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Malaysia Says Piracy (Might Be) OK for Learning
mkbz writes "a Malaysian newspaper published a story quoting Malaysia's Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Minister, Muhyiddin Yassin, who condemned the use of pirated software for business, but also said they may turn a blind eye to piracy when it comes to education: "But for educational purposes and to encourage computer usage, we may consider allowing schools and social organisations to use pirated software." is learning more important than copyright enforcement? could each of the pirated works found in schools be written off as donations? how can this benefit both the people AND the software makers? Read the full article here."
If there is really no other software available to do what needs to be done, and your schools honestly do not have the money to pay for it... morally, I think it's okay for the schools to just copy it, legal or not. Knowledge trumps money.
A lot of software, though... you don't really need that commercial version, you can get something free, especially in educational institutions. If all you need is office software for writing papers, then get Linux and OpenOffice, don't pirate copies of Microsoft software.
Maybe this should be common sense, but it seems like common sense really isn't all that common, especially when it comes to intellectual property issues.
Educational (at least publically-funded primary and secondary schools, i.e. high school) institutions frequently lack cash--so as a result, they either use pirated software (dangerous and illegal) or simply do without necessary software (i.e. half the machines don't have MS Word because they can't afford licenses for them.)
By allowing the software companies to write off software used in nonprofit institutions, they are in essence getting the same thing as if they sold the profit--only the number goes on the other end of the stack, on the debt side, and cancels a part of it. It keeps them happy (there is a simulated positive cash flow), and keeps the nonprofit organizations happy because they don't have to spend as much on licenses.
Perhaps if a large software manufactuerer were willing to announce such a policy in the United States...If you're an educational organization, catalog the number of pirated copies of Microsoft software, and send it, along with a copy of a certificate of tax excception and a signed affidavit of compliance to Microsoft Piracy...the promise being MS won't take action against you for the declared copies. Forget to declare some, and you're in trouble...
The Malaysian government has a very different stance than we have here in the US, but it seems to be one that will be beneficial for all parties involved.
That stealing is ok if the cause is deemed just?
Copyright infringement is not theft. If you steal something from me, you have it and I no longer do. If a school in Malaysia pirates a copy of Photoshop, Adobe has no fewer copies than they did before the school pirated it.
From an ethical standpoint, a more meaningful consideration is whether the school is depriving someone of revenue. In other words, are they pirating the software to avoid paying for it or are they pirating it because they are unable or unwilling to pay for it? If a 14 year old kid that gets a pirated copy of 3D Studio Max -- a $3,500 software package, who is being hurt? The publisher had no reasonable expectation that the kid could have purchased it.
Please keep in mind that the above is a discussion of ethics, not law. The law has made many ethical acts illegal. Just look at the effects of the DMCA, for instance. Or consider that it is illegal for you to exceed the posted speed limit even if you are transporting someone to the emergency room after a serious injury.
There's a catch-22 here, though. Since we're all willing to use a warez copy of expensive applications in order to get enough familiarity with them to do the work, businesses have no reason to provide training or other tool-exposure time, since we're doing it for them, even if it is piracy.
Wouldn't we be better off if businesses recognized that 3D SuperMagic Dot Net cost $5k per copy and required a testicular implant -- and thus people with the background and skills to learn the application and do the job weren't likely to walk in with those skills and should instead be exposed to a training period where they (A) learned the application in a productive fashion that helped them get productive faster?
As long as we're willing to do the industrial training businesses want ourselves, why should we expect them to hire us without work-for-pay experience?
Good point. How about...
- Quicken - Gnucash doesn't cut it (yet).
- Adobe Acrobat - Ghostscript tools are not user-friendly enough.
- SmartDraw/Visio - OpenOffice.org Draw is ok, but I want something with lots of templates for software engineering, networking, etc.
- Macromedia Flash (the editor, whatever it's called) - any OSS equivalents out there?
- MS Office documents - we need something that reads those
.doc files flawlessly, please!
If anyone knows of better free software alternatives out there for the above list, please post!It's easy to say in ignorance that companies should sell software to companies and give it free for people to learn, but they assume you'll pirate it anyway. Like Adobe said it wanted Skylarov jailed, but they didn't EXPECT it to actually happen. "Put all the software pirates in jail" is something the sales department would say (and they talk VERY loudly and forcefully). The CEO on the other hand would definitely recognise the learning effect of pirated software, but the massive cost of consulting lawyers to actually release two tiers of the product and splitting/forking the codebase to give a different free version are prohibitive. It took me 10 days to make a minor alteration to a shareware contract just to allow distribution. This is because at the end of the day every lawyer knows that a Judge can spend 8 hours debating the meaning of one word, and that your entire case will depend on the outcome.
This is why the BSA targets corporations only, they know that if they went after the public that the ACLU, FSF would bring a whole pile of trouble on their heads, and BSA's customers won't want to be associated with this so the BSA would lose its funding.
A caveman dreams of being us, the incalculable power and riches. We dream of being Q, then what?
"Just because you can't afford to buy something doesn't give you the right to steal it."
Nobody's saying "I'm poor so I have the right to steal it." What people are saying is "I need to know how to use these things in order to succeed in life, but there's no outlet to let me do it affordably."
I'm a Lightwave animator. When I started using it, it cost $2,500. You cannot get a job using Lightwave unless you know how to use Lightwave. Here's the thing though, LW's not about pushing buttons, it's about being an artist who understands his/her medium. School can teach me how to cut clay, but it cannot teach me to be a scupltor.
The simple fact of the matter is that in order to use any 3D App, you have to be intimately familiar with it. Without a job, there's no way I can pay $2,500 to buy the software. (Plus that's really risky, what if you're better off with Maya?)
The resort is to 'acquire' the software. Is it right? No, it's piracy. Should Newtek do something about it if they know you have it? Yes they should, otherwise the floodgates open to people being able to legitimatley use LW without paying for it. Should Newtek look the other way? Oh absolutely.
3D Apps are unusual software because you can make a good living knowing how to use it. I learned how to use Lightwave, and now I have a job where I use it extensively. Not only has my company purchased a full license plus 2 upgrades, but now I have my own copy I paid full price for. My 'piracy' 6 years ago earned Newtek 2 full licenses, 2 upgrade licenses, and repeat business from me in the future.
One day, the licensing will be figured out such that it's okay to use unauthorized copies of software for educational use. Until it is, yes it is wrong. But there's a difference between being legally wrong and being ethically wrong. Newtek profited off me being legally wrong, but ethically right.