Transparent corp legal action/class action lawsuit

[Andy]

Mind Workstation Activation Form Link:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...n6Zkw/viewform

[JoeV]

Mind Workstation Activation Form Link:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...n6Zkw/viewform

Hmmmm.... Wonder why they need all that info just for an activation code. Do they realluy have the time to research all that, and are they going to deny access if they deem anyone has violated their licensing verbiage?

[philsouth]

But what if you can't find your license anywhere and can't find it because the Members area of the site was deleted? I'm screwed aren't I?

[Andy]

Fill out the form anyway and send it in. They might have a record of your name or e-mail address.

[Bikerdude]

I reached out some months ago. Adam, the founder, went or is still going through some serious health issues and could no longer sit at a desk. He was completely bed-ridden and said he had been so for months when he responded. Adding to the issues, when Windows 10 came out, it would have required an enormous amount of reprogramming. He did not have the health to do it and could not give it to someone else to program. Everyone out there wanting to sue him or whatever, give it up. He has a sad but legitimate reason for shutting down. You can't sue someone's business when their health fails them making it impossible for them to continue. Knowing him for many years, this is not the outcome he would have wanted. He saw no other option. He has been unable to work.

Regarding Transparent corp,

I found this thread on the Microsoft homepage: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/...=1543001875672

• TransparentCorp was never officially dissolved and brain.fm is operating underneath that flagship
  
• TransparentCorp is going under the name brain.fm but the parent company is still TransparentCorp and they have no financial problems. They just saw MWS etc as not worth the time to maintain and said screw it. Not right and not legal.
  
• TransparentCorp promised a year of support and continued license keys (https://filestore.community.support....a-9db318da41a3)
• TransparentCorp's terms of agreement stated that all licenses were 'lifetime licenses': (https://filestore.community.support.microsoft.com/api/images/ba8568cb-ae80-4aeb-a508-9ea58e2427f6) however all licenses are now worthless since they turned off their activation servers.

Some are speculating that Transparent corp's in the process of 'rebranding' the software to resell to people later, an attempt to make more money from past customesr......which is why they've shut down the activation site and are renigging on their promise to issue license keys for existing customers.

The group is getting together. Some have emailed support to see if a solution can be worked out so we can activate our software on older machines. Some are talking about banding together for legal action if our support emails are ignored. If you have purchased any Transparent corp product and are unable to activate your license, you might want to join us. A discord server (https://discord.gg/sF7JFRA) and a Facebook group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/1822860054508308/) has been set up for those who have The more people who sign on, the more likely the case will get attention and/or gain traction.

thank you

[JoeV]

I reached out some months ago. Adam, the founder, went or is still going through some serious health issues and could no longer sit at a desk. He was completely bed-ridden and said he had been so for months when he responded. Adding to the issues, when Windows 10 came out, it would have required an enormous amount of reprogramming. He did not have the health to do it and could not give it to someone else to program. Everyone out there wanting to sue him or whatever, give it up. He has a sad but legitimate reason for shutting down. You can't sue someone's business when their health fails them making it impossible for them to continue. Knowing him for many years, this is not the outcome he would have wanted. He saw no other option. He has been unable to work.

No, I can't blame Adam for not updating MWS, especially when it directly competes with brain.fm. What people are most upset about is shutting down the website to get downloads and activation codes for the "lifetime license" they paid for. It certainly took more effort to shut down the site completely than to just leave it up. The software still works on older versions of windows. Some people like myself count on the software to make a living. Not being able to retrieve the software in case of a computer catastrophe just adds tons of anxiety into my already hectic life.

[dan_hoog]

In my continuing opinion, damaging valid licenses sold to customers to apparently sabotage their businesses so transparent can compete a little better as brain.fm may eventually be the demise of transparent and its new venture. This is a very ugly skeleton in their closet.

I will be happy to join any legal action against the firm, its founders, its owners, etc. I will contribute a modest share of legal expense as well. I'd like to see them forced to honor their existing sold licenses under the original terms and suffer a severe economic penalty for impairing the businesses of their once loyal customer base.

The silly thing is, all they need to provide is the license server and one or two pages from their previous web site. Remember, they also promised you lifetime access to various materials in the 'downloads' area. They can certainly stop selling, improving, etc. Any real company would find a consultant to make this run on current computers. It really isn't that hard to fix, it just may be hard to find the solution.

Best,
Dan

[Demixl]

Thank you for sharing

[teteros]

Windows 7 will officially be "dead" as its extended support ends on January 14, 2020 so I wonder if there will be a bigger case then?

[chrisjswanson]

In my continuing opinion, damaging valid licenses sold to customers to apparently sabotage their businesses so transparent can compete a little better as brain.fm may eventually be the demise of transparent and its new venture. This is a very ugly skeleton in their closet.

I will be happy to join any legal action against the firm, its founders, its owners, etc. I will contribute a modest share of legal expense as well. I'd like to see them forced to honor their existing sold licenses under the original terms and suffer a severe economic penalty for impairing the businesses of their once loyal customer base.

The silly thing is, all they need to provide is the license server and one or two pages from their previous web site. Remember, they also promised you lifetime access to various materials in the 'downloads' area. They can certainly stop selling, improving, etc. Any real company would find a consultant to make this run on current computers. It really isn't that hard to fix, it just may be hard to find the solution.

Best,
Dan

I agree, this can't be legal. I spent a bunch of money on transparent products over the years, and would have no problem running in a VM. I have email receipts for "enterprise" software with "lifetime access", and the download links just take me to a page saying it's no longer available.

At first I was just bummed out, but now realizing that Transparent is alive and well as brain.fm, and are almost certainly using the very technology they promised me lifetime access to in order to generate much of the content they sell, I'm extremely disappointed.

Is there somewhere to sign a petition for a class action lawsuit?

My first thought is to have someone who's still got the binaries to provide them, decompile it, post it on github, and start encouraging a community effort to reverse engineer and create an open source version. If Transparent gets pissed off and intervenes, it'll make it really clear where their motivations are, and they'll have to answer to all existing paying customers. If they leave the project alone, I'd gladly contribute to the effort. It was really good software.