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March 27, 2007

So easy a caveman can do it!

Ease of use. This was one of the core driving factors that we built Diskeeper 2007 around. We wanted to deliver a product that was completely automated, and solved poor disk performance without the user having to lift a finger. That design works great for the home user, gamer, the small business customer all the way up to mission critical servers in the world's largest corporations.

With that cheesy intro, I'd like to welcome our new friends, the wacky green lizard and neanderthal friends to the Diskeeper family. As a site license customer (formerly Winternals Defrag Manager's largest), they join Diskeeper site/huge VL license customers in the insurance biz such as Allstate, Nationwide, 21st Century and Liberty Mutual.

Posted by Michael at 10:21 PM | Comments (1)

March 16, 2007

Product Activation - Why?

Foreword: This blog is written to express my personal viewpoint of why Diskeeper Corporation has included activation in the latest Diskeeper 2007 version.

A few years ago, Diskeeper Corporation began a global expansion plan. That plan targeted Asia as a huge and growing market, about to come into its own in the world of software. China is predicted to be the world economic power in a relatively short period of time. One example of this is the city of Shenzhen. Shenzhen has grown from a few hundred thousand locals in 1980 to about 10 million people today. This city was "created" by the Chinese government as a modern industrial city and trade center to the world.

Pioneers such as Adobe and Microsoft have long since moved to take advantage of this burgeoning market. As part of that process they developed anti-piracy technologies and began educational campaigns in many parts of the world, including Asia.

Diskeeper Corporation has established great partners in these new locations to help expand the company. They are there to aid customers in their respective regions with Sales and Support. They are also a tremendous asset in that they are local to their regions and know the culture. We understand that we, as an American company, have a lot to learn with respect to doing business with the rest of the world.

While I can't speak for the reasons Microsoft, Autodesk, or Adobe have added activation, I am privy to much of the same type of information from which they are operating. These are the reasons Diskeeper Corporation has moved in this direction. In many parts of the world, digital piracy is rampant.

So why is the piracy rate so much higher in other parts of the world than in North America or Western Europe? Are people in those regions "bad people" or more prone to steal? No. In large part it is cultural. In many East Asian cultures, "copying" is considered flattery. If you have a desirable product and others want it to the point of copying it, that is considered a compliment to the original creator. Little has been done to educate these markets that copying movies, music and software hurts the artists/companies and the employees of those companies, who create these products. The Western concept of "copying is illegal" does not exist in the same form. We cannot judge other cultures by our standards. If there is disagreement, then it is our job to educate, understand, and come to a cooperative arrangement.

Another consideration is pricing. Music [MP3] piracy was rampant in the late 90's (Napster, Kazaa). It's not that it isn't a problem now, but legal outlets to purchase electronic music at more consumer-agreeable pricing have helped. Being able to spend just $.99 USD/per song, for a couple of songs you like off of a new music CD, rather than paying $12.99 USD or more for 10 songs, 8 of which you did not care for makes getting what you want for a price you are willing to pay feasible. In less economically-developed parts of the world, prices originating from more-developed nations may exclude the affordability of a product. In many parts of China a family making $500 USD a month is considered middle class. Selling Windows, for example, for a price of $300 or so USD would mean that a family would have to work weeks to be able to purchase it. Local economies work on a relative scale so schools in those regions would not be able to purchase Windows. That is why Microsoft has special products, such as the Starter Edition for Vista, and why Diskeeper Corp is working with partners local to these developing nations.

While much of the foreign piracy is a matter of differing philosophy, there is an entire industry of piracy in Asia - it is big business. Yes, the people in this industry are well aware what they are doing is wrong. And yes, it is illegal in those regions to do this, but on the streets they run the operation much like a drug dealer would in the US. I recently returned from a trip to East Asia where I saw street vendors selling pirated software. One "booth" in particular that I photographed was a table covered with pieces of paper identifying different software products by name only - mostly Microsoft and Adobe. Buyers pick a title they want to buy. They tell the booth attendant who then disappears around a corner. The attendant tells another hidden partner who then also disappears. A few moments later the attendant returns with the chosen software package - often in perfect replicas of the original package. It's all very orchestrated and covert.

Diskeeper is not in the position of Microsoft, we just don't come anywhere remotely close to them in market presence and power. We are a small, humble company with a very focused existence. We do not believe, for a second, that those who willingly and knowingly pirate our software will purchase it, and we aren't trying to change that. Personally, I'm not opposed to Microsoft's activation - I agree with it, given it is done right. I also agree with the Recording Industry Association of America's movement to protect digital content under the same circumstances. Why? Because they will put that revenue back into their products and services and the result of that will be benefit me. And no, I don't buy into the "they make enough money already" excuse. It's real people (artists, developers, actors, and the supporting staff) that are affected.

I agree that those who will steal, will still find a way. Some will view Windows Activation procedures as a challenge, just as they view the creation and distribution of destructive viruses as a challenge. They'll do everything in their power to defeat activation, create viruses, spyware, etc... In the long run, I agree that it will take the individual to be morally responsible for their own actions. I think for that to occur the manufacturer's who create, or represent the artist/intellectual property(IP), will first need to educate the world on how to view and respect IP. That will take time. The "casual" copier will hopefully come around, and the real bad guys will hopefully either reform and use their technical or business talents to be productive helpful members of society (and probably make a lot of money doing so), or be caught and shut down.

Are we trying to penalize the honest buyer in Omaha, Toronto, Frankfurt, Shanghai, Jaipur, etc...? No, and I do not think that the technology we have built and refined does so. Some companies have made mistakes in the past and developed technically incorrect or invasive anti-piracy technologies. Of that there is no doubt. Diskeeper Corporation is in the privileged position of being able to learn from the mistakes of others and not repeat them. That affords the ability to properly execute "best intentions". We spent many years of R&D to get the technology to where it is today.

We are not trying to stop the casual copier, and we are not adding activation out of arrogance. We are adding activation so that we can grow our company and make money in markets where we could not otherwise do so. If the only way to accomplish this expansion was to screw over existing customers, we would not do it. Our existing loyal customer base is why we are where we are. It's why I and all the rest of the staff as Diskeeper Corp have a job.

I do, however, think it is unfair to customer's who pay for the software to have others illegally download the same software and not pay for it. As a paying customer, I'd be upset that someone else can easily download a pirate copy of the latest Norah Jones or The Shins CDs for free when I've paid for it. That's not self-righteousness, it is simply not fair to me, or for that matter, to you as a loyal paying customer in the case of Diskeeper.

Ultimately, the choice is yours. Unfortunately some will say activation, on sheer principle, is unfair, unjust, and invasive. If an anti-piracy technology is invasive or irresponsible then I would agree that it is not acceptable. I would not buy it, nor would I expect anyone else to do so. Yes, this has been done in the past, but the "guilt by association" principle connection to Diskeeper is not true. I think we have done a good job making this technology seamless. I'd like to think it is perfect, but there is always room for improvement and we definitely want to hear from you on how we can better service you. That is what has made Diskeeper successful and nothing else (and we'll never forget that).

-Michael

PS: We have had a section in the FAQ page on Activation since the release of Diskeeper 2007. If you have any questions that are not answered there, let us know. More information for volume license customer will be coming soon.

Posted by Michael at 05:56 PM | Comments (5)

March 13, 2007

Top 10 Corporate Utilties - a marketing blog.

First off, please forgive the non-technical blog. It's a rarity and I'm promise not to make a habit of it.

So how does the most popular automatic defragmenter (with a 98.9% defragmenter market share*) compare with other popular corporate software products? Lucky Number 7! Given the respective company, that's not to shabby.

Best-Selling System Utilities for Corporate Use by Unit Volume* (North America):
1. Symantec Antivirus, Symantec
2. Symantec Ghost, Symantec
3. NeatSuite, Trend Micro
4. Clnt/Svr, Trend Micro
5. ScanMail, Trend Micro
6. Active Virus Defense, McAfee Inc.
7. Diskeeper, Diskeeper Corporation
8. Active VirusScan, McAfee Inc.
9. Etrust, CA, Inc
10. OfficeScan, Trend Micro

Top 10 list taken from a 3 month span of unit sales, from November 2006 through January 2007.

*North American Product ranking and market share are based on unit sales. All the data comes from National Purchase Diary (NPD) distribution channel software sales report. NPD captures 88% of all sales going through distribution channels.

Posted by Michael at 08:09 PM | Comments (2)

March 06, 2007

New Diskeeper Build (11.0.701) available

We've released another build of Diskeeper 2007 with a few minor fixes and new functionality. This build will install on Windows 2000/2003/XP/Vista. Here's the list of enhancements:

1. This product always requires Product Activation upon install.
2. Silent Activation is enabled which will automatically activate when an internet connection is found.
3. If an Internet Connection is not found, the ability to manually activate the product is available (also for PC's not connected to the Internet).
4. Fixed some User Interface refresh issues.
5. Changes have been made to prevent Diskeeper from unnecessarily polling floppy disk drives in Vista (already fixed for other OS'es in build 698).
6. Reliability and performance issues handled.
7. Diskeeper now preserves timeframe exclusions when imaging across multiple machines.
8. Diskeeper defragments NTFS Metadata Files ($Extend) in XP and above online. This includes the USN Journal.
9. Diskeeper now recognizes Encrypted Virtual Drives.
10. Fixed minor issue regarding MFT fragmentation reporting.
11. Boot-Time Directory Consolidation is now available for FAT volumes.
12. Some 508-compliance (accessibility) issues have been fixed.
13. Fixed InvisiTasking graphs for Foreign Operating Systems.
14. I-FAAST Measurement fixed for Foreign Operating Systems.
15. Fixed various minor Vista Compatibility Issues.

This build is available via Check for Updates if you are running Vista. Due to the fact that this build requires activation (and you may not have had to do this in the past) it is not yet available via Check for Updates for XP/2000 users, though will be in the near future. You can, however, grab the trialware from our website and install it over an older, licensed, build of Diskeeper 2007. This is essentially the same as downloading and installing the trialware from the Check for Updates site.

I anticipate one more build release for Diskeeper 2007 in the coming month or two as we complete other minor accessibility requirements for our standard Microsoft "Logo" Certification for Vista and Windows 2003.

PS: Sorry for the hiatus from blogging. I've have been (and still am out of town - travelling in East Asia, meeting with partners and customers). I will answer questions asked in in the blog after March 10th.

Posted by Michael at 10:18 AM | Comments (23)