jv16 - Pay to keep license on file?

[Cloq]

Did I miss something...? Is it common practice to charge to resend a license code/file? Or is it the beginning of an easy money making trend?

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jv16 2009

VIP Package ($5.95) Includes:

Premium technical support for life. VIP users are always top of the list when technical support requests are handled.

License storage service for life, and unlimited number of license resends. We will store your license file and can always resend back to you if you should lose it in the future.

[mouser]

i think its beyond ridiculous when companies offer this "insurance" policy of keeping your license on file.  give me a break -- all companies keep your license key on file and can resend it if you lose it.  this is just a way to squeeze a few more bucks out of you for nothing.

[mrainey]

But what is this on the Macecraft website?


[attach]

[Cloq]

Odd indeed.. 

[Carol Haynes]

It's looking for features to add to make the new licensing model worth the bother. The license resending 'feature' is just plain daft - unless they plan to remove the automated web-based retrieval.

[mrainey]

Macecraft has historically been anything but greedy.  Freeware for years, JV16 Power Tools is now a modest $29.95.  Yearly upgrade fees are $6.95.  This is their (pretty damn relaxed) policy on licensing for personal users.  There's no activation or other baggage.

"A single personal license can be used with up to five personal computers at your home if the computers are mainly used only by you or the members of your family."


I'm amazed by how many people write me for lost keys for my own software.  You would think that people who make their livings with computers would keep backups.

[steeladept]

I'm amazed by how many people write me for lost keys for my own software.  You would think that people who make their livings with computers would keep backups.

I am not even a programmer and I am amazed.  I know a few developers who took this route out of sheer necessity.  So many people kept "loosing" their license (or at least claiming to), that it was literally preventing them from doing anything more than licensing support.  By charging, even a modest amount, it dropped the requests down to a trickle.  Most of those requests from one developer in particular were honored without billing, however the option was there for him for those who abused it.  It doesn't have to be a significant amount, just enough to keep people from asking when they don't really need to.  It also helps defray the cost of being sidetracked from developing the software further.

I personally don't like the trend, if that is indeed what it is, but I do at least understand this one.

[Deozaan]

How hard would it be to set up an automatic system like most sites have for forgotten passwords?

Work smarter, not harder.

[Carol Haynes]

What do you do with people who can't remember their user name, email and password to request the automatic retrieval?? I come across a lot of people who don't know what their email address is and have no clue what their password is. Makes life interesting when something goes wrong. These are the same people who either never create recovery disks or on older systems throw away all the disks that came with their computer (because they haven't had to use them before) and then blame the manufacturer or Microsoft.

Golden rule - however simple you make something some people will still screw it up!

[steeladept]

What do you do with people who can't remember their user name, email and password to request the automatic retrieval?? I come across a lot of people who don't know what their email address is and have no clue what their password is. Makes life interesting when something goes wrong. These are the same people who either never create recovery disks or on older systems throw away all the disks that came with their computer (because they haven't had to use them before) and then blame the manufacturer or Microsoft.

Golden rule - however simple you make something some people will still screw it up!

Nice - but it is true.  I have had so many emails that after a few years with a product I couldn't remember which email I used for it to save my life.  I switch providers - new email.  Start school - new email.  Different job - new email. Girlfriend (now wife) finally turned me on to the idea of using a webmail service and that worked wonderfully, but for those programs I bought before that?  Well....

Just a note - that was over 10 years ago now, and since then I haven't had issues such as that (as well as my life has settled down A LOT).  Never the less, I can see where that would come into play from my own past. Of course even back then I always backed everything up and kept copies.  The only time I had to do a request was when I had a total drive failure and my backup disk had a bad sector and was unreadable (for that file) when it came time to use it. Threw that zip disk out in a hurry!

[JavaJones]

But really you can only take a certain level of responsibility for other people's stupidity, obliviousness, lack of preparedness, etc. I think developers/publishers should go to a reasonable degree of effort to allow users to retrieve purchased licenses, but ideally it would avoid a large amount of personal effort, so that devs can spend more time on work that actually contributes to the product.

For inexpensive products in particular it's important to avoid increasing overhead, and if you have a single support person getting paid e.g. $20/hr and you're selling a product that costs $20, if someone inquires for a license with none of the info Carol mentions (email, password), say it takes 15 minutes to look them up manually by name and retrieve and send their info. That's $5. If they do it twice, $10. Now half your profits are gone, and who knows what your overhead already is on that $20 cost, maybe your profit is only $15 to begin with (say a percentage is taken by credit card processor, or sales partner, etc.).

To Steeladept, it makes a lot of sense that things have become easier for you now that you have a single web-based email address, and I think that's true for most people. There were a lot of historical problems like you mention with many different email addresses, but nowadays I think those are becoming a thing of the past, as it should be. So devs should not need to account for that, it's the user's responsibility to manage their emails, and it's getting easier and easier each day IMO.

- Oshyan

[Carol Haynes]

Just upgraded to Xara Design Pro 6 (the new name for Xtreme Pro) and this was in the email AFTER THE PURCHASE WAS MADE:

Please note:
This serial number may stop working if you change your hardware.

If the computer on which the program runs has internet access, you
can re-activate the program by following the procedure above.

If you do not have internet acccess or you have any problem with the
serial number, please contact our support team at http://support.xara.com.
Please ensure you have this receipt in front of you since we may
need the serial number and order number.

Re-activation may be carried out free of charge up to three times
after purchase.

The emphasis is mine. So after you have purchased a piece of software costing £250 (not far off $400 US) you can only activate it three times if you change your hardware. There is no option to deactivate the product before upgrading windows or reinstalling your system or adding a new graphics card or memory etc.

I have generally liked Xara in the past but if this is the way things are going they will not be getting money from me again in the future.

[Deozaan]

I bought some version of Xara after you mentioned a really big discount on it some here some years ago and I've regretted it ever since. I never could get them to stop sending me promotions and advertisements, despite numerous unsubscribe requests.

[mrainey]

I bought some version of Xara after you mentioned a really big discount on it some here some years ago and I've regretted it ever since. I never could get them to stop sending me promotions and advertisements, despite numerous unsubscribe requests.

My experience as well.

[Curt]

Cloq's example from JV16 2009 is a little extra "funny" because JV16 always shows the (Edit: now blurred) license key, when asked, and can even find it automatically:

[attachimg=#]

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Just upgraded to Xara Design Pro 6 (the new name for Xtreme Pro) and this was in the email AFTER THE PURCHASE WAS MADE:

Re-activation may be carried out free of charge up to three times
after purchase.

The emphasis is mine. So after you have purchased a piece of software costing £250 (not far off $400 US) you can only activate it three times if you change your hardware. There is no option to deactivate the product before upgrading windows or reinstalling your system or adding a new graphics card or memory etc.

I have generally liked Xara in the past but if this is the way things are going they will not be getting money from me again in the future.

I was actually impressed with this guarantee, until I read Carol's post! I didn't think of all the situations that could trigger the need for resetting the key. But on second thought, maybe I should have, because of all the times in the past that I had to write Agnitum, asking them to reset my key so I could do this or that, trying to solve the mysteries of a firewall.

Regarding the threat's subject, I also had to ask Agnitum to re-send me my license key, several times, because it is impossible to ask for their support without pasting the key into their site's form, and the problem was that I was testing various versions of their firewalls, on several computers, but I had deleted the relevant keys and kept the out-dated ones! If, in such situation, Agnitum had told me to pay a fine, I would probably not be using their suite today!


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I too upgraded to Xara Designer Pro 6, but was very disappointed when I realized it still comes with Photo Designer version 7. This product has not been updated for several years! I felt it like installing Microsoft Office 2010 and seeing the very same Photo Manager they passed along with Office 2003. Man, was that a disappointment!!

[J-Mac]

Curt - you might want to blur the license code in your post.

Jim

[MerleOne]

BTW, the 2009 license works for the 2010 version released today !

[Curt]

BTW, the 2009 license works for the 2010 version released today !

-I really didn't expect this, so I am pleased!

Forgive me being impressed by small details, but I am also quite pleased that even though the new version installed into \jv16 PowerTools 2010\, it managed to find the key which was placed in \jv16 PowerTools 2009\ , during the installation and without asking!

[MerleOne]

-I really didn't expect this, so I am pleased!

Forgive me being impressed by small details, but I am also quite pleased that even though the new version installed into \jv16 PowerTools 2010\, it managed to find the key which was placed in \jv16 PowerTools 2009\ , during the installation and without asking!

I noticed that too, excellent !

[J-Mac]

I'm pretty sure that they mentioned either in their forum or somewhere on their web site that it is a free upgrade for ANY jv16 license holders and that the 2009 license works for it. I'll post a quote and a link if I can find it again. 

On the other hand, I haven't used it since installing Windows 7 as several modules weren't compatible with it. Also be take care in using this version: there are apparently still a lot of issues that are yet to be ironed out. Check their forum for more details. If your current version is working well for you then you might want to stick with that until a few more point updates are released. That holds true for most new software versions but especially for jv16 as the issues are plain to see on their forum!

Thanks!

Jim