Mac App Store devs need careful code validation, otherwise downloads can be copied

sooo this might mean that I can no longer share nice stuff with my friends. If I "buy" something, I like that something to belong to me. If I buy things I cannot have control of, I'd rather not buy.

i think i'll try to stick on to piracy. besides, I am unemployed. I am sorry devs, but my stomach's first.

I dont think this 'piracy' is that widespread. The non-free apps I just checked, DropCopy Pro and Insight, did not run on other machines where they had not been installed via the App Store, but instead gave me a validation error and took me right to the App Store to log in, as I would expect it to do.

"Developers should want their apps to be hassle-free"

Ironic that you say this because the whole point of the app store, from an average user perspective, is to make the experience of finding and installing apps easier through a controlled environment than searching for them without any guidance "in the wild." The particular use case you speak of is not that frequent and when it does happen, logging into your iTunes account to download is second nature for app store users on both iPhone and Mac/iTunes.

As for DRM, I can't say I disagree with you there but I'm definitely less conspiracy-theoryish than you sound about it. Proprietary stuff, be it media or apps, is pretty commonplace and users have long since compromised. Besides, whoever said there was no other way to install Mac apps without the app store?

It used to be that many developers, particularly on the mac, objected to DRM in their applications out of principle. I even remember the Mac OS being praised for never calling home behind your back to check your authentication (and of course no one even imagined it would some day silently report all your applications to Apple -- for the user's own convenience, of course). I guess those days are over now. The future is DRM, I guess : (

Why would users want to buy DRM-locked down apps from a new App Store when Mac apps have traditionally been free from this sort of rubbish.

One main reason I moved to Mac was because I was tired of all the hassle of 'authentication' in the Windows world.

Developers should want their apps to be hassle-free -- maybe the people who buy them want to copy them to another machine and don't want to have to jump through 'authenticating' that machine with 'big brother'. It's the same reason DRM died in iTunes, because hassling your users is bad business.

As a small developer I chose not to use the validation method. My main reason was I didn't know about it till late in the day but even now I don't think it's important for me. If people want to pirate my app then so be it, I trust that 95% of my users will be honest and the 5% that want to pirate are better off being easily able to pirate rather than left to some of the mirky sites that offer these downloads.

Now I appreciate that not all devs will feel this way but even with validation apps will be hacked so I don't worry about it. The increased sales more than make up for the odd person who cannot or will not purchase.

Just my 2 cents worth.

gruber is completely insufferable these days. seriously? APPLE should reject the app because it could possibly pirated at the expense of the developer? the responsibility lies upon the developer simple as that. gruber really needs to stfu and think about what he says before he speaks