I own pirate music software

Look at that title, eh?

People are going to click on this for different reasons with all sorts of preconceived emotions. Outrage, searching for vindication, but no. Let me finish that sentence.

I own pirate music software that I've already bought.

WTF Keef? What the horse knackers are you talking about.

Well...

On my main music machine I have an iLok and an e-licenser. They're permanently sat in there and downstairs I have a laptop.

Now I could.. I COULD take the e-licenser and iLok out and put them in my laptop but..

A) i'll likely forget that I've done that
B) Knowing my absent brain I'd probably drop them in the bin on the way down.

You see, I lose shit.. I lose shit all the time. I must have bought a hundred wooly hats, I only need one. And I've lost USB pen drives and.. Actual pens as well.

So if I'm constantly moving an iLok and e-licenser around that have... I don't even want to think how much money in the way of licenses in them... They're just going to go.

And yeah, that's not such a big deal in my house but if I take my laptop to another country and plan to write some tunes when I get back from the hotel, it's not so easy to get what looks like a USB pen drive back from a hotel in Austria. So I get pirated versions for my laptop.

So what does this teach us?

Well.. Let's start with "in the 21st century market which is going more and more mobile, dongles don't work"

Now that laptops properly have the grunt to make music all a dongle does is punish the consumer.

I know what software companies will say, "We need to protect our software".

Yes, you do...

But it doesn't work does it?

I'll say again, "I have pirated versions on my laptop". Ergo pirated versions can be obtained, Ergo iLok and e-licenser protect you against Dooley-squat.

So what's the answer? Well copy licensing models that work. I'm going to take two extremes that work really well here. Renoise and Ableton.

Renoise, you log in and download, and install. That simple.. No limit, all on trust, but if your copy of renoise with your license details appears on a pirate site, you're banned sunshine!

Ableton, you're licensed for two machines, after the second you can't license unless you contact Ableton support saying you're replacing a machine (which I have done after a rebuild and no doubt will when my replacement laptop arrives) and BAM, they send you a mail back saying they've unlocked your code. Done.

Both of these models work really well, are portable between machines and require no dongle.

So it CAN be done.

Also I'd like to point our that people are less likely to buy if they see it's protected by dongle, either for the reasons above or because they don't own one and an instant download purchase has now turned into waiting for snail mail and the additional cost of a dongle.

So come on, drop the dongles. It just doesn't work any more.


It hurts you, it hurts me, the only people it doesn't hurt are the pirates, the very people you're fighting against.