Be watching for an Update on Starforce from Toms Hardware!!!
 

Here it is:

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/2006/0..._revisited_uk/






Hello all, Some great news to share.....First of all have you seen this:


http://www.game-overdrive.com/site/m...hp?storyid=734

Here is the actual Article:

PROVIDENCE, RI -- Game Overdrive today announced that they have added all game publishers using the Starforce anti-piracy program to a blacklist. Making an ultimatum by email on the first of February, Game Overdrive's Press Officer, Ben Halpern, told the publishers "Game Overdrive is extremely upset over your choice to use the Starforce anti-piracy software in your products. We have taken great pride in playing your games as gamers, and some are even reviewed on Game Overdrive. However, because of your choice of using Starforce in your software, we have no choice but to choose not to review your products until the software is removed or replaced with a functioning yet safer anti-piracy software. "

Click "Read More..." for the rest of the press release.




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Among the blacklisted publishers are Ubisoft, DreamCatcher Games, Tri Synergy, The Adventure Company, and many others. When asked to speak about the blacklisting, Game Overdrive founder, Dan Mattia, said, "I hold the utmost respect for publishers, but when software is installed without my knowledge that compromises my system, I get angry. I have no problems with anti-piracy software, but software that can harm my computer is unwanted."

Game Overdrive is indefinitely halting all work associated with these publishers until a satisfactory reply is recevied.

According to the Boycott Starforce website, Starforce is "a software copy protection tool installed by PC game publishers, which is designed to prevent the casual copying of retail CDROM applications. It installs as a hidden device driver, without the end-user's knowledge or consent."

Game Overdrive is actively participating in the boycott Starforce campaign.

Further information will be released when responses are recevied from the blacklisted publishers.


Be watching soon for an article from Toms Hardware!!!!

Who or what is "Game Overdrive"? I´ve never heard of them before. Do they really matter?

Topic moved to "General Topics".

Never heard of them either so I would assume they will just sluff it off.
Interested in the article coming from Toms Hardware though.

Hello,

I'm Dan Mattia, founder and co-owner of Game Overdrive. I was forwarded this link by Game Overdrive's Public Relations Representative.

Before I begin detailing our committment to the Boycott, let me first say that Game Overdrive has a zero-tolerance policy for piracy. Piracy is a harmful act against the developers that slave over their work for many hours per day, and really needs to stop. We also can't stand malware and software that can damage our expensive game-review machines, so we have joined in the fight against Starforce.

Game Overdrive is a gaming media company started in April of 2005. With an experienced staff of gamers, writers, and other professionals, we are committed to providing accurate, unbiased news, reviews, and content to our site's visitors.

One thing we do at GO to provide this accurate content is to make sure we are never swayed by corporations whose products we are reviewing. We don't accept bribes for a good review or newspost, and we won't allow any sort of attempted alteration by companies to our content. All companies that we associate ourselves with understand this, and still continue to work with us.

Now, focusing on the topic at hand--our committment to the Starforce boycott.

Acting on the facts provided by gamers and techies regarding Starforce, Game Overdrive has announced (as provided in the link by an earlier poster) its boycott of publishers and developers using Starforce. The page providing a list of these boycotted companies can be seen here, uploaded yesterday. Keep in mind that we had posted the original news of the boycott on February 1st.

We have also emailed every company on the boycott list asking for an explanation on their choice of using Starforce. We have receieved responses and are acting on them, but we are not disclosing the content of the emails we have sent and receieved. We are happy to say that most publishers we have contacted are happy to work with us regarding this controversial topic.

There are also two topics posted by me on Glop.org regarding Starforce and a gamer boycott of it. These two posts can be seen here and here.

So before dismissing Game Overdrive, make sure you see all the facts. We're committed to working with the community, so any feedback you give us is greatly appreciated.

Hello Dan! Welcome to Subsim.com, good to have you here!

I´m simply wondering/questioning if you can make a difference, to me GO seems to be a minor and not very important site. I would really like to see some major sites comment or fight against SF in a professional way.

Well, what we're trying to do is gathering a community and organizing them to help a stronger cause--an effective boycott of Starforce. We have received lots of support from those who have seen the posts, and our visitor count has skyrocketed.

The two publishers who have replied to us thus far have mentioned that they are discussing with both Starforce and those in charge of implementing the anti-piracy software of their product about Starforce and its suspected problems.

As you can see in the first forum post I mentioned earlier on glop.org, the majority of the community agrees with and understands GO's work. Some have listened to our requests to email publishers and media professionals.

Both I and my staff have been emailing individuals about Starforce as well. Game Overdrive's boycott information is merely there to provide a centered area for our email and forum campaign, as well as providing information to our visitors.

Any publicity is good publicity.

Its about time this starts to take hold and people start to protest. I won't play SHIII anymore because I don't want SF on my system. It screwed up my burning, and when I complained to Starforce directly about it, they made me give them a printout of everything hardware and software on my system so that they could try and reproduce the problem in their lab. They eventually got back to me and told me that they were unable to reproduce the problem and that they suspect my anti-virus was the real problem.

So, if it was not 'their' problem, how come when I removed Starforce using their removal program that they provided that everything went back to normal??? They are living in a fantasyland.

-S

PS. I kept all my emails on the subject for future reference. They have some confidential thing attached to them, but I never signed anything - nor do I recall a Starforce EULA in my game!

Yeah, my research into Starforce prices also had an email with that confidentiality message attached.

Maybe it is time to test my Pre-Paid legal service to see if that even holds any merit by just writing that in an email. I highly doubt it could be enforced.

-S

PS. I pay for it on a monthly basis, so I might as well use it once in a while!!!

That'd be a great help. I don't think it's legal for them to do that, however, as nothing was signed between either party.

Sounds all to familiar for me. Same here. Only difference: In the beginning the removal tool did not work. I had to reinstall the complete HD (3x all in all). Thank God by formatting and copying over an image partition from an external HD that I never infested with SF.

Dan Mattia,
I wish you luck. I doubt that you will find real sympathy with the producers of SF, but I made myself the experience (one time) that at least companies that are using it, eventually change their policies and abandon SF if enough customers voice their critizism and give the feedback that they do not buy their software as long as it comes with SF.

The best vote is that which is done with our wallets.

Actually, the response I've gotten from publishers is amazing. They're actually quite understanding when consulting with someone who understands their choice of protecting their software from piracy. I've mentioned using alternatives and the like, and have gotten some excellent responses from them regarding it.

I think you mean you pay a 'retainer' to a law firm/lawyer. The answer to your question/query may depend on the legal system of your country where you made the purchase, and the (applicable) law of the contract.

I am a lawyer myself, but not an expert in the IP field. As far as confidentiality is concerned, it should be dealt with by the contract between parties. Your recieving an email with the confidentiality message attached may not be enough to bind you, as it doesn't form a binding contract between two parties (being a unilateral obligation imposed for no consideration), but your replying to it may have resulted in some sort of implied or express (depending on the wording of the confidentiality message attached) consent to the confidentiality obligation.

Anyhow, if you are serious about it, do get a proper opinion from your lawyer. In any case, consumers usually enjoy a lot of protection (through special consumer protection laws in most countries) and you will not be easily sued for damages even if you breached a confidentiality obligation unilaterally imposed on you in order for you to get support from the seller etc.

Things are happening fellas...I'm just not at the liberty to say.

As usual, we must conduct ourselves professionally. Keep your eye on this thread.


SC

It is not written well like other binding emails that I have read - it is all of one sentence and simply says that this letter is confidential and may not be disclosed to third persons. Nothing more.

THanks for the tidbit. I'll see what they say.

-S

Hi Dan, great to see Game overdrive has joined the fight for the right to freely use games/applications which we have purchased in the manner they where intended in the first place.

You may be interested that PCPlus Magazine in the UK are also getting on the bandwagon with a "Hands off our PC's" campaign.

Its about time these 'Trojankits' where dealt with once and for all.

Trojankit:

1. Security Applications installed without end user consent.
2.Software that grants Ring 0 access to Ring 3 (user level) applications.
3. Interferes with other software such as virtual drives, SCSI/SATA etc.
4. Puts its own virtual protection drivers on the system.
5. Interferes with other applications Windows registry settings.
6. Can be exploited with replacement malicious versions to grant Full Ring 0 access

Wow, that's awesome. We really need support from big-name companies as well, instead of niche-targeted companies like mine.

Support is there, due to contractual agreements a lot have not gone public yet.

However you can expect more replies over the next few weeks.

NGH, 'my site' does have lot of influence. We have reputation for honest straight forward tech support.

as you can see here some news sites have already taken this onboard.

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=29429

and here

http://techdirt.com/articles/20060201/1842220_F.shtml

Dan, your company as well as many others combined, hand in hand create a Large Network and I personally thank you for your companies stand. Many here on this forum have been a part of the SF Investigation that was conducted with Ubisoft and we have been informing and helping everyone to understand these Trojankits and what they are capable of.
It's good to see progress being made. It's a start in the right direction!

SC

Definition of Trojankit: http://www.n-gage-help.com/modules.p...&p=42089#42089

That's largely my goal in GO's part in this boycott--inform the public about Starforce and rely on word-of-mouth to generate the rest of the boycott. I must say, I've really enjoyed working directly with the public and publishers/developers, and I'm very pleased with the responses I've been reading.