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BSA Says Software Theft Exceeded $51B In 2009
alphadogg sends a NetworkWorld.com piece going over the Business Software Alliance's latest stats on software theft around the world. "Expanding PC sales in emerging markets is increasing the rate of software piracy, according to the Business Software Alliance and IDC. The rate of global software piracy in 2009 was 43%, meaning that for every $100 worth of legitimate software sold in 2009, an additional $75 worth of unlicensed software also made its way into the market. This is a 2-percentage-point increase from 2008. Software theft exceeded $51 billion in commercial value in 2009, according to the BSA. IDC says lowering software piracy by just 10 percentage points during the next four years would create nearly 500,000 new jobs and pump $140 billion into 'ailing economies.' ... In the United States, software piracy remained at 20%, the lowest level of software theft of any nation in the world. ... The PC markets in Brazil, India, and China accounted for 86% of the growth in PC shipments worldwide." The BSA president said, "Few if any industries could withstand the theft of $51 billion worth of their products." It's unclear whether that was a brag about the industry's robustness, or a result of the industry's low cost of goods sold.
In not very long, all software will be accessed via the web only. No pay, no play. Problem solved.
-- Anybody here remember the Atari 800?
I believe I can smell what can only be described as first word B and second word S.
In not very long, all software will be accessed via the web only.
That won't happen until Internet speeds go way up and prices, especially for satellite and mobile broadband, go way down. Otherwise, people will switch to apps under a free software license because people can run free software while riding a bus or carpool or while living in a less population-dense area.
I always think these are stupid, why not throw in the fact that 90% of pirated software is never actually used more than like once or twice if even used at all. Or the software doesn't even function the way it was intended to or it flat out doesn't work. How about the fact that the software most likely wouldn't even be bought in the first place so they aren't actually loosing any money from this because it would not equate to earned revenue. Why doesn't someone come out with a useful report that actually shows these facts. Douches.
Few if any industries could withstand the theft of $51 billion worth of their products.
It's a good thing your products aren't being stolen, then...just copied unlawfully.
The industry could do a better job of being sympathetic, if it wasn't so obviously dishonest about its victimization....
Seriously. They talk like people stole the $51 billion from their pockets. When you steal from a company, you are depriving them from twice the value of the item that you stole (the lost sale to you, and the lost sale to someone else for that particular item). When they claim their losses from theft, they claim the second loss (the one that's physically quantifiable). But with software, there's no physical product. If I pirate an item, they only lose my sale. I don't deprive somebody else from being able to purchase it (since copies are for all practical purposes free). And since they don't count the lost sale to me in the case of physical theft, why should they here? So nobody stole $51 billion. Total losses due to piracy === $0. Now, opportunity cost may be $51 billion (they had the opportunity to sell the person who "stole" it, but didn't), but not the loss... There's a fine line between them, but there is a line none the less...
BSA discovers way to increase size of anus, so they can pull larger numbers out of it.
"This post contains words, known to the State of California to cause thought. Wash brain thoroughly after reading."
Postulate:
Units of pirated software installed != Units of lost sales.
Better questions:
How many of those using or at least possessing a pirated copy of a given piece of software would actually pay for it if it were not available in pirate form?
How would that ratio change if the software were priced differently?
If prices were lower, would piracy decrease?
How would profits change in response to the above?
Answers? *shrug*
Additional important question:
How many copies of the software were sold because someone was exposed to it through a pirated copy?
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
You'd think that marketing folks would, you know, interact with customers now and then. If they did, they'd find out that what you're saying is absolutely true.
Aside from a small number of online pundits who advocate its use, although they themselves don't have to maintain or even use such systems, everyone hates cloud computing.
Cloud-hosted systems end up being horrifically shitty. Their performance is poor. Their reliability is poor. Their usability is poor, because cloud environments are so fucking restrictive. It doesn't cost any less than dedicated hosting. Getting reliable, on-time support is nearly impossible. Data security is basically non-existent.
Data loss is a real problem, because all sensible relational techniques and ACIDity have been thrown away in favor of moronic hash tables. The only thing stupider than a cloud computing advocate is a NoSQL advocate.
Cloud computing is the biggest failure our industry has seen. It's even a bigger failure than Windows. At least Windows sort of works, some of the time. Cloud hosting never works. It's always a failure, regardless of who is using, and where it's being used.
Yup - "IDC says lowering software piracy by just 10 percentage points during the next four years would create nearly 500,000 new jobs and pump $140 billion into "ailing economies." "
The question is - WHERE would that money come from?
Chances are, if somehow forced to "go legit" on a particular piece of software, rather than cough up the money, people in third-world countries would instead:
1) Choose an OSS alternative
2) Choose a more reasonably priced commercial alternative (PSP instead of Photoshop for example)
3) Choose no alternative, i.e. choosing to simply forgo that functionality altogether
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Isn't that like saying I lost 100 billion in lottery winnings? How can you lose money you were not going to get in the first place?
did you forget to take your meds?
The more people who use Linux and OpenOffice the less people will be stealing from the BSA members.
So is the BSA pushing the use of free software where people find it to costly to use commercial software?
Somehow I don't think so. But that is the real solution to the piracy.
Jut use Free and Open source software. Why risk using pirated anything?
If you really have to use a commercial product, then pay for it.
In 2009, Michael Jackson's last words were "End software piracy" as the stolen copy of Windows XP that regulated his IV's drip failed because he had just passed the 30 days he had to authorize his copy.
Except, you know, only non-pirated versions suffer from this flaw. Unless that copy was literally stolen, that is -- but I have yet to hear about a case when someone actually pilfered boxed software.
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
Most definitely not. Allow me to explain: If a product in inventory is stolen, you, i.e. the company that owned the goods, can write off the cost of goods associated with that product as a loss from theft.
Similarly, if a person owns a car and it's stolen (and not replaced by insurance), they can write off the depreciated value of the car at the time of its theft.
But you can't write off losses associated with products you didn't actually make because somebody illegally copied your software.
Just like you can't get a tax deduction for "donating" unpaid services (because you'd have to record pay for them, i.e. income, then take a deduction for a donation - net tax impact is zero). However, you can potentially write off other expenses actually incurred as part of a charitable endeavor.
So if you had a bunch of software, in boxes, ready to ship to stores, stolen from your warehouse, you can deduct the cost of replicating the CDs, printing the boxes and so on. But you can't deduct the retail or even wholesale price of the software units stolen.
Since there were no direct costs associated with producing the copied items in this case, you can't deduct them.
Otherwise, everybody would "lose" stuff to theft all the time for the tax benefits. And Uncle Sam isn't *that* stupid. There are certainly tax loopholes out there, but they require a bit more cautious execution to benefit from, or they tend to get legislated away eventually.
Shoot a policeman
then steal his helmet
then go to the toilet in his helmet
then send it to the policeman's grieving widow
and then steal it again
The whole point of value added product is that it is easier for the consumer to buy the product rather get it in another way. For instance I often pay 6X the amount for a soft drink because it is easier to buy a small cold bottle than carry it around. Am I stealing money from coke when I buy a big bottle and keep it a cooler? Likewise, many families buy various pastries instead of making them at home, at a fraction of the cost. Would these families be stealing when they use their own time to make the pastries rather than paying the excessive store prices?
Sales stats show that the industry understands this reality. Most firms are making products people will choose to buy. Some are trying to legislate closed market rules to protect their obsolete products, but fortunately, as we see in the video, they are rightfully and increasingly ridiculed.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Piracy is theft
Copyright infringement isn't theft, it's copyright infringement.
"You wouldn't steal a car..."
I may not, but in telling me they are happy to steal electricity from me
Unskippable ads are stealing!
Yes, but what you're really talking about is the difference between trespassing and theft. Copyright infringement is more like trespassing. When someone trespasses on your property (not counting possible destruction of property) they are depriving you of the right to control who can and cannot go there (and possibly making money off the use of the land).
Nobody says "Hey, Stop that thief! He walked on my land!"
If you need web hosting, you could do worse than here
This is a very important point that is often overlooked.
The counter-argument is that many software companies offer student discounts. Very significant student discounts. However, any student studying graphics today needs many different apps from many different vendors, they also need to upgrade each year to the latest and greatest version. So even though software is priced well for students you can easily be talking about a grand or more per year and at the same time the students still need good hardware which you can't pirate.
I pirated a lot of software while in college. I got a job and now I own thousands of dollars in software that I upgrade every 1 - 1 1/2 years. Had I not been able to find all that software for free and invested the vast amounts of time learning it I'd probably be working as an insurance broker and would not have bought any of the software I now own.
Quit paying the BSA for a service that alienates your future clientele and remember, the software that is too difficult to pirate will never be purchased by the "student" because the "student" in question didn't become familiar with it...
No kidding.
I was going to call them parasites, but after reading about the website that sells pubic lice, I decided I didn't want to compare the BSA to such a relatively reputable and useful business endeavor.
The enemies of Democracy are
So what kind of logic is that? If I point at your car and say "Give it to me" and you go "Ok" and hand me the keys then there'll be no theft. If all girls always said yes to sex there's be no rapes. Open source software has a license that (almost) always says "Yes", but it's a damn poor analogy to... anything.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
And for every imaginary dollar spent only 1% of that would actually be spent, because 100% of 15 year olds who downloaded CS5, wouldn't have ever bought the thing.
We also pay an intagible tax for intangible assets such as patents, trademarks, goodwill, etc.
I couldn't find anything with Google about an analogous tax in my home state of Indiana. But perhaps if California got a real intangibles tax, its Governator might be able to lean on the software and movie "industries" to pull it out of the hole that it's in.
It can't cost anywhere near what the fees are to obtain and maintain a patent for a patent clerk to review an application.
This article is not about patents nearly as much as it is about copyrights. The U.S. copyright registration fee is only $35, which is more like a title fee than a property tax.