Rockstar Ships Max Payne 2 Cracked By Pirates 340
Jamie noticed a fairly amazing little story about Rockstar shipping a version of Max Payne 2 via Steam that was actually cracked by pirates to remove the DRM. The going theory was that it was easier for them to simply use the pirate group's crack than to actually remove their DRM themselves.
Re:But...? (Score:3, Informative)
just because they usually distribute a new exe instead of a patch doesn't really change anything. Unless they wrote the new exe from scratch, which I highly doubt, it's still an unauthorized derivative work, and thus Rockstar owns the copyright to it.
Re:Expediency (Score:5, Informative)
Most likely they simply found themselves unable to build the old codebase. You'd need a seven year old version of whatever build environment they were using, tons of other severn year old bits and pieces and a seven year old OS version. You'd probably need a seven year old machine too, and all the peripherals that go with it. Bits rot when left alone..
Lol Wut?
They don't need the source code or anything else.
If you don't know, most DRM is only buried in the game exe and maybe a dll.
All they needed is a DRMed copy of the game + a debugger in order to
strip out the DRM exactly the same way the scene release groups do.
Re:Hypocrisy (Score:4, Informative)
But if you steal your car back from an impound lot, that is definitely a crime. Don't ask how I know.
17 USC 103: Infringing works aren't copyrightable (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Pirates! Yarrr! (Score:3, Informative)
So it all stems from a guy named Daniel Defoe misappropriating the word near the turn of the 18th century? What a vivid imagination that guy had. Didn’t he also write “Robinson Crusoe”?
~ ~ Yes, I realise it didn’t start with him. Amusingly, though, it was originally used metaphorically.
For instance... [luminarium.org] (from 1603)
Banish these Word-pirates, (you sacred mistresses of learning) into the gulfe of Barbarisme: doome them euerlastingly to liue among dunces: let them not once lick their lips at the Thespian bowle, but onely be glad (and thanke Apollo for it too) if hereafter (as hitherto they haue alwayes) they may quench their poeticall thirst with small beere.
A terrible metaphor, but it seems to have stuck.
Re:Pirates! Yarrr! (Score:2, Informative)
Re:OK, but (Score:5, Informative)
The myth that cracked software = malware needs to die. It is simply untrue. Cracked software is no more susceptible or infected than legit software. Crackers =! malware authors. They have no incentive to include malware in their cracks.
Re:Unclean hands (Score:2, Informative)
Rockstar owns the rights to the game, and since they had to break the law to produce the crack (via the DMCA), I think you'd be hard pressed to show that what the crackers did was "fair use" and therefore copyrightable themselves.
In other words, you don't get to claim copyright for stuff you violated copyright law to produce. The idea is absurd.
Re:Hypocrisy (Score:5, Informative)
-1 Incorrect.
For the millionth time already, you can't steal copyrights and intellectual property. They are merely legal entitlements granted to them by the State, meaning We The People.
The only thing you can do with a copyright and/or a patent is infringe. That's it. Not remotely the same as the theft of a physical object, which is why the only way you could steal Max Payne, is to steal the piece of plastic the copyrighted material was placed on.
Inevitably, this post will be construed as support for Piracy, which it is not. It is a post in support of accurate information regarding copyrights.
Re:Hypocrisy (Score:3, Informative)
You decided I was right, and redistibuted MY version, and charged for it.
The part of what was being sold that was mine is what I added. In this example, we would BOTH be in the wrong.
Yes, Myth had no right to re-distribute the code they did, becasue it was not granted from Rockstar. They were wrong. But unless Rockstar had permission from Myth, or whoever owns the copyright to the Myth logo, they did not have rights to re-distribute Myth's copyrighted material. (Before you try to tell me Myth probably didn't actually copyright the logo, yes you are correct. However anytime you create something it is automatically copyrighted. Officially doing it just makes it easier to sue later.) Rockstar owned their original code, but anything that Myth added they do not own, and cannot re-distribute, which is exactly what they did. Myth owns whatever the difference was between the original code, and the cracked
Re:OK, but (Score:3, Informative)
A vanishingly small number of people receive cracks from the original creators. Most get it after it's passed through several people's hands, who have nothing to do with "the scene", and don't abide by its standards of ethics or excellence. That's where the malware comes from. Sometimes they'll be creative and embed their malware into part of the application or even the crack itself, but often they'll just package it with it and ensure it gets run through other means (e.g. hijack the autorun to run their malware as well as the installer).
This provides an easy avenue for infecting people: you download a good crack or release, add some malware, and re-upload it. Nobody's going to come after you for adding the malware, since the stuff you're corrupting is illegal anyway, and the actual creator of the product won't really care either (since malware decreases the value of warez). So it's easy to do, costs very little, potentially reaches a lot of people, can be done completely anonymously, and law enforcement will almost universally not give a shit anyway. Pretty much perfect for people who want to spread malware.