[game_preservation] Online DRM

[Andrew Armstrong]

Oooh, manual lookups (or in Civilization's case, Trivia questions!), 
code wheels (I had one for my dad's Premier Manager - matching shirts 
and shorts to make a kit with a matching number), and so forth, yeah, 
fun stuff. Dissuasion yep. Better the hacking the distribution media and 
technically breaking it.

Laws differ from country to country, on the credit versus refund issue. 
Untested EULA's and requirement specifications on boxes (or lackthereof 
here) etc. etc., wish it was more concrete... but yes, digitial 
distribution as discussed isn't workable for preservation even if 
compatibility issues were resolved - there is the issue of control too, 
since Valve has automated, horribly supported (ie; lack of appeals), 
banning processes - that ban you from the service, not a specific game, 
which is a terribly bad practice, among other issues (this isn't just 
Steam mind you, but other services do this too). Basically that might 
come into play if a "preservation account" was hacked or somesuch. Oh 
well, maybe in the future!

Andrew

Info wrote:

>

> Ahh, simpler times.  That was one of Dani Berry's (Dan Bunten at the 

> time) early titles.  Shortly thereafter Ozark went to a "enter the 7th 

> word on the 4th line on page 12 from the manual" - model for DRM.  It 

> was irritating but worked well enough. It meant that you had to have a 

> copy of the shipped manual to get into the game.  This worked alright 

> at the time and served as a middle ground between protected disks and 

> dongles and no protection at all.  Obviously this wouldn't be much of 

> a solution present day for retail product.  Much of the point of DRM 

> (forgive me if you've had this discussion already) is simply to create 

> enough friction to dissuade 95% of those copying the software.  Same 

> goes in other media. You'll never eliminate all of them unless you 

> stay with a closed Steam-like setup. 

>

> Steam works well for new releases designed to be distributed that way. 

> I've been using it since '03. The only trouble I've had with Steam was 

> with the purchase of a single legacy pre-online title.  Wouldn't run, 

> wasn't supported, they even make refunds impossible.  I had to settle 

> for a credit.  I wouldn't recommend purchasing anything not designed 

> to be distributed through online means.  Or at least I wouldn't 

> purchase titles not supported by a major label.  Id's stuff works fine 

> via Steam.  There may come a day when a system like this may be 

> feasible and supported for preservation purposes.  Possibly as a 

> research network of some kind.

>

> Sam Punnett

>

> At 11:01 AM 8/4/2009, you wrote:

>> Content-Language: en

>> Content-Type: multipart/alternative;

>>          boundary="_000_C69DB7955C10zvowellaustinutexasedu_"

>>

>> This doesn't have much to do with DRM mechanisms, but it's an 

>> interesting little footnote to EA's history of copy 

>> protection....maybe call it the pre-web attitude to copying.  It's a 

>> snippet from the Command Summary document found in "Robot Rascals" 

>> (published by EA in 1987):

>>

>> "For your convenience, "Robot Rascals" is not copy protected so that 

>> you can easily make *one* backup copy for your own use, or install 

>> the program on *your own* RAM or hard disk.  Please show us that copy 

>> protection is unnecessary -- *do not give copies of this product 

>> away*.  Thank you."  [emphasis in the original doc]

>>

>> Very polite :)

>>

>>

>> Zach

>>

>>

>> On 4/2/09 12:28 PM, "Andrew Armstrong" <andrew at aarmstrong.org> wrote:

>>

>>     That, along with Henry's comments, really does make it seem like the 

>>     most sucky system ever - what I'd half expect from laws of course.

>>     Either we'll have to look to propose something for next year (I

>>     presume 

>>     it runs yearly) somehow if anyone is interested, else the

>>     Americans on 

>>     this list might be having legal troubles with some of their

>>     efforts, or 

>>     just, well, let it all lapse!

>>     No idea about how to coordinate it however. I'm not American,

>>     good luck 

>>     letting a UK citizen into the USA law books and procedures ;)

>>     It'd have 

>>     to be sorted, I guess, between the digital archives, libraries

>>     and the 

>>     Library of Congress.

>>     Andrew

>>     Rachel "Sheepy" Donahue wrote: 

>>     > 

>>     >> A question to the procedure: Is it necessary, to propose that an 

>>     >> exemption should be keept every three years again after it was 

>>     >> granted first? Or does it remain automaticly until someone

>>     proposes 

>>     >> that it should be canceled? 

>>     >> 

>>     >> Andreas 

>>     >> 

>>     > 

>>     > I looked at this a bit more in depth in the fall, and looked at

>>     the 

>>     > list of proposals up for review, and this one was not included.

>>     I am 

>>     > fairly sure that someone has to sponsor it for it to remain. 

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