license issues (was mystery exception)

[Robert Brenstein]

Thank you Heather for a voice of reason and clarifications. I hope 
you find a reasonable way to warn about the restrictions on 
standalones without scaring users uneccessarily. I will see about 
pursuing my project later on.

Robert Brenstein


>  > Date: Thu, 13 Mar 2003 15:08:01 +0100
>>  To: use-revolution at lists.runrev.com
>>  From: Robert Brenstein <rjb at rz.uni-potsdam.de>
>>  Subject: Re: license issues (was mystery exception)
>>  Reply-To: use-revolution at lists.runrev.com
>>
>>>  If all you wanted to do was give away a 12-year effort in crafting a highly
>>>  optimized scripting engine by just slapping a five-minute UI on it, you'd
>>>  have to work a litte harder than that.
>>>
>>>  Admittedly I'm having a tough time thinking of a commercially viable
>>>  opportunity for an app that truly needs dynamic scripting and doesn't
>>>  compete with Rev....
>>>
>>
>>  I don't really want to prolong this thread but you guys seem to think
>>  that I would want to produce a generic application that allows to run
>>  any transcript code user wants, an evil program that will run Rev to
>>  bankrupcy.
>
>Easy there. I don't think anyone thinks this of you. They've merely been
>explaining the reasoning behind the way the licensing works. After all, it
>would actually only take one ill intentioned or unscrupulous person to
>achieve this, if we didn't have some sort of restriction to prevent it.
>
><snip>
>
>>
>>  Furthermore, the starting point of this thread was that
>>  MC/Revolution's license explicitely allows me to produce and
>>  distribute standalones without any further royalties.
>>
>>    Using Revolution, you can deliver powerful, fully-featured
>>    applications on all major platforms - quickly, easily, and
>>    royalty-free.
>
>Correct. It does. A standalone in Rev has the restriction that it cannot be
>used for full programming and development.
>
>>
>>  Unfortunately, the engine imposes the limit on the do length in those
>>  -- the fact of which is not clearly stated up front. This is also
>>  evidenced by a number of people admitting the surprise when they
>>  found it out the hard way, although in their cases it was not a
>>  showstopper. This discussion should be not as much about my shareware
>>  program ruining 12-year effort but about false/misleading advertising.
>
>Ok, here you have a point. This issue should not come as a surprise to
>established users, and I will see what can be done to clarify our terms,
>conditions and licensing text on the website and in the docs. Part of the
>problem here is that many people do not read long, boring, licensing text.
>
><snip>
>
>>
>>  But then what stops users from running 10 lines at a time in a loop
>>  rather than simple "do me"? The fact is that MC and Rev folks do not
>>  mind people using the limited stack for fairly complex stuff, and
>>  they explicitely allow us to use starter kit to produce and
>>  distribute commercial applications. There are publically available
>>  tips and tricks how to do that.
>>
>Yes, but it is harder, slower, and in time serious developers prefer to buy
>a license. It works pretty well. Those that it truly is not worthwhile for
>to buy a license can still work in the starter kit.
>
>>  It is just sad that at the same time they do not provide means of
>>  overcoming this do restriction for legitimate uses in standalone
>>  applications (even if this was on case by case basis).
>
>Try asking us. You never know, we might be able to come to some arrangement.
>
>Regards,
>
>Heather
>
>>
>>  Robert
>
>--
>Heather Williams <heather at runrev.com> <http://www.runrev.com/>
>Runtime Revolution Ltd.
>Tel: +44 (0) 131 7184333 Fax: +44 (0)1639 830707
>Revolution: Software at the Speed of Thought
>
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