). The developers were doing this because they were keenly aware of the economic situation in their home countries, and because the software would have been pirated anyway. So there was less incentive for russian speakers to crack it as it was free for them. It was a completely different time as well, nobody was thinking about legal action.
- gowld 5y ago
  > I believe it's not related. Not related to what? Law enforcement risks are probably not related. Discouraging piracy outside of Russia, more likely related.
- nzmsv 5y ago
  Not sure why this is downvoted. An exUSSR license was very common in shareware whose authors were themselves from the region. WinRAR and FAR are examples, but there are certainly more.
  - wildmanx 5y ago
    Maybe because it claims "they are unrelated" and then spends some time describing the relation? That is, between cracking shareware and its language filter to avoid said cracking.
    - nzmsv 5y ago
      And I think what the comment meant was: the special license was driven more by consideration of the fellow countryman's economic situation than by appeasement of crackers. In reality it was probably a bit of both.

at_a_remove 5y ago

Even more amusing -- if Russian, then use a different license scheme.

ma2rten 5y ago
They would likely notice once they fire up a disassembler or debugger.
- jonny_eh 5y ago
  Plus, I don’t think anyone in Russia would pay anyways. So it’s not like making it free would lose sales.
  - konart 5y ago
    >Plus, I don’t think anyone in Russia would pay anyways. Not in the 90s, that's for sure. Steam change this for games market though when they case to russian market with local prices.
    - tick_tock_tick 5y ago
      I wonder if we will see a surge of eastern EU countries cracking again since the EU is banning local pricing in the region.

forgithubs 5y ago

Wow, make them become lazy

grishka 5y ago

Am Russian. This made me smile.

matthewmorgan 5y ago
Coming from a land of thieves makes you happy?
- grishka 5y ago
  Piracy is not a theft because it doesn't deprive anyone of anything.
  - astrange 5y ago
    It deprives you of future work from the developer. Costs are real even if they're not marginal costs.
    - NaturalPhallacy 5y ago
      Non-sequitur. Many developers have and always will contribute for free to open source projects, and freeware.
      - mycologos 5y ago
        Sure, and other developers want to get paid for their contributions, so they use copyrights. Pirating those pieces of software is only not theft in the narrow sense of not literally taking an object that can only belong to one person. But it's clearly breaking some sort of agreement of exchange that the creator tried to build into this process, which is some kind of immoral. That's not to say that every copyright is good or makes sense, but blanket statements like "piracy is not theft" are either so narrowly scoped to be useless ("it's not theft, it's some other unethical action") or ... wrong?
        astrange 5y ago

dmitrygr 5y ago

I used to sell a lot of shareware software, priced around $15. For Russians it was much cheaper: 200 RUR, sent by postal mail transfer to my grandma who still lived in Russia. She got a small stream of income from it (negligible by USA standards), to augment the laughable pension.

shard 5y ago
That's smart and sweet at the same time.
zrobotics 5y ago
What an absolutely awesome idea! Sacrificing a (probably negligible from a western perspective) income stream to help your grandmother and help your countrymen simultaneously. Plus, avoids fees from sending money back to your grandmother; and any dollar that middleman remittance companies don't get is a net positive for the world.

slim 5y ago

It's fair because russians don't have any means to pay in dollars. That's why they crack

hvis 5y ago
That was more or less true in the 90s, at least.
AussieWog93 5y ago
I sell open-source hardware and get plenty of sales to Russia and even occasionally China in USD. I think they appreciate the fact I don't charge stupid shipping fees to people in smaller markets.
selivanovp 5y ago
Russians pay in Rubles, but banks/payment gateways convert them to your currency, so for you Russians will pay in dollars.

huhtenberg 5y ago

The earliest I've seen this trick was in Far Manager [1], back when it was a commercial software. Made by Eugene Roshal, the author of RAR format and WinRar, Far Manager distribution included a text file in Russian that explained how a comrade can do a full unlock in 2 easy steps. Don't know if it helped with sales, but I don't think it actually solved the cracking problem, because Roshal ended up open sourcing it despite of it having a very sizeable following. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far_Manager https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far_Manager

iDisagreedEar 5y ago

I have a similar situation, most of my paying customers live in the united States, a few in Europe, and a rare 1 person outside those areas. I give away free content, so I don't mind if people use the website, but I have no incentive to create topics specific to (third world) users. They have never paid, and from interactions with them, they can't afford their own lives, let alone buying my products for under $10USD.

ptr2voidStar 5y ago
> ... from my interactions with them, they can't afford their own lives ... That's a tad condescending.
- iDisagreedEar 5y ago
  My website is about personal finance and they openly tell me this stuff

EastSmith 5y ago

IBExpert (firebird GUI), used to have something like this in cyrilic in Help -> About: "If you can read this, this program is free for use for you. Have a nice day."

devenvdev 5y ago

This is some two-steps thinking which is not the default mode for most humans AFAIK. The "Russians won't pay for this but that means there won't be a crack for the rest" line of thought seems like an easy insight, but it's not IMO.

ptr2voidStar 5y ago

Brilliant move. I must admit, I wouldn't have thought of that ... (would be more hellbent on fighting ...). There's a life lesson in there, I'm sure.