}SkOrPn--7 Posted January 11, 2008 Share Posted January 11, 2008 Phoenix-Simulations by the looks of things have gone belly up and Graham Waterfield has slipped of the map leaving thousands of simmers who just brought there product or old hands that have spend hundreds of $$$ without a way to re-install there files. To protect themselves from theft/piracy every installation is required to connect with their web server for activation. ORBX Simulation systems will more than likely never suffer this problem but what are you doing to protect us consumers from the same issue should you or Flight1 give us the slip and also go belly up? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Venema Posted January 11, 2008 Share Posted January 11, 2008 We hate software piracy, but hate software protection even more. FTX will have a simple serial number unlocker and we will never tie our software to dependencies on websites or activation. The only thing we'll do is ensure that serial numbers can't be used twice to download free patches etc. We'll match IPs to serials and if there is abuse then user accounts will be reviewed and/or suspended. We believe in trusting users to be honest and yes, sadly FTX will be on a torrent site the day it's released - we can't stop that, but we fundamentally believe that most simmers are honest enough to purchase the product if they like it. Those who only use torrent-leeched addons deserve all the bad karma that comes with that practice. Oh, and Orbx is not about to go belly-up; we're a well-funded private company with a long-term business plan and vision. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
}SkOrPn--7 Posted January 11, 2008 Author Share Posted January 11, 2008 Thx for the reply John and just to clear up I never envisioned ORBX to go belly up and your explanation goes along way to make sure the consumer is protected but I'm sure your well aware of our concerns because we the consumer are always getting stung trusting companies when it comes to the gaming industry. FTX had made it clear on this issue and because your in cahoots with FEX can you voice the same police as you did with FTX ensuring we are protected under the same umbrella? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teecee Posted January 12, 2008 Share Posted January 12, 2008 Thanks John.. this gives me real peace of mind..I bought a heap of stuff from Simmarket.. only to find after a system crash that I have to pay to "insure" my ability to re-download any items I purchased from them.. what a rippoff.. needless to say, I have lost some of the items I "bought" from them, as I refuse to submit to this scam. I no longer buy from them, and never will again. On the other side of the coin, you have flight1 who will give you every assistance to re-download even the oldest items you buy from them.. stuff from as far back as 2002. I was pleased to see that you are marketing thru this company.Teecee. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mstyles Posted January 14, 2008 Share Posted January 14, 2008 Flight 1... ok great! I've purchased various products through them and am happy to hear you are using them too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Venema Posted January 14, 2008 Share Posted January 14, 2008 Where do I say we are using Flight1? I explicitly say we are NOT using Flight1 - they distribute FEX, which is not our product, just our partner brand. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Auzy Posted January 17, 2008 Share Posted January 17, 2008 Not to throw a spanner in the works of the convo or anything, and I'm not associated with Orbx in any way (and probably speaking out of line), but correct me if I'm wrong, but there isn't much competition against FTX at all at the moment (which is certainly an advantage). X-plane and FSX's default scenary are a joke (and yeah, I've tried the airport pack on Xplane too, moorabin was great, but its useless for VFR). VSX I haven't tried yet, but I know VOZ was a bit low res for my use (at the time though, machines would have chocked on high res). VSX I'll certainly use though to fill in the gaps of places which aren't covered yet, but every pilot strives for the best quality environment he can get. And VSX is 150MB only, so would I be right in assuming, it is much, much lower res? And which flight simming pilot would not put money into this? It makes it easier for guys like me to study for my VFR, because weather conditions dont prevent me practicing anything, and real lessons become more efficient. I can study the terrain/scenary in FTX, and know where all the waypoints are before I go up next. This way I can spend more time up there worrying about recovering from my spiral dive, then worrying about how I will answer my instructor as to where YMMB is. FTX will probably save me lots of money off my PPL (in fact, it could even be marketed as a VFR learning tool too). Its great to hear there wont be any need for product activation either (just a serial number). Either way, I checked a lot of terrain packs online, and 1M/pixel is 20x better then the best resolution one I saw (maybe there are others now). I'd say world domination by Orbx seems to be the only likely outcome at this time from what I can see. It wouldn't surprise me to see commercial flight simulators using this. And yeah, I'm counting down the expected ETA (since I resigned two weeks ago to take a long break, got lots of time to count. I just hope I get a chance to use it before starting my new job). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joshua_Stone Posted January 18, 2008 Share Posted January 18, 2008 Hey John, If i was to purchase FTX and install it on this PC, register it and do all that, if i was to down the track get a new computer to run FSX on, would i be able to install FTX with the same serial code??? thanks Josh Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Venema Posted January 18, 2008 Share Posted January 18, 2008 Hey John, If i was to purchase FTX and install it on this PC, register it and do all that, if i was to down the track get a new computer to run FSX on, would i be able to install FTX with the same serial code??? thanks Josh Of course Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mknorr Posted January 25, 2008 Share Posted January 25, 2008 Dear John, I just read in the 100th issue of Computer Pilot magazine "There will also be a First Class World Membership. This will be somewhere between US$300-400." Will this be available before the release of AUBLUE or would I get $25 off if I already bought AUBLUE? I really do hope you guys take over the world. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Venema Posted January 25, 2008 Share Posted January 25, 2008 Dear John,  I just read in the 100th issue of Computer Pilot magazine "There will also be a First Class World Membership. This will be somewhere between US$300-400." Will this be available before the release of AUBLUE or would I get $25 off if I already bought AUBLUE? I really do hope you guys take over the world. We've abandoned the idea of the membership version of FTX, as I've mentioned elsewhere in other posts. Given the global currency situation we are now just setting a flat rate of US$25 per region, for all regions. Still an absolute bargain to be honest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
--- Posted January 25, 2008 Share Posted January 25, 2008 >Given the global currency situation we are now just setting a flat rate of US$25 per region, for all regions. Still an absolute bargain to be honest. That's the understatement of the year! (I know it's still january but you get the idea) On the other hand....in this case I don't even have to think twice if I should buy EVERY FTX region orbx publishes And I'm sure that I'm not the only one who thinks that way! Regards Bernt Capt 767 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mknorr Posted January 31, 2008 Share Posted January 31, 2008 "I don't even have to think twice if I should buy EVERY FTX region orbx publishes" Totally agree. For one thing this is a partially Aussie company, plus what they do is world class stuff. Even if I never fly over a region that they enhance, I'll buy it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyhalf Posted February 22, 2008 Share Posted February 22, 2008 Ever thought about locking down the support forum to legit owners, like Level D, to keep out the torrent kiddies? or is there a high cost associated with this avenue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Venema Posted February 23, 2008 Share Posted February 23, 2008 "I don't even have to think twice if I should buy EVERY FTX region orbx publishes" Totally agree. For one thing this is a partially Aussie company, plus what they do is world class stuff. Even if I never fly over a region that they enhance, I'll buy it. Orbx is 100% Australian owned by its shareholders. Some of our contractors working on the project are based overseas though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Venema Posted February 23, 2008 Share Posted February 23, 2008 Ever thought about locking down the support forum to legit owners, like Level D, to keep out the torrent kiddies? or is there a high cost associated with this avenue. There will always be torrent kiddies Max, not much we can do about them. I believe in karma though, and what goes around comes around. Not sure if we want to lock out the forums to non-registered users, but it's an idea though. I'll mention it to Jay, who's the guru of such matters. Still, that can be circumvented by torrent kiddies who share serial numbers and passwords anyway. Orbx does not want to make it too hard to get support, LOL! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay Kae Posted February 23, 2008 Share Posted February 23, 2008 I have to agree with John, I tried it once with one of my other forums and then found that 8 or 9 people got in with the same code, I could not lock the code out due to the fact that one of them might actually have been the original buyer, I also could not limit it to just one because what if the one that registered first was a kiddie and not the original purchaser? It was a major hassle and we stepped away from it in the end. Good idea, bad people out there though Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matthew Webb Posted February 24, 2008 Share Posted February 24, 2008 I wonder how hard it would be to log the IP addresses that seed/peer's torrents and just display a warning/guilt trip before those IP's enter the site/forum? Cheers, Matthew. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay Kae Posted February 25, 2008 Share Posted February 25, 2008 Virtually impossible unfortunately, seeds can be done via proxy/gates and all sorts of other fun (read: annoying) ways to hide an identity so even though I wish I could do more to protect our legal rights it would be an insane job to track all of that Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Quinn Posted March 3, 2008 Share Posted March 3, 2008 Just a thought Dont we have access to some reasonable hackers on the "good" side of the fence that could throw a spanner or two over on the kiddies heads? Like I said - just a thought Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jay Kae Posted March 3, 2008 Share Posted March 3, 2008 Not without doing anything illegal Quinn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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