BSA's Tactics and Motives Questioned

_Hellfire_ sends us over to Baseline Magazine for a longish article entitled After 20 Years, Critics Question the BSA's Real Motives, which paints the Business Software Alliance in the same colors as the RIAA. "A recent Associated Press story highlighted the fact that 90 percent of the $13 million collected by the BSA in 2006 came from small businesses. Since 1993 the group has collected an estimated $89 million in damages from businesses on behalf of its members, every penny of which it keeps. 'I don't know of a business where you can get away with raiding a customer with armed marshals and expect them to continue to do business with you...' said [Sterling] Ball, who shifted his company to open source software after the raid."

Comments

adversaries

[SoupGuru]

Is it only in the technology world where it seems that vendors and their customers are more like adversaries? Is there any other realm where the manufacturer demonizes the very people that buy the products that pay the rent? I'm sure the fact that 0s and 1s are easy to replicate makes this standoff easy to achieve but it's to point where a valid business model would include giving something away and then suing everyone to pay the bills. Of course, it already is a business model, I suppose. When it comes to patent trolls, the music and movie industry, and software producers it just seems like they are able to get away with treating their customers like dirt more than anywhere else.

Re:adversaries

[Todd Knarr]

But what happens when I do buy a TV from Best Buy. I hand them my credit card, the charge is approved, it shows up on my bill and I pay it, in short I bought and paid for that TV. 2 years later, Best Buy comes around demanding that I prove to them that I really did pay for that TV, and if I can't they're going to charge me with theft. I show them my credit-card statement showing their charge for the price of the TV, and they say "Not enough. You need to show us a printed store receipt for it.". Now, after 2 years the warranty's expired. The credit-card charge is long since paid and history. The TV's not something I can take as a deduction on my taxes or anything. Why in the world would I have the receipt still around? But Best Buy still says that they'll charge me with theft if I can't cough up that receipt.

Now, should Best Buy be demonizing me, calling me a thief? Or should I be demonizing them as clueless nut-cases?

Re:adversaries

[Chris Burke]

The only way that the BSA is going to come after you is if they get tipped off that you are violating your license. If that happens it means that people at your company knew they were infringing.

If you're accused you must be guilty. Yeah, that's a safe assumption.

It couldn't possibly be that it's a disgruntled ex-employee who called in a bogus tip simply to harass their former employer. It couldn't possibly be a disgruntled ex-employee who was themselves responsible for the licensing and thus the lack of compliance, and they were the only ones who knew it.

I'm sorry, but in my world thats not gray, thats black. Having one valid license to a software product that was copied 200 times doesnt make it "gray".

And is having 200 valid licenses to a software product that was installed 201 times because someone forgot to delete one copy off an old computer black as well?

Is having 200 valid licenses to a software product that was installed 200 times, but someone didn't obey the specific terms of the EULA and moved the software from one computer to another also black?

Is having 200 valid licenses to a software product that was installed 200 times in complete accordance with the license terms, but not being able to meet the strict (and poorly specified) accounting to prove this to the BSA when they raid your company also black?

Is there any gray at all in your world?

Re:If you're being raided... (you are a customer)

[Anonymous Coward]

A) much of the time they get their authority to raid you from the agreements you signed when you became a customer; not being a customer makes you much safer

B) most of the people they get actually had licenses but have no clue how to fulfill the strict audit requirements. No the stickers on the back of your machine are not enough. You must have a purchase agreement for _everything_

C) most of the time the they threaten jail sentences (for the IT managers and staff) and accept money.

People just don't bother to fight because it's not worth it unless you are whiter than white, which is almost impossible in any company actually working and not spending it's entire time preparing for a BSA audit.

In other words, the best way to avoid the BSA is to stop being a Microsoft customer and switch over entirely to free software like Linux. Even if you claim the proprietary stuff is better (which it isn't) is it really worth destroying your life for a few bucks more of your employer's time?

Re:Same again

[Chris Burke]

Therefore a big company is likely to have an IT department that does a good job of making sure it has licenses for everything and doesnt cut corners to save a few bucks here and there.

Yes, that's very true, the big company can afford to pay people solely to look after their licensing.

It also has to do with the kinds of licensing small business vs large ones can afford. A large corporation can afford site licenses or bulk-licenses where a large number of users are covered by a single license. It's much easier to keep track of, and to know whether any particular user of the software is legal (either they all are, or any machine that can get a license from the license server is), and easy to know when it expires (there's one date).

Whereas a small company that has to buy individual licenses (especially in the form of shrink-wrapped boxes which means the license is in paper form) has a lot more to keep track of, like when each piece of software was purchased and thus when it expires, and more documentation to dig up when the BSA comes knocking. Plus the BSA is notorious for going after technical violations of licenses where things like moving a hard drive from one machine to another is against the terms, so even though Software In Use == Legal Software Licenses and thus the software vendor got all the money they deserve, the BSA will still force them to pay a fine.