As the Technical Director of a group doing telecom related multimedia application development back in 1995 and a long time Mac User, I was sad when I had to make the decision to develop for Windows '95 instead of Mac OS. The reason was simply that Apple had abandoned the home and educational markets and there were far more development options in Windows by that time. I remember writing a letter about the problem to Mac Weekly (Now defunct I believe).

Getting back into the educational system is Apple's best hope of retaining the desktop market they once dominated.

It's good to see any run of the mill village idiot can still start a game company. I was beginning to think it was only for smart people.

I see why he is concerned, however. When your game is utter crap, who wants people finding out before they fork over large sums of cash? A free demo is just a way for people to discover the game is junk and let their friends know.

I can't tell you how many games I sat on the fence for and only decided to purchase AFTER the free demo proved the game might be worth it.

But maybe he's right, maybe Chik Fil'A will stop handing out free samples. Maybe movie theatres will stop showing trailers of upcoming movies. Maybe MMO companies will stop giving out 5-10 day free trials.

Maybe the Sun will stop coming up in the East.

Until then, I suspect Crytek is in trouble with their current management.

That is far too broad a brush for the police to decide. Life isn't fair, I suspect most people who are mature enough to get through a Police Academy are mature enough to understand that. If the law is clearly immoral or unethical then I'd agree with you. However I don't see this law as being either of those.

Is it unfair? Yes.

Should the police not enforce it because of that? No

That is for the courts to decide. If a jury of this man's peers cannot be convinced the law is wrong, then he's going to jail. I have no doubt that any worthy sheis...lawyer will be able to argue this well enough to keep the man out of jail. He may end up paying fines.

Same argument goes for "just plain disproportionate." I don't think the Police should be in the habit of deciding what laws have disproportionate penalties. That is also what the courts are for.

Lets just agree to disagree. :)

This reminds me of the 60's when there were actually people who believed that all of those little Japanese cars were programmed to fall apart when a signal came from Tokyo. We'd be stuck with no transportation and Japan would finally win the war.

I'm not saying this couldn't be done with computer software today. But obviously paranoia isn't limited by technology.