Oscar Trelles

More on Product Activation

Macromedia is not alone on its product activation initiative. Since the introduction of product activation with Microsoft’s XP line of products, many other companies have been working on their own approaches to this ‘solution’. Adobe is also testing its product activation schema with the australian version of Photoshop 7. [via eWeek]

Adobe’s approach is hooked to the hard drive’s ID rather than the computer’s, letting the users in liberty of making additions or changes to their hardware configuration, thus avoiding multiple activation requirements. Also, if an attempt of making an illegal installation of the product is detected, the user is not locked out (as it happens with Microsoft’s products) but the software will be only functional for 30 days, time the user has to contact Adobe and solve the issue.

All this initiatives are targeted to stop friend-to-friend software trading or ‘borrowing’, stopping established ‘piracy houses’ is another bussines.