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Flaws In a BSA Software Piracy Report?
Ian Lamont writes "The Business Software Alliance has just released its state piracy study (full PDF also available). The BSA says that one in five pieces of software in use in the United States is unlicensed, and notes that piracy rates are highest in Ohio (27%). However, as noted by the Industry Standard, there are problems with the state study, and the way the BSA is presenting the data: the study only includes eight states, and it is making some questionable connections, including the claim that lost state and local tax revenue from piracy would have been enough to 'hire nearly 25,000 experienced police officers.'"
because the bsa has really nothing to gain by providing numbers that don't accurately reflect the true situation with regards to the use of unlicensed software.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
"Do you pirate software?"
"Yes."
"Okay, thanks. Have a good night."
'hire nearly 25,000 experienced police officers.'
By definition, won't most experienced police officers already have jobs? Say, as police officers?
So, according to the BSA, when you don't buy software, you put the cash you didn't spend under your mattress so the city doesn't get any tax revenue from it (past income taxes, I assume).
Man, I'd better check under my mattress when I get home! I might just be RICH!
is this: if a company pirates (arrrrr, mateys!) a piece of software, they immediately take the money that would have been used to buy that software and stick it in an underground vault, never to be seen or spent again. That's why the state gets no tax revenue.
What a bunch of schmucks.
Do you have ESP?
Everyone get on TPB quick!
Lost state and local tax revenue from piracy would have been enough to "hire nearly 25,000 experienced police officers", which being experienced are already working somewhere else. So do we move 25,000 officers from another state to Ohio? Why? Would the source state like it?
I always like it when they assume that every piece of pirated software is lost revenue. Given that the pirates have already demonstrated that they don't find the software valuable enough to pay for, it seems more likely that if the option to pirate software is removed a good portion of these people would find a free alternative or another solution to their problem... or they would just go without.
Heh heh. I'd like to see what happens when the BSA members are told that online purchases of software will be taxed locally and by the states...
I'll bet their maths for calculating lost state and local tax revenue from pirated software would change.
The other factor being, if people couldn't get the 'free as in beer' copies of that software, they wouldn't pay for a legit copy. But that's been rehashed approximately 6.022 x 10^23 times on slashdot, so I won't go any further.
On a side note, why did the BSA have to break tradition and not use an acronym ending in AA? They've made it much more difficult to lump them into the bin with the MPAA and RIAA. Sigh... BSA/**AA is four too many characters.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Just because somebody pirates something doesn't mean they would pay for it if that was the only way. They would instead just NOT BUY IT. The entire premise that if you are losing so much in taxes is bunk. Pirating may cause harm in disrupting some tax money, just not that much.
I mean, honestly, could people even raise that kinda of tax money if they had the cash to buy the software?
import system.cool.Sig;
Not as bad as the RIAA?
Does the RIAA have jack booted thugs that can walk into your office with body armor and machine guns? Do they fine you millions of dollars if you can not produce the receipt for every version of software ever purchased or installed on a machine? Etc.
I think it's time for the Boy Scouts of America to file suit and get their acronym back.
Hey, the World Wide Fund for Nature did it...
You can't talk about Wikipedia's flaws on Wikipedia
Just think about it... There's no tax revenue on Open Source software! People are using it for FREE! It's the end of the government! OH NOES!!!!
Suppose companies were paying salaries with the money they save by pirating software. Then rather than
X * 0.05 = 25,000 police
we would have
X = 20*25,000 = 500,000 unemployed people
So another way of looking at the statistics is that the BSA wants to put 1/2 a million people out of work in each state.
Lies damn lies and statistics, learn to master them.
Jack booted thugs with body armor and machine guns? I would seriously doubt that. If they did, I would love to report myself with a false tip and have them walk face-first into a claymore.
Welcome to Florida, where I can lawfully defend my home and private business with lethal force!
then use your computer with a clear conscience for free...
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
Not having RTFA or RTFR referred to by TFA, I still have to say I'm amused by the last line in the summary (presumably paraphrasing the report) and its implications to further reports...
"The lost state and local tax revenue from piracy would have been enough to save the lives of HUNDREDS of poor, sick people, assuming they could afford the hospital costs after becoming poor from buying software regulated by our association."
"The lost state and local tax revenue from piracy would have been enough to pay the ransom on this CEO's poor daughter, kidnapped by evil software pirates, and because you selfish greedy bastards had to go and murder her by pirating software, they didn't have the money to pay to get her back! I HATE YOU ALL!"
"The lost state and local tax revenue from piracy would have been enough to save the lives of five hundred innocent kittens from being pulverized in our patented BSA Kitten Pulverizing Machine, whose sole purpose is to abduct and pulverize kittens constantly and whose operations may only be tempered by a continuously-accelerating stream of revenue. Why do you selfish pirates want the kittens to be pulverized? It's all your fault, you know."
Demanding constant attention will only lead to attention.
Who pays sales tax anymore? Especially since the invention of the internet. Here in Chicago, the lack of sales tax more than covers the cost of shipping.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
If every big corporation did not out source we could employee 10,000,000 United States Citizens and therefor increase tax money to employ 500,000 experienced police officers.
How can you criticize them if you are complicit in their actions?
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Would I be the only one surprised if the BullShit Association told the truth?
Anything from them is a M$ policy ad.
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.
including the claim that lost state and local tax revenue from piracy would have been enough to 'hire nearly 25,000 experienced police officers.
And the lost of sun light due to lack of solar panels would be enough to power the whole world.
alias possession='chmod 666 satan && ls
Did you really get paid?
You heard the AC folks, Open Source software is the software of anarchists and libertarians.
If you use Open Source the terrorists win. Also for no apparent reason the fire fighters will stop getting Timmy out of the well and the alternate Back to the Future II version of the US will result.
Piracy among home users is much higher. Proof? Look at yourself !! you thieving leach !!
I make this point at least once a month.
There used to be an assumption of ethics. If someone was caught in a lie or fabrication, it would be shameful and cause harm to the individual or an organization. Even organizations with which you disagree would probably be telling the truth.
Those days are long gone. There isn't any effort into presenting the truth. No one cares. Everyone merely selects facts that support their position and tosses the rest. If you dare to present opposing facts, it just becomes a dispute.
Look at "intelligent design" for some reason news agencies seem to think they they deserve equal time with actual science. That is no different than putting astronomers and astrologers on equal footing. Yes, Carl Sagan said there are billions of stars, but madam Maria predicts that there only 100,000 and half of them are in retrograde until 2012. Dial in, who do you believe? 1-900-USA-fucked
There is no ethics or common sense. There is no public outcry or demand that public statements be factually accurate. We expect people to lie. We then use the lies we like to bolster our opinions based on our prejudices.
Communication is impossible when everyone is lying.
I have three linux machines at home. Every time I fire one up I run several hundred 'programs', including X, Qt, the TCP/IP stack, flash, firefox, amarok, ipchains. My two little headless linux computers, one disguised as a DSL modem and the other as a firewall, likewise run at least dozens of programs. I know there are tens of thousands of computers hosting websites all over the world that, likewise, are running dozens of 100% free programs.
For their 1 out of 5 statistic to be right, within the United States, there must be a dozen people running nothing but pirated software just to make up for me.
I know nine other people who are, likewise, running multiple computers, including several Windows machines, that have 100% legit/free programs on them. So now we're up to a hundred or so people running nothing but pirated software just to make up for me and my nine friends.
Are there vast underground barracks filled with armies of illegal software users in Ohio and Florida? Is China outsourcing its goldfarming to the ghettos of East LA?
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
How does a dead person recover?
I wonder what their definition of "unlicensed" is. Are they using their definition that unlicensed means you can't find the original invoice for the software? You know, the one where you can have every COA stuck to the case of each machine, but no invoice is considered unlicensed because you can't prove that you didn't buy the licenses after the fact?
Do they consider Open Source code to be unlicensed? Or shareware? Or what?
Are they counting companies that shift licenses around when employees leave and PCs are retired?
Then there's the process the BSA uses to initiate action against an entity. The first thing it does is look at the financials of the company in question.
I know, I submitted a former employer and was told that the company was in poor financial condition and would not be a viable target because of that.
So if you're not making much money, pirate away!
They are equally bad as the RIAA. Not sure how they operate in the US, but here in Belgium and the Netherlands, they don't have the best reputation. If they "suspect" piracy, they'll come knocking on your door and demand to have access to all computer-systems (though in some cases, they do announce their visit one or two weeks in advance). Everyone is ordered to move away from any computer system and they'll start snooping around while you dig up all license information. People not working costs money, but then again, it is not the BSA's money.
What's worse is that if you are not able to find all proper licenses in time, you have two options. Let the BSA confiscate your equipment and go to trial, or sign a settlement. Most business will do the latter. In Belgium, a Printing Shop recently won a case against the BSA which had opted to do the latter (sign the settlement, for 60.000,-, which was cheaper than losing their workstations for an unspecified time) because they were unable to locate all licenses in time (visit wasn't announced). But when did locate all the licenses and asked the BSA their money back, the BSA refused to undo the settlement. In the end the Printing Shop got back their money though the courts, 60.000,00 plus interest plus expenses, but AFAIK, cases like this show that the BSA is nothing more than another money grabbing machine.
There is also another effect. In the (IT consulting) company I work for it is just a pain in the behind to get paid for licenses on tools I may use on one project. Now, don't get me wrong here, if there is a valid reason, I can get it.
However, for many tools I do not think there is any valid reason to go and purchase something. Either stuff comes with a developer license (Oracle's SQL Developer vs. Toad; [note: I am not saying the one is better than the other]) or you pull it out of the open source community. Works for me, keeps my conscience clean and keeps the license checking folks of my back.
So again, license fees that -eventually- pays for police offices and DMV personnel are down for a good reason.
Load New Commander (Y/N)?
We need many more mental asylums.
Heck, even the A-team could be in a valid paying job.
Load New Commander (Y/N)?
The BSA numbers are highly suspect. Here's their forumla:
As Russel McOrmond points out, only two of these numbers are actually known: the number of machines shipped and the amount of legal BSA software. The usage estimate multiplier is an estimate of the average amount of software on a machine in a given region. The essential number, however, may be the amount of legal open source software. How on earth do you calculate that? If it is low, then the piracy numbers could be way off. I distribute some open source code, and even I don't have a clear idea of how many people use it. McOrmond says FLOSS not shipped with a PC is often not included. Read McOrmond's article for an in-depth explanation.
My Mac has only a few BSA apps - the OS, iLife, and Photoshop Elements. How is the BSA to know that I'm also running Firefox, Thunderbird and OpenOffice (all FLOSS), or Scrivener, Tinderbox, and NetNewsWire (all legal non-BSA stuff written by and purchased from individuals)? How about my parents' machines, on which I've installed OpenOffice software? They probably wouldn't remember it was open source even if asked.
This is one major reason to buy retail and not a corporate license.
The only thing that allows them to do this is your consent to inspection.
t
I think it's time for the Boy Scouts of America to file suit and get their acronym back.
Yeah, right. You think they want to piss off the BSA? They'll be back to cutting notches in sticks to calculate their finances instead of using software. The BSA can find issues with anyone's accounting of their licenses.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Eliminating the failed prohibition model "war on some drugs" would result in being able to fire 25,000 cops as "not needed at all", as the main result of said war has been an accelerated crime rate related to black market prices and the associated violence with those huge sums of money. No telling how much savings there, but I would imagine it is in the billions. Switching to free and open source, just with governmental use on governmental machines, and especially if magically it could be retroactive back 10 years or better, would have freed up enough cash to give every person in ohio a free computer on savings over software licensing fees, said fees based completely on the "artificial scarcity" model of busy-ness as it relates to digital copies. And probably allow them to give upgrades every few years as well, using the same exact cash levels they are spending now.
Now mine is thin air and I admit it, but at least it is closer to reality than the BSA and MAFIAA "enron styled" accounting figures, and that tie in with cops and crime was just too obviously *lame*.
trying to justify it's own existence? ..... I knew you could.
A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.
I used to run almost nothing but pirated software.
Of course, my monetary situation has changed in the years since I graduated high school.
GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
That cannot be legal. Sounds more like the Mafia tbh. Who or what gives the BSA legal power to do any of that?
Caesar si viveret, ad remum dareris.
In other words, get on board with the anti-piracy program and you will have more revenue to trample peoples rights outside of cyberspace.
Keep in mind that part of the target audience of the report is the law enforcement community who at some point has to see some benefit for themselves if they are going to enforce anti-piracy laws. Notice that they don't talk about it in terms of after school programs, or more teachers. Nope, not here in Amerika. We need more cops damn it! The people are getting too uppity.
BSA: "Do you pirate software?" Pointy-haired Boss: "I'm not sure we even own any ships." BSA: "Have a nice day."
www.purevolume.com/martyd
of hearing about all the police officers, city parks, and free massage parlors we could finance with all the money we've 'lost' due to piracy. Why do I never hear about the thousands of police officers that could be financed if only they bought 9 rockets instead of 12?
Every time I read 'BSA' I can't help but think of it as "BullShit Alliance", but it's too true, as it is with any business who's goal is inherit to their trade, that is, every business.
I'll assume the BSA was (at least mostly) founded on keeping tabs on 'piracy' and stuff, particularly in the business sector.
Restaurants make their money on selling food and service, they have to make themselves more appealing by putting that food and service in the best light they can.
Colleges make their money by selling education, they have to make their campuses and services look as appealing as possible.
The BSA is in the business of WTFPWNing 'software pirates' and disseminating information about it. They have to make their business appear worthwhile to their members.
Many fast-food chains are well known for making their greasepatties and other less than perfectly healthy options seem much more wonderful than they are.
Colleges are only getting more expensive and it's only getting easier to argue the need for such high tuition fees in a world where we need to focus on the quality of education yet so many people aren't learning anything new.
Where does that leave the BSA?
"Most people, I think, don't even know what a rootkit is, so why should they care about it?"
Emphasis mine
CART MASTER: [clang] Bring out your dead!
CUSTOMER: Here's one.
CART MASTER: Ninepence.
DEAD PERSON: I'm not dead!
CART MASTER: What?
CUSTOMER: Nothing. Here's your ninepence.
DEAD PERSON: I'm not dead!
CART MASTER: 'Ere. He says he's not dead!
CUSTOMER: Yes, he is.
DEAD PERSON: I'm not!
CART MASTER: He isn't?
CUSTOMER: Well, he will be soon. He's very ill.
DEAD PERSON: I'm getting better!
CUSTOMER: No, you're not. You'll be stone dead in a moment.
CART MASTER: Oh, I can't take him like that. It's against regulations.
DEAD PERSON: I don't want to go on the cart!
CUSTOMER: Oh, don't be such a baby.
CART MASTER: I can't take him.
DEAD PERSON: I feel fine!
CUSTOMER: Well, do us a favour.
CART MASTER: I can't.
CUSTOMER: Well, can you hang around a couple of minutes? He won't be long.
CART MASTER: No, I've got to go to the Robinsons'. They've lost nine today.
CUSTOMER: Well, when's your next round?
CART MASTER: Thursday.
DEAD PERSON: I think I'll go for a walk.
CUSTOMER: You're not fooling anyone, you know. Look. Isn't there something you can do?
DEAD PERSON: [singing] I feel happy. I feel happy. [whop]
CUSTOMER: Ah, thanks very much.
CART MASTER: Not at all. See you on Thursday.
Caesar si viveret, ad remum dareris.
Shit, ipchains? Not an upgrader, are we? ;)
You are not the customer.
So, really, what you're saying is that the report is just a bunch of BS, eh?
I'm not what you'd call an early adopter. That particular machine has a GPIB card in it to talk to my 1978 function generator, and a serial connection to my 1989 Amiga, which between them have dozens of other not-pirated programs running every time they're powered up.
(I swear if I could get my 1964 oscillator interfaced to my computer I'd jump at the chance...)
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
How can you trust any group with BS right there in its name?
It seems to me that it is the business of the BSA to present software piracy as a significant problem, whether it is or not. I mean, their business model is to earn money by uncovering violations, right? So it would be bad for business if their software piracy report uncovered, say, a sharp decline in piracy. With such a clear conflict of interest, how could anyone believe what they say?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
yup, last year. use www.nopiracy.com
... but eventually, I got to sit back and wonder what my boss was going through in the office, and when he finally stormed out and demanded the licenses from me, I asked him what he was talking about, and said 'Hey, I'm just a sales guy, I don't know!'
... I figured he'd be just a little upset.
I didn't get paid one paycheck, and got told I'd get it on the next one. Since I had unofficially done some of their IT fixing (basic networking stuff), when I offered to upgrade the office to Vista (from XP) for the boss, he jumped on the opportunity. I also switched office 03 to office 07, installed norton and acrobat 8. It was only about 40 computers.
Two weeks later, when they 'forgot' to give me my commission from the previous paycheck, so I cashed the check, called the BSA and reported the problem. When they called to let my boss know they'd be investigating, he asked me if he should be worried. I told him that I was sure that our windows licenses were good for ANY version of windows, and not to worry.
A few weeks went by, and another paycheck,
Since it was my word against my bosses word and he couldn't provide the licenses, he opted to have the computers confiscated (maybe because he didn't have the money?). He told everyone that they could work from home, and he'd continue to pay them. I'm not sure how many people got paychecks after that, but I never tried
I guess I could have taken him to court for the backpay, but that wouldn't have been very nice.
Looking through, I just found another thing they counted as Piracy I havn't seen anyone mention yet. In the talk about the benefits of using legal software, they say "It simply works better than the pirated versions, which are often trial or beta copies;" If they are counting trial software, hell, a dell comes with so many programs that 30 days after purchase become "pirated". That's where 1 in 5 come from. Win-zip!
I run about 75% pirated software (really, only stuff that's legit that's on this box are free, or the OS), so I make up for... about 1/9th of one of your friends.
http://news.cnet.com/2008-1082_3-5065859.html
I am having difficulty digging up other articles about the BSA using armed police (in some european countries the police carried machine guns) on their audits. IIRC there were a few slashdot articles on this a couple years ago.
Oh, and my bad. It looks like the RIAA does use jack booted thugs with machine guns...
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/18/magazine/18djdrama.t.html?_r=1&ref=slashdot&oref=slogin
I first read it as 'Please pay for his speedy recovery'.
emt 377 emt 4
Part of my point is that the BSA, and the companies the BSA represents, have a problem: every year, fewer applications need to be bought because there are free versions that work well enough. We don't expect to buy driver programs hardware -- they're free. We don't expect to buy internet connectivity programs -- they're free. Many window managers, garbage collection programs, data compression programs, codecs, bluetooth protocol stacks, are free.
What the BSA is saying is that 1/5 of the OS installations, Photoshop installations, and Excel installations are pirated. That's possible. But right now my computer is running 72 processes, and only ten of those are programs that can be purchased. You can't pirate free stuff, and an increasing amount of software, even on Windows systems, is free stuff.
That, in my opinion, is what the BSA is really concerned with in the long term.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
The formula they use for piracy is as follows:
They take the number of Software units installed and subtract the number of software unit's purchased/obtained legally, and the resulting value is the number of pirated software units. Now how did they get those numbers? Well, look at page 11 of the report for that, because if my interpretation of what they are saying is correct, the software units installed = hardware units times the software load (which if that means how much can be put on, will lead to inaccurate numbers) and the numbers legally obtained is Software Market revenue divided by the cost per unit.
Yea...um, that formula really sketches me out.
Well, if they are using government law enforcement officers, that's a different thing altogether.
Just like RIAA set out to do with the definition of music downloads. Most of the "piracy" are simple oversights. I read about one engineering firm that got dinged because they had software on retired workstations that were then used for a different purpose (at the same company). They forgot to uninstall...I think it was some CAD tools...and they got fined big for that. They had licenses for all their working drafters, just neglected to delete the old software off re-purposed machines.
That's why I'm happy to be setting up a Linux network. Doesn't necessarily insulate you from a BSA audit. But unless their software runs on Ubuntu, they can go pound sand.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
they certainly don't support customer interests.
Sure they do. Adobe, Apple, Microsoft, Symantec... their interests are being supported just fine.
You don't really think WE are the BSA's customers, do you?
More Twoson than Cupertino
One thing that doesn't get mainstream media coverage is the piracy rate of BSA members.
From what I hear that's a pretty substantial number of unauthorized copies (per BSA requirements) but it would be bad publicity to acknowledge that even their own members are pirating* software from each other.
If their own member companies can't prove ownership using the BSA 'chain of licensing' then you know it's a crock.
* That's 'pirating' for a specific definition of pirating. Kind of like a certain ex-US president asking what the definition of 'is' is.
Apologies to Pixar.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Its true. Check it out here
I don't have anyone in my "foes" or "friends" lists. There have been a whole lot of people I have been sorely tempted to put in my empty "friends" list, but this is the first time I ever gave thought to adding a "foe".
I sincerely hope you're just trolling. First your user name - I was a victim of Sony's rootkit.
Second, and finally on topic, do you realise that you are a narc? A rat? A snitch?
And the worst kind of snitch; one who does it for filthy lucre. Judas. I don't care how bad someone mistreats you, only an evil asshole narcs for pay.
If you had any ethics or morals at all it wouldn't have taken a bad experience to get you to turn them in. You would have turned them in because you thought it was the right thing to do, or more intelligently not at all.
You really should consider just how loathed people like you are. I have no idea how you got modded insightful for stating the obvious, then saying you narced on someone, but it I see the comment you just made while I metamoderate, well, like they say on "My Name Is Earl", karma is a funny thing. Now go crawl back under your rock, troll.
Mods, I'm checking "no karma bonus" but mod me down further if you wish. The parent flamebait really pissed me off and I can easily take a downmodding.
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
You sure about that? I think you're counting the same biased way the BSA is. I bet your printer driver program's not pirated. Ditto your keyboard-scanning program, or your web browser, or the default text editor or the program that displays the load average and the currently running processes. How about the program that shows what hardware is connected? Or the one that defragments the hard drive?
There are hundreds of programs interacting to keep a computer running, and only a very few ones right on the very tip-top are still sufficiently unusual to warrant purchasing.
Now, if you're running a pirated OS, then you *are* running probably 75% pirated stuff, in a manner of speaking, and there are a lot of people doing that. But even then I'm betting it's nowhere near 1/5 or even 1/50th of the people in the US simply because computers are so cheap and installing an OS is something that most people have not the ability, motivation, or willingness to do.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
As a resident of Ohio, let me assure you our barracks are only full of life saving supplies in case the apocalypse. After all, we may need 1 million copies of AutoCad to rebuild the earth after a major disaster.
So they're blaming Microsoft, one of their members, in part for pushing up piracy in California?
So we should eliminate non-brand-name PCs to reduce piracy?
Yes, you're automatically a pirate if you install that copy of software package X on a new computer. I personally enjoy this one since when I recycle computers, the recycling place tosses any MS disks/manuals/licenses in the appropriate garbage bin. They use Ubuntu. Obviously, this copy of Windows XP that I bought in 2002 is pirated because I've installed it on 3 computers and removed it from 2 computers I donated.
I believe the parent was referring to the BSA's ability to get the government to come in on its behalf to seize equipment and software and generally intimate you. RIAA, to my knowledge, still relies on using lawyers who, like stormtroopers, can't hit the broadside of a space ship.
I really am touched. It is so important to see how Ohio could have hired 25,000 new policemen, because we need more policemen. We need to kick our public's ass. No, we dare not hire 25,000 new teachers... or improve the school system or raise teachers salaries... but instead... hire more gun legal state cowboys.
No one really gives a shit about this country anymore. Its all about money. We're fucked because we eat ourselves alive. If piracy stopped tomorrow, i'm sure Adobe would NOT be charging $10 for photoshop. No, I'm pretty sure the price would go up on the product because of supply and demand. If it were impossible to pirate photoshop, many would find free alternatives. Adobe would be forced to increase prices due to the fact that photoshop users, pirates and legal users.... have now moved to other applications which are cheaper or free. Adobe doesnt really want a world where photoshop isnt the standard.... even at the cost of piracy.
But dont worry, the little man will lose... he/she always does.
The amiga was initially just to get 10 megs (the size of the hard drive) copied off the amiga and onto the linux machine, without using the floppy drive. (If you remember Amiga floppy drives you'll know why. If you don't, it's because I don't hate my neighbors and it scares my dog.)
The function generator, I use to produce very precise timing for a bunch of stepper motor drivers I'm using for CNC machining stuff. But, in general, it's really nice to be able to interconnect test&measurement equipment to computers: I can precisely measure the curve of current flow into a disk drive as it spins up and seeks/writes, at 50 measurements a second, with a computer interfaced to a digital multimeter. I have a plan, involving a strain gauge glued to a milling machine bit, and connected through a DMM, so I could do real-time calculation of tool deflection and not break off any more milling bits because I was making too heavy a cut. Stuff like that.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
Then perhaps another acronym is in order: RICO
The BSA apparently have a long-established pattern of illegal behavior.
You can't talk about Wikipedia's flaws on Wikipedia
Granted you can legally defend yourself but can you legally buy a claymore mine in Florida?
Thats a nice way to twist the truth a bit and rope in people that use free software to give it a bad impression to the average Joe.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
BSA report link
IDC Global Study Methodology Details
Economic Input Methodology
Comments on the contents:
1. Tone is funny. Does not pretend to be scientific, but rather a position paper.
2. Note, study does not include Server/Mainframe software.
3. Basically, they take the Sales Quantities and divide by Install quantities to get "Legitimate Installation" percentage. The install quantities are based on surveys from 100 folks in each state and extrapolated to the state level.
4. Open source software is theoretically included. It's fairly easy to track installs for this (assuming the interviewee's include these in their responses and are honest). However, I have no idea how the shipments end of open source would be calculated (seeing as most of it is likely downloaded). Thus, it's possible that open source is causing the perceived piracy rate to be increased, lol (note, it is stated that lost economic value of OSS is zero).
Because business runs on bullshit, and you're just a pawn in their chess game. You dont matter... you never did. The public isnt a factor in this. It is just another Business to business money making organization and you are used in their numbers games to help leverage laws and built wealthy people nice homes that you, if you're lucky can some day mow for $3.50 an hour.
Suck it up. America is dead. Think like a businessman, not like an American.
America is just a set of failed ideals, raped by its own capitalistic society. The laws favor businesses more than civilians. Enjoy.
They are using law enforcement (and therefore public resources) to enforce civil contract and copyright law. That is illegal in many jurisdictions and unethical for most.
One of the articles I had a hard time finding was one that stated that the BSA had armed civilian agents operating in a few places. Either I have a wacky paranoid memory, or my google-fu is weak.
This is one major reason to buy retail and not a corporate license.
The only thing that allows them to do this is your consent to inspection.
The risk of an inspection will be considered sufficiently negligible as to be worth it to most businesses, particularly considering that the corporate licensing can easily knock 70% off the price.
So.. you're saying I should have accepted the surprise pay 'cut', and avoided my civic duty to report a crime? ;)
Hmm.. well, I guess if you're too smart to turn autoplay off on your cd drive, then you're too smart for me.
Then again, maybe you're just emo - I read your journal, and it seems to say "Oh, my suburban rich lifestyle is soooo hard... booo hooo". Not all of us have an easy ride in life, and some of us have to work. If you get screwed out of a paycheck and can't pay rent because you just paid tuition, you'd be upset too. I guess not as upset about losing a date with Kathy, but then again, you've always got your hot hooker-married-to-a-politician friend to rely on.
Your reasoning isn't correct for business users. Most businesses, even if they are pirating software, don't want garbage (or even unused software) on their computers.
Because if enough of us get pissed we'll organize the equivalent of a pitch fork and torch protest of their organization and shut them down once and for all.
"The only use I've ever had for the business software alliance is to report a bad employer to them, and get 'paid' for the tip."
How much money? That could be worth keeping in mind as a vengeance option. :)
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
I read about the way the BSA makes their numbers:
they ESTIMATE "how much software" a usual PC needs and compare that number to how much software was sold... so using free software or freeware or sticking with old versions is considered "piracy"...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Software_Alliance#BSA_annual_software_piracy_study
The MAFIAA is a bunch of mindless jerks who will be the first up against the wall when the revolution comes
Disclaimer: As a software engineer I absolutely in no way shape or form support software piracy.
I have serious issues with studies like this which indicate that "lost tax revenue" could do this or that for the population. Where do these groups think the money is coming from? The taxpayers would be the ones coughing that cash up, and in an economy like this there's no more cash to cough up.
Don't compare things to real dollars unless you can prove there is a market willing to pay those real dollars!
Is slashdot doing a joint story with the Daily WTF today?
"We are Microsoft. You shall be assimilated. Competition is futile."
I know there are tens of thousands of computers hosting websites all over the world that, likewise, are running dozens of 100% free programs.
According to groups like the "don't copy that floppy" BSA, there is no such thing as free software.
"We are Microsoft. You shall be assimilated. Competition is futile."
Nice of them to offer to fund 25,000 police salaries with the money they'll make when pirating is snuffed out.
this is not a sig
It depends on the amount of piracy involved, they pay you based on what they get from the company you rat out.
Can we stop playing that stupid starspankled banner at baseball games already? NO ONE FUCKING CARES ABOUT OUR COUNTRY.
Correction: No one cares about baseball *in* our country.
Could have been referring to the long, pointy type...
Normally, when a product is sold in a state with a sales tax, the business doing the selling collects the tax and submits it to the state. Is the BSA actually doing that with the money they collect for pirated copies of commercial software? Inquiring minds want to know.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
...have them walk face-first into a claymore.
Welcome to Florida, where I can lawfully defend my home and private business with lethal force!
The stabby stabby kind, or the explody kind? I always think of the second type when I read claymore, but I'm guessing that one would be illegal to have around your home or private business.
It's about time we were first in something good!
You do the recovering. Of the body. Pirates only die in a few ways.
For instance, being made to walk a short platform into the unforgiving sea. Or being killed near the edge of something, and fall over a railing into the ocean. Washed overboard by a wave. Left for dead in a raft (though this usually results in washing ashore at the most opportune location possible). And several others I've forgotten. Also, rum-poisoning.
Anyway, you want to recover the body quickly because of the speed at which it becomes all decayed and eaten, and barely recognizable.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
"narc"? "rat"? "snitch"?
Are you the kind of person who calls policemen "pigs" and think that people who help policeman against criminals are "snitches"? That it is good to cover the crimes of friends?
And you talk about moral?
Wow...
To me, a "narc," "rat" or "snitch" is someone who gets caught at something, so he rats out others who were doing the same thing as he was so he can get off lightly, thus profiting from whatever he was doing wrong, then further serving his own interests at the expense of others by ratting them out.
This case is different. The above-mentioned douche bag set up his former employer and profited from it, while his co-workers - who had nothing to do with his pay dispute - were effectively screwed in the process.
So, yeah, I'd go along with rat, and any number of other epithets.
I had never looked at the Wiki article for the "explody kind" before. It gave me warm fuzzies to learn that a guy named MacLeod invented and named the Claymore mine.
These words are used by criminals to label people who cooperate with policemen. And are you seriously suggesting it is wrong to cooperate with the police? A specific case: if Joe is caught by the police and he knows that John and Bob are drug dealers, are you seriously saying that Joe should not talk to the police about them?
Again, wow...
Did he say he set them up?
I personally think that calling someone a "rat" or "snitch" as you call it is the stupid thing. I am pretty sure that my current employer has about 1/4 th of the working force covered with licenses. Some licenses are just bought and put on a company image. If I would go to my boss, my career would end. If I would report on some software they would figure out who I am and my career would end.
So if I go away, you can be sure I'll anonymously report him, for the sake of all the honest programmers out there.
Calling someone a snitch is a simple negative reaction by somebody that does bad and doesn't want to be hold responsive for it. As long as the actual society isn't rotten, reporting crime should not be called ratting or snitching. It becomes different when there is a clear difference in "class" between the reporting party and the enforcer, or when the crime is relatively small in proportion to the punishment. Or, of course, when you do it for profit as the grand parent does.
But there would be a hell of a lot more justice when there would be more ratting and snitching in the sense that a bully or a rich company "gets it". This is why rich company snitching is called whistle blowing. Sound a lot better, doesn't it?
No. He is a criminal. But we would be a worse criminal if he did not cooperate with the police.
Their *criminal* friends. Those who will commit more crimes if not arrested.
Of course.
The 30 pieces of silver concept refers to Judas Iscariot, who *betrayed* Jesus. Not "ratted".
Traitor: One who violates trust. Word has positive connotations on those who are betrayed: it is assumed that they were doing nothing wrong, and should not be persecuted for their actions. It is immoral to betray.
Rat: One who cooperates with the authorities, reporting that his (criminal) friends were committing a crime - when they were indeed committing a crime! Word has criminal connotations on who uses it: it assumes that those who were "ratted" were committing crimes, but they should not be arrested by the police, because their crime is nobody's business, and "the pigs" should "stay out of our way".
So:
A policeman who gives classified information to drug dealers, is a traitor. His action is immoral.
A drug dealer who cooperate with the police gets called a rat by other drug dealers. His action is moral (the cooperation - not his previous crimes), but as it is not in the interest of the drug dealers, it is "criminally immoral" - that is, it is immoral in the distorted morality of the criminals.
The funny thing is, every company I have seen with a corporate license (especially MS) purchases Dell's or HP's that already come with the licenses.
This is a reason why you used to find OEM licenses for sale all over the place. It would seem that the 70% savings would be offset or negated quite a bit by that.
The funny thing is, every company I have seen with a corporate license (especially MS) purchases Dell's or HP's that already come with the licenses.
This is a reason why you used to find OEM licenses for sale all over the place. It would seem that the 70% savings would be offset or negated quite a bit by that.
Then I can only assume you haven't looked at the terms of the licenses very closely.
The corporate Windows site licenses are "upgrade only" - you can't use them against PCs which don't ship with OEM Windows.
Similarly, the licensing terms of OEM versions of Windows explicitly forbid using one as the base of an image for mass deployment (unless, presumably, you are the OEM).
Oh yes, one thing I almost forgot. It is commonplace to find that the OEM builds aren't actually terribly good. Think "wireless drivers which supply their own GUI which remove much of the functionality of the native Windows GUI", think "network drivers which sort-of work and sort-of don't", think "just as much crapware as the consumer line". I have on my task list a bunch of now-complete issues which all stemmed from "relying on the OEM windows build". As soon as we started using our own build, 90% of these issues evaporated.
But did you work at making those numbers a reality? The rat in question did. He put his employer in that light then falsely assured him that everything was OK.
That wouldn't put you into the same catagory as this guy. Reporting something you know is wrong is one thing. Waiting until your in a position not to be financially or physically harmed to do so is a variation of that same thing. Morals and circumstances can dictate that pretty easily. But, if your only reporting something to settle a grudge, or if you worked at putting the situation in place, then you would be a rat too.
From what you have mentioned so far, you wouldn't be one.
A snitch is someone right in there with you who commits the crime or act and then tells on you to save their own skin or somehow profit. If your association to the incident is incidental to something else, like witnessing a murder or something, then you aren't the snitch/rat whatever. If however, you loaded the gun, handed it to the shooter and drove the getaway vehicle, your a snitch.
You see, you pretty much have to be involved and benefiting somehow. Drug dealer snitches usually snitch to get rid of their competition.
Actually, whistle blowing is separate. It is when you aren't doing anything wrong and end up telling on someone who is. It really is no difference then witnessing a crime or reporting some violations or something. Ratting and snitching imply complicity which simply wouldn't be the case with whistle blowing. And if a company forced the whistle blower to do whatever is wrong that they are blowing about, the whistle blower protection laws usually won't shield them from that wrong doing.
in my country, one in five pieces of software is licensed. oh wait, i think it's one in hundreds. ehm.. okay, i don't know, never saw any licensed one.
S.S.D.D
I think your confusing the licenses from the software assurance program with site licenses from open value and similar programs. In fact, the open value licenses give or come with a PUR agreement that allows the use of any of the covered products on any machine.
I had to check with a site I was dealing with today, their licensing is the way I described so I called our MS rep and he assured me that we had a site license that would include custom builds as long as we didn't go over out "limit". Now typically, what happens is that a site will license 100 or so copies of something, then when a computer dies, instead of building one and imaging it, they buy a Dell or something with an OEM version already there. You can buy OEM licesnes through your site license channel i your adding but that typically doesn't happen because of limitations with logistics in larger operations. For a fresh start up or a company wide upgrade, it might also be beneficial.
Right.
I have seen the same problems. I also find that getting people off the blue E eliminates a lot of issues too. Typically, it is impossible to do this because of third party dependencies so we generally lock it down and tell users to use Firefox for personal browsing and threaten deducting the repair bill from their salary if a problem results from them using IE for anything other then Specific work tasks.
Of course I have a few sites where a partner of owner must have AOL installed. They then think they can fix any problem with the AOL fix tool which usually ends up screwing things up worse. I had this happen just the other day where AOL told the user that they needed a firewall installed and he ended up with two separate anti virus programs locking the computer up randomly, a software firewall, and no access to any network resources that weren't specifically mapped using windows.
I think your confusing the licenses from the software assurance program with site licenses from open value and similar programs. In fact, the open value licenses give or come with a PUR agreement that allows the use of any of the covered products on any machine.
I had to check with a site I was dealing with today, their licensing is the way I described so I called our MS rep and he assured me that we had a site license that would include custom builds as long as we didn't go over out "limit".
I can only assume that we are in different regions and the license varies by region.
Page 54 on the Microsoft Volume Licensing Reference Guide:
http://download.microsoft.com/download/a/7/0/a70853c1-a783-4d48-a7ad-f404abdb1e7d/Microsoft_Volume_Licensing_Reference_Guide.pdf
states:
"In Volume Licensing, the desktop PC operating system is an "upgrade license". You may only upgrade devices for which you have already licensed a "qualifying operating system". A list of "qualifying operating systems that qualify for an upgrade is contained in the Product List, which can be found at .... If you acquire software assurance, you have the right to use "Windows Vista Enterprise Edition" on the device instead of Windows Vista Business. This also permits you to run up to four additional copies or instances on the device".
Like I said, I think you are confusing the software assurance program with the open and site licensing programs. The software assurance used to be separate but now it comes with the site licenses and open licenses except they don't apply to some OEM software.. You can however, get the software assurance separately. Or at least you could in the past.
The software assurance is a program that does what you mention, it give an upgrade path to ensure that your software purchases aren't outdated during the useful life to you. A site and open licenses cover any use of specified products company wide (and beyond in some cases) They cover the OS, server products, CALs, office, and any other product specified in the agreements. You build a configuration and each product lists points and after certain levels, you get a certain discount for that software. But if you have a site license for 15 OSes and 15 office programs, it doesn't matter which computers they are on as long as the company owns or controls them.
Like I said, I think you are confusing the software assurance program with the open and site licensing programs. The software assurance used to be separate but now it comes with the site licenses and open licenses except they don't apply to some OEM software.. You can however, get the software assurance separately. Or at least you could in the past.
The software assurance is a program that does what you mention, it give an upgrade path to ensure that your software purchases aren't outdated during the useful life to you. A site and open licenses cover any use of specified products company wide (and beyond in some cases) They cover the OS, server products, CALs, office, and any other product specified in the agreements. You build a configuration and each product lists points and after certain levels, you get a certain discount for that software. But if you have a site license for 15 OSes and 15 office programs, it doesn't matter which computers they are on as long as the company owns or controls them.
I know what the various bits of licensing are; the PDF states that operating systems are available through the volume licensing schemes only as upgrades (in other words: it's equivalent to the "Windows XP Upgrade Edition" box you can get from a retail store which is cheaper than the "Full version" box but you're only allowed to use on a system which already has an older version of Windows on).
Software Assurance is just an add-on to the license scheme that allows you to upgrade from the version you originally licensed if/when a new version is released. Sucks to be you if they don't release an upgrade during the course of the license agreement.
This isn't just my understanding; I've confirmed it with account managers from a number of Microsoft resellers in the UK on a couple of occasions.
There must be something different with the agreements I have experience with. Our MS rep specifically told me that building systems to replace systems taken down was acceptable. The document you provided does say "Upgrade" But I'm able to use older versions of the software (like windows XP instead of Vista and even 98) and activate them all without any issue. All my media came with the product packs they give when we renew the program. It is this way at three separate sites. Unless this is a regional thing (the PDF you listed didn't show anything indicating it was), or we have some other program in place, I'm not sure why we are different.
Actually, this was a problem with the windows XP release. There was such a lag behind Vista that a lot of people who purchased a 3 years agreement in 2003 didn't have any upgraded programs to benefit from. Office didn't release a new version until office 2007 and vista wasn't available until the end of 2006 with similar time lines on the server products.
Like I said, I confirmed it with our account rep. I don't have access to our actual license program and documentation as they are put up for upper management to drool over but I have access to the MS account rep who sold it to us. I'm going back in in a day or so and I will call and asked him again and point to this thread for clarity.