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Piracy Built the Romanian IT Industry
An anonymous reader submitted a link to a Washington Post article about a very interesting press conference. Romanian President Traian Basescu stood up in front of international press and discussed the role pirated Microsoft software played in bringing about the IT industry in the country. The other big player at the press conference was Microsoft chair Bill Gates. Gates' company was opening a technical center in Bucharest, and he declined to comment on the president's remarks. Romania passed anti-piracy laws nearly 10 years ago, but nearly 70 percent of software used in the country continues to be of an illicit nature.
This just in: Romania destroyed by what appears to have been a bombardment of chairs. More at 11.
I'm in between insightful sigs right now...
...is that someone of note said such things publicly.
Rampant piracy has been the norm for quite a long time in Eastern Europe & Asia.
Bill Gates most certainly knows this, but there really isn't anything he can do about it... and by opening a "global technical center" in Romania, it would seem like he is rewarding the country, regardless of their piratical ways.
Maybe it's cheap labor, maybe he sees opportunities for growth, I can't say.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Actually, MS owes Romania. You see, MS has been using the vampire method of business: sucking the blood of their customers. A clear rip-off of the vampire business model.
I live in Romania, and the fact is that many people here, after spending 500$ on a decent PC, find it hard to pay another 400$ on software (cheap computers here come with no software, or FreeDOS or Linux, and in some cases illegal Windows). So most people run pirated versions of Windows at home. In contrast, most bussinesses have legitimate licenses.
But I do not think this hurts MS too much. My reasoning is that if forced to pay for Windows, most people would spend a little more time learning to install and use Linux (it's really not that hard this days). And in the long this would result in more users proficient with Linux, and some bussinesses might also switch (not having to train employees).
So software piracy is bad, but not necessarily for the software maker.
If you build a foundation a certain practice or idea, such a piracy, it is hard to weed it out later. That being said, it seems like from the article that piracy wasn't for the simple purpose of getting software for free, but rather getting enough software out there for the country's technical economy to grow. I would think that initially it was a smart move for the country as a whole, but now that they have truly gotten into the computer field, they are experiencing the draw-back from actually participation with other nations. This seems like a correlation to what's happing in other nations that have poorer classes of people that are trying to modernize their technical standing.
"I only know 2 things: The love for me, and the fear of me."
"Every person you can successfully move off of a windows running unauthorized windows is a gain for free software."
;)
:)
No argument here...
"My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love"
My onions listen for the gentle dripping of your tears.
I reserve the right to think for myself. Others' opinions are optional. Puppy on lap = typos...not illiteracy.
The United States economy was initially built on slavery, but I don't hold it against them because they've cleaned up their act. If you sold drugs to make enough money for rent but quit once you were on your feet in a job, I wouldn't hold it against you. Yeah, I realize those are flame bait analogies but that's just how I feel. If Romania's infrastructure was built on piracy, I certainly hope they clean up their act--there are plenty of FOSS alternatives out there that are not as well supported as Windows apps but certainly can do the job with a lot of time and effort.
What they're doing is illegal. I hope the president was acknowledging this and leveling with Gates so rarely does a politician shoot straight, let's enjoy this rare moment.
My work here is dung.
US refused to pass any copyright laws in the publishing industry
till the time there were enough US authors whose rights needed
to be protected. When Charles Dickens visited the US, he saw his
books sold legally all over the place & he wasn't getting a penny
out of these sales. He complained to the US Govt repeatedly but
of no avail.
But publishers who were "pirating" his books in the US made
enough money to kickstart the publishing industry in the US.
Then a time came when there were enough US authors whose
rights had to be protected & that's when the relavant laws
were passed & enforced in the US.
Something similiar is happening in Romania wrt the software
industry.
Hey, I dunno about you guys, but at least 90 percent of the commercial software that I've used for the last 20 years has been pirated, or obtained through some other means besides paying for it. I find it hard to believe that would make me much of an oddball among the Slashdot crowd.
What's more, I concur with some of the Romanian president's comments. If it weren't for software piracy, I wouldn't have half the understanding of computers, software, and building systems out of the two, that I have today. Piracy made it possible for me to be a more valuable member of society. (I would argue that this fact is one more reason to encourage open source whenever and wherever possible.)
In comes piracy - people from developing countries and students everywhere gets to try just about any kind of software that's sold. When they're not as poor anymore, or have influence over what software their employer should invest in, they are probably a lot more likely to have formed an opinion from their previous experience with pirated software. Personally I think this kind of piracy is 100% beneficial for both users and software companies. I suspect even Bill Gates (gasp) understands this, but is unable to say anything that might sound pro-piracy.
Of course there comes a time in the progression from poor to "wealthy" (or adequately financed) where there has to be a transition from pirated to licenced software for this to hold true. People who can afford it should always buy the non-free software they use, or else I'm in trouble as a software engineer!
Uh, what? Fuck that shit. I live in Romania since I was born and the level of technical education is nothing close to high. Most of the IT professionals I know are either self taught, either have gone to university to another country.
But what the president said it's true. And you should have seen the "WTF did that dude just say" look on Billie's face.
This is not your signature.
Imagine for a moment that the Romanian government had done everything in their power to prevent software piracy. The people, most of whom had very little money a few years ago, may well have adopted a different (cheaper/free) OS and who would start paying for M$ software after realising there are some very good, free alternatives.
As it is M$ have secured dependence on their software in yet another emerging market. They may have lost millions of sales in Romania in the short term but in the long term, with a bit of political persuasion from America and the BSA, they will start to reap the rewards.
Just like Metallica's bull$#&T war against piracy Microsoft benefits from and was built on the concept of _almost every computer_ running it's software. The company might 'claim' to have a serious problem with piracy, hell they might fund major sting operations and propaganda to dissuade piracy but what they really want to dissuade is people not buying their software when they can afford to.
What they won't admit, and what would crush them completely is if they actually got rid of every pirated copy of microsoft windows in the world. If the entire country of romania never ran microsoft products, you would have an entire country of linux fans contributing to linux's evolution and coding software exclusively (or mostly) for linux platforms.
What kind of jolt would that be to Microsoft? A major one I think. But romania would have lost out as well (numbers wise), since Linux has traditionally been more complicated for new-users to use and receive support on than windows.
Metallica can afford to sue and chase-down and arrest their own fans, because after they used bootlegging of tapes to become world-famous while fans footed the bill of reproduction and distribution -- they have enough money to re-write history and say that napster is bad. How many people buy music they've never heard before? You can't sell CD's to the world by just showing off a picture of some faggy guys in tights, just like Microsoft can't possibly sell Windows to 90% of the people on earth using personal computers.
But trust me, they want to be on 90% of the computers.
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metallicas new album?
Ace
Take off the rose colored glasses and see how the world really works:
In 1842 there was still no international copyright law, a condition that was stunting American letters and depriving authors on both sides of the Atlantic of a living. Britain was willing to recognize the copyright of foreign writers--but only if their countries reciprocated.
This American publishers adamantly refused to do. Instead, they competed in bribing English pressmen to get early sheets of British books. The sheets were rushed by boat over to the United States, where the jolly pirates churned out cheap editions in a matter of hours.
But it was not only British authors they were robbing. Few publishers were willing to pay American authors for books when they could purloin better-known British ones for free. Herman Melville was hurt by the lack of an international copyright, and such eminent American authors as Emerson, Longfellow, and Hawthorne had to pay publishers an advance, rather than vice versa, in order to have their books produced. The early giants of American literature had to scramble for work at customhouses and in other government jobs, and Edgar Allan Poe, according to his biographer Sidney P. Moss, had to raise advance money for one collection of poems by soliciting 75 cents a head from his fellow West Point classmates, to whom he then dedicated the book.
"The Americans read [Dickens}; the free, enlightened, independent Americans; and what more would he have?... As to telling them they will have no literature of their own, the universal answer (out of Boston) is, 'We don't want one. Why should we pay for one when we can get it for nothing.'"
Copy Wrong
we are also known to drink the blood of every fat american that makes the mistake to walk the streets at night.
Stop Computers/Cars Analogies on S
How many
Of course, now that there are very high quality OSS programs available there's really no need to pirate MS stuff anymore.
1 in 4 Maine children in struggle with hunger.
Yeah, stereotyping an entire ethnic group as thieves is hilarious. Tune in tomorrow for Slashdot's best jokes about jews and blacks! It's okay, we're all grown-ups here.
One of my Comp. Sci. professors gave a talk to our ACM chapter about once a year or semester, describing his experience as a computer scientist in Russia. He had worked on a chess-playing program back in the '70s, and became a professor there.
Part of the talk was the history of Russian computing. Essentially, it was a lot of reverse-engineering of big IBM's. IIRC, it was Romainia that was assigned the task of reverse engineering the system OS machine code. Having to do it this way gave the programmers intimate knowledge of systems and assembly, and consequentially in the 80's produced some hardcore virus & worm coders.
So I wouldn't really expect their attitude toward software to be quite the same...
Maybe. But the concept of treating piracy as free publicity only works when you don't have an enormous stake in the current offerings, as many game companies do.
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Now YOU have a transfat problem!
Suckers.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Well... same thing in Malaysia, Indonesia and China... Alto anti piracy law exist for such a long time, ppl just dont gives a rats ass abt it simply because law enforcement officer thamself is also using them. You think they use original software on the personal computer? Yeah rite~~~~~
Romanian salaries are 10 times lower than in the US - if MS would sell Windows 10 times cheaper than in the US, most Romanians would buy it... no comment.
Currently, Windows costs about 3 months of a student's scholarship, or almost a month of a beginner engineer's net income.
it is mostly an IRC joke.. But it just so happens tht 95% of romanian chatters use the Grave key instead of the Apostrophe.. like "they`re" instead of "they're".. or "you`re" instead of "you're".. you get the picture..
*plays the Apogee theme song music*
He maybe could. Microsoft's market value is $299 billion and Romania's GDP is $219 billion.
So say we all
In 1990-1993, Romania just started to understand what democracy is, there was no concept of licenses, rights much like in other countries (see for example the story of Tetris and its licensing problems on Google Video). Even more, there was barely any economy and computers used to cost a fortune. A computer I think used to cost about 6 or 7 salaries, without software.
.. police raids companies or finds hackers or people guilty of piracy.
Also, even if you wanted to buy legally software, there were no companies that could legally license you software. You couldn't buy software legally because the percent of users buying software was so small, it was not profitable for companies to make stock of software products.
Later, companies started to build computers and offered preinstalled software and operating systems legally but even then there were problems with gray market (smaller companies could not afford to compete with large computer builders buying license in large volume and used to buy small volume of windows licenses from Hungary and other countries - later the BSA declared these licenses not valid and companies had problems).
Nowadays, almost all companies are using licensed software because there are laws about it and whenever the government has to prove something to the European Union or licking USA's ass
With home users, piracy is larger but that's mostly because some people can not afford it. The minimum wage is about 120 dollars and Windows is about 140 dollars (if you included taxes).. Private companies offer wages usually starting from 300 dollars.
So our president is right, but you don't have to take it like he agreed to it and thought it was OK. It was not but you can't change the past.
But take another subset of piracy nowadays: Games. So what if tons of people play a game? You can't get money from them later on for having experienced that game. I didn't pay more for Oblivion just because I pirated Morrowind.
So piracy can be useful, and harmful.
I agree. Business software is not games. Piracy of business software, especially by home users, only serve to further entrench the software, as users may demand that software from their employers, while getting used to one game does not mean getting used to the next game too.