From: "John Beamish" 

http://reversecode.com/

Public Letter:

I hope the public will read this entire letter. There has been alot of
confusion regarding the copy protection of the program called Display
Eater.
It is described here in:

There exist two illegal cd-keys that can be used to register the program
without paying for it. When Display Eater detects these keys, it would
delete your home directory.

However, this is not the case in reality. The whole purpose was to create a
scare campaign. You can download, the file linked from the main page, which
is now down(the link is still intact here), and check it for yourself. It
has been this way since 2/7/07.

It was my hope that by creating a scare campaign, I could stop wasting time
writing copy protection routines to be broken over and over.

It turned out to be a mistake.

People started buying multiple keys, which I never intended, and when the
protection was in place, people who did not even know they had committed
piracy or what piracy was were left in the dark. Legitimate and prospective
users started fearing the program, which I never imagined.

A reporter called me today, and suggested that I make it free, and or open
source. I plan to do both. Once the code is cleaned up, a GPL'ed version
will be released.

Since the program is free, this key will activate it, until it is released as such.

display eater
reverse{at}reversecode.com
PROD-9PNRM6-4RPRY-JUA5D-XW20G-J0MPY-9MTWX-2L9KW-1


-Reza


On Sat, 24 Feb 2007 14:40:03 -0500, RobertB  wrote:

> In article ,
>  "Rich Gauszka"  wrote:
>
>> I wonder if someone from the wga team has seen this and thought - GREAT
>> IDEA!!!!!
>>
>> If Ballmer purchases 'reverscode'  (http://www.reversecode.com/  )
>> beware
>> the next wga update 
>>
>> http://geekpatrol.ca/2007/02/display-eater-eats-more-than-just-displays/
>>
>>
>> Display Eater Eats More Than Just Displays
>>
>> Well, this is interesting. It turns out that Display Eater, a
>> screen-capture
>> application for Mac OS X will delete your home folder if it thinks
>> you're
>> running it with a pirated serial number. How's that for a draconian
>> anti-piracy policy? [Karsten Kusche over at briksoftware] also thinks
>> it'll
>> generate some of the worst PR possible:
>>
>>     Removing the home folder of some users will probably do way more
>> advertisement. But that kind of advertisement is not good. This blog
>> post is
>> such a kind of negative advertisement. I definitely do not support such
>> software and I suggest you should not use Display Eater. If you need a
>> tool
>> to create screen-casts go for iShowU. It's just 3$ more expensive than
>> Display Eater but seems to have a much better user experience.
>>
>> Of course, Display Eater's developer thinks his approach is perfectly
>> reasonable, and has threatened to take his toys and go home if people
>> don't
>> stop pirating his application:
>>
>>
>> http://www.versiontracker.com/php/feedback/article.php?story=200702071246147
86
>>
>> Feedback Type: Developer Note
>> Contributed by: 02-07-07 12:46PM
>>
>>
>>
>> Product Platform: MacOSX
>> Used Product For: Over One Year
>> Recommend Product: YES
>>
>>
>> You "checked" to see what piracy protection I was using,
right. Why
>> dont you
>> just admit that you PIRATED it?
>>
>> For the rest of you nice people. I'll try to be as clear as I can. There
>> exist several illegal cd-keys that you can use to unlock the demo
>> program.
>> If Display Eater detects that you are using these, it will erase
>> something.
>>
>> I don't know if this is going to become Display Eater policy. If this
>> level
>> of piracy continues, development will stop.
>>
>> -Reza
>
> There's gotta be something illegal in this, aside from the bad PR and
> generally bad Karma of erasing a user's *Home* folder, which has their
> critical documents on it. More like vendettaware!

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