Software Piracy At the Beijing Branch Office?

spirit_fingers writes "I'm the IT manager for a west coast design company that has a small branch office in Beijing with 5 employees, a few workstations and a couple of servers. Recently, it came to my attention that the Beijing office has been routinely installing and using pirated software on their computers — MS Office and Adobe Creative Suite, mostly. We're very buttoned up about being legal with our software here at the home office, and I consider it unprofessional and risky for our Beijing office to be engaging in this practice. When I called the local office manager on this, he shrugged and replied, 'Well, every other shop here does it.' So I was wondering if there are any IT manager Slashdotters here in the the US who may have experienced something similar with their colleagues in APAC, and how they handle a situation like this." Click the link for more of this reader's thoughts on the subject.
Up until now, the powers that be here in the States have had a relatively laissez faire attitude about what goes on at the Beijing office and our accounting department hadn't noticed that Beijing never submitted receipts for software, until I questioned them about it.

I have no doubt that "everyone else does it" in that environment. Frankly, I could care less what those guys do with their personal computers, but when it comes to company-owned gear my attitude is to stay legal no matter what anyone else is doing. And it's not like they need to do it to save money: the Beijing branch turns a tidy profit. It just seems to be an attitude so firmly ingrained in the culture over there that no one gives it a second thought.

My response (CC'd to our CFO) was to ask for copies of all receipts and serial numbers for the software they're using. and see what happens. This came down today, so I'll give them a day or two to come up with something.

Comments

He's Right

[Anonymous Coward]

EVERYONE in China massively pirates all software.

Seriously, the company I work for has facilities in China and everything we don't specifically buy and install is pirated over there.

Re:He's Right

[Anonymous Coward]

This is about more than just pirated software. Depending on where the Beijing office got the software, it could be carrying a malware payload that handed over back doors to all of their computers.

China is well known for using corporate (and other) espionage to further their political agenda. Hooking into company systems to exfiltrate any possibly valuable data is far too common.

I would consider the computer security risk to be far more of an issue than just not having proper licenses.

I know it's easy to say this from the outside, but if their Beijing office routinely pirates software, everything about this company's IT security posture seems very out of control.

The OP might as well post logins and passwords on the Internet. It sounds like an extreme analogy, but the reality is that their Beijing computers are probably compromised - possibly multiple times - and any data has probably been examined and pilfered.

Re:He's Right

[Uber Banker]

EVERYONE in China massively pirates all software.

Not everyone does it, as well as being illegal it's a big reputational risk. Living in China I find it quite fascinating seeing the differences large international companies, small international/foreign companies, and large/small local companies work. This topic is an example of such.

[Cue Slashdot car analogy.] Large international corporations often do not let their senior foreign staff own a car, even if such staff state a preference to do so. A rented car and driver are cheap. The risk to the reputation of the company (and international companies often hire on their reputation for being well backed financially, esp. in white collar sectors) should a senior staff member have a well publicised accident are sufficiently high to cause this behaviour. Many more examples exist.

Aside from other concerns like IT security, backdoors in commonly pirated software, lack of availability of software updates, the reputation with the OP's customers is at risk. Perhaps that is how the home office could be persuaded to put some force on the foreign office.

Outsourcing brings with it cost cutting - legal software may appear highly expensive to the overseas office. It MAY BE THE CASE that the manager of the overseas office is pocketing the money, or will pocket the money if legal software is demanded, and providing fake receipts. This is not unusual. The home office should audit all software. China provides an environment where QQ (a hugely popular instant messaging program) or other software may be installed on machines and local IT/security staff have lower standards than that of the home office. Again, an audit and remote administration should be mandatory.

I would point out that this case is not unique to China, all developing economies share work and cultural environments which may surprise, disorientate or confuse the home country office. A professional consultancy* can often be hired at good rates to ensure best practice is maintained in any developing or unfamiliar situation, helping to avoid potentially costly mistakes and lapses in judgement.

*I run such a company but I'm not going to astroturf. Slashdot is for my fun time.

Re:He's Right

[1u3hr]

... backdoors in commonly pirated software,

Bollocks. Never seen it, or heard of it, except from software vendors trying to scare people. And I live in Hong Kong and have seen a fair sample of pirated software. Pirates are actually pretty good at customer service, most give full refund or exchange on demand. They have no interest in selling infected software, it would just rebound on them. Can't say it never happens, but there has been plenty of infected factory fresh legal software. The risk is not larger, in my experience.

Re:He's Right

[Anonymous Coward]

"Bollocks. Never seen it, or heard of it, except from software vendors trying to scare people."

Many people had never seen a banana a few hundred years ago. They still existed. I've been to Hong Kong, and I've been to China. World apart, literally worlds apart, my friend.

Re:He's Right

[alexandre_ganso]

When you say unfair to usa, you forget that those pirated softwares are exported using US prices, being charged to india/china/russia/brazil salaries.

A single copy of a software may cost as much as one year of an employee's salary there.

Re:He's Right

[julian67]

You're confusing the people who sell the stuff on the street/malls/markets with the people who crack the software and to some extent with the people who manufacture it. You're also making a mistake in assuming a modified binary in a software installer is something that an anti-virus/anti-malware program can necessarily detect. I've seen "clean" installs from commonly used and sold XP CD (in SE Asia) which contain keyloggers and so on from minute one. They were undetectable from the running machine but could be found by scanning from read only media such as live CD. The best way to get a rootkit onto many, many people's PCs is to have them install it along with the OS, or have the local PC retail industry helpfully do the work for you when they clone the pirated OS onto the newly purchased (without OS) PC using their cracked copy of Norton Ghost....and the distribution network of human vendors is efficient, motivated (profit), looks after its customers and broadly trusted. Perfect and beautiful! You pay now, wait 5 minutes.

Re:He's Right

[c6gunner]

You could say the same about lots of things. Oil, for one. Or gold.

Not THAT horrible old analogy again!

What you're saying is that if you can't afford something, it's OK to steal it.

No - what he's saying is that if you can't afford something, it's ok to copy it. Now, you're free to disagree with that and in many cases I might even agree with you, but there's no reason to misrepresent the other side of the argument. You CAN NOT compare physical resources to information because information, once created, is an infinite resource, whereas physical resources will always be finite.

Re:He's Right

[Anonymous Coward]

What you're saying is that if you can't afford something, it's OK to steal it.

No. Copyright violation is not theft.

Re:He's Right

[alexandre_ganso]

No I'm not. Let me quote it again:

Outsourcing is just another commodity in this "Free Trade" world that is unfair to the USA. How can USA companies and their employees compete with people who steal?

Mind you that realities are different. The cost of pretty much everything in a place like the aforementioned places is way lower, being the salaries lower as well. That's why good food seems almost free for a 1st world tourist in those places.

But this reality is not passed to software. American companies outsource jobs to those places exactly because they're cheaper, but charge their software the same.

When I was a grad student there, I couldn't afford even the educational prices for an office license. So I tried to convince my teachers to accept the broken .docs that openoffice 1.x did at that time with little success. I eventually had to pirate it myself.

Now I can afford iWork (and a mac anyway), but that's because I live in europe. I would pretty much doing the same thing if I was there, because I need to, not that I want to.

Re:He's Right

[julian67]

You're still confusing the street vendors with the people who make the warez (the cracked software *not* the physical CD). For example: "where there is a motive for the supplier to add "evil bits" even if it only earns him a few cents a ....." It isn't the guy making a few cents selling physical media who adds anything (except a few scratches ha ha). Reputations: assume someone spends the whole $2 and buys XP Pro and installs it. Next step? Install a bunch of other stuff too, some from similar warez CDs, some from p2p, some from warez ftp. Now tell me how anyone who *even notices there is a rootkit(!!!)* can determine its origin? Street vendor reputation unaffected, in fact not really even relevant. I like the idea of "a reputation system the non-braindead use to check out quality and safety" because the idea contains the paradox of supposedly intelligent people trusting all their IT security to street vendors and unknown warez producers. Sweet! p.s. a rootkit is by definition very hard to detect ;-) p.p.s. claiming that something doesn't happen because you haven't noticed it, and demonstrating neither the ability nor the will to notice it, is not a powerful argument. Even if you say bollocks. Seems to me that Brits writing "Bollocks" at the start of a (usually flawed) assertion equates to Americans writing "Period" at the end of one. Neither is as impressively convincing as the author always believes :-)

Re:He's Right

[wisty]

Why shouldn't they use imported technologies however they see fit? It's not like they are stealing anything.

Re:He's Right

[renoX]

Even if you activate the firewall before connecting to Internet?
I doubt it.. My memory is fuzzy but I think that even original Windows XP had a firewall, but it was disabled by default (which was quite dumb or evil depending on how you look at it).

Re:He's Right

[robthebloke]

nLite & vLite my friend. Not only can you remain legal, but you get a much better set of options that with your pirated CD. It can even do hands free installs so that next time someone has a problem, then can just re-do the whole thing themselves.....

Re:He's Right

[commodore64_love]

>>> It's not like they are stealing anything.

I love how you took slashdotters' favorite argument and turned it against them. There does seem to be a double standard here ("I can download all the music I want! Information should be feee!") ("No, no, pirating software is bad.").

  Could ye at least try for some *consistency* in your views? I download stuff, and I freely admit that it's wrong. I'm a thief stealing from the corporate thieves who stole 1500 billion from the U.S. Treasury. I don't deny it.

Re:He's Right

[commodore64_love]

>>>there has been plenty of infected factory fresh legal software

Like Windows XP. Everytime I have to reinstall XP, I'm faced with this annoying virus that gives me a "Something service has ended. Automatic shutdown in 1 minute."

Re:He's Right

[julian67]

Basically, on the whole, people who use prostitutes are a lot more aware of the "dark side" and take more precautions than upright citizens. And they never get the clap or have their wallet stolen. Basically, on the whole, people who use badly maintained electrical goods are a lot more aware of the "dark side" and take more precautions than upright citizens. And they never get a shock or have their house burn down. Basically, on the whole, people who use heroin are a lot more aware of the "dark side" and take more precautions than upright citizens. And they never OD, get a bad batch, get sick or die. Basically, on the whole, people who use illegally modified cars are a lot more aware of the "dark side" and take more precautions than upright citizens. And they never break down or crash. (Compulsory car analogy, offered as part of the /. car analogy quota target program). I think I spotted a flaw in your reasoning. It's obvious to everyone that if you can't detect malware by using cracked "security" tools on a cracked OS then there simply isn't any malware there to find. Obvious and simple too! Duh. Anyway carry on with your warez. Trust all your data to the goodwill and competence of the warez scene. Believe that if you can't understand or perceive something then it can't exist. And good luck.

Re:He's Right

[ScrewMaster]

Yes copyright infringement is theft of labor. It's no different from if you hired an employee to mow your grass, and then you refused to pay them.

Actually ... no it's not. At least, not in the U.S. What one feels (according to one's own personal moral code) and what copyright law says are often two very different matters.

Guess which one trumps the other in court.

Re:He's Right

[MrZaius]

This is about more than just pirated software. Depending on where the Beijing office got the software, it could be carrying a malware payload that handed over back doors to all of their computers. China is well known for using corporate (and other) espionage to further their political agenda. Hooking into company systems to exfiltrate any possibly valuable data is far too common.

Quite right. Given my druthers, the first and most important thing I'd do is strip them of any and all administrative rights and, most importantly, re-Ghost the boxes nightly or run them as thin clients. The security situation is so poor in-country that you shouldn't even consider letting the local staff manage their own stuff if we're talking about such a tiny little office. Five guys wouldn't warrant a separate sysadmin in the states, and it still doesn't abroad when you've seen malfeasance on this level and are operating in a country with a massive corporate espionage problem. Again I say, strip them of their rights.

Make sure you have a couple of spare, online, patched workstations ready to go for when one fails 'cause you don't want them to have to have local admin rights. Grab yourself an IP-KVM, too and make sure you have two ISPs running into the office, even if the second is just some dinky little 256kbps line. That'll give you the capability of having them jack a KVM-enabled computer into a switch or firewall for diagnostic purposes if one of the two networks goes down and you can't remote into those devices. Likewise, it'll give you the capability of taking a peak at a bad NIC prior to having them swap a workstation out for one of the spares. Having Ghost on the network or something like it would be useful at that time to allow you to replace the no-longer-spare equipment you've had to have them put into use.

If I could get approval to do so, I might also lock down their workstation's USB ports and optical media to the point of uselessness and drop a monitor-less *NIX box with good AV software somewhere in the office with a ton of USB ports and DVD-ROM drives to remotely scan and introduce anything they think they might need onto the network myself. This should, of course, also be paired with an HTTP proxy that blocks any sort of executable code beyond the stuff that's used to render a normal webpage from coming in. I'd then set up MAC address whitelisting on all networks, wired and wireless. This would be a PITA, but it would give you an extremely high level of control over the network there, going far beyond what you have now, and limiting any practical attack vectors to hardware based attacks (keyloggers) and viral attacks embedded in flash apps, PDFs, etc. I don't think I'd bother with this step back home, but it seems worth it in China. Of course, this carries with it some rather dramatic drawbacks if your "design" shop is doing software engineering, and probably shouldn't be considered. Seems perfectly reasonable if we're just talking about artists or a bunch of people running AutoCAD.

Protecting your proprietary knowledge is probably well worth the level of hassle you'd be subjecting everyone to, yourself included, by doing the above.

Re:He's Right

[Dan East]

How can you feel sorry for the Chinese, when they have been manipulating their currency to keep the value artificially low? That's the whole point. If the value of their currency is low, they can't afford to buy stuff from foreign countries, thus they keep a massive export to import ratio.

Maybe if more enforcement was done to prevent such rampant copyright violation then they would have a little incentive to achieve a better trade / currency balance.

Re:He's Right

[cpct0]

EVERYONE in China massively pirates all software.

Seriously, the company I work for has facilities in China and everything we don't specifically buy and install is pirated over there.

I will have to agree with you. My friend has a company branch there, and at first, all computers came with all illegal software, although the invoices were saying it came with Windows, it was a pirated version that couldn't even software update (talk about a bad hack :) ).

My friend had to go to the store, ask for "real" Windows, he got told multiple times it was real, it's not a copy, no one here never sold any "official and legal" Windows. They finally agreed to (get this) order 5 copies, that took 2 weeks to receive, and finally he got his real Windows.

That's the tip of the iceberg. Untold hardware changes ("But I asked for this", "this is the same" or "this is better"), specific requests for legal versions getting preinstalled cracked versions, and so on.

You know what, we're frowning today at this practice, but in Windows 3.1 times, it was always like this in here too, and that's not too far away. When you purchased a computer, you seldom had any official version of your software. Everyone I knew had some Autocad version dangling around (why, I dunno!), and the hardware was (and sometimes still is) a black box of arcane things.

Re:He's Right

[v1]

Yes copyright infringement is theft of labor. It's no different from if you hired an employee to mow your grass, and then you refused to pay them.

There are more than two things happening. You are seeing the fruits of the labor, and the money changing hands. You're overlooking the work your neighbor put in to mow your lawn. The difference with software is it's not like mowing a lawn. With lawn mowing, every x units of work you invest get you paid for x units. If you mow 2x lawns you get paid 2x. There is always a 1:1 investment, and anyone that fails to pay you directly impacts you, in two ways. One, you worked, and two you missed an opportunity to work for someone else (lost a sale) because you were busy mowing the deadbeat's lawn and couldn't mow the other guy's lawn that would have paid you.

Software development is a whole different business model. You invest y units with development and marketing, and then you sell x units and get paid x. If you sell 3x units, you get paid 3x. Once you've spent y, changes in x have no affect on y. You can increase your x beforehand by pouring more money into y with continued marketing and development, but it's nowhere near a 1:1 relationship. If somewhere along the line you sell another 1x units and don't see the payment of 1x, it doesn't even appear on the books so to speak. It's "icing on the cake".

Theft is usually described as depriving someone of their property or failure to compensate them for their labor done for you. (often referred to as "theft of property or services") We can clearly see no deprivation of property, so the question is one of labor. How much labor did we fail to compensate you for by copying that application? (how much additional work did I just cost you by copying the application instead of buying it?) None.

If you don't pay your neighbor for mowing, he's wasted his time when he could be mowing someone else's lawn and getting paid for it, or he could be doing some other work, or he could be relaxing. You've clearly affected him. But if this morning I install this single license on a second computer over to the right, I haven't affected Adobe in any way this morning.

The only way to justify it is to say that if I hadn't copied the app, I would have bought it. OK that could be viewed as theft of a sale. But that always has to assume I would have bought it. While sometimes this assumption is true, often times it's not. We see that a lot with copying music. When I see someone with 350 albums of music on their 1T hard drive, do I really think they would have bought 350 CDs if they hadn't been able to download them? Isn't that just a little bit ridiculous? I'm not denying the possibility, but it's nowhere the scope imagined. That same person may have bought a dozen or two dozen CDs or more even, but not 350. Software I'd expect to be much the same.

So there are two important differences - copying doesn't have the same direct impact to the vendor as theft, and copying does not necessarily imply a lost sale.

Re:He's Right

[hesiod]

Could ye at least try for some *consistency* in your views?

In case you hadn't noticed, there are more than two people on Slashdot (or so I'm told) which means there are different views that come up, and consistency across the board is nigh on impossible. It everyone's views were consistent with each other, it would be incredibly boring.

Re:He's Right

[hesiod]

Well, if anyone had mentioned anything about a keylogger, we might be inclined to believe you had some fucking clue what was going on. But since he was talking about patching windows before being compromised from the Internet, a firewall is exactly the right thing to bring up.

Re:He's Right

[FatdogHaiku]

You CAN NOT compare physical resources to information because information, once created, is an infinite resource, whereas physical resources will always be finite.

The ability to replicate something infinity does take value away from it. AutoCAD is expensive because of the time spent building, integrating, and maintaining an awesomely powerful set of tools. By copying it, the value of the tool is reduced for the people that put the work and money into making it what it is. And I don't have a problem with those creators deciding how abundant or scarce their work is through pricing, that is an artist's (or any other creators) right... including programmers and companies that hire them to produce software.

Re:He's Right

[VendettaMF]

Ha.
HaHaHa.

Three hours, three hours tops. That's how long your locked down machines would last before they were wiped clean and reinstalled from whatever cracked windows media they prefer. Including your fancy-schmancy-linux scanner system. It'd be running xp, vista or windows 7 RC1 before you reached the airport.

This is China. The rules are different here. For starters, law is irrelevant. All laws. All the time. Cold-blooded pre-planned murder is a debatable situation here depending on who you know. The only actually arrestable offense is annoying a police officer or someone with a hold over police officers.

Re:He's Right

[makapuf]

are photoshop, SQL server, office and windows 7b1 "a true necessity" ? Even when linux/gimp/OO.org do exist (not are completely equal, but do exist) ?

Food or shelter is something different here, and of course "it's OK" can be taken from the law or morals.

Re:He's Right

[wintermute000]

Your advice will turn the OP's working life into a living hell. Most likely relations with the China team will go to ---- and he will only be able to make a small dent anyway.

Enforcing by fiat from several thousand miles away.... geeze I wonder how that's going to look to the Chinese staff.

Classic case of culture mismatch + geek 'how dare they trespass my domain' indignation = epic fail

The ethics aside, doing the above will surely fail and not have any impact on anything, leaving no traces. That in itself is a reason not to do so.

There's plenty of other posts here that may educate the frustrated petty bureaucrat in you so I won't even bother trying to explain how incredibly arrogant and condescending you come across as

Re:He's Right

[jridley]

Heck, there's a clone builder a few miles from where I work (in Michigan, in the US) that used to (10 years ago) load up EVERY machine that they sold with pirated Windows and tons of software (games, Office, etc). You got a 20 GB hard drive on it (this was a while ago) it was half full of pirated stuff.

I helped a friend spec a machine there, and we told them that we needed legal copies of Windows, Office, and one or two other things, and we did NOT want any other software on the machine. It took them a week to get the software (they didn't have a SINGLE legal copy of Windows or Office in the building!) and they totally screwed up the install, because they normally just Ghosted in the OS (with a pirated copy of Ghost I'm sure) with all the pirated crap on it, and they weren't used to doing bare-bones installs on fresh machines. I wound up having to reinstall everything myself.

This was a place that sold a few thousand PCs a year, with a storefront, in the US. And they did it for years, and I never heard of them getting in any trouble over it.

Re:He's Right

[Rich0]

There can be a lot of politics and cultural issues involved here.

I've known people sent to foreign plants with a mandate to institute some change, and they've made changes to the plant design only to come in the next day to find those changes reversed. The changes were made again (with managers nodding the whole time) and again the changes would be reversed overnight. Said changes involved welding pipes and adding hardware and stuff like that (this was a chemical plant). It was apparently something to behold. In this case the cultural issue was that "yes" meant "yes, I understand" and not "yes, I agree." Having traveled a little to asia on business myself I've encountered similar situations (not to this extent).

Rarely will company senior management step in on something like this, unless there is a real cost to the company involved. They just care that they can say that they're outsourcing x% of their work or whatever the driver is. As long as those Chinese branch workers are selling product or are being paid less or whatever the driver is, the office isn't going to be closed. And if the branch office manager was hired because they're friends with the local party leader then good luck getting rid of him.

Business in China doesn't always work the same as business in the US. The cultures are very different. Sometimes you need to put your foot down, and sometimes you need to decide if a hill is worth dying on...

Let the directors decide.

[GrpA]

Why make the decision yourself?

Send an email to the directors just confirming this is what they wish to do and that they don't want you to take any action on this matter.

Then it's not really your problem anymore.

Passing the buck works both ways :)

GrpA

Re:Let the directors decide.

[p0tat03]

If you want something to happen, try reporting the situation to the Beijing branch manager, and CC a higher-up of appropriate stature at the home office.

Speaking as a Chinese, and having much dealings with my kind, I can say that Chinese people will shit a brick when it comes to potentially pissing off a higher-up in the States.

Re:Let the directors decide.

[Corbets]

One could (and I would) argue the ethics of allowing someone else to decide whether an immoral or illegal act should continue. "Passing the buck" is for cowards, no matter the direction; I think this fella is doing the right thing in trying to solve the problem.

Besides which, proof that the directors of a company want something to happen is not absolution of your complicity. Suppose you know someone was cooking the books; do you suppose an email from the directors saying "it's ok" would be enough to absolve you when the IRS came in?

My 2 cents, at any rate.

Re:Let the directors decide.

[QuasiEvil]

Okay, I'll argue those ethics.

IT guy probably doesn't have the power to force the Beijing branch to do anything. His responsibility is to make sure that his superiors, who do have the power as well as the responsibility, are informed about the situation. The corporation is their charge, and if they fail to act, it's the corporation that will incur the risk.

It'd be a whole different issue to me if the company was doing something that endangered people. In this situation, though, it's merely a calculated economic risk of decreased costs vs. the cost of getting caught.

Re:Let the directors decide.

[calmofthestorm]

It's not necessarily a moral matter. That's debatable. What it is, is a business matter. And if you're not authorized to make decisions about that business matter, it's fine to pass the buck to those who are.

Re:Let the directors decide.

[djupedal]

The IT guy could always play the role of whistleblower...give you one guess where that leads.

I've spent years working around Asia and found the same thing, time and time again. Cracked software sits on servers and everyone helps themselves. Unless compliance officer is one of your titles, best tack is to stick to your specific job description.

I worked at one company that seemed puzzled why I didn't bring my own copies - turned out they didn't have any English versions. You'd be surprised how quickly you get used to software that isn't in your own language.

Re:Let the directors decide.

[DreamsAreOkToo]

First things first,

Make sure, that under no circumstances, that you post your situation to a popular internet site. That way you can be sure not to draw attention to your circumstances from the people who might investigate... ...oh wait one minute.

Re:Let the directors decide.

[jamesh]

"Passing the buck" is for cowards, no matter the direction

I think the idea of "passing the buck" wasn't as cowardly as you make out.

If you ask a superior verbally, and they say "we don't care and are happy for this to continue", then if the shit hits the fan they will plead ignorance.

If you ask the superior to put it in writing that they are aware of the situation and are happy for it to continue, then the chances are higher that something will be done. It's not just passing the buck.

cc'ing _their_ superior in the 'please confirm' email may get more response still, but may be a career limiting move.

Re:Let the directors decide.

[horza]

It's not a good analogy as homicide is a criminal offense and software piracy a civil offense. If you witness a homicide then you are under a legal obligation to report that directly to the police. If you see a fellow employee using a pirate copy of Photoshop you are not legally required to go to the police station and file a report on behalf of Adobe.

In this case it seems passing the buck is the best thing to do. He's obviously not authorised to pay for authentic copies otherwise he would have done so. The people that are able have no desire to do so. All he can do is protect his reputation should there be an investigation, which is to show he competently audited the software under his jurisdiction and informed the people above of any missing licenses.

Phillip.

Re:Let the directors decide.

[robthebloke]

We get more support requests for our software from China than from any other country - and we've never sold a single license there.

If the people using the software have no qualms in contacting the developers directly, then it seems to be a fairly entrenched problem that's going to take an awful lot to stamp out. Whilst talking about this topic many people may think 'windows+office' the fact is that piracy is affecting every developer large and small (and I work for a small one). I applaud anyone who takes an interest in stamping the problem out at their office, though unfortunately it's not going anyway anytime soon...

Re:Let the directors decide.

[robthebloke]

I work for a small software company, we do not provide software to dictators, and we do not undertake any business that could even remotely be called immoral - and as a company we are heavily affected by piracy in China (where we have never sold a single license, and we receive continual support requests).

Piracy doesn't just affect Microsoft and other multi-mationals, it affects every software single developer, big and small, working in every single corner of the world. You seem to be implying that it's OK to pick and choose which products you pirate - and for some reason you assume that you can be Judge, Jury and executioner when deciding if a company has involved itself in immoral activities - a decision that will be based on suspicion, or on implication (you're big, therefore must be immoral), but at no point would you ever have the full facts.

Re:Let the directors decide.

[Threni]

> It's not a good analogy as homicide is a criminal offense and software piracy a civil offense.

Depends where you are. In the UK, as well as loads of other countries, copyright infringement is a criminal offence.

A few things come to mind

[Dyinobal]

1) you speak to someone who has the power to set things right educting them on the legal risks and possible get a cookie. 2) You do as above but use this as a chance to push open source software, it's free and legal so why not use it? 3) you keep your mouth shut and just hope no one ever tells on the company. 4) blackmail (for money if you want to be simple 5) keep it in mind if they threaten to lay you off due to budget issues. Nothing like having something on the boss (see above) All these are pretty sound options, well save maybe blackmail for cash.

Given it'smostly MS Office and PDF stuff....

[jkrise]

You are better off suggesting Open Office and Free PDF software; rather than fighting piracy.

I used to work at a multi-national company; and I used to be amazed at the amount of self-imposed lock-ins created by IT staff in Western branches (I am based in India). Routine inter office correspondence happens using 'advanced' features in Exchange and Word which work only on the Windows platform. I always felt plain text and HTML suffices for any and all communication requirements.

Re:Given it'smostly MS Office and PDF stuff....

[jkrise]

But I'm curious -- did you actually get that multi-national company to use any open standards, or are they still doing Exchange and Word?

I tried, but failed badly. I was with them from 1996 to 2002; and in late 2000, the MNC entered into an alliance with Microsoft globally, to use Windows and other Microsoft products. Initially I joined them to set up an SGI-based development network on IRIX and OGL; this was disbanded in 2002 and I quit.

My impression is that in many Western economies, the pricing for Microsoft products isn't that big a deal; so people tend to think of it as a problem that will disappear if they can throw some money at it. But on Server products, things got very expensive and complicated with Craptive Directory and Exchange 5.5; so many Directory Service Replication errors, and a nightmare for the sysadmins. It's like a treadmill... we need to keep running (upgrading) but seldom move forward.

Re:Given it'smostly MS Office and PDF stuff....

[lokedhs]

As an interesting side-note, the only time I receieved OpenOffice documents from a client was from an Indian customer.

I have to admit I smiled a bit with joy when that happened. :-)

The company's policy

[tftp]

My response (CC'd to our CFO) was to ask for copies of all receipts and serial numbers for the software they're using. and see what happens.

Can you request that from that branch only, and ask nothing from other branches? I'd think the manager would be seriously upset if you in such an open, unambiguous way declare him a pirate.

A better way, IMO, would be to set up a company-wide policy of keeping track of all software, all licenses and all computers. You need that anyway, just to know what you have, where, and what can be reused, and such. To implement that you, of course, need scans of receipts and licenses, serial numbers, codes or whatever is needed to install and use, along with some notes on what license governs the s/w (such as whether it can be moved from one box to another, etc.) This way when a computer is decommissioned you know what was on it and what can be salvaged. Tools like ManageSoft and HP CM do this, and there are other (free and not.) And when Boy Scouts of America kick the doors in you have all the receipts (that they insist upon!) to prove that you are not guilty, this time.

That assumes that your job makes you responsible for licensing compliance. If not, maybe you should not bother.

Re:The company's policy

[Tuoqui]

Thankfully the BSA cannot 'kick your door down'. Unless they get a warrant and police cooperation simply refuse to let them on your premises. This is in your best interests even if you ARENT engaged in pirating software.

1) Some policies are lax enough that any boob in the company could install an unauthorized copy of . In which case you have licensing violations despite any and all attempts at 'good faith' to keep track of this.

2) The BSA presents a security risk for any small company in the fact that they are not looking out after YOUR INTERESTS but rather those big companies like Microsoft/Adobe/whatever... It could very well be that they engage in corporate espionage and steal your code and/or ideas while they are there.

3) If they do find licensing problems and/or piracy they will insist (blackmail) you into putting some software on your machines that will report all your used software to the BSA. This makes it easier for them to get police cooperation and warrants in the future. This is also a security risk since such stuff is proprietary, you cannot audit the source code and basically makes unauthorized connections to the outside world (they could still steal information from your network this way too).

Set a policy and enforce it

[Matt Perry]

Create a written IT policy for hardware and software. Make sure everyone knows what it is. Create a business ethics policy and ensure that components of it address using unlicensed software. Make sure that your employees are trained on these policies and that a record of training goes into their employee file. If the employees violate the policy, warn them in writing and file the notice in their HR record. If they violate the policy again, fire them. If they want to keep their job, they will fall into line and stop exposing the company to unnecessary legal risk.

Re:Set a policy and enforce it

[MooUK]

That phrase has never made much sense. Apple pie isn't especially american.

why do you care?

[Trepidity]

Unless your job is legal compliance or you own a lot of Microsoft stock, why bother with this?

Re:why do you care?

[daveime]

America != World.

In some developing countries, software piracy is not considered illegal. In Russia, which is not a signatory to the Berne Convention it is legal to copy any software as long as it is not in the Russian language.

So what strawman will you choose next I wonder ?

Re:why do you care?

[sw155kn1f3]

bullshit, it's illegal to copy any copyrighted software in russia.. the only question is will you get punished for doing this or not. this happens because copyright law can be enforced only by owner of such software registered within RU itself. so if say, adobe, has no representation in russian federation, then this just cannot be prosecuted by russian law (no intl treaties, correct, but this can and will change), because law clearly states that only copyright holder can protect their property.
IANAL, but this is how this works in RU.

Re:why do you care?

[cj1127]

That "it's someone else's problem" attitude utterly stinks. My guess is that the guy actually *cares* about the reputation of his company and takes pride in its work, which might be a novel concept to some people. Like it or not, software piracy is illegal; the fact that you have an axe to grind about Microsoft doesn't detract from that

Re:why do you care?

[seifried]

"In Russia, which is not a signatory to the Berne Convention"

Uhhhh. No. That is incorrect.

The Berne Convention also became effective for Russia on March 13, 1995.[51]

Contracting Parties > Berne Convention > Russian Federation > Details

Re:why do you care?

[Jeoh]

These are not the licences you're looking for.

I suppose, when in Rome...

[kkrajewski]

It's not like they're going to be caught and prosecuted. Although if possible, why not go for a FOSS solution? Personally I do tend to try to compensate people who write cool software that I use.

Ocassionally I get emails from Chinese users asking for a serial for one of our products. I asked one if there was not an accessible store from which to purchase it. He responded, basically, yeah, there's a couple, but no one buys software in China, they just download it. So there you have it!

Sadly we're not popular enough for anyone to have made a keygen that I can find.

I'd go the other way, personally

[Trepidity]

I'd say trying to get some people in a third-world country to pay rich American monopolists extra money is an immoral act.

Re:I'd go the other way, personally

[Anonymous Coward]

China is third world? you must be a stupid amelican.

Re:I'd go the other way, personally

[rolfwind]

I'd say trying to get some people in a third-world country to pay rich American monopolists extra money is an immoral act.

Maybe we should stop paying for Chinese goods? Because obviously some factory boss in China is getting rich off of his exploited workers.

Besides, besides Windows it's hard to argue that any software company has an absolute monopoly.

Re:I'd go the other way, personally

[xstonedogx]

Classifying Chinese working for a branch office of an American design company in Beijing as "some people in a third-world country" is more than a bit disingenuous. Also please consider that the money to be spent also belongs to another American corporation (design, so presumably a monopolist as well) not those people in China.

Re:I'd go the other way, personally

[Anonymous Coward]

China is a Capitalist Authoritarian Dictatorship. You know, like the US tried in South America in the 70's/80's.

Re:I'd go the other way, personally

[1u3hr]

Normally I would agree with you, but you do realize that the US has this gigantic trade deficit with China, don't you? Maybe you could be more clear about who is the rich and who is the poor guy here.

List of countries by GDP (PPP) per capita
China, People's Republic of: $5,325, rank: 100
United States: rank: $45,725, rank: 6

Clear enough?

Re:I'd go the other way, personally

[Alex Belits]

You mean, American companies sell Chinese products in US for eight times the price they paid in China?

Re:I'd go the other way, personally

[gtall]

"Maybe we should stop paying for Chinese goods?" Uh, I think we're already doing that. And just to be Democratic about it, we've stopped buying everyone else's as well. You might have noticed the global slowdown and other countries blaming the U.S. They are correct, the U.S. people are officially tapped out, spent, broke, going back to basics and saving their money. And the rest of the world is livid about it.

Gerry

Re:I'd go the other way, personally

[fork_daemon]

Yes. As an example. In Mumbai, India there is a place to buy Brand New Original Computer Hardware for cheap. These are called grey markets. I once bought a Seagate Harddrive for INR 3000/- The Price tag on the Disk read, INR 8000/- Now they are many people who have made enough profits before selling that disk to me.

But in US and Europe, people usually end up paying the Final Price. Ofcourse, it includes Shipping costs,but still you do get it with huge profits in the pockets of the American Corporates.

For people from this side of the globe a small profit is a big thing. But the equivalent profit in First world countries ends up being negligible.

Re:I'd go the other way, personally

[patiodragon]

"China, People's Republic of: $5,325, rank: 100

United States: rank: $45,725, rank: 6

Clear enough?"

No, not clear. While you may or may not be making a valid point, giving absolute values of income does nothing to tell you the standard of living, which is what would really determine if someone was "rich" or not. Where I live in the US, the average price of a home has probably dropped back down to about a million dollars. You can't rent a room for less than 1,000/month. While there may be a difference in the average standard of living, I don't think it is in proportion to the dollar values you cite. So, no, it is not clear at all.

Re:I'd go the other way, personally

[orzetto]

Actually the classification went on like this:

1. First world: America and direct allies (NATO).
2. Second world: Soviet Union and direct allies (Warsaw pact).
3. Third world: underdeveloped countries, including China as it did not stay an ally of the USSR for long (in case you are too young: it was actually an ally of the US in the cold war).
4. Fourth world: newly developed former third-world countries (Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia), which usually got rich finding oil under their asses and keeping foreigners from stealing it.

This is a cold-war-era classification, but "third world" has become such a common way of saying "poor country" that it stuck. However, Mao Zedong had its own classification, in which China was still in the third world:

1. First world: the superpowers, i.e. USA and USSR;
2. Second world: the superpowers' satellites, i.e. most of Europe, South America, Africa, and Oceania;
3. Third world: independent countries, among which China.

Revoke install privs?

[magarity]

It seems rather simple: just revoke their account privs for installing new software. I'm in China now and the piracy is not only rampant, the attitude is that only suckers pay. You'll have a near impossible task to try to enforce a no piracy rule by just asking nicely and for receipts. BTW, fake receipts are just as easy to get as pirated software so accepting those as proof will just get you fooled. The only way is to check product keys.

Re:Revoke install privs?

[sumdumass]

The way they need to handle it if it is as you say would be to just buy the software, ship it to them and invoice it against their accounts.

I'm not sure why a single branch is allowed to make their own software decisions anyways. Granted, they are in a different country but if it's the same company and not a contracted company or some partner thing between several companies, then it only makes sense that the company has control over this regardless of what the local management say. It's not like they can refuse to report income or something or steer the branch in the opposite direction the company is aiming for and start selling car parts or anything, likewise, it isn't like they shouldn't be obligated to follow corporate policy.

Don't Stick Your Neck Out, But CYA & Pass the

[darkmeridian]

It is admirable that you want to follow the law, but it is not your decision to make. First, decide if you are willing to go down to the mat on this issue. You may antagonize your superiors and be retaliated against. The threshold question is whether the risk of losing your job or getting your career stalled is acceptable to you. It's perfectly fine to let the matter lie if you feel your job may be at risk in this economy.

Whatever you decide to do, you should cover your ass. Write a formal memo detailing the foreign office's inability to demonstrate that its software is all legit. Call it to the attention of the Beijing folks and a US-based superior. But do not admit that the software is illegal. You do not know if it is. More to the point, it does not violate American law, which is mostly territorial. (The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act covers bribes, not copyright infringement but don't hold me to this.) Just say that you cannot prove the software is legitimate and leave it at that unless you have proof that it is illegal. File a copy of the memo away in a safe place and keep on trucking.

Should you decide to go on the warpath, make sure you have adequate backing. You do not want to be left alone, or be the problem-maker. Work up the numbers and see how much it would cost to go legit. See if you can use this as a selling point: "All our software is legit; the competitors use stolen software that may have trojans or be incompatible." Work on a consensus with your colleagues and superiors.

Lastly, be nice and tactful. Avoid being that douchebag who thinks he is better than everyone else. You cannot be effective if you are that dude. Be chill and try to make a win-win situation.

But if the company management is utterly unwilling to fix the problem, let it drop. Document your suspicions (and say that it is only a suspicion, not proof), send it to the Beijing folks, and save a copy of the memo.

Re:Ya know what else you should ask for?

[RodgerDodger]

It snows in Australia. Some parts of Australia receive no snow, just like some parts of the US receive no snow. Some parts receive a lot. Those parts presumably like to stock up on snow shovels.

I know who you are

[CuteSteveJobs]

Well, I don't. But Let's see...

* IT manager
* a US west coast design company
* a branch office in Beijing with 5 employees

Can't be that many of them... I reckon half an hour on Google and I can work out who you are...

> When I called the local office manager on this, he shrugged and replied, 'Well, every other shop here does it.' So I was wondering if there are any IT manager Slashdotters here in the the US

Oh he knows who you are already...

Good luck in your new career.

Re:I know who you are

[1u3hr]

Can't be that many of them... I reckon half an hour on Google and I can work out who you are...

I always assume that these "Ask Slashdot" topics are entirely fictional. Most seem to be crafted like a TV movie of the week to hit a bunch of hot buttons and provoke controversy. Even if the company is real, (and having personal experience in China, the attitudes are quite expected) the person posting is not necessarily who he says he is, perhaps a former employee or junior staff trying to make trouble.

Re:I know who you are

[Slashcrap]

Well, I don't. But Let's see...

* IT manager
* a US west coast design company
* a branch office in Beijing with 5 employees

Can't be that many of them... I reckon half an hour on Google and I can work out who you are...

You seem to be angered by the Op doing his job, to the extent that you wish to track him down and get him fired.

I know it's difficult being a confused, hormonal 14 year old. Seriously though - try not to be such a gigantic faggot about it. This is some seriously pathetic rage against the machine type shit. I hope you remember it long enough to be properly ashamed about it.

Re:I know who you are

[Airw0lf]

Can't be that many of them... I reckon half an hour on Google and I can work out who you are...

I always assume that these "Ask Slashdot" topics are entirely fictional. Most seem to be crafted like a TV movie of the week to hit a bunch of hot buttons and provoke controversy.

I just wish they could be more like the letters in the "Penthouse Forum"... :)

Re:Ya know what else you should ask for?

[zonky]

Tell that to all the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ski_areas_and_resorts_in_Australia

It's not "PDF stuff"

[PCM2]

It's Adobe Creative Suite ... which includes stuff like Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. You won't find free replacements for those. (And don't bother replying about the GIMP until it has proper CMYK support.)

Re:It's not "PDF stuff"

[MooUK]

It's related to the print method. A design company needs to know exactly what they will be printing, and their printers work on CMYK, not RGB like your screen (and therefore most programs). They therefore prefer to work with CMYK and are limited in their program choice.

Re:It's not "PDF stuff"

[Alex Belits]

"GIMP has no CMYK support" is in the same category as "You will lose copyright on anything made with GPL software". It is constantly being repeated by Microsoft marketing people despite being obviously false.

Re:Don't Stick Your Neck Out, But CYA & Pass t

[daveime]

Avoid being that douchebag who thinks he is better than everyone else

I'd say it's probably a bit late for that.

While the poster's motives might appear noble, I don't understand exactly what he's trying to achieve. A promotion, extra brownie points, getting someone in a foreign country fired, or at least severely embarrassed (and they set a lot of store on respect in Asia btw).

He's already approached the person responsible, and voiced his concerns. Just because said person didn't take the action he expected, instead of leaving it alone, he posts it on Slashdot for the world and his wife to comment on. And within a few days it'll be all indexed by Google for posterity.

To me he comes across as an anal retentive asshole who should be spending more time doing his job, rather than trying to shaft other people ... but that's just me, karma be damned.

What is with all the posts advocating open source

[ragethehotey]

When the fact that he has stated they are a design firm makes it pretty clear that at least one of the pirated pieces of software is Adobe Photoshop?

Nobody would actually be so naive to claim that GIMP is a legitimate and complete open source alternative for Photoshop for a design firm at this point in time? Right? (Although I obviously hope that it will be at some point in the future and GIMP currently is great to give to friends that are learning photo manipulation software for the first time)

Re:See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil

[B2382F29]

Reading slashdot from china at the moment I can verify it is definitely NOT banned. You might want to use another DNS server though (e.g. from OpenDNS) as the DNS requests tend to take longer if you use the DNS servers of the chinese providers.

Call the BSA.

[Narcocide]

http://www.bsa.org/ It is completely anonymous.

Why would I - an open source advocate - suggest such a thing? Simple; Forcing people to use and learn from Linux (and thereby allowing Linux to learn from them in turn) is better than passively letting them steal MicroSoft products they can't afford which only improves MicroSoft's ability to leverage their installation base in illegally (in the US at least) anti-competitive practices. This will force MicroSoft to price their software at what its worth or make it worth what they charge.

Why would I claim to be a benevolent person who cares for the good of humanity with such apparently cruel intentions as forcing users to use Linux unwillingly? That answer is also simple but if you don't already know it then it is pointless for me to state it.

more likely, there'd be more

[Trepidity]

If it were 100% impossible to pirate Microsoft and Adobe products, it'd speed up their replacement with open-source software immensely.

this is usual...

[perryizgr8]

atleast here in india. every computer that has not been bought from dell, hp or some other international company has pirate windows and office on it. recently microsoft complained to a big company here and guess what they switched completely to ubuntu.

Seen it time and time again with Asian offices...

[Taelron]

I'm an I.T. consultant in Silicon Valley and several of my clients over the years have had manufacturing offices in Hong Kong and China.

I've had to deal with this situation more times than I care for in the last 10 years. Its a very big legal hassle for your company, and their are raids every few years. Not enough to scare the Asian work force into compliance, but its enough of a game of corporate Russian roulette that the risk just isn't worth it.

Not only are many of the Asian offices using pirated software, but are not running any antivirus software. I've routinely tracked down about 80% of all infections at my client offices to their e-mails with their overseas counterparts or from when they are traveling in Asia on business.

Also, much of the pirated versions of the software are riddled with trojans, spyware, and security holes galore. Allowing them to use that software further opens up your entire company up to a breach or leak of information.

I've also seen more than one company fold or nearly go under because one disgruntled person called in an anonymous tip that their current or former companies software was not legit.

In a corporate environment, getting the documentation and legal software is definitely the IT managers job, and an obvious C.Y.A. for anyone in the I.T. department and the company officers... Its those heads that will roll if the B.S.A. shows up with the authorities to audit you.

No cross-culture training in your company, eh?

[dbc]

Of course this will happen with APAC shops unless the APAC employees get training in US buisiness culture, and the US employees get training in Chinese buisiness culture. Bootleg software is the *least* surprise your exectutives will receive unless they get out in front of this issue.

The APAC employees need the "this is how we do things here" speech. They will think you are nuts. If you repeat the speech enough, they will get it.

Re:No cross-culture training in your company, eh?

[1u3hr]

APAC employees need the "this is how we do things here" speech.

First learn what "APAC" means. Australia, New Zealand, for a start. Try not demonstrating your ignorance when giving your patronising "speech".

Re:No cross-culture training in your company, eh?

[1u3hr]

If, among a list of 30+ countries that includes China you can only identify Australia and New Zealand and therefore claim that he is some how wrong then at best it isn't the OP who is demonstrating his ignorance.

No, it was an attempt by the original poster either to use some buzzword acronym, or perhaps to avoid seeming to be racist by using the word "Chinese". Certainly APAC includes China but it also includes many other countries where patronising its people by giving them a lecture about "how we do business in the USA" would be both unnecessary, inappropriate and offensive. (Of course Chinese would probably also find it insulting, but I'm just speaking as an Australian.)

Re:No cross-culture training in your company, eh?

[GreatBunzinni]

No, it was an attempt by the original poster either to use some buzzword acronym, or perhaps to avoid seeming to be racist by using the word "Chinese". Certainly APAC includes China but it also includes many other countries where patronising its people by giving them a lecture about "how we do business in the USA" would be both unnecessary, inappropriate and offensive. (Of course Chinese would probably also find it insulting, but I'm just speaking as an Australian.)

Now that I see your point I have to say that you are absolutely right. I focused on the topic of this discussion (the company with the 5+ employee office in China) and kept thinking that by "APAC employees" he was referring to those 5+ in the China office. After looking at the big picture then it becomes pretty clear that the comment in fact sound patronising and conveys a bit of the old proverbial colonial attitude.

Re:Seen it time and time again with Asian offices.

[ebonum]

I hate to say this, but you sound like a paid microsoft poster. Raids? In China? Have you ever been to China? Honestly. Please don't spread FUD. Trust me. I live here.

I would worry about trojans, spyware. These are legitimate concerns.

Another concern is that a lot of development in China takes place on very old slow machines. You want to do development here? Plan on using Microsoft VCC 6.0. Want to buy a copy? Forget it. Microsoft dropped that one about a decade ago. ( actually it is amazing how these kids get so much done working little on 17 inch monitors )

Iâve seen a lot people here using pirated software that is three generations old and no older available. But, it runs 10 times as fast as the new versions, and still seems slow on the old machines here.

Make the decision yourself.

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be a terrible idea to stall purchasing proper licenses any longer.

Get them their own, legit copies of the software they use immediately - so that I can use their CS4 key when it inevitably shows up on the internet next Tuesday. This is China after all. It'd be like buying a hobo a Ferrari and expecting him not to swap it for booze.

I am in APAC. And we don't use pirate stuff.

[bronney]

The companies I worked for thru the years here in Hong Kong never install pirate stuff as we have great timely support from the US office whenever we need. The question I have for you is:

Why is your BJ branch installing pirated office and adobe? Don't you have license for those software and whether you provide them with a link to the US servers to download? If not, do you have a process where they can "order" software from you, or have the budget to buy the software in mainland?

The ultimate question, which I suspect is why they do it, is, are they pirating photoshop because your US office is too cheap to get them what's good, and forces them to use MS paint to crop silly pictures?

This happens in a lot of places, 1 or 2 computers in a company has Acrobat, all the other ones uses Acrobat reader. Those 2 computers go on vacation, some dude needs to change some text in a PDF and notice the reader can't do it. They ended up pirating Acrobat.

Provide everyone with the software they need to get the job done. Educate them to ASK you for them if they need it but don't have it. And if you don't have it, won't buy it in time, and don't care, then just shut up (I am sorry for the bluntness). If the BJ office has access to your legit software, they won't pirate it.

In soviet russia...

[alexandre_ganso]

The software pirates YOU!

Totally his job to know what is on those computers

[gsslay]

To me he comes across as an anal retentive asshole who should be spending more time doing his job

The poster may have been foolhardy bringing it to slashdot, but it is totally his job to be concerned about it. As IT manager he needs to be know about software installed on the company's computers. This applies whether it's pirated, or completely legal copies of software not approved or suitable for the company's business.

Pirated software is more likely to have viruses and malware than legitimate copies. If this branch office is either networked or in regular email contact with the rest of the company, then any IT manager would be being negligent if they weren't taking an interest in what was installed on those computers.

If the IT manager doesn't have enough influence to instruct what should be on those computers, and what should not, then they he needs to tell his superiors he will bear no responsibility for any possible damage traced back to them. If his superiors are fine with that, then so be it. But you'd then be left wondering what they want an IT Manager for.

Taught computers at a U. in China for year

[cenc]

Even the "authentic" software is often pirated in China. I mean with laser stickers sold by the largest brand name stores in China. Even if you wanted to, you might have trouble finding real software.

In my year in China, I seen thousands of computers and not single one had a real copy of windows on it. Even the computer provide to me by my Chinese government handlers for my work had a hot copy.

I promptly installed my own copy of linux. No windows machine in that environment can withstand the volume of malware attacks from every direction. There are virus in the wild in China that simply have not made it in to the virus software yet.

By the way, there are no copies of anti-virus software for sale on the streets either. In over a year, I never seen one single copy, and Chinese I talked to about it think they are silly.

So, switch to linux or live with it. Copying others is a tradition that goes back thousands of years, and it is not going to change simply by the central government outlawing. All property is public property in China.

He's Not Right

[azadrozny]

By your logic I should be able to walk into a grocery store and take what I want as long as I don't open a restaurant. It would be nice if I paid for what I took, but I might want to spend that money on a dinner cruise at some point in the future.

Re:He's Not Right

[jonbryce]

If you steal from a grocery store, you deprive them of the groceries they paid for.

Pirating is more like buying from a different grocery store, or growing the food in your garden. That way you deprive them of the sale, but they still have the groceries to sell to someone else.

Re:He's Not Right

[cbiltcliffe]

Because 98% (SPFMA) of people fall into one of two categories:
1. Intentionally obtuse.
2. Stupid

Next question?

Re:He's Not Right

[cbhacking]

Your analogy is just as flawed as that of stealing from a grocery store.

Software, unlike groceries from any source, has an immense up-front development cost, and in many cases a substantial ongoing cost (several posters have mentioned the huge number of support calls they receive from countries where their software isn't even sold...) Those costs represent a major investment. Selling the software is how you get a return on that investment.

Pirated software doesn't inherently increase the developer's costs directly, but it decreases their return on investment, which is very similar. Factor in support calls and it can become a significant cost, but even without that piracy can be a major problem for a software shop that in unable to produce sufficient revenue to recoup costs.

Re:He's Not Right

[TheLink]

The analogy is more like this:

Say everyone has one of those Star Trek replicators.

Someone goes to the grocery store, and buys an item.

Said someone then puts that in his replicator and then uploads the "recipe" for that item.

Everyone else who wants to, downloads the recipe and creates a copy of that item (from their own raw materials).

I do not see how this is clearly unethical or wrong.

In a Star Trek world, I guess everyone would be able to obtain the raw materials for making whatever meals they want. So there is no food scarcity barring exceptional events.

Of course it'll be harder to be rich from selling food.

But if everyone could eat the best foods in the entire world anytime they wanted, aren't they all now richer than the wealthiest kings 1000 years ago?

A computer in this respect is just a replicator that only works with information.

In the future we might have "real" replicators.

One might argue then that it is immoral and unethical to create an artificial scarcity when there does not have to be one. Preventing people from making copies of all sorts of items, just so that you could make yourself "rich".

Plagiarism would still be wrong - since it involves lying. It'll still be wrong to make a copy and claim it's an original you came up with.

Re:He's Not Right

[Anonymous Coward]

"Pirated software doesn't inherently increase the developer's costs directly, but it decreases their return on investment, which is very similar."

That is one of the fallacies of software piracy.

That is only true if the pirate would have bought the software otherwise. If they would not have bought the software, then the developer loses nothing (they don't even lose in service/support, because they won't service/support pirated software, so there is no loss there either.)

Re:He's Not Right

[skroops]

How is this modded insightful??

Pirating is more like buying from a different grocery store

How can it be anything like "buying" if you paid nothing.

or growing the food in your garden

The reason everyone doesn't grow food in their gardens, is because gardens take work, land, water, soil, and other investments. That is nothing like typing "adobe torrent" in google and you have your software in 10 minutes.

That way you deprive them of the sale, but they still have the groceries to sell to someone else

Why would anyone buy from that grocery store if they could go to the free groceries store down the street or go and pick groceries in their magic garden???

Re:He's Not Right

[Locutus]

in Star Trek, the needs of the many, out weight the needs of the few or the one. Open Source would rein _the_ way software was done, not the One Microsoft Way way.

LoB

Re:He's Not Right

[StikyPad]

No, the analogy is more like this:

As long as we live in a society where people earn a living by getting paid for their work, there must be a method in place to compensate them for that work. That method is copyright protection. Other methods have been tried, are being tried, and may turn out to work better, but for now copyright is still the law.

We pretty much agree (as a society, though perhaps not as Slashdotters) that it is immoral to willfully violate a just law. Since copyright is not depriving you of any inalienable rights, and since it facilitates the existence of people who create intangible works for a living, there doesn't appear to be anything unjust about copyright.

I commonly hear that, "Copyright infringement isn't stealing because it doesn't deprive anyone of anything." No, it's not stealing, because we decided to make different words for different actions, but it still deprives someone of something -- it deprives someone of compensation for their work. No, that's not a tangible object, but neither is "being alive." Neither is "being free." They're both far more abstract than an audio recording, yet we agree that depriving people of their freedom or life is generally also wrong. There are acceptable reasons for doing all of the above, but "because you wanted to" is not among them.

Are there cases in which copyright fails to create the desired results? Sure. There's abandonware, out of print works, bizzare licensing schemes, etc. But that's no excuse for copying a work just because "I wouldn't have bought it anyway."

Whoa, steady now

[jandersen]

Calm down, just a bit or two, there is no need to overreact.

For one thing, whether it is OK to copy software without the consent of the one who produced it is mostly a matter of taste or culture - unlike, say, murder or burglary. The whole idea of "intellectual property rights" is something that is very recent and has come into the world in the West; not to mention the whole idea of private property that underpins it, which one may be excused for thinking is alien to a Communist nation. All that aside, it has long been a part of Chinese culture and tradition to copy things - it is seen as a perfectly legitimate thing to do. You learn calligraphy or other arts by copying the masters, after all; so why not literature or software?

China is well known for using corporate (and other) espionage to further their political agenda.

Really? It isn't well-known to me, among others. You see, when you make a claim like that you need to be able to prove your case. Otherwise it merely ranks as "smug ignorance", on par with all the other prejudices - such as "all muslims are terrorists" or "Jews are money-grabbing misers".

Apart from that, you could substitute "England", "USA", "Israel" or just about any nation for China in that statement and get something equally justified. There is every reason to believe that all countries do this kind of things. Just to take one example: Isn't it true that we keep hearing about how American government agencies want to induce eg. Microsoft to install backdoors in their software? And is that not "espionage to further their political agenda"?

It is too lame to drone on with this sort of automatic demonizing of everybody you don't like or don't understand. The only two effects that is like ly to have is alienating your opponents and making you look stupid. Right now China is storming forward in the world and they are opening up; this is among many other things a great opportunity for the western governments to make friends and influence their policies on all the issues we criticize them for. And who knows, maybe some time in the future we will be glad that we have a friend in China.

Copyright infringement not criminal?

[SirGarlon]

It's not a good analogy as homicide is a criminal offense and software piracy a civil offense.

You must not have watched a DVD lately: "Criminal copyright infringement is investigated by the FBI and carries penalties of [insert long prison sentence] or [insert whopping monetary fine], or both." There's also the international warning that Interpol will hunt you down if you live overseas.

I'd agree with you that copyright infringement should be a civil matter, but it's also a criminal offense in most countries, thanks to the lobbying efforts of the MPAA, RIAA, and related racketeer^H^H^H^H^H^H industry groups.

Re:Don't Stick Your Neck Out, But CYA & Pass t

[HikingStick]

As another IT manager, I know it's my can in a sling if the license status of the software is questioned and found to be illegal or unauthorized under my watch. It's not only my reputation on the line, but my company's reputation. When I took a stand on a recent plan proposed by one of our consultants, I knew that I was putting my neck out, but I was not going to let my name be listed as a supporter and implementor of a solution that would clearly violate our contract with a service provider. [The consultant wanted us to purchase a limited number of licenses for an online SaaS solution and then share the logon information with everyone in the company when the contract states in plain English that user accounts are intened for individual users and may not be shared.]

I know many of you may shudder at the thought that a company continues to use M$ products, but that decision was already made in this case. Being an American company, comliance with licensing terms is something to which the company may well be held accountable. I think the best advice I've seen here is for this manager to document his concerns, communicate them up and down the tree, and then decide if he is comfortable working in the environment if management continues to overlook the issue.

In my situation, I expressed my concerns about the company's reputation and legal liability issues to my upline, and I offered to walk (while making it clear that staying was my preference) if my stance was incompatible with the company's views on licensing and contract law. Two weeks later, we purchased the additional licenses, and I still have a job.

Forget about it, Jake.

[FatalTourist]

It's China (town).

You've been to Asia, right?

[rwa2]

Walk into a mall and there are no "legit" software stores. You still buy your software, there are stands and small storefronts all over the place filled with shiny boxes and jewel cases.

Short term solution is just buy legit copies of what they have installed and send it to them, so at least they have the licenses and CDkeys available, might help you get some leniency if the BSA or someone decides to come down on you. And then work to clean up the mess and get them aligned with IT / accounting standards.

As far as the cultural aspects, they will never understand... it is much more convenient to install and run things through the "pirate" distribution channels, which have usually cleaned out the annoyances of product activation and click-through EULAs and all that other crap that US software companies subject us to. Also they wouldn't stand for software with half of the additional-cost features locked out, even if they are features they'd never use.

On the other hand, this mentality makes them particularly amenable to adapting open source software, since they tend to be technically proficient enough to learn new ways of doing things, and really appreciate and expect not to have to deal with licensing hurdles and DRM. All you have really need to do is convince them that the open source software is technologically superior, which in most cases isn't too terribly difficult.

Re:You've been to Asia, right?

[rwa2]

Yeah, they don't really consider it "piracy"... they usually bought it from a store off a shelf. They do realize that it's quite a bit cheaper (1/5 to just over the price of blank media) than what other countries might be paying for it.

Places to buy "official" software practically have no presence or visibility in any marketplace. And if they did have a store, the locals would just laugh at how ridiculous the pricing was.

Incidentally, people are much more sensitive to "market" prices. For example, when Nintendo releases a game, it doesn't sell for a fixed price, but rather by some kind of composite of materials complexity (e.g. 1MB vs. 4MB ROMS in old Famicom carts, which was actually listed as a "feature" on the box!) and how popular the game is on the charts, and of course traditional supply/demand of commodities. Only in the U.S. have I seen so much corporate and marketing-based price fixing, where a lame game based on a movie debuts at $40, and then maybe goes in the bargain bin for $20 some years later. The concept that some product (especially "dated" things like books and software) could have a fixed price is still somewhat alien to the East.

Reward Money

[highfidelitychris]

Turn them in for a reward. It's win-win.