The Boy Who Stole Half-Life 2! Amazing story about how HL2 leaked.

Discussion in 'The Guru's Pub' started by thecake90, Feb 21, 2011.

  1. Glidefan

    Glidefan Don Booze Staff Member

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    How it was estimated at 250 mil? Well, a million per month does add up :D
    If i was Valve, i'd put the guy in a meat grinder than ask him to work, no matter how talented.
    My team that was working non stop for ages just lost its steam cause of it.
     
  2. Death_Lord

    Death_Lord Guest

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    They caught him just because he shown himself, he could have stayed in the shadows and never get caught.

    The game leak just made the hype bigger, people was crazy looking for a demo, even the smallest form of it, Valve dint released a HL2 demo till the game was already out and well sold. Im not a big fan of their secretism and way of handling things, EP3 its a joke by now, we dont know when it will get released or ir if it will be ever released...
     
  3. F1refly

    F1refly Ancient Guru

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    was the old HL2 source code actually leaked on the net though? *edit: am meaning to say did did gamers know and download it cause at the time of the news, i never saw any indication that people were downloading it much less playing it. I remember during the time Valve was redoing it all, it was highly anticipated and peple were pissed from the delay.

    i guess the 250 million in damages remark was an estimate based on what Valve invested as well as potential sales they expected at the time?
     
    Last edited: Feb 22, 2011
  4. dcx_badass

    dcx_badass Guest

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    I knew the code had leaked and could be downloaded and I was still on dial up and didn't download stuff back in 2004. It was pretty big news.
     

  5. blinx

    blinx Maha Guru

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    I always wondered what happened def a good read
     
  6. Cyberdyne

    Cyberdyne Guest

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    I totally agree with Mkilbride, what that kid did was completely different from pirating/torrenting. This is no different from robbing a bank IMO, you should not be rewarded for it, to think that he should have been is ridiculous.
     
  7. Adicto

    Adicto Guest

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    Hahaha you guys are actually waiting for the sequel . . .
    Now that they are sitting in their pile of cash with Steam, you won't see something in a loooooooooooooooooong time :D
    Same as Blizzard.
     
  8. Seref

    Seref Guest

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    Criminal or not, that kid's a genius. He sounds legitimately sorry and regretful. Hope he gets a hired by some big company one day, the software development world needs more geniuses.

    Valve must have been pretty pissed to learn that they had gotten bent over by one kid at his home computer. If he didn't turn himself in, they would have never found him. Embarrassing as hell for Valve.
     
  9. inklimited

    inklimited Ancient Guru

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    Locks are only made to keep dishonest people out.
     
  10. Mkilbride

    Mkilbride Banned

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    Doubt he'll get hired, he's in jail right now for releasing a virus on the net. It's a tale of redemption, then damnation again, lol.

    I can understand something like stealing the Source code, I can understand cracking games, pirating movies ect, but releasing viruses? Well, there is only one purpose for them, to **** people over...so yeah, not a nice kid.
     

  11. MikeMK

    MikeMK Ancient Guru

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    Good read...
     
  12. kapu

    kapu Ancient Guru

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    I agree here, while i can see some redemption in stealing that source code.

    But he got what he deserved for releasing virus (malware or whatever)
     
  13. nhlkoho

    nhlkoho Guest

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    You're joking right? How does pirating a game not cause financial harm? Say you seed that game you just downloaded to 100 people. That's 101 copies of a game stolen because of you being cheap.
     
  14. CronoGraal

    CronoGraal Ancient Guru

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    Because people who do it wouldn't have bought the game anyway? Because you're not somehow magically reducing the supply of the game therefore the timeless concept of stealing is null and void? The reason why stealing has been a negative concept throughout the history of mankind is because there isnt an infinite supply of anything, whereas with files you can just copy them.

    It's like stealing, except it isn't.
     
  15. maleficarus™

    maleficarus™ Banned

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    "In criminal law, theft is the illegal taking of another person's property without that person's freely-given consent. The word is also used as an informal shorthand term for some crimes against property, such as burglary, embezzlement, larceny, looting, robbery, shoplifting, fraud and sometimes criminal conversion. In some jurisdictions, theft is considered to be synonymous with larceny; in others, theft has replaced larceny.

    Someone who carries out an act of or makes a career of theft is known as a thief, and the act of theft is known as stealing, thieving, or sometimes filching."

    If it looks like a duck....it is a duck!
     

  16. putty

    putty Ancient Guru

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    Very good read indeed!

    I never knew about this!

    But yes, what is a hacker with a concious worth nowadays?:p
     
  17. Year

    Year Ancient Guru

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    one thing to appreciate about this story is the total honesty of the boy, another thing it proves that people make mistakes.

    the bottom line of the story is not half-life 2, but the fact this boy deeply regretted his mistakes and worked hard to fix himself becoming a better person, this is exactly what all of us should learn to do, become better people by learning from our mistakes. some people never do. :)
     
  18. Phragmeister

    Phragmeister Guest

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    Very good read, thanks.

    What a waste of talent. Considering how clever this guy is, he could have easily redeemed himself by putting his skills to good use, worked for an anti-virus company etc, but instead took the road of destruction. Shame.
     

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