The creator of MTR has to do what he does with the licensing scheme because of rampant abuse of the licensing system.
Typical abuse scenario:
- User sends in a $10 gift and gets a copy of MTR
- User gets his license via the automated process
- User then sends the copy of MTR with the .lic file to 40 of his friends or puts it on PirateBay.
- MTR creator see all of this abuse but people still expect him to work on MTR.
I'm not trying to make excuses for the guy... but I have to admit I'd do the same thing if I were under the same legal constraints he is to create this type of software.
We're going to have Yet Another Copy Protection Discussion(tm).
Let us get the following out of the way:
1) Has any form of copy protection ever been successful at keeping media from being copied?
No.
AACS and BD+ are some of the most advanced forms of copy protection ever devised and the media they protect is still available via pirated channels.
There are some examples where those with the appropriate skills to crack the protection have not bothered to crack various pieces of software, but these should not be taken as examples where protection is successful. These are often small software vendors that escape the notice of pirates by simply not having large enough market share.
2) Has the elaborate licensing scheme prevented Mac the Ripper from being copied?
No.
It is still available via pirated channels.
3) Does the licensing scheme annoy users enough to keep them from purchasing the software?
I cannot speak for everyone else, but yes in my case. I just use alternatives in Linux when necessary due to the convoluted licensing scheme used by the software.
I can appreciate your argument, but the reality is that copy protection often annoys legitimate users more than pirates.
