Sunder wrote:

The only way that this could work is if they put up some sort of splash screen at some point to let the luser know that the program isn't buggy, but that the copy protection noticed it's a backup. After all, if you get a copy of a game from a friend, and it crashes on you all the time, would you think it's because the copy is bad, or because the software is as buggy as a Microsoft product?

Unnecessary. These guys know what they're doing. The scheme is very carefully targetted at the Warez scene. Software copy protection is usually cracked by a small number of people who compete for reputation. For a copy or a crack to be worth anything in a trade, it has to be something that the other guy doesn't yet have. Thus the core software piracy networks focus on cracking and trading new software as quickly as possible (the "zero day" scene). Fade's technique makes it much harder to test a crack. There could be any number of independent copy protection code fragments hidden throughout the software. The only way to tell if you've removed them all is to play the game in its entirety - a task requiring several days or more. By that time, the other guy has already released a (probably incomplete) crack, thus reducing the value of your work to zero. A kind of prisoner's dilemma (a game theory of game piracy?): the likely outcome is that incomplete cracks are released. It's these same copies and cracks that filter down through various kinds of markets and networks to the general public. This has already happened. I've seen a number of cracked and copied games over the past year or so that appear at first glance to function perfectly; it's only after playing for several hours that it becomes obvious something isn't working. The reaction of a player at getting "stuck" after investing several hours in a game isn't to simply toss it; it's to search the game hints sites and forums (which are numerous and lively) for a solution. A shareware-style nag message isn't needed to prompt this. If they discover rumors (accurate or not) that only illegal copies are affected, there's an incentive to purchase a legal copy if the game is of high quality; and a disincentive to waste their time on illegal copies in the future. Most people who use pirated software probably wouldn't use the same software if they had to pay for it. Fade isn't aimed at these users; it's aimed at the small percentage who would purchase a copy if they couldn't get it for free. It's possible a new market will emerge for "aftermarket" cracks, that fix the gaps in the zero-day versions. But this is only likely to happen for extremely popular games. The few people with the necessary skills have little incentive to deal with a month-old game unless it's an exceptional case. The long term outcome might be to increase sales of niche software and less popular games: anything good enough to attract loyal users, but slip beneath the radar of the zero day scene.