First let me say that this stopgap of yours has worked great for me so far. Thanks for posting it- I was trying to find a way to force Win 7 to do this by clicking through every option menu and system tool I could find but I've never had to do it before and I could not remember the a close-enough term to produce useful google search results when looking it up.
Now I'm not saying the lawyers yelling at the forum staff (or their bosses yelling at them) would be reasonable if they said anything approving of your fixed exe file, I just like how their smartly avoiding getting hassled while not squashing your helpful post. I understand what you're saying too, but that's not what would bother the lawyers. They would argue any or all of the following:
1.) You are redistributing their IP without license.
-Yes this is silly since you can distribute all the mods you want and are licensed to do so by the EULA you accept with installation. That EULA purposely does not cover redistributing content that is not generated by the mod tools so that people can't argue a cracked EXE or whole copy of the game is allowed to be redistributed because of the EULA. You're not doing that, but it may technically be a violation of the letter of the EULA if not the spirit. Still officially sanctioning redistribution of a core game component could be used as a defense by someone redistributing much more so any good attorney would reccomend at that they at least not give this the thumbs up. An over zealous attorney would send you a cease and desist and charge them fees for doing so.
2.) They can't control how someone reads or misreads your instructions.
- It's unlikely that anyone with just the right balance of functional illiteracy and minimal computer knowledge to be dangerous will read this, do something terrible, and end up having to (or thinking they have to) reformat and reinstall their OS. I doubt someone could even make a reasonable connection between your instructions and any coincidental computer implosion they might experience. Still, officially sanctioning this fix and your instructions might incur liability in the eyes of many attorneys. It would at the very least incur the risk of being considered liable, even if the that would be a false conclusion.
3.) They can't control how exactly you may have modified the exe file.
- Sure, they could compare the files and show that the only difference was a modified property contained in the wrapper and that none of the compiled code was actually altered. Still, a good attorney or even a good support staff supervisor would argue that it's best not to officially approve downloading it. While they could be sure that there was nothing harmful (maliciously or accidentally so) they would be better off avoiding the dozen angry customers who assumed that virus they got about the same time they downloaded it was from your link rather than the flying-spaghetti-monster porn puzzle game they downloaded. In terms of protecting yourself from legal and more mundane hassle, it is always best to completely avoid even the hint of liability whenever practical.
Anyways that was a long ranting explanation of what I meant. Like I said, I wasn't trying to imply you were doing anything morally or legally wrong, just that them saying "Hey thanks, go ahead and give that a try" would probably give a few overfed corporate attorneys or their overworked paralegals heart attacks. At the same time I was glad they were being reasonable in not deleting your post since it looked like a promising stop-gap for me. It turns out it was, so thanks again.
