"An Open Letter to Cock de Gorter and the CSVN Board"

[kingliveson]

Thought by now this thread would have been dead, but apparently people want to see more of Harvey and PlayChess sysops behaving badly.

Here we see PlayChess sysops Holger (kibitzbot) teasing a paying customer with Harvey and Rob. Because he posted something outside of PlayChess server they didn't like. This continued, as the individual did not take the bait, Holger decided to mute and then later banned his account. I don't know about the consumer protection laws in Germany, but am quite sure a U.S.A based company cannot just decide to terminate a customer's account for reason as such and not give a prorated refund.

[Jeremy Bernstein]

There is one other piece of evidence here you are ignoring. It is written in my report. This is a 2nd offence. 6 months previously at Leiden Cock told Amir and me that he had received the previous version of Junior in an email from a friend. despite trying he had been unable to get it to run. We let the matter drop that time but it was clear we were unhappy. 6 months later he tells me he now has a working one.

Aren't you interested in improving the security of your products? I recently had a long meeting with a hacker who cracked our software, where he demonstrated, step by step, how he did it. It was fascinating and educational, and will certainly lead to improved CP in future versions. That's a tangent, though.

[Harvey Williamson]

There is one other piece of evidence here you are ignoring. It is written in my report. This is a 2nd offence. 6 months previously at Leiden Cock told Amir and me that he had received the previous version of Junior in an email from a friend. despite trying he had been unable to get it to run. We let the matter drop that time but it was clear we were unhappy. 6 months later he tells me he now has a working one.

Aren't you interested in improving the security of your products? I recently had a long meeting with a hacker who cracked our software, where he demonstrated, step by step, how he did it. It was fascinating and educational, and will certainly lead to improved CP in future versions. That's a tangent, though.

The best protection we had was when a user had to supply us with the unique id of the machines he was going to run the product on. This was unpopular with users. If an exoert in the field wants to advise us on how to make the protection better sure that would be interesting. At least we make an effort unlike Rybka which has 0 protection.

[Harvey Williamson]

There is one other piece of evidence here you are ignoring. It is written in my report. This is a 2nd offence. 6 months previously at Leiden Cock told Amir and me that he had received the previous version of Junior in an email from a friend. despite trying he had been unable to get it to run. We let the matter drop that time but it was clear we were unhappy. 6 months later he tells me he now has a working one.

Aren't you interested in improving the security of your products? I recently had a long meeting with a hacker who cracked our software, where he demonstrated, step by step, how he did it. It was fascinating and educational, and will certainly lead to improved CP in future versions. That's a tangent, though.

The best protection we had was when a user had to supply us with the unique id of the machines he was going to run the product on. This was unpopular with users. If an exoert in the field wants to advise us on how to make the protection better sure that would be interesting. At least we make an effort unlike Rybka which has 0 protection.

Another point about someone using a cracked version they have no way of knowing that it really is the engine they think it is. Or it may not be fully cracked and some of the safeguards still in place may make the engine misbehave

[Jeremy Bernstein]

There is one other piece of evidence here you are ignoring. It is written in my report. This is a 2nd offence. 6 months previously at Leiden Cock told Amir and me that he had received the previous version of Junior in an email from a friend. despite trying he had been unable to get it to run. We let the matter drop that time but it was clear we were unhappy. 6 months later he tells me he now has a working one.

Aren't you interested in improving the security of your products? I recently had a long meeting with a hacker who cracked our software, where he demonstrated, step by step, how he did it. It was fascinating and educational, and will certainly lead to improved CP in future versions. That's a tangent, though.

The best protection we had was when a user had to supply us with the unique id of the machines he was going to run the product on. This was unpopular with users. If an exoert in the field wants to advise us on how to make the protection better sure that would be interesting. At least we make an effort unlike Rybka which has 0 protection.

Another point about someone using a cracked version they have no way of knowing that it really is the engine they think it is. Or it may not be fully cracked and some of the safeguards still in place may make the engine misbehave

True.

[Chris Whittington]

There is one other piece of evidence here you are ignoring. It is written in my report. This is a 2nd offence. 6 months previously at Leiden Cock told Amir and me that he had received the previous version of Junior in an email from a friend. despite trying he had been unable to get it to run. We let the matter drop that time but it was clear we were unhappy. 6 months later he tells me he now has a working one.

Aren't you interested in improving the security of your products? I recently had a long meeting with a hacker who cracked our software, where he demonstrated, step by step, how he did it. It was fascinating and educational, and will certainly lead to improved CP in future versions. That's a tangent, though.

just as it is not possible to be 100% bug free, so it is not possible to prevent illegal copying. If you go too far down the copy protection pathway, you annoy genuine users, it's best to tackle the problem by considering the user base - if they are all friends with each other, or friends once or twice removed but still in the network, it only takes one copy to spread throughout. My solution was to have no copy protection at all, or else something very minor that would stop most people (because most people are not technically savvy) and to sell, in the main, into a disconnected user base, ie via the department stores or by advertising. Perhaps there would be some copying amongst these users, but since they had (mostly) none or little network connectivity, copies never spread too far.

The network where the great mass of copying and illegal distribution takes place is talkchess.

How do I know it's talkchess? Well, I did a little experiment by mistake back in 1997, when CSTal II was released. The release schedule was more or less controlled by the german distributor because he made large orders. Their line, as with many other software houses, was to have a german sales monopoly for the first two months; this because they were exclusive and didnt want competing english product being grey-imported at lower prices to the other german distrbutors. So, Oxford Softworks manufactured the initial stocks of German, French and English packaging, announced the release schedule to all distributors (german first with two months lead time), and then the german distributor, citing poor market conditions and a general reduction in chess program sales, cancelled the order.

Thus, for two months, the only units sold were by Oxford Softworks mail order to its user base who had returned reply cards on previous purchases, or had made previous credit card orders. Thus, for two months, we knew the real names and addresses of all purchasers, well, except three which was the usual small order placed by GambitSoft which was fulfilled. On release, CSTal became a hot topic on talkchess. Some people loved it, some people hated it, many people talked about it, or claimed it was buggy, or crap or all the other usual stuff. I checked the talkchess names against the sales records. Zero matches.

To solve the problem, and I am not being flippant, close down talkchess and reduce the ability of end users to get to know each other on the other comp chess forums. Remove the chat facility, suppress email address distribution, prevent them organising into gangs, remove the silly one man one vote which evidently raises end users to the same forum level as the creatives. And stop sending free samples to the testing groups, some of those act as illegal copy distribution networks too.

[Sean Evans]

To solve the problem, and I am not being flippant, close down talkchess and reduce the ability of end users to get to know each other on the other comp chess forums. Remove the chat facility, suppress email address distribution, prevent them organising into gangs, remove the silly one man one vote which evidently raises end users to the same forum level as the creatives. And stop sending free samples to the testing groups, some of those act as illegal copy distribution networks too.

ChrisW, that sounds a bit like fascism!

[BB+]

I checked the talkchess names against the sales records. Zero matches.

So if I trawl the 1997 TalkChess postings, I can provide a list of future blackmail victims... Obviously they acted in good faith, and were providing an invaluable service in talking up the product.

[kingliveson]

Ah, what do we have here?! A member telling another to just ignore PlayChess sysop Holger (Kibitzbot) who along with Harvey have been harassing, taunting, and teasing a paying customer because he criticized them on another forum outside of PlayChess server. It wasn't enough though because his account was still muted and banned.

Some who have not followed this thread from the beginning are probably wondering what all this is about. It's about character and professionalism especially when privileged to be in a position of authority.

[Harvey Williamson]

Alright, it was mostly you and Rob Osborne implying that Swami (chezzter) was me.

So now your accusing me of being him?