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MS Attempt to Find Pirated Software Fails Miserably
Anonymous Coward writes "Microsoft set up an outdoor booth outside San Francisco City Hall yesterday offering to trade free licensed MS software for pirated versions. The only visitor they got was the guy picketing to have Clinton impeached for treason against 12 galaxies." Here's the SF Chronicle story about the "event." Read it and weep. Or laugh. (You choose.)
Microsoft has filed law suits againts 160 computer sellers in the last year alone!!
What if you are one of these computer sellers and you get sued by MS. Before you even make to court you have two problems:
1) You have legal fees to pay.
2) You no longer get legal copies of Windows at competitive OEM prices.
In other words, MS can sue any company they want out of business , whether or not they are doing something illegal.
Oh give me a break, this reason makes me want to throw up. Piracy is caused by the fact that people know their will be no recourse for their act of stealing. Software piracy, no matter how you look at it, is fundamentally stealing. I agree prices are high, but I also think the price of a lexus is high too, doesn't mean I'm going to go steal one. Its the same thing, this excuse is a lame front. Even if the price of software dropped by 50%, the amount of piracy would remain constant.
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If companies like Adobe and MS slased prices, then these goons would have to drop theirs, which isn't something they can reasonably do while keeping up a front of "respectability".
I agree that this is the right way to go, but people have a natural tendancy to resist this.
Consider that this exact same argument is used in support of the decriminalising and legalising of hard drugs (ie. to stop the pushers and makers from being profitable). It hasn't got very far there, just like I think it won't get very far with software.
Which is why I believe that free software is the only solution, and why I just don't concern myself with non-free software anymore, as much as possible.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
Ok, lets say piracy is stopped cold turkey, and lets further say that 18000 new jobs are created over night. The US government goes oh no! We are having too much growth! And boom, we are in another economic recession...and 180,000 people are put out of work. Now _that's_ productive.
OFTC: By the community, for the community
No because I'd then feel sorry for whatever it was.
Not to pick on renegade187 (his is just the first visible reply to this um, subthread, given my current set of viewing preferences, so I replied here for visibility and clarity)...
/. a useful resource.
Everybody who replies to stuff like this effectively negates the work of the moderators by making large segments of the thread leap into visibility; I'm sure nobody wants to spend moderation points downgrading replies of varying intelligence and humor because the original poster was an idiot. And so we end up with a big string of off-topic score:1 and score:0 (unmoderated reg users and ACs, respectively) posts telling this guy off.
Sure, he deserves it. And I bet it felt good too, especially those of you who came up with clever retorts. But IMHO it's not worth it if the rest of us then have to wade through dozens of posts having nothing to do with the original topic. People like this will generally disappear quietly if we don't rise to the bait, and in the meantime the moderators help make it easier for us all to ignore them and keep
Businesses buy site licenses. They certainly don't pay the retail box price per seat. Plus, $500 is a trivial amount of money compared to the other expenses of having an employee who sits at a keyboard. They would easily absorb costs twice or three times that for switching to any other software (retraining and data conversion).
That doesn't mean Linux is crap. It just means lots of software is lacking (although this is changing).
It still doesn't make Linux garbage. It just doesn't fit what you do. Yet.
DING DING DING ...
we have a winner.
And I bet that most people who have tried pirated software found that it did not live up to the claims of the company that was hocking it.
CHING NOSALE...
> The Solow paradox says that computers don't seem to add anything to the productivity
/all/. Were I allowed, I could automate a good 80% of my job with a few perl scripts, but quite frankly my bosses are frightened of technology... so I'm left doing data entry and manually counting things. I need a more technical job before I explode...
> statistics. That either means computers aren't as useful as we think, or the
> statistics are wrong.
Or could it mean that the standards are rising? I haven't read the material in question, though it sounds interesting, but I know that a lot of times, when capacity to produce increases, demand for production increases at twice the rate.
Also, it could be due to improper use of the resources. In the $VBC I work for, we manage to get rid of any time-saving benefit of computers by a). layering the whole process around with procedures, rules, forms, etc, and b). NOT using the capability of the computing resources that we have at
Propaganda ?
Heh, it is now considered propaganda to educate people about law ?
It is still illegal to pirate software, isn't ?
Warez is more prevalent in business then you might imagine. I've been in environments where nearly everything installed was illegal. Copied CDs were passed around freely, stuff was posted on internal web servers for distribution, etc...
Piracy is a serious issue. Estimates on the impact of piracy on the industry are more accurate than most of us know (or want to admit.)
Sorry, not all windows users are ID10T's, consequently, not all ID10T's are windows users...
Version: 3.1 www.geekcode.com GCS/IT d- s:+ a-- C++ UL U->++ P>+ L+>+++ E? W++ N+(++) o? K? w+ O? M? V PS(+) P
can we ban this bastard by his ip?
/ignore for /. :) Then you can just add the fools to there. Also should have an option to truncate the discussion tree at their posts, so you can't see the bun-fight that occurs after their post.
:) :) :)
And what happens when he dials up on a different IP? Besides, whatever happened to free speech? You shouldn't stop him from speaking, you should stop listening.
Which prompted me to think of a neat idea. Previously Rob's said to set your threshold up to weed out the twits. Problem is that sometimes you then miss out reasonable stuff that's sitting on score 1 or 2.
Better would be to have an extra option which is a kill file, where you can list the nicks or uids of people you never ever want to read stuff from. Kindof like a
Then we just have to get ESR to put Bruce Perens in his, and Bruce to put ESR in his, and maybe then slashdot wouldn't explode when one of them posts a story or comment...
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
Must it be ALL? OR would people with a WORKING *nix partition or *nix IPMasq/Proxy setup be exempt?
Have any of those 12 galaxies started anti-Monopoly (I'll be the car, thank you) proceedings against MS? DOJ may want to leverage their work. The fact that there are many hungry mouths to feed on planet Xorthnanc in the X12R34 galaxy and no decent software programmer can make a living writing Xorthanc-OS, despite the fact that no Redmond programmers have tentacles and can taste blue, may have some bearing on the DOJ case.
Maybe...
Is this thing on? Hello?
> Truthfully, I think there are some genuinely pro-Microsoft
/. long enough to recognize the most common group biases, and I'm almost tempted to moderate unpopular opinions first as long as they meet my criteria -- just because it's less likely that they would be moderated up by someone else, and I feel that both/all sides of the discussion should be heard. It's important to me to see well-rounded discussion, or we're just all sitting here AOL'ing "Me too!"s all evening.
> folks lurking here.
I don't know about anyone else, but when I'm moderating, I don't take personal opinion into account. It seems to me that modpoints are not for promoting a personal agenda, but for pointing out reasonable, well-constructed comments. I have in the past moderated up sentiments with which I did not necessarily agree, but which seemed to me to be important or well-reasoned. I've been reading
"Cause there's 40 different shades of black, so many fortresses and ways to attack, so why you complainin'?"
I've known a lot of tech support people who've wished software licenses did work that way - that is, that users had to pass a test before they were allowed to use the software...
--
Do I look like I speak for my employer?
Well, prove it's garbage. What's that? YES! You'll actually have to THINK about ACTUALLY USING IT!!!
But until you do, go away. And don't come back.
You've enlightened us to nothing except your stupidity.
The lost tax revenue concept really pisses me off. The money that isn't spent on software isn't being thrown away is it? That money is being spent on other things, and probably (gasp) creating other jobs.
Ever stopped to wonder just how many people would own Micros~1 Office 97 if there weren't any illegal software out there?
Of course Microsoft doesn't mind pirating, because it means people get their software for free. You get Windows 98 for free, and then decide to BUY Office 97. You wouldn't have bought Office if you didn't already have Windows.
Granted, of course they'd rather we all paid for the software, more money to them, but they understand the economics. Better to "give away" a free OS and then charge a packet for the applications.
Of course, I'd be more inclined to pay AU$150 for Linux, and AU$5 for Windows, but that's just a pipedream.
"Only now, at the end, do you understand..."
The problem is... I bet most people don't know if they're sold a pirated Microsoft product.
It would be much easier to buy a copy from everyone who's selling windows and check out the product.
I think you have missed that fact that all those pirated copies are being used by people. MS DOS was/is about the most pirated software in the World, but all those copies also gave MSFT market share. The same it true with win95 and NT, take away all thoes pirated copies from 89 on and we would live in a very different World.
Anyone who belives that companies don't cook the books when it come to priated software and loss ROI is a fool.
Let me illustrate with an example. Suppose you are living in pre-Civil-War US, where slavery is legal. Illegally helping someone else's slaves escape does in fact hurt the plantation owner. Does this fact alone mean that it is bad to illegally help slaves escape? No. Nearly everyone nowadays agrees that the law was wrong, and that slavery should never be allowed. Even if it does help some people (plantation owners), it hurts other people more (slaves).
You may have a different opinion, but I am completely convinced that current copyright law in the US hurts consumers more than it helps producers, and as such is a bad law that ought to be changed for the better.
Who the hell's idea was that? If It was billy's, I no longer have any reason not to break in and steal a million. He wont even notice :)
You make easy-to-copy bits and sell them for hundreds of dollars then you have to expect that some people are going to copy them without paying. It's a cost of doing business. For the most part, the people who are your core market are happy to pay because they need and use your software and so they don't question its value. Take the money and run, don't stand around complaining that somebody's running Office in their basement 10 times a year to do things they would have done with Wordpad or something if they hadn't got a copy of Office from Joe.
For some people, a particular app is worth $20, and for others it's worth $1000. If you price it at $200, you're just not going to get any sales from the guy who only thinks it's worth $20, whether he uses it or not. You can't count those folks and say you lost $200 for each one.
Where did I see a chart that showed this kind of thing? ESR's site?
Even the best Y2K estimates predict that there will be lots of annoying little problems. Add those to the lots of annoying little problems Windows has already made computers famous for, combine with the fact that the gov't is suing the biggest and best known shrinkwrap maker for allegedly being the biggest assholes ever to take a meeting and you'd think that the software industry would really want to avoid getting into anyone's face right now.
This is like the "no lending" clause that appeared on CD's a while back. You just make yourself look like a greedy bastard in a situation where goodwill and a dialog with your users will get you much greater returns. If you please them, they will pay.
We posted it just to piss you off. No other reason.
We hired a psychological consultant to draw up a profile of konstant so that we could determine which stories would make him go berserk.
Smile for the camera.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
In front of the Microsoft booth?
Think their monopoly has really grown that big yet?
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I've begun using mozilla more and more regularly due to the fact that Netscape on Linux is a piece of trash, and I just don't like using lynx for all my browsing.
When I started to really pick Mozilla apart (especially under the hood) I realized that in a few months Microsoft will have finally lost their browser war. Adobe will lose massive "market share" to the GIMP within the next year, even on the Win32/64 platforms.
And, to top it off, I was playing with the most recent build of Win2k at a friend's house, alongside an NT4.0 machine. To tell the truth, I couldn't tell which was which (other than the "Win 2000 build number ...." at the corner of the screen). The biggest improvement I could see was that windows minimize really quickly -- they still start up slow as dogshit through a panty, and the disks still sound like someone is testing a cache-busting head scheduler on them everytime you access the file system.
Leading me (along with the exponential-feeling progress of the major linux distros and GNU software in the past year) to comment more than once to people that "Microsoft is in trouble.".
Fact of the matter is, IMNSHO, within 2 years they will be falling back upon the Office Suite which was their foot in the door for so many years. Whatever the outcome of the court case, it will be moot,as many predicted -- but not for the reasons they predicted. People thought that Microsoft would be penalized too late for issues (like the bundling of IE) that would be unimportant. Instead, the outcome of the case will be moot because Microsoft is already on the downhill slope of a long and steep descent into ruin.
"Cause there's 40 different shades of black, so many fortresses and ways to attack, so why you complainin'?"
(I start all posts with the subject "hrm...")
Wow. I think the most effective weapons against software piracy are:
a) Lower prices
b) Incentive to purchase (make the customer feel worth it)
and finally,
c) Software coded on punchcards that are 3 feet by 5 feet.
But that should apply for all companies. Maybe if they were to focus more on fighting software piracy on-line. I bet many of the folks present upon the street had little experience with software piracy... in that case, Microsoft should have focused more on the education of the public, instead of trying to acquire pirated software.
Ah well, life goes on in Redmond.
You'll eat it and you'll like it.
Why is it that people have an alarming tendency to leave the caps key on when they're being idiots? Is this some sort of "my member is bigger than yours" mating ritual? Combine that with an alarming tendency to misuse numbers and really, really bad punctuation (we all misspell from time to time, but really...)- and being taken as anything other than a chronicly pissed off six year old who needs a spanking is going to be very, very difficult.
More importantly:
Why do poeple pirate software?
There are, from my experience, three types of "pirates", if you will:
1. Warez D00dz. Enough said. These are the sort of people that use pirated software because they think they're cool. So what if your average flamer has 3dsMax, True Space, Illustrator, Quark, etc. on his hard drive? Odds are it's only to impress his friends and the applications get little to no use. These people have enough trouble typing- their artistic capability is more than likely lacking. I'm sorry, but you could have every program ever and you're still not going to impress me. I'm more impressed by my roommates- one has rewritten LiteStep into a respectable GUI and the other has created the Max Script from Hell and is doing high-profile freelance for a big company. And he hasn't even graduated yet.
2. High-end criminals. The fly-by-nighters who sell the stuff for cheap at trade expos and in the back of catalogues, on ebay, or web sites, etceteras. These people usually have the resources to fabricate the packaging, and are going to charge you a fairly reasonable amount of cash for the goods. What the software should be priced to begin with, IMHO. If companies like Adobe and MS slased prices, then these goons would have to drop theirs, which isn't something they can reasonably do while keeping up a front of "respectability".
3. The "Morally Ambiguous", or Rational Anarchists, if you will. These are the sort of people who have legal copies of the stuff at work and school, and natrually, their home machines are loaded to the gills. They have indirect access to the latest and greatest at no personal cost- do you expect them not to take advantage of it? If you do, leave now: it's a mentality that is difficult to reason with. If programs that were as powerful and useable as Director, After Effects, Photoshop, etceteras, were available in Linux, these types would scarf them up instantly. And no, Gimp can NOT compete with a base install of Photoshop 5.02 in the hands of a capable user. Sorry. Flame me all you like. These people do as they please because they are in an environment where it is condusive to do so. The issue of license holding can always be brushed aside, since someone in the chain of command actually owns one. Just not the Rational Anarchist.
The rational anarchy standpoint is an interesting one, particullalry in the case of apps like Photoshop and Director: the project work gets done, but in a more convenient setting. And the company laready has the license for the stuff.
If you really, REALLY want to stomp out piracy, go the Media100 route. Media100 software requires a board of varying capabilities and costs to be physically insterted into a PCI slot for your software to perform at something approaching peak useability. Oh, yo ucan dupe that CD as much as you want, but there's only one board per license- and good luck fabricating THAT. But then, do really want a bunch of dongles and PCI boards cluttering up your box? Didn't think so.
If it isn't already obvious, I firmly stand for the third category. If Linux ever developes apps that are useable for what I do for a living, then I'll jump on the bandwagon. It's a concept I believe in. But then, I also think Eight Tracks and Bubble Memory are cool ideas too. Linux is to me the way the Mac is to Windows users: it goes, and it does a lot of neat things you can use, but overall, it doesn't have anything you want or need. But that's me. Of course, as is much the case with things like Quake and Star Wars, Linux has its share of Zealots. Followers who really need to get a life. Let them flame me if they like. In my opinion, Slashdot is an open forum for this sort of thing. And in the tradition of freely developed stuff, if the people in charge see a reason to do something off-topic (Hemos losing his living quarters, for example), then as the people in charge, they can. I doubt that the bulk of the detractors out there have any idea what it is that goes on behind the scenes, what makes Slashdot tick. These people are more than likely ignorant louts who have no idea what Perl is or how talented Rob is when it comes to its implementation.
Of course, said detractors more than likely fall into category one.
Bottom line: as long as large amounts of cash are charged for software, there will be piracy. As long as licencing is an issue, there will be the Morally Ambiguous to step around it and get the job done anyway. And as long as there is an "average" intelligence, those on the lower end will make fun of and yell at (in caps, of course) the things they can't understand.
I have noticed KOffice reference in your sig. ...
I don't have anything against KOffice but don't you think it is a bit amusing when people who consider MS to be the root of all evil in the industry, advocate free software that tries to be almost exact copy of MS Office
Which galaxies are they, anyways?
As much as we'd all hate to see a continuance of spaced out legal chickanery in the US government, I must admit that I'd personally love to watch representatives of these 12 galaxies come down for a babylon 5-ish style court hearing. THAT would be worth switching over from X-files to watch ;)
--
rickf@transpect.SPAM-B-GONE.net (remove the SPAM-B-GONE bit)
"People will pay big bucks for the luxury of ignorance."
In the case of Microsoft or any other monopolistic
company, the prices they charge are higher than
the free market (efficient) price.
Companies don't generally price goods and services
based on the cost. They price based on the
market. As long as the price they can charge in
the market will cover their unit costs, then
they'll sell product or services.
Piracy doesn't directly increase the PRICE but it
does increase the COST. The response can be a
price increase, exiting the market, etc...
depending on how much the cost increase is.
Putting a dollar value on software piracy is
tricky, though. You can't just count the number
of illegal copies around and multiply that by
the price. You have to take into account the
fact that some number of illegal users wouldn't
use the product at all.
Bolie IV
who here would never be caught dead at the M$ trade in thing?
i think it would be funny if someone went up there with about 1000 copies of windows and wanted licenses for all them.
icq:=22921393;
i walk by that guy downtown like every day at lunch...he's an old chinese guy with funny flip-up shades on his glasses. the sign says something like 'impeach clinton reagan ford bush for violating the gamma-mega treaties of zialon' ...
-- your knees hurt, don't they?
An executive order had to be signed to mandate this??? You'd think our various government agencies would at least make an attempt at being honest without a law enforcing it.
You can have your license suspended for not being in town when you have a court date for a speeding ticket. Point is, licensing does nothing to guarantee a safe driver.
"A society that will trade a little liberty for a little order will lose both, and deserve neither. " Ben Franklin
Oh come on how can you say that? I just can't believe anyone would want a copy of WinNT instead of Linux. I use dual boot with Win98 and Linux and I can tell you that Linux has only crashed ONCE for the whole time I've been using it, and get this, Win98 crashes EVERYDAY. Yep that's right everyday.
SO what you got to say about that anonymous coward? Don't post anonymously, so that we can track you down and give you a little spanking.
Why does everyone shoot at each other in Quake 2? Can't we one day just all get along and hold hands to run around the
I was a company lawyer at a UK financial institution (IDEA Ltd) in London. I said the same thing to my boss "you need £50,000 in licences" and got the same reaction. Difference is he ignored me. Then when he sacked me later I grassed on them to the Business Software Alliance.
They had to buy £50k of licences and I got £500 reward. MWWAAAAHH HAAAAAA.
This is the reason M$ etc run these campaigns - to allow payback by the disgruntled.
"revenge is a dish best tasted cold"
-he who laughs last, is a bit slow.
journal
-- .sig files go when they die?
Child: Mommy, where do
Mother: HELL! Straight to hell!
I've never been the same since.
Just like driving a car:
(D) to go forward
(R) to go backward
Do something about that cap locks problem, dude.
I bought a dumb terminal about fifteen years ago to plug into an Altos box (it had a Z-80 and ran CP/M. Sweet little machine). It turned out to be UPPER CASE ONLY. I looked on the keyboard, and sure enough there was a wire bridge making it permanently upper case only. Check that, but the easiest thing would be to first swap in another keyboard.
Assuming they buy from a large OEM distributor. I called Merisel for the price on a boxed copy of MS Windows 98 SE (you know, the one with free phone support that the OEM version doesn't come with). It was over $250 (CAN) ... that's about $175 US. A few bucks? I don't think so. Considering OEM copies specifically state that your only support is through the OEM. I don't want to sell my customers OEM Windows 9x and have to support it ... it's buggy, we all know that. I want MS to support their own software. But then I have to pay the extra because very few customers will.
... make an obvious difference between products with a similar core to maintain so that they can price the higher end product much higher (Think high-end Intel and AMD chips).
... we learned this in highschool Calculus people ... for every dollar you add to the price, your profits go up per copy sold and a certain number of copies won't be sold. You figure out the optimum price not based on how many people will get the product but on optimum profit. If you're the only option, you can price much higher and have this work for you -- MS has lost in the past to software pirates, but in the future it will be to competitors (Linux, BE, etc.). If a 16 year old wants to upgrade to 98, are they going to pay the bucks or pirate it? They'll install Linux in the future ... ie, MS isn't losing much money to individual pirates (home users) as they wouldn't buy the software at any rate (in many cases).
IMHO, the reason software is so expensive is not primarily because of piracy but because the main consumers are businesses who are more than willing to shell out the money for Windows products. That's the reasoning behind Windows 2000 "editions" (home, business, enterprise)
Individuals get screwed, price-wise, because they aren't the real target market on a curve of price-profit ratios
Who MS really IS losing money to are large piracy houses who manufacture fake MS Windows boxes, etc. and get them on the shelves. These should be busted by FBI, etc. though, not MS themselves.
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
And, to top it off, I was playing with the most recent build of Win2k at a friend's house, alongside an NT4.0 machine. To tell the truth, I couldn't tell which was which (other than the "Win 2000 build number
I PULEEEEZE.
You used i for what? 10minutes? Did you even look at the new control panel? The new administrative tools? Even look into active directory? COM+? MTS? If your friend was using IE5 on NT4, you could be forgiven for thinking that they sortta look the same, but Windows 2000's admin tools make NT4's look like the crap that they are. NT4's user manager etc were horrible. (although you could script it or use NET USER).
There are so many new features in Windows 2000, it's just going to take so much time to list them to someone who prolly doesn't care. Needless to say, saying Windows 2000 is NT4 is stupid.
babacas! idiotas!! nerds babacas estupidos o mundo nao eh só computador sabiam? idiotas! babacas!!!!!!!!! vao se fuder!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! get a life estupidos estupidos idiotas babacas geeks bestas nao tem mais o que fazer?????? vao dormir!!!!!!!!!!!!
-- You are in a twisty maze of passages, all alike.
babacas! idiotas!! nerds babacas estupidos o mundo nao eh só computador sabiam? idiotas! babacas!!!!! vao se fuder!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! get a life estupidos estupidos idiotas babacas geeks bestas nao tem mais o que fazer?????? vao dormir!!!!!!!!!!!!
-- You are in a twisty maze of passages, all alike.
next they'll be running ads telling kids to turn in their parents - love is hate, war is peace, windows is stable!
-- your knees hurt, don't they?
Someone like RedHat has to make counter ads which prove that copying Linux isn't piracy but copying Windows is and also try and make Microsoft l;ook greedy in the process.
--
The thing to remember is that `Absolute power sorrupts absoultly'. If I'mm BillG, I am going to want a part of everything - inluding /. Who is my greatest threat? An informed consumer. Who can inform consumers better that /.
., on occasion. If I'm an intelligent emporer, I will look to my resistance to help make me stronger.
This isn't to say that I buy into the conspiracy theory. However, I do feel that it's well within the realm of possibility that BillG reads
(please note: I've posted these comments after three glasses of Merlot and two Crown and Cokes. IOW, Forgive the spelling and gramatical errors, please)
censorship is a form of noise, which actively seeks to drown out content with silence - Crash Culligan
babacas!! idiotas!! nerds babacas estupidos! o mundo nao eh só computador sabiam? idiotas! babacas!!!!! vao se fuder!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! get a life estupidos estupidos idiotas babacas geeks bestas nao tem mais o que fazer?????? vao dormir!!!!!!!!!!!!
-- You are in a twisty maze of passages, all alike.
This is actually the same technique Novell used. They used to have a hardware lock, which made it very difficult to pirate, they stopped doing that, and after about 5 years they suddenly cracked down on some large businesses for piracy. When every big business was afraid of the lawsuits, and were too entrenched with Novell, they registered their copies. Suddenly Novell controlled the majority of the NOS market.
-- Keith Moore
This sig is the express property of someone.
babacas!! idiotas!! nerds babacas estupidos!! o mundo nao eh só computador sabiam? idiotas! babacas!!!!! vao se fuder!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! get a life estupidos estupidos idiotas babacas geeks bestas nao tem mais o que fazer?????? vao dormir!!!!!!!!!!!!
-- You are in a twisty maze of passages, all alike.
Those millions of copies are sold to average users who fancy themselves to be photographers.
:-) Seriously, do you have any statistics on how much Adobe (Photoshop is a app, damnit, not a company) actually sells?
That would be me.
I'll ignore the latter part of your post... zealotry. Sounds like MS commercial.
-
__
Comment submitted. There will be a delay before you understand what you posted.
I want to do some video editing or professional sound editing. I want to play games such as AOE2 or Test Drive 99. Linux certainly blows in those particular categories.
I completely agree with you on your final point.
I know that i would have never purchased Riven if i had not "borrowed" a copy of Myst from a friend. In fact, i probably would have never heard of it. The same deal with Space Quest... A borrowed copy of Space Quest III resulted in my buying of Space Quest 4, 5, and 6. This is the same principle of "Try before you buy." I'll use it and try it, and, if i like it, i'd probably buy it. If I use some excellent software, i'm willing to pay for it, even if just to give thanks to the makers. But, then again, since i started using Linux, i really don't have any borrowed software... So i say Long Live the GNU Revolution!
haha, if I'd been there I'd have taken a debian gold cd (or something similar) and showed em it. And if they'd said it was legal I'd have acted stupid (I have a natural advantage, heh), and if they said it was illegal I'd have pulled out a printed copy of the GPL and confused em with it.
Wonder if they'd give me a copy of win9x in exchange, hardly a fair trade.
-Yarn - Rio Karma: Excellent
How so? Case in point: I had a copy of Visual C++ 6.0 Enterprise on my machine for a while (I nuked it this afternoon to make room for MP3s). IIRC, that particular piece of sw costs ~$10,000 (mostly b/c it comes with the MFC and C-runtime sources). Now do you really think I would have paid $10,000 for a freakin' compiler, especially when cygwin/g++ is a better compiler to start with? And if I did have $10,000, I'd buy a 364... nevermind, just fantasizing.
Anyway, my point is that just because people pirate some software doesn't mean that they would have bought it if they couldn't get it as warez. I can't think of a single time I have done so. If I choose to buy commercial software, it's because I really like the product, for instance, Volition's Freespace 2, or Borland C++ (no Linux examples, as anything I need there is free).
I don't usually post AC, but after all, I did just admit to stealing some pretty valuable w4r3z from M$. :)
I use FreeBSD mainly - I own everything I use. I even buy the FONTS I use.(and that gets expensive) The RSA licensing is a problem for me..I would like to be able to have some security. Isn't it against my constitutional right to restrict me from having the privacy RSA would help to be?
You hit the bottomline. MS doesn't really care about home users installing two copies of win 98 when they only bought one. They do care about companies creating thousands of win 98 cds and selling them as the real stuff. The latter is bad for MS but it may also cause trouble for the people who buy the illegal cds (without knowing it).
:)) doesn't make me feel guilty about installing their software without paying for it.
Anyhow, MS keeps the door wide open for piracy and only has trivial obstructions for copying the cd. The only copy protection is the serial number you have to type in when you install the product. If MS were serious about doing something about the smaller software pirates, they could easily add some copy protecting stuff on the cd (which would make it hard for the average user to make a copy). But they don't, they choose to keep the door wideopen to piracy. This causes me to believe that they actually benefit from home users cheating a little with their software. They even allow those users to download updates!
All this (in theory
Jilles
The SPA get a lot of tips from disgruntled employees.
Maybe Microsoft should take advantage of that in their ads instead of the current themes.
I'm not a Microsoft fan but I forward all spam containing "too good to be true" offers for Microsoft software to piracy@microsoft.com.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
Seriousyl, thought, you are looking way way way too far into this... People may actually have good tings to say about microsoft. They're not 100% evil, you know. Oops. Now i said something that's not pro microsoft, and therefore should be moderated down, right?
Just because this is slashdot, that doesn't mean it has to been this festering pool of anti-microsoft sentiment... I really enjoy the discussions around here where people intellegently debate the pro's and con's of each angle of everything.
I think you need to get over this paranoia of Microsoft trying to invade and influence your life. Next thing you know, you're going to start thinking that all the computers you buy funnell money back to microsoft due to components that you don't need, or that maybe that pro microsoft letter to the local newspaper originated in their PR department, and that they're buying opinions of major corporate consulting firms... Oh wait. Drat!
I think though, honestly, that slashdot is useful for MSFT to research what people dislike about them, but i doubt they would expend the energy to try to change the opinions found here, because most seem to be way out in right fiend and not even remotely changeable.
my two cents
I'll agree that that is another cause, however if the price of software dropped by 50% I don't think the amount of piracy would remain constant. There are a fair nuimber of people who will but software if the price is reasonable. Right now for personal use the price of a lot of software is ridiculous.
I'm not arguing that it isn't stealing. I'm argueing that MS is trying to stop it in the wrong way.
God does not play dice - Einstein
Not only does God play dice, he sometimes throws them where they
I found this old tidbit again, out of sheer luck looking for something else.. (today).. and forgot about it. Its a bit interesting, pretty old. Not sure what else to say.. just that anyone bothering to read the forum....
"Open Source?" - Press any key to continue
This is the second Microsoft article in a row to have a blatantly pro-Microsoft post marked up to 4 at the top of the list. Let's not read anything into this, ok? However, consider the following: If I were Bill and I perceived Slashdot to be a threat to me, what would I do? Because of moderation, I couldn't just use my normal trick of spamming it to death, so now what? Answer: create lots of moderators. Send in my guys to post humorous, or well-informed articles under "non-threatening" articles, such as the one about the house fire, or perhaps the one about the penguin-webcam. In this way, I would have a continous supply of Slashdot moderators working for Microsoft. The next step is simple: have an alarm go off whenever Microsoft is mentioned in an article header, and have someone from the spin department, or perhaps a highlevel manager, respond to it immediately. Then the Microsoft moderators are called in to mark the article up. OK, this may be pure speculation, but twice in a row is kinda fishy.
The point is, even this tactic doesn't work. There's no way Microsoft could create enough moderators to significantly damage the work of real, honest moderators, or even to control the inevitable flood of well-thought-out responses to the original FUD article. In fact, the strategy actually backfires by making Slashdot to appear less anti-Microsoft.
What needs to be done about this? If it's not a figment of my imagination that is? As far as I'm concerned, absolutely nothing. The current system can withstand this kind of attack quite well as it is.
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
Well.. let's not get hasty there... more likely that they couldn't get their parents to drive them out to the event. =)
Hokey statistics and ancient misconceptions are no match for a good thought in your head, kid!
Somehow I not frightened at the possiblity that somebody using an unlicensed copy of windows will crash their computer into me.
God does not play dice - Einstein
Not only does God play dice, he sometimes throws them where they
But, ten years ago, would you have felt the need to do it?
The problem is that while computers make things easy to do, once things become easier to do they also become required. The things that are added tend to be nonessentials -- for example, consider all these fancy, pretty internal documents done in word and friends. 10 years ago, they would have mostly been done on a typewriter without the benefit of fancy formatting and that would have been fine.
Even worse, docments are created that would not have been before because it's now easy. Which just proves that most work is busy work.
-- Slashdot sucks.
Carmack likes the GUI enviroment, he didn't mention the compiler.
And AFAIK GCC is better than the MSVC one.
Which provides for a very interesting mathematical problem: exactly what axioms of our mathematical system would have to be changed in order to create a universe in which piracy was impossible. And what would be the other effects of such a change on the way the universe function.
I'll be back in six years...
-
There was a piracy case involving a state university where the software vendor lost, even though there was evidence of piracy. I think the decision was based on the sovereign immunity of the state, which extends to a state university.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
The industry is only losing money from software piracy if the people using 'borrowed' copies would have actually paid for them ,which is unlikely for almost all of these users.
By 'piracy' , i mean people copying and installing software for their friends...copying it and selling it is entirely different.
Anyone who is interested in a well thought out, logical viewpoint on this should go and read the GNU outlook.
Juln
I've seen a bunch of insightful comments on how piracy is costing the one group or another so much money.
Think about that statement for a little bit.
How much money would have been spent on legit software? Now, ask yourself where did that money go instead?
Software has an extremely low cost of production, especially when compared to durable goods.
Yes, I know, there's tech support and all that, but.. think about how much money Microsoft has spent on developing NT in the past four years. My guess would put not greater then 100 to 250 million dollars. How much money has Microsoft made off of NT? Why does it cost $25 dollars a person to connect to NT server? (do that math on that one. My former company had 3,000 seats, that's $75,000 dollars of income that costs Microsoft how much to produce? Hell, you don't even get a piece of paper with a CAL anymore.)
If my company hadn't spent the money on those seats, where would have it gone? To pay someone's salary maybe? Building a better business? I don't know, and I don't care. My point is that the money hasn't been lost to the economy in general, it has just been lost to Microsoft.
I'd bet my ass that for every dollar Microsoft loses to piracy, three more dollars are generated in other sectors of the economy.
I don't mind paying for tools, but when the price of those tools far outweigh the benefits, then those tools become a liability.
This is why free software is a good thing.
(I was only an egg, but then I cracked)
I think copyright law applies to the government differently somehow; if you'll notice a lot of licenses have separate sections that cover "government use".
I have seen the future, and it is inconvenient.
Yes. That's a good question. However, possible answer might be that MS is ,at this time,simply the best when it comes to this type of applications. Almost every major Office suite tries to follow GUI/usability schema developed by MS Office authors and I don't think this is is only because it is what users are expecting.
Maybe, nobody at this time has anything better to offer - this is real possibility, that should at least be considered.
Piracy numbers are always to be suspect, but lets say for now that they have a magic way of knowing how many copies have been made.
18000 jobs? I didn't know there was a team of M$ employees in California that just copied CD's, one at a time, for them.
Is antone alse getting sick of there twisted version of piracy laws? I is LEGAL to make copies of software, It's is illegal for you to have two copies of the same license running at the SAME time. You can install as many copies of The same liscence on as many computers as you want, just don't have the software running at the same time.
Just for the record I am running Win98 for person reasons, yes, yes I know Linux is more stable.I have moral reasons not to run pirated software so I have a license.
Hello! I am Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die
Wow, just what I need, a few more licenses to software I don't want... Micrososft should be able to go out there and hunt down illegal copies of their products. I for one own some copies, as do a lot of people I know. However, I happen to have more licenses than I know what to do with. A friend of mine gave away around 3dozen WinNT Workstation Licenses to anyone who wanted one this summer. In case you don't know, Microsoft gives NT4 Wrokstation away for free every day.
Also, Microsoft tactics are a lot nicer than some other companies. Once you start dealing with software in the $50,000 - $1,000,000 range, those companies will randomly audit their customers. I know of one company that let a few extra people use some software, until one day the manufacturer flew some people out to that company, walked into the building and told the president to immediately show him where every copy of their software was and who was using it. So, I'm thinking Microsoft's approach is a little better.
Now, as for reasons why MS software is pirated, there are still people out there believing that they are striking blows against the establishment. And in all honesty, they are right. Unfortunately, it wont hurt Microsoft one bit to pirate 10,000 copies of Win98, etc. The only way the Linux community will be able to defeat microsoft will be to provide a better product. I already feel that Linux is superior, sooner or later everyone else will too.
Yow, what a weak analogy... an unlicensed motorist either doesn't know how to drive, or has done something bad to get that license revoked (DUI)... someone could actually, really get hurt under those conditions. But with software, there's no chance for physical damage.. unless someone shoves the CD sideways up into one of your 'dark places'.
Guess they fear lots of people getting run over by drunken employees at the wheel of Powerpoint or something...
I'm rather glad I haven't heard those radio spots yet =)
Hokey statistics and ancient misconceptions are no match for a good thought in your head, kid!
Piracy serves an important purpose. Say John Q. Businessman needs to create MS Office documents, since all his clients use Office (and MS claims there is no such thing as network effects!). He has to go buy a win32 environment to run Office (ignoring macs for now). Since MS is the only place to get an OS to run Win32 apps, he must buy their software.
Since he doesn't have a choice, MS can charge whatever they want. But wait, they don't! There is some competitive force keeping prices down (not very well, but its there). At some point, Windows would just cost too much, and the fines for piracy, times the risk that they'll get caught is less than the price of Windows. The smart businessman then pirates windows.
Microsoft does have competition. Its the software pirates. Obviously this doesn't make piracy good; I'd prefer that said businessman used free software, but it is certainly something to think about.
*grin* you can pirate support. I've done it (unknowningly). I called Wordperfect's support line once (shoot, for their first version for windows, how long ago was that?), because I had a video card driver conflict with their software, and wanted an upgrade to 6.1. I ended up just completely making up a license number on the phone (read off from a water-streaked piece of paper which turned out to be for a different piece of software)
:)
What arrived in the mail? Wordperfect 6.1, and a new license
Microsoft got away with producing inferior software because they managed to get it in front of lots of people, which created a critical mass effect.
The definition of quality is a tricky thing. On one level - ease of use and versatility - Microsoft Windows software, aka Word and Excel, were better than what proceeded it. On another level - reliability - Windows software was far worse than what came before.
Consumers noticed the first part, ignored the second. That's why we're in the pickle we are today.
So I would say my point is still valid - if a company more interested in quality had spearheaded the GUI revolution, we'd have better and more productive computers.
D
----
The rest of it is meaningless. Since an economy is a closed system, you say it may be beneficial to pirate software since your money stays in your wallet for other uses. So by that rationale, even if you stole stuff it is fine, since the $ stay in your wallet and are used productively elsewhere.
There's a very big difference between "piracy" of intellectual goods, and stealing physical goods... Comparing the two is apples and oranges, the route you took to "prove" me wrong. There is a fixed cost associated with producing a physical good. If I go steal a candy bar in a store and eat it, it absolutely costs the manufacturer (well, really the store owner probably, but still) whatever amount of money it took to create the candy bar in the first place. For intellectual property, like software or music, if I go and "pirate" a copy of MS office, it costs microsoft *absolutely nothing*. There's a theoretical profit loss, but there's no corresponding fixed cost that's being lost because the original investment money to create MS office is a sunk cost - it has no bearing on the profit/loss of each sale. Hence my points about software piracy not being quite the scourage on society that the software companies make it out to be.
Hijacking a truck with 5000 msoffice boxes in it, then reselling them at a computer swap sale is bad. Period. You're stealing a physical box + cd that cost microsoft $3.50 to make. This is called stealing. Putting up MSOffice on an FTP warez site is not the same thing at all, even if you charged people five bucks to access the site. Every downloaded copy is not a loss to microsoft... it's a *potential* loss, yes, but the whole point of my argument was that the potential is much smaller than the software companies would have you believe.
It's stuff like this that results in slashdotters being called crackpots. Here, let's think about the positive aspects of sneaking in and watching movies for free, or shoplifting magazines - if you like the product, it creates awareness of it and makes you likely to buy more of it! Woo hoo!
First, if you want to be insulting, don't post as an AC. Second, we're back to apples and oranges. There is an absolute loss if you steal a magazine, because you're walking away with something physical. If you sneak into a movie, presuming you're not taking up a paying customer's seat, you cost the theatre *absolutely nothing*. Is there a potential benefit to you being there? Absolutely. Does that benefit outweight the theoretical cost of you not paying? Maybe... And that's my point. Maybe. Not absolutely not.
Don't know about where you live, but here in San Diego, there are hundreds of tiny little PC shops. I was getting a hamburger at some place in Kearny Mesa (part of town where most of them are located), and there were like five shops in one strip mall.
Sure, some of the big ones get their MS products from big, reputable distributors like Ingram Micro, et al. But if you're a tiny little PC maker, and you're looking at various distributors, and somebody's selling Office for $10 less, don't you think you'd try to cut corners?
Take this to its extreme, and since MS products prices keep staying the same (or going up) as PC prices keep diving, it gets more and more important to having the lowest price to get the best deal on MS products from your distributor.
Particularly when you're a little mom-and-pop store and less money for MS products means more money in your pocket, I can really understand why you'd want to get the best deal, even when you thought your distributor might not be on the up-and-up. If you could plausibly say that you thought they were legit, and they delivered everything on time, why not?
Add to this the fact that the shops that were using reputable distributors, and those that weren't suspicious about the too-good-to-be-true prices, and it's surprising that all of those who went to check weren't getting fakes.
-Esme
please.. piracy is a lot of things, but not stealing. stealing involves the physical movement of goods. software pirates only duplicate a set of bits.
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
This isn't true. If the only way to get photoshop was to buy it more people would. People who pirate all their software are willing to pay over $1000 for a computer, so I really think they'd pay $600 for a program.
Don't get me wrong, I am not an M$ lover, but my business relies on selling M$ software. When you and 5000 of your closest buddies go out and pirate *any* software it pushes up the cost for everyone else.
:)
This is absolute bullshit. If I've got $100 I can spend on computer software, and I spend it on, say - a couple of games. I've got no more money to spend. If I then go out and pirate the games I cannot afford - then nobody looses, since I would not have bought the games anyways. I simply wouldn't be able to get hands on enough money.
Of course, people that use commercial software and don't buy ANY of it - those you can put SOME blame on. But those who buy when they've got money and pirate the rest - don't blame them for beeing too poor to buy all the software.
Bottom line is - if people buy then they can and pirate the rest, everybody is happier.
or even better, if they do like I did and erase their Micro$haft partisions and install linux
--
"Rune Kristian Viken" - http://www.nwo.no - arca
Why is this story posted on slashdot? Is it simply to provide people with a forum to make snide remarks about Microsoft? Aren't there enough legitimate opportunities to do that already?
In case you don't realize this guys, 20000 geeks' livelihoods depend directly upon Microsoft. Twenty thousand employees and their families are directly influenced by software piracy. Pirated copies of software cost Microsoft money, and do you think they'll be passing that cost along to BillG? Forget it. It comes straight out of the base employees' salaries.
Hey, I know you guys don't like patents. I know you don't like copyrighted software. I know you don't like Microsoft. I get what you're saying. What some of you don't seem to get, though, is that as long as our industry operates on those principles, ordinary peoples' lives can be harmed by flippant acts of "rebellion" such as piracy.
If you want to change software, advocacy is the best way. Look how much has already been accomplished by those means. Laughing about guerilla tactics like cracking and piracy only reinforce the negative stereotypes of this movement.
-konstant
-konstant
Yes! We are all individuals! I'm not!
it's a crappy burn or I have some other problem with it.. I call up MS for tech support, whoops, I have a fake copy, tough luck!
Oh, i forgot to add.. Would it have helped if you had a real licence? Probably not.. they would've replied with "you've got to reinstall windows" whatever your problem had been.
--
"Rune Kristian Viken" - http://www.nwo.no - arca
Are these MS ads I hear on the radio urging employees to turn in their employers to "protect" them from piracy. They make a stupid analogy to unliscenced drivers, and scare people with warnings about viruses.
I don't necessarily object to MS protecting its intellectual property, but for them to do it in such a blatantly misleading manner makes my skin crawl. Reporting piracy is not in the employer's self-interest, and can likely land them with fines and jail time. To claim that it is in their interest is a lie.
Microsoft? Adobe? With the prices they charge for their shrinkwrapped products?
There were pirates at that event all day, but they never bothered to look in the mirror.
Justin Herman Plaza is nowhere near City Hall. The words 'City Hall' are nowhere to be found in the article.
Justin Herman Plaza is about 2 miles from City Hall, which is a LONG way in San Francisco. This event was 'outside City Hall' in the same way that, say, Candlestick Park is outside City Hall.
Authors/sumbitters: don't just make up stuff in your summaries and titles -- actually READ the article, and summarize what's actually there?
*I* would have shown up...with my cd-r around the corner and a buck or so per local bum, I could have had tons of legit software, and resell it to the ingorant masses...semi-legally too ;)
Maybe they just changed productivity. I can't hand a 200,000 record table to a person or even a group of people and have them hand pick out duplicates and expect to see the result within the week. This takes a matter of hours with a medium power (today) desktop computer. Maybe it just doesn't apply to certain industries, but, like I said in my other post, my job would have been impossible to do in a company our size 10 years ago (at least at the volume I do now). Maybe computers don't increase productivity for people who don't USE them (salesmen, secretaries) but for me, and the artists (who have G3s) at work, a faster computer can double the amount of work we can do, because the work itself is processor intensive.
+&x
Of course they will never admit this through official channels. It's the classic double standard.
The Solow paradox is certainly not gospel. And even if it IS true, it may very well be BECAUSE of buggy software killing as much time as it saves. The paradox actually makes the most sense like this: computers are great at replacing back office workers- they do the work about as fast and as efficiently, and so they don't affect back office productivity in the long run, but they are way cheaper. As for non back office computer tasks, the problem is that most real economic capital generating tasks aren't just organizing your rolodex, but rather coming up with good ideas and solutions to problems. Computers don't really aid that task too much either, and if people spend too much time fooling around with getting their Outlook and desktop settings configured just right, instead of thinking and writing- well, then that's the Solow paradox in force. But what computers do change, without ANY doubt, is the end quality of the work. It's better looking, organized, smelling, and tasting.
...
;)
Damn, I missed my chance to play Wack-a-Troll.
What? So I'm bored tonight, Okay?
Microsoft, the biggest crier of wolf, has over (if I remember correctly) 10 BILLION dollars sitting in banks earning interest. How does this provide jobs? Does an extra 500 million mean an extra 10 thousand jobs? Erm, actually..... it might. If you remember, maybe, from an econ course, or have just figured it out, the reason banks pay interest for money is because they use it... to loan out to other people. Most businesses need to borrow capital in order to get going, and few people pay cash for houses. Interest is no more and no less than the 'price' of money, determined by the interaction of the supply and the demand for loaned capital.
It's a horrible crime if someone breaks the GPL but it's just dandy of someone breaks MS's software license?
Do you guys ever step back and look at yourselves? You're pathetic. You don't believe in anything, you just pretend to.
You're all just a bunch of bigots, it makes me sick.
What I understand of this story is that in order to receive a licenced copy of your Microsoft software at the booth, you had to *snitch* your PC dealer!
;-)
Of course, once Microsoft knows who the dealer is they sue the shit out of him, so giving away a couple of licences (which cost them next to nothing anyway) is an incredible good deal to Microsoft.
Since the deal was no success I can only conclude that people prefer their relationship with their PC shop better than the relationship with Microsoft!
-------
Warning: Slashdot may contain traces of nuts.
My sole problem with this - Do you really think that they are going to drop the price of the software if everyone buys it at the inflated price?
The recording industry said that CD prices were only going to be high until the technology was adopted by more people. Though CD's are cheaper to manufacture than cassettes, you can still expect to pay several dollars more for the CD.
The exact same thing is happenning with the transition from VHS to DVD. DVD's are more expensive because they're "new, and there isn't a large market for them yet". Do you really think DVD movies are going to get cheaper as time goes by?
CD Prices have dropped. Yeah they are still more expensive than tapes, but the actual price of CDs has dropped considerably. Just a few years ago a new CD would run about $20 -$25. Now I go and they average about $13. Pretty big drop. Same deal with software, it does get cheaper. And here is the short reason why: you make more money when you sell more of the product, even at a lower price.
And there are other reasons to drop the price.. take the example of getting people to upgrade from win95 to win98. Not that much of an improvement software wise, especially when you hold 98 up against 95osr2. So what is the incentive to switch, especially for Mr. Joe Budget user? He may want the extra bells and whistles, but he doesn't want or maybe even have the $90 to spend for it. So they roll it out at $90 a pop, and when they make their money back they start to lower the price.. sure it might be outdated by a couple of months, but the price does come down. Same deal with games.. personally I am in no rush to buy the most current game.. I like to sit back, wait for any bugs to get worked out, and often enough the price drops quite a bit after a couple of months.
The bottom line is that any business student can tell you that not everyone will pay the initial price. Many people do exactly what I do, wait until the price comes down. And since there is still money to be made by selling to that market, you bring the price down.. albeit slowly.
So, if they were willing to trade, I could have just burned me a few hundred copies of say win98, winnt or what have you and gotten the real one????
Anyone know when they are next going to be doing this???????
-Lord Shadow
I would love this to happen, but: Photoshop is primarily a photo editing app (hence the name). Who uses that? Photographers and press. What do they use? Macs! Until Linux can duplicate the easy of use and installation of the Mac OS, the Gimp will be used mainly for content creation (like Tux :-). Nothing wrong with that, but that isn't Photoshops main market.
-
__
Comment submitted. There will be a delay before you understand what you posted.
I wonder if we'd be in more of an economic boom if a company that created working software had succeeded in setting standards instead of MS.
Think of all the productivity lost through crashed programs and frequent MS software reboots - that must amount to billions of dollars worldwide.
D
----
Anyone who belives that companies don't cook the books when it come to priated software and loss ROI is a fool.
My point exactly. The software company says.. 'Ok, we are going to lose (or not make depending on your POV) money due to 20% of the market buying pirated software. So we need to raise our price by x ammount of dollars to cover that loss.'
No matter how you look at it the consumer gets the pointy end of the stick.
If you need to use their operating system, you certainly should buy a license for it. If you have an overwhelming need not to support them, don't use their products.
Don't make it illegal. Here's a crazy idea to become legal. Use Free Software. This could be a MAJOR advocacy point. What? You want to be a law abiding citizen? Here use this. Yep, give it to as many friends as you want. Hell, burn it to a CD, make a pretty box, get announced on /., and go public, everybodies doin' it.
Software's value is zero (Demand/Supply). The sooner the law realizes that the better. The same with IP. We need some serious restructuring of these laws to allow for an infinite product. Capitalism and an infinitely renewable procucts make for a dangerous mix.
+&x
Office has at its core a decent product that has been bloat-matized in the newer versions. MS seems to do a pretty good job of making good software when they're trying to put a competitor out of business, like IE (admit it). As long as KOffice keeps the good features and doesn't implement the bloat (read: Animated Paperclips) it is fine by me. But that doesn't excuse them from not innovating the product themselves, which I don't think will be a problem.
Hey, next time Microsoft goes to hang out in front of a court house why doesn't everyone show up with their Windows 98/95 CD's that aren't being used because they aren't running it and demand their money back. Hell, if they're at the court house complaining about the money being stolen from them why not go to complain about the money they're taking?
No. You can have all the mp3 you want.
Owning copyrighted material is legal.
DISTRIBUTING copyrighted material without permission is what is illegal.
Software, on the other hand, is about licensing.
What MS was trying to do was find companies who had purchased counterfiet microsoft products. And this seems to me like a good way to do it.
They would rather give the guy who unknowingly purchased counterfiet software the real thing, and find out about it, and gather evidence (maybe they can find out who is counterfieting.).
Somehow, I'd be surprised if RedHat made that ad. Debian maybe, but not RedHat...
Microsoft Corp. is holding its first "Be Sure It's Legal Day" from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuesday in the main lobby of the James R. Thompson Center, 100 W. Randolph St., Chicago. People who suspect their software might be pirated are encouraged to bring the software to the event to be examined by Microsoft experts. Microsoft announced Thursday it had sued five Illinois companies -- including businesses in Homewood and Matteson -- alleging they sold counterfeit software to consumers and business customers.
(can be viewed at http://www.dailysouthtown. com/southtown/dsbiz/161bd6.htmOooh, using a winmodem, that basically garuntees butchering ;)
dude, i dont know what your problem is, but i bet its hard to pronounce.
icq:=22921393;
i noticed that there are alot of flames and people acting like idiots in this area. i posted once there thinking that it would be the only troll/flame there. to my suprise, when i come back tomorrow, theres a ton of bait/flames.
i use windows, dont like it, but i refuse to go bantering about it.
what might be of some help is presenting _some_ form if identification, be it an email available only to the admins or ip tagged messages.
i dont know how much sense this is going to make to anyone else, to be honest, i dont even know if this is going to make it up because internet explorer crashed while i was typing this. (no joke)
icq:=22921393;
I've been hearing TONS (and the rock means TONS) of commercials making blanket statements that copying ANY and ALL software is piracy. I usually just laugh at them. But after the first month I started thinking (scary though in itself). Is it possible that companies like Microsoft are pushing the piracy issue to confuse people on the opensource issue? I mean if you get average joe user who is interested linux/bsd. Joe linuxuser friend gives him a copy and joe user wonders about piracy. Just some random thoughts.
"Fighting the underpants gnomes since 1998!" "Bruce Schneier knows the state of schroedinger's cat"
When I hear that Microsoft is *Shipping* a Linux port of Office, I'm gonna party. Everyone in the office will look at me funny, but, heh, what else is gnu.
+&x
You're right that Microsoft loses no potential revenue if you wouldn't have paid anyway. That doesn't make stealing morally right.
Microsoft offers their software to the public under certain terms. You can accept those terms or take your business elsewhere.
Deciding you'll take on your own terms is called stealing. Perhaps your parents didn't tell you this was wrong.
Would you as easily violate the GPL? Let's say I don't like the GPL and think Linus is an evil person. Does that justify me incorporating Linux kernel code into my own software and not properly copyrighting and distributing source?
Nobody loses any money. Does that make it right?
LJS
The first point is valid.
The rest of it is meaningless. Since an economy is a closed system, you say it may be beneficial to pirate software since your money stays in your wallet for other uses. So by that rationale, even if you stole stuff it is fine, since the $ stay in your wallet and are used productively elsewhere.
*positive* aspects of piracy. Software piracy increases awareness of the software.
It's stuff like this that results in slashdotters being called crackpots. Here, let's think about the positive aspects of sneaking in and watching movies for free, or shoplifting magazines - if you like the product, it creates awareness of it and makes you likely to buy more of it! Woo hoo!
exceeds the value the customer is forced to fork over.
Nobody is forcing you. This so called "forking over" is what is known as a purchase. In a capitalistic society, it involves exchange of money for goods and services, for a price set by the seller, at conditions also set by the seller. The reason the seller sets the price and conditions is because he OWNS the product. If you don't like it, you don't buy it. That's how it works.
No matter how crappy the product is, it doesn't justify pirating it. You could as well justify pirating anything that way - movies, books, CDs, medicines. There are countries that manufacture all of the above without the consent of the original producer, simply because they think it's too expensive. You might claim drug companies are charging exorbitant prices, but the reality is that they also spend millions on product development, just like MS does. If you don't like it, don't buy it. But please don't justify churning out fake copies and selling repackaged copies.
I'm not talking about casually handing a CD to friends. Normally, MS and companies crack down on mass piracy, which I can't find any reason to justify, simply because the pirates make money at the expense of the producer, while leaving the customer stranded with a fake product.
And yes, I use linux. And the stunt MS pulled was stupid. but that doesn't mean piracy is a good thing.
So....um...suppose you just made a great new computer technology. You sold it to a lot of people who drew up blueprints and sold it for a lot less. You'd be pissed, n'est pas?
So, that's bad, but software piracy is ok? Well, software piracy is just about the same thing. So what makes it so diffrent?
I think slashdot has a very close minded approach to Microsoft (though very open minded in other ways). We need to realize that Microsoft is not the `evil empire' and dosen't want to take over the world (sorry).
Just remember how upset we are at companies that burn copies of Linux distro's and sell then for $5 on the corner. We don't like them, however, it's just legal piracy, same concept, diffrent licensing agreement.
That's my $(2^4*3+1/7%3*2/100)
--Justin Mitchell
"2nd Place is a fancy word for losing" --Bender (Futurama)
The Solow paradox says that computers don't seem to add anything to the productivity statistics. That either means computers aren't as useful as we think, or the statistics are wrong. I tend to think it's a little of both, but the result is that MS doesn't do a whole lot for the economy.
I've seen these Solow statistics, and I don't buy 'em. Maybe its just that Moore's law has made what I do possible on desktop machines. Ten years ago it would have taken desktop machines days if not weeks to do what I can do in a single day. Not that I do that much, but it still wouldn't have been possible without the overlal speed increase of computers, and networking, and now, the Internet.
I don't think this report/study takes into account the tremendous amount of work that is now done by robots. Not the big shiny metal ones, the ones that live and work in our machines. Programs and such. My little army does the work of at least 200 people, every day. I recently started an in-house data entry company, on one machine.
Anyway, I think that report is bunk.
+&x
Did you mean 'hacker' or 'cracker'?
Do you know the diffrence? I don't think you do.
The real watershed for BI was the release of Turbo Pascal 3.?? for $75.00 a pop. The TP 3.x distribution consisted of a shrinkwrapped paperback manual (I still have mine) with a single 360K floppy stuck in the middle. This came at a time when most PC compilers were going for $1,000.00 or so, and required royalty payments if you sold binaries linked against their libs.
I suspect that part of the reason that TPs sales were so high was the "cost of documentation" factor. Many otherwise honest folks, when faced with the decision whether to buy a license for a software package or "borrow" it, assume that they will have to pay at least $40-150 for third-party books if they really want to get any use out of the software. Since one had to spend roughly the same amount of money to get any value from TP no matter how it was acquired, I think a lot of people who would otherwise have copied a friend's diskette, decided to buy the package.
For what it's worth, BI's prices started to rise because PK got into a stupid OOP VaporWar with BG, which took a huge toll on BI. Buying Ashton-Tate and getting sidetracked into other things like an office suite competition didn't help either.
slashdot broke my sig
After all, this _is_ slashdot you're reading. It wouldn't be slashdot if it weren't slashdot.. (kinda redundant, but ... )
but I am completely convinced that current copyright law in the US hurts consumers more than it helps producers, and as such is a bad law that ought to be changed for the better.
Agreed, our current laws only exist the limit the supply of the product and therefore create value through scarcity. This is an unnatural situation given the nature of the product. The laws should be changed accordingly. Or at least the people should be educated about an alternative...
+&x
> The Solow paradox says that computers don't
> seem to add anything to the productivity
> statistics.
Hmmm, first nobody was using computers in their business, now everyone is. It's a matter of keeping up with everyone else. Try running a business NOW without any computers. Just bring in the typewriters and keep track of all paperwork in huge filing rooms. Type all reports for clients/investors individually.
I bet your productivity wouldn't be very high.
--
grappler
Vidi, Vici, Veni
I always thought there was somekind of law against false advertising which I would think this was suppose to be, perhaps entrapment. Well I am no lawyer/law man- so this is just proof that M$ is never happy and always wants more money. Perhaps they are exploring unknown revenues of cash so they can delay Win2k until say 2010- when it could be stable if they start working on non-stop from now to then.
Not really, Unix has had some of them for years, but the NT implementations have more to them sometimes.
Anyway, Windows NT and Unix have come from different directions. NT from the bottom up, Unix from the top down (linux).
Why do you think XFree86 sucks compared to windows GDI (when it comes to things like fonts etc). That's why Linux is starting to get things like windows has had for almost years.
I wonder if gold CD's count? In that case I'm in trouble :)
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
why do you refuse to purchase anything microsoft makes? im guessing its because you think their products are not up to par with your standards. if that is the answer, then why do you use their OS? why would you avoid pirating software except when it comes to microsoft? people need to stop being anti-microsoft simply "because". open source software is not about stopping microsoft its about making open source software. if all those propriety companies find it hard to compete with open source projects, then so be it, but the goal of open source projects should not be to put those companies out of business...oh well i kinda went off on a tangent
I've known a lot of tech support people who've wished software licenses did work that way - that is, that users had to pass a test before they were allowed to use the software
There are also quite a few "support" people who really need to pass a test before they be allowed to provide support.
If you don't like Barnes and Noble do you just steal the books? Some of us make a living writing software.
LJS
It's not hard or overly expensive to implement hardware copy-protection, but how many companies do it? None at the consumer level. They claim that they're saving users "inconvenience" but the reality is that with tougher copy protection schemes, sales drop. Ask Macromedia and other companies who have liberalised their copy protection in recent years.
They can't admit it, but the sales are all that matters - not ethics or principles. And their sales depend on piracy to lock in users and generate awareness and formulate standards. The Internet economy shows us that standards make money. MS can't risk not being the standard - and they rely on piracy. Bottom line.
Danny
OK, lets think about this:
once you've written a product, you don't need to
pay the programmers anymore (not true actually, bugfixes and all that - but the development cost for that version is almost fixed at the current amount at the time).
There is a fixed cost for production overall, plus a fixed cost per copy produced. If you sell enough of these products, at whatever price, to cover both of these fixed costs, AND pay your employees, bills, etc, then you are in the clear.
Having some extra is good - safety net for screwing up or source of cash for new projects.
After you've reached this point, only one form of software piracy can hurt you in any reasonable way - dilution of the market by fraudulant copies.
Those who wouldn't have paid full price anyways, have no effect on all this. Those who might have, but have now pirated the software, might have effect - but since we've already made enough dough, it doesn't matter more than increasing the bottom line. Also, their effect is almost nothing, because they didn't steal an ALREADY PRODUCED legit copy, they made a copy of one.
Therefore, no loss in the form of unpaid for units. Those units produced but not sold, do incur a loss, as their production cost is not directly recouped. This is usually handled by making sure your selling price is high enough you can absorb these occurances.
So we have say, 1,000,000 copies installed that were not paid for - if these one million copies were never physically produced, they create no loss. Therefore they can't count against the total revenue.
So... lesse.. somewhere I was going to mention that the average warez'er has no or almost no effect on the actual loss to piracy. Only where people who would have bought it if they couldn't warez, or those who wanted to buy the real thing but were sold an illegal copy, would affect the loss of income, but only as a loss in potential sales - if you produced enough units to serve them and they weren't sold as a consequence, you have a loss, but if you didn't produce enough for those you expected not to buy, then there is no loss except in potential, assuming they would have bought it from you and not the illegal copy from someone else pretending to offer a legal copy.
I hope this made sense..
I'm not sure, cause I'm not entirely awake and there's no caffeine sources around.. argh, grocery trip time!
Or could it mean that the standards are rising? I haven't read the material in question, though it sounds interesting, but I know that a lot of times, when capacity to produce increases, demand for production increases at twice the rate.
Well, they're supposed to take rising standards into account when they determine all of that and weight productivity statistics accordingly, but as you might guess it's pretty impossible to do that right.
That software under a license like the GPL is better. Think about it. If you buy a GPL program with support, and then pirate it, what profit has been lost? YOU bought the support. No one else. Therefore no potential money has been lost. Software that is released under a truly open source license simply cannot be pirated. So Microsoft wants the magic bullet that will kill software piracy. I believe I just gave it to them.
Umm... So tell me what's the difference a post titled 'Hrm...' and a post titled '...'? Where's YOUR 'good, informative subjectline' and why are you preaching about it if you don't use it?
(climbs into flameproof tank)
Maybe because the alternatives are not up to par either.
(climbs back out)
I have yet to encounter one OS which fullfills all my demands. (Tried win95,98,98se,NT,Linux SuSE, Redhat, Mandrake, Slackware. Currently dual-booting 98se and Mandrake.)
Btw, have you ever heard of a Shift or Return key? ;-)
-
__
Comment submitted. There will be a delay before you understand what you posted.
But what is it that you don't believe? This is more than just one report by Solow. This is a few dozen reports by lots of people, who still haven't come up with a consistent explanation. The data are gathered from various sources. It may be that computers waste productivity exactly as much as they help, cancelling out the effect. Or maybe they're just not that important (~2% of business capital investments). Or maybe we just need a better measure of productivity, but it stands that "you can see computers everywhere but in the productivity statistics."
Ok, so you've got to earn money to continue paying people to code, I understand that. (reading the above post about the costs of piracy coming out of the base employees' pay...) I figure it this way - If ALL buisness bought legit copies of software, and all people using it for personal use ONLY got free copies, who is to complain? Now I'm not talking ALL software, but things like Windows, Office, and other buisness related software (minus MS Money)... if they were free to home users and the buisnesses HAD to pay, it'd even out fine. Things like Photoshop and Sound Forge and even Accelerated X (gotta throw a Linux app in there or I'd be flamed to hell) are also included in there. Buisness pay, homes users don't... Or maybe a very small price for home users even to cover the packaging and materials (an almost not-for-profit copy, if you will). It'd work fine, though there would have to be another buisness in which employees went around checking buisness for licenses on their software. Other applications like Gizmos and Paint Shop Pro and other non-buisness type software can stay just where it is on the shelf. Theose are more non-buisness type software and can be paid for by the home users if they want it. What I'm saying is, why make the home users pay for something at buisness' prices if they don't use it like a buisness would and they don't make money off the end-products? Granted, Linux is nice and it is great that it is free but if you are looking for quality in applications, you are almost -always- looking at Windows apps. I don't care how much you insist, Gimp does NOT come even CLOSE to Photoshop. And Linux is still nowhere near up to par with it's hardware compatibilty (2 weeks it took me to get 2 NIC's recognized by PnP and then I get an error on startup about the (ISOLATE PRESERVE) line that noone can answer). However you take that, I am -NOT- slamming Linux, hell, I am trying to get my server up on it (proxy/ipmasq/portforwarder to run ftp's on other machines behind it)... I just CAN'T do it. - 8Complex
I think most of us Linux users would LOVE it if MS actually enforced their licenses..
Can you see it? One $500 copy of office for every PC in the office when you only need it on three at once, can't publish benchmarks, have to actually buy 100 user copy of NT server (insted of pressing UP 95 times)..
If forced to go legit, people would flock to Linux in mass numbers.
The huge mistake that you make here sir is that
you believe that the GIMP will become a corpse
for the littering in the same way all these other
fine products are.
This is not true. GIMP may die off, but not the
same way. Adobe cannot kill it! Adobe can only
lobby to get laws passed to criminalize such
development in the US. In which case development moves offshore! The only way GIMP can die is if the programmers quit.
GIMP is going to bust photoshop right in the chops. Maybe not next year or the year after, but it will happen.
I especially liked the person who thought shoplifting a candy bar was a worse crime than pirating software.
People seem to have a natural expectation that software is free. Maybe this is just more evidence that proprietary software vendors are dinosaurs.
(With a suitable exemption for those progressive companies that create someone that nobody else ever has--I think there's room for that in the market.)
That's really not the point, yes the price is hard to see. What microsoft is after is not the little guy making CD-Rs of windows, but rather dealers to OEMs pirating copyies and selling it to OEMs as the real thing for a lot less then what a legit company would charge. Often the OEMs don't even know it is a fake, you can hold them side-by-side and they look identical. This would not happen if windows it competitively priced. Microsoft has been pretty good at punishing the bad dealers, how about giving the legit dealers a break (price wise)? It costs the OEM dealers illegaly produceing copyies of software in order for them to look legit, plus the added risk. If illegaly copying software no longer becomes feasable, maybe the piracy problem will get smaller.
"I don't necessarily agree with everything I say." - Marshall McLuhan
YIKES! AVERAGE users buy Photoshop?! That proggy has got to be one of the MOST expensive apps on the market, along with the Macromedia tools. I can't imagine my uncle (who *is* a photographer, and is fairly computer savvy) just popping down to the software store and picking up a copy.
YIKES! I say! YIKES!
I avoid pirating software, except when it comes to Microsoft. I refuse to purchase anything they make, and I make it a point to only use their OS products. I won't pay a Microsoft tax to run the software I want to use.
They've come by here in MN, busting places that pirate Windows wholesale, and their explanation is that they're "protecting consumers". They can't even admit they're doing it to protect their bottom line. I'm a consumer, and I prefer pirated copies.
Ahhh... I understand your confusion. You see, you're not a consumer, you're actually a thief.
Probably a subtle difference in your mind, but it's an important distinction to make.
Simon
Coming soon - pyrogyra
As I said: there are three types of lies.. :)
Daniel
Hurry up and jump on the individualist bandwagon!
I wonder if a person could have taken CDs harvested from alt.binaries.cd.image, gathered from warez sites, and traded at lan parties and traded them for licensed copies? Hrmm.. Somebody could have walked away with $10,000 or more in new licensed software.
So next time someone gets wind of them doing this, burn up a bunch of CD's of the redhat ftp distro, set up a table across from the MS folks and give them out, all the while ENCOURAGING people to copy them because it's LEGAL.
Does anybody really think that MS's half-hearted efforts to stamp out piracy are genuine? They are going after the people selling large quantities of counterfeit software, not the average (and far more numerous) home pirate with a cheap CD burner.
The fact is: Piracy helps Microsoft propagate it's monopoly. I have no statistics to back this up, but I've seen so many home-burnt copies of NT4 and Win95/98 floating around, I can't even count them all. Lot's of folks build their own computers, and probably very few of them cough up the cash for their OS (since they are cheap bastards in the first place). Do we really think that MS couldn't come up with some kind of registration scheme that disables the software after a registration period is up (to prevent duplicate registration numbers)? They did something like that with the Office2000 beta, as I recall.
No, they won't be doing that anytime soon. They know that allowing piracy helps make their OS's ubiquitous, which makes MS the easy and obvious choice for OEM's and businesses. They will keep up appearances with little publicity stunts like these pirated software turn-ins, but they know that really cracking down on OS piracy would be a boost to Linux of historic proportions.
///MrF
Several years senior folks at Microsoft would insist "I would rather they use a copy of MS Office illegally, than use a copy of Wordperfect etc". :)
Well, see, there's a difference. When you buy a bicycle, and later give it to your sister-- you no longer have a bicycle. But when you copy software and give it to your sister, you both now have a copy of it. A copy has been created, independently of the company who creates it.
So, you've just set up your own bicycle factory, and made a new bicycle, claiming that it's the same Huffy you had. If I were to set up a car factory making what I called "Ford" vehicles, I'd be in a lot of trouble.
THe difference between software and physical goods however is, software is mostly made of thoughts, and so easily reproducible.
So, what's the solution if you want to make money making software? Outlaw actual ownership, and license use. Doesn't quite make sense to me...
THat's why I think an Open Source model addresses the problem more effectively
Ok, so you've got to earn money to continue paying people to code, I understand that. (reading the above post about the costs of piracy coming out of the base employees' pay...) I figure it this way - If ALL buisness bought legit copies of software, and all people using it for personal use ONLY got free copies, who is to complain?
Now I'm not talking ALL software, but things like Windows, Office, and other buisness related software (minus MS Money)... if they were free to home users and the buisnesses HAD to pay, it'd even out fine. Things like Photoshop and Sound Forge and even Accelerated X (gotta throw a Linux app in there or I'd be flamed to hell) are also included in there. Buisness pay, home users don't... Or maybe a very small price for home users even to cover the packaging and materials (an almost not-for-profit copy, if you will).
It'd work fine, though there would have to be another buisness in which employees went around checking buisness for licenses on their software.
Other applications like Gizmos and Paint Shop Pro and other non-buisness type software can stay just where it is on the shelf. Theose are more non-buisness type software and can be paid for by the home users if they want it.
What I'm saying is, why make the home users pay for something at buisness' prices if they don't use it like a buisness would and they don't make money off the end-products?
Granted, Linux is nice and it is great that it is free but if you are looking for quality in applications, you are almost -always- looking at Windows apps. I don't care how much you insist, Gimp does NOT come even CLOSE to Photoshop. And Linux is still nowhere near up to par with it's hardware compatibilty (2 weeks it took me to get 2 NIC's recognized by PnP and then I get an error on startup about the (ISOLATE PRESERVE) line that noone can answer).
However you take that, I am -NOT- slamming Linux, hell, I am trying to get my server up on it (proxy/ipmasq/portforwarder to run ftp's on other machines behind it)... I just CAN'T do it.
- 8Complex
Don't have much opportunity for piracy. You can't do that kind of thing on any scale in a business (perhaps with the exception of real fly-by-night places). The risks and consequences are just too great -- you really don't want your company sued out of existance.
As for users, most of them get M$ for free on their computers. So they don't pay, more than in some very abstract sense. And it's not more than a few bucks per machine.
Your explanation uses a different definition of "productivity". If computers can do the same amount of work equally as fast but cheaper, productivity has increased and we no longer have a paradox.
I will agree with the quality part, though. For better or for worse, we have much nicer documents now than we did 10 years ago. And our spreadsheets can be a lot bigger.
And what does that make you, praytell?
I'm quite curious as to your answer.
I think you're posts should be moderated up because they're funny.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
Piracy also seizes the privilege to use software. You're not buying the software itself so much as media, documentation, support and a *license* to use it -- e.g. check the GPL, where it notes that the license is the only thing that grants you the privilege to use any GPL'd package. If you don't agree w/ that license and you use it anyway, you're still stealing.
You can steal intangibles, like space (squatting), as well. And so forth.
There is no basic *right* to use software unless the publisher/author gives you the right to do so, perhaps indirectly (via a transferrable license).
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
How do they come up with this number? The only explanation I can see is that they've built a machine to travel to a parallel universe in which piracy never occurs, and discovered that there are 18,000 more jobs in it.
Or for a more mundane explanation: there are three types of lies...
Daniel
Hurry up and jump on the individualist bandwagon!
Because them legal types are clever in ways normal humans are not (they are also other things, but thats off topic :)
I will need to be guided by some one with a more firm understanding of the licence situation, BUT they might say...
a) If it was pre-installed, then it WAS used (seal broken), and thats what you paid for.
b) If it wasn't pre-installed (ie just handed over) and not used, then take it back to your vendor for a refund.
c) If you don't want a copy when you buy a machine, go to a vendor that gives you the option.
Arguments more stupid than the ones stated above have worked!
I am afraid that we must just grin and bare it and add it to the collection of coasters on the bar.
Okay, so what if... (you'll have to imagine here with me now) I use Linux. Let's say, Redhat 5.2, and use that for all that I do with my computer. Let's also say, that I'm a programmer, developing for M$ Windows. Okay? With me so far? Let's also say (keep in mind that all of this is theoretical) that I don't like Windows, wouldn't ever pay for Windows, and don't need Windows to do any of the things that I use my computer for. HOWEVER, (and this is where it gets hairy) I DO need a copy of Windows so that I can code for it, obviously. Would it not make sense, that for me to have a copy of Windows so that I could code for it, thereby propagating the Windows (based) economy, and adding to the (sarcasm)ROBUSTNESS(/sarcasm) of the M$ Windows environment, that it makes sense for me to have a copy for free??? I mean, quite admittedly, I would NEVER pay for a piece of software as bug-riddled, weak, and insecure as M$ Windows is, but still need it to propagate it to its own benefit?
Anyway, just think that it's fair. Maybe I'm just screwed up.
The opinions expressed in this post are not necessarily the opinions of slashdot. Hell, they're not even necessarily the opinions of myself, I assume no liability, and refuse to warrent any truthfulness to this post. -i9mm-
The horrible thing about posts such as this is that it represents the Linux and Open Source communities as a whole. The idea that "Microsoft is Evil!" is just dumb. It saddens me that people cant see that there is room for Windows and Linux at the same time.
Microsoft creates alot of jobs for people, when compared to Linux, which created reletively little if you look at the number of linux software makers to people who make software for Windows.
While a couple people stealing a few copies of NT Server isnt a big deal, if you add up all the totals it is a huge deal. Billions of dollars that rightfully belong to Microsoft arent getting there.
As for the posts about "What if a company who made software that works set the standards...", my NT box has been up for months without a slowdown, now I dont know about you, but I'd say it works great.
God, I hope you weren't serious. For your own mental health, that is.
"Don't touch the bunny!"
The numerical value I can see, but can anyone prove that piracy of software could actually cost 18,000 jobs in one state alone (even if that state is CA, the state with the most tech jobs).
Seriously, are the numbers you see piracy pundits all that serious? I mean, who gives a half a fsck about someone lending a friend a bit of software? The rings that SELL pirated copies are a different case, but all the same, 18k jobs sounds like a number that's so far out there it isn't funny.
"Don't touch the bunny!"
-- .sig files go when they die?
Child: Mommy, where do
Mother: HELL! Straight to hell!
I've never been the same since.
Just like driving a car:
(D) to go forward
(R) to go backward
Everyone seems to be touting the evils of comercial software and hailing free software. Has anyone stoped to think about the motiviations of programmers here? It's money. Plain and simple. On my free time, I stop to help out the open source community, but come Monday morning, I'm gonna go get paid to do what I like. Flame me all you like, but there just arn't that many good people out there that would just sit down and program 40 hours a week for free. We all have to live on something, and I'd rather have a job that pays me to do what I like. I can go get my warm fuzzy feeling on the weekends.
Hmm... I woulda loved to see that...
------------
Demanding constant attention will only lead to attention.
-- .sig files go when they die?
Child: Mommy, where do
Mother: HELL! Straight to hell!
I've never been the same since.
Just like driving a car:
(D) to go forward
(R) to go backward
It's stuff like this that results in slashdotters being called crackpots. Here, let's think about the positive aspects of sneaking in and watching movies for free, or shoplifting magazines - if you like the product, it creates awareness of it and makes you likely to buy more of it! Woo hoo!
Obviously you haven't been to a public library recently. It's amazing - you can walking in, walk away with a book, read it, then give it back to someone else can read it. And it's all free. Yet many of the books I've bought were because I borrowed them first from a library and liked them enough to own them.
You seem to claim that using libraries is akin to stealing. (I know this is a major paraphrasing of your view, but I'm making a point) If you used libraries more then you'd appreciate the community benefits of having free access to intellectual works. Libraries also rent out software and music for free these days too.
A simple test for whether piracy (a.k.a copyright infringement) really matters: how did we ever get along without copyright law before?
Andrew Scott
Come on now ... just give us his IP.
CC
"Pray arm me further by your reply" Winston Churchill
Thank you, that tells me all I needed to know.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
Anybody know if these are regularly scheduled events? It would be so much fun to show up and setup a booth and pass out some other free licensed software, like nice linux CDs. Now that would be a stunt to pull.
While I am solidly against software piracy, the argument that microsoft geeks are in danger of losing their jobs due to it is solidly rediculous.
BillG himself is worth $400,000/employee.
I refuse to pay for software which does not meet needs and expectations. Does this mean I pirate Microsoft software? nope, I just don't use it.
As for the anti-patent/IP/copyright people, I don't think many of them realize the implications of what they're arguing for. Personally, I like the fact that if I write an industry changing program, that I'll be very very rich.
My personal feeling is that if you want to change software, learn to program and code the weaknesses.
not "faster" and "cheaper" in the sense that people using them do it faster and cheaper, but rather that the computers can replace the people altogether. This doesn't increase human productivtity, which is the only thing that increases living standards.
It's caused by high prices.
This "event" failed because MS was assuming that people with pirated copies of MS products had bought them, and thought they were probably legal. Unless I'm badly mistaken most people with pirated copies of software got them from their friends.
And the reason people do this is that software prices are incredibly high. I was told that Borland made their fortune when they released their development tools at a fraction of the going rate for software. People considered their prices fair and actually bought them. Paying $500 for an office suite isn't a big deal for a big company, but it is for an individual.
When you're trying to sell software there are a couple of key questions:
1) How many people want this program?
2) How much are they all willing to pay?
If software costs substantially more than people are willing to pay, and people want the software badly enough, there will be piracy.
How much this piracy is hurting software companies is debatable. Often if they didn't have a pirated copy they wouldn't use the software at all. In that sense it costs them nothing.
Companies would do better to stop trying to "educate" customers about piracy, and figure out how to keep the cost of software in the range that customers can afford.
Note: I'm not argueing that piracy is right. I'm commenting on what I think the real causes are.
God does not play dice - Einstein
Not only does God play dice, he sometimes throws them where they
All my CD's say Unauthorized duplication is illegal. Nothing about whether you are going to distribute or not.
Think about it folks. Counterfeit software may be a ripoff of Microsoft, but it's an even worse ripoff of the consumer. Go through any computer show, and you'll see piles of "Microsoft OEM" software for sale, or retail copies of Office at suspiciously low prices. If you develop an eye for it, you'll realize that as much as 90% of the stuff is counterfeit.
If you want to rip off a copy of Windows from Microsoft, that's your decision; but if you're going to pay for it, then you might as well get the real thing. People who sell a counterfeit copy of Office to an unsuspecting user for $200 or more are pretty slimy.
Offering to replace counterfeit stuff with the real thing is pretty generous on MS's part, and as I said, I have no problems with them chasing down the people who make the stuff. These are not innocent home users making an extra copy of Windows for their buddies, they're professional criminals, they know what they're doing, and they're ripping off consumers.
Is it just me, or is there some grammarian AC that's lurking around who likes to criticize those who screw up your/you're. Whoever you are, it's lame, stupid, and adds nothing to the discussion.
Offtopic, and proud of it too.
it falls under authorized duplication.
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
I AGREE WITH THIS L33T D00D! LINUX SUCKS. IT ONLY TAKES 20 MINUTES TO INSTALL. wHAT IS THAT? SINCE WINDOWS TAKES LIKE TWO HOURS TO INSTAL IT MUST MEAN THAT LINUX IS REALLY NOTHING AT ALL. DOOD LINUX IS GAY, LETS ALL USE WINDOWS AND STARE AT THE PRETTY BLUE SCREEN
well that was fun. can we ban this bastard by his ip?
--Have a Johsonville brat.
You lose all rights to hold the company accountable for their faulty and bloated code.
Well, I don't recall having that option with most commercial software anyway. Try reading those MS EULAs sometime - you have 90 days (iirc) in which to claim product defect, and have the product either repaired or replaced. Nothing about refunds - no, they don't GIVE refunds. Nor do most reputable software shops - the best you can usually get once you've opened the box is store credit on another product. And after the 90 day period on that MS EULA, MS effectively disavows any fault (of ANY kind) with regard to the product. So you're not gaining that much.
I admit, I recently bought a copy of Applix's ApplixWare for Linux - I also admit I pirated it previously. I thought that the price was fair though, and I could afford it. Also, unlike pretty much every MS product nowadays, it has a nice, BIG, spiral-bound manual. Don't get that with most software of ANY kind lately. If I'm gonna buy commercial software, I'd rather buy it from a company that offers a good, stable product that does what I need at a fair price. (Yes, I think $100 is a fair price for an office suite - $200 for an upgrade is NOT. And yes, I think including a real manual is a very nice feature, too.)
Sam: "That was needlessly cryptic."
Max: "I'd be peeing my pants if I wore any!"
Why can't you just retreat to your interests and leave us to ours. So we like linux, so we like to develope it. If LINUX didn't have shortcommings we wouldn't need to develope it. I wouldn't have it any other way. I guess the trouble that you have is that you can't understand what it is we're about.
I don't see why you have to judge us. Why? Why not just let us be? How have we wronged you? Don't like us, just don't listen!
I am the penguin that codes in the night.
To tie the two topics back together: Adobe, pleeeeeze port Photoshop to BeOS! Apple wouldn't stand a chance...
-
__
Comment submitted. There will be a delay before you understand what you posted.
I agree, MS accells at creating a user interface (though I still think IE's interface sucks:)
But how worthwhile is a good interface for an unworkable product. Thats what I truly appreciate about linux, and is the reason linux is taking absolutly so long in the development of a good GUI. Linux Developers are concerned with getting a product which is rock solid, then we can go back and make it look good. But sad to say, it seems MS works the other way around.
Ken Starr.
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Open source is hurt every bit as much as closed source when someone steals software.
Closed source we allready know about... theft of service and of hard work by hard working programmers.
Not just Microsoft but people in companys compeating against Microsoft are also effected.
If stealing software wasn't posable whos to say the theaf would even use the same product?
Often the justification for the theft is the theaf would have NEVER paid for it. Thats fine by me you don't have to use THAT product you can use free software or cheaper commertal alternitives.
But instead of using cheaper alternitives or free alternitives the theaf steals Microsofts titles.
That dosn't just hurt Microsoft.. that hurts everyone who's trying to provide you with an alternitive to Microsoft....
I don't actually exist.
Of course the loss figures cited by the software industries are similar nonsense. They usually assume that each illegal copy would have been sold at full price. Moreover, they totally ignore the fact that the user of the illegal copy (and hence the overall economy) has a net gain from this use - after all, he does not need to spend the money on the software, but can use it to improve his business or his live in some other ways (which usually involve buying other goods or services).
I don't condone illegal software copying, but the overall economic loss is much lower than alledged. In fact, there might even be an overall gain for the economy, as more people are able to work more productive using their illegal copies ;-)
Stephan
Um ... 'amendment' has 2 'm's ...
-- Arm yourself when the Frog God smiles.
You'll note I didn't state that Win2K is NT4, just that for such a "revolutionary" change it still looks, acts, walk, smells, and quacks like the same old duck.
In some other related posts it has been noted that Linux is just coming into its own regarding some of the GUI features windows has had for some time. Of course, Windows is still not coming into many of the features Linux (and *nix before it) have had for many more years (security, solid TCP/IP stack, easy remote administration, true multi-user operation, etc.). And I have 1500 true-type fonts available on my desktop Linux box, with 36 full-screen virtual desktops, intense themability, ssh-remotable (with Kerberos key management) X sessions (across a firewall which accepts only ssh sessions authenticated by RSA). I've paid only the price of hardware, which is lower than it would have been for the hardware to run a comparable (well, there isn't really such a thing, but if there were) Windows setup.
Oh, almost forgot (that machine is a PII):
12:44pm up 43 days, 14:01, 15 users, load average: 1.19, 1.25, 1.26
(sorry the uptime is so low -- I upgrade the kernel every so often).
"Cause there's 40 different shades of black, so many fortresses and ways to attack, so why you complainin'?"
I avoid pirating software, except when it comes to Microsoft. I refuse to purchase anything they make, and I make it a point to only use their OS products. I won't pay a Microsoft tax to run the software I want to use.
Don't get me wrong, I am not an M$ lover, but my business relies on selling M$ software. When you and 5000 of your closest buddies go out and pirate *any* software it pushes up the cost for everyone else. You see, if they do not make enough money from the product then they have to charge more to make up the difference. And by pirating software you help that along. (sarcasm)Thanks buddy, thanks a bunch!(/sarcasm)
They've come by here in MN, busting places that pirate Windows wholesale, and their explanation is that they're "protecting consumers". They can't even admit they're doing it to protect their bottom line. I'm a consumer, and I prefer pirated copies.
Now let's see.. you sell me a fake copy of windows or some other program. You neglect to inform me that said software is pirated... it's a crappy burn or I have some other problem with it.. I call up MS for tech support, whoops, I have a fake copy, tough luck! Or how about keeping the costs down, there are just a whole slew of reasons that piracy *is* bad for the consumer. Of course, M$ is protecting their bottom line at the same time, but it is still protecting the consumer.
DOOD, YOU ARE AWESOME. GIVE ME YOUR IP SO I CAN SEND YOU A PROGRAM THAT WILL CRASH STUPID LINX.
--Have a Johsonville brat.
Think about it. You lose all rights to hold the company accountable for their faulty and bloated code. You also increase the installation base of the bad software, thereby increasing the market share, thereby eliminating the competition base and further reducing the incentive to provide better software.
Sheesh! If 29 percent of all copies of MS Windows upgrades and MS Office are pirated, no wonder it looks like Microsoft has a monopoly! Does that include all the legal copies that are installed multiple times? What would actually happen if everyone was forced to pay in full? If sales tax is %10 (a high estimate?) then that 244 million turns into almost 2.5 billion dollars not spent in California alone on software! No wonder there is such an incentive to pirate this stuff.I'm afraid that Microsoft is taking the downward spiral out the drain. These numbers just don't make any sense, and it looks like it is only going to get worse. If the average person feels worse about stealing a candy bar, the only operating systems that will survive are ones that are free (that's gratis, not liberty).
As much as I would like to believe in the liberties of open source software, the truth of the matter is that I don't usually open up the hood myself (though it provides peace of mind with that option being open). The primary benefits to the end user are thus reliability and not having to repeatedly shell out for registered license agreements.
I agree with an above comment that one way to slow the high rate of piracy is to reduce the cost to the consumer. Another more frightful way is to fire up the IDs on those PIIIs . . . . =8O
Of course, it won't be the end of the world, will it? There are several free (gratis and liberty) OSes out there. My future as a consultant isn't disappearing anytime soon. In the meantime, though, make your bosses pay for all the MS licenses as required by law, or threaten to turn them in! If nothing else, this should restore some accountability.
BS. When Linux can install with 2 check boxes(wether or not to install optional software and/or media files) and an edit box(the partition to install to) and then detects all your hardware, including NIC and sound card, you can talk. When you can set up networking by typing in your IP and checking off wether or not you want telnet and/or ftp server, you can say Linux is easy. Until then, BeOS has a monopoly on easy.
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...
#1 - Turn off your caps lock key you fucking moron... it makes much sense that you cannot turn your caps lock key off, since it is obvious you attempted to install Linux and failed miserably.
#2 - What is your obsession with homosexuality and your stereotypical classification of women? You either have the lowest mentality of a tadpole, or the highest mentality of a redneck. Perhaps both. I was under the assumption that we as a society had moved from thinking that labeling someone as a homosexual was somehow degrading or a bad thing. Thank you for proving me wrong you unenlightened drivel filled moron.
#3 - Perhaps you have some kind of repressed homosexual urges yourself? Maybe you feel the need to lash out at others because you have not come to terms with your own sexual preferences. Hmh. Any psychology majors care to share their opinion on this?
Charlie
ps - Why don't you just go back to watching WCW. Bwahahahaha.
-- .sig files go when they die?
Child: Mommy, where do
Mother: HELL! Straight to hell!
I've never been the same since.
Just like driving a car:
(D) to go forward
(R) to go backward
The cost for piracy is passed right to the consumer.
You Aren't Worth using a moderator point.
Quemadmodum gladius neminem occidit, occidentis telum est
Didn't it occur to anyone to get a copy of MS*, make a bunch of copies, then turn them in for real ones?
No one is paying for it. Microsoft knows what it's doing. They didn't get to be the most valuable company in the history of the world by being stupid.
They're certainly not penalizing developers, but in they're also not passing it on to customers either. I remember a time not long ago just about every item in the Office suite used to cost what the entire suite costs now. They make lots and lots of money, money's not even part of the equation for them. It's all about control.
The software piracy situation here is at least a _little_ underground with respect to english-language titles, and the reason for that is that companies like Microsoft make a lot of noise. But with VCDs it's out in the open and ubiquitous. There are neighborhoods where every block has multiple high-profile stores selling nothing but illegal CDs, DVDs and VCDs.
Why? Because it's socially acceptable in Hong Kong to buy and sell copies, so such behavior is winked at, even by the police. The point of anti-copying publicity campaigns in America is to combat that sort of attitude, so that the extent of copying _remains_ as much a marginalized activity as it is today in the US.
Glen Raphael
I play Nerd-Folk!
Stealing a magazine and sneaking into a movie are both completely different from copying software.
If you steal a magazine, you are taking away a physical object that the company can now no longer sell to someone else, and likewise if you sneak into a movie, that seat can no longer be occupied by a paying customer.
Here's a couple analogies for you:
The magazine:
You walk into the store with a scanner, and proceed to scan in every page of a 25 page book that costs over 400 dollars, then leave. In this case, the object still exists for the company to sell to someone, and in reality, would you have bought that magazine for $400 if you didn't have a scanner?
The movies:
You walk into the movie theater carrying a chair, you set it up out of the way of everyone else, and you watch the 5 minute movie with a 700 dollar ticket price. The company has lost nothing, you haven't taken up a single seat, and again, if you didn't have your chair? would you have paid $700 to watch the movie?
This whole "piracy" = theft thing really irks me, think of software like books - some people buy them if they're good, but if you just want to read it once, wouldn't you rather go to a library?
---
Ooh, ooh! I have a question! What do you suppose the moderator did if she was female?
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
Uhh...*you* may not have a sense of humor, but the richest company in the US getting no takers on its offer of licenses for warez is pretty amusing to most people.
In case you don't realize this guys, 20000 geeks' livelihoods depend directly upon Microsoft. Twenty thousand employees and their families are directly influenced by software piracy.
Oh, gee, get out the hankie. Excuse me while I puke.
Did you ever stop to think about how many careers Microsoft *destroyed* with its illegal tactics?
I don't use proprietary software. I don't think people should pirate. But I really don't care what happens to Microsoft, its employees, or the mindless lemmings who have built it into the monstrosity it is.
--
Interested in XFMail? New XFMail home page
I'm going to take a stab at this:
Can't be in the 12th grade, must be 11th or lower. Unless you have a really low IQ level or were beaten severely as a child. You think you're "cool" because you can insult people, although you can't even define "cool", can you? I'm betting on you play sports, most likely football from the arrogance. The internet is a place for you to vent your frustration because computers are changing you and everyone around your life and you don't know very much about them so you're scared. You don't know what computers can do and you want everyone to turn back into the brainwashed TV freaks that everyone was at one point, and you probably still are. Am I correct? Just curious...
Here in the Chicago area, they have also started radio advertising, asking people to bring in their software if they suspect it's pirated and they will check if it's authentic or not.
They compared unlicensed software to unlicensed motorists, and noted that you woudn't want one out of four drivers to be unlicensed, and that one out of every four microsoft products used in business is not licensed.
/Simon
-- .sig files go when they die?
Child: Mommy, where do
Mother: HELL! Straight to hell!
I've never been the same since.
Just like driving a car:
(D) to go forward
(R) to go backward
Is this you Roblimo? Hehehehehehe... venting your anger about the earlier fiasco :-)
This was in jest. Duh.
Charlie
-- .sig files go when they die?
Child: Mommy, where do
Mother: HELL! Straight to hell!
I've never been the same since.
Just like driving a car:
(D) to go forward
(R) to go backward
No, you're just a moron who needs to shut up.
(as you can see, no one is wasting their time on you)
And I bet I have a few guesses as to what you had sex with. Congratulations, not many can claim to be the proud father of a new hybrid species.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
Hahaha you were post #69. Sorry, just had to point that out...
-- .sig files go when they die?
Child: Mommy, where do
Mother: HELL! Straight to hell!
I've never been the same since.
Just like driving a car:
(D) to go forward
(R) to go backward
Also, why the HELL are you wasting your time posting nonsense? What would you be doing if you weren't doing this?
Why can't you just retreat to your interests and leave us to ours. So we like linux, so we like to develope it. If LINUX didn't have
/.'ers I don't think that we should kill this guys net connections or even ban him, it's entertaining. We should be able to exploit those of less knowledge for our own pleasure. :)
shortcommings we wouldn't need to develope it. I wouldn't have it any other way. I guess the trouble that you have is that you can't
understand what it is we're about.
I don't see why you have to judge us. Why? Why not just let us be? How have we wronged you? Don't like us, just don't listen!
Oh, and this is my second time posting this one... if you can repeat so can I.
For all
I am the penguin that codes in the night.
The industry claims:
Piracy cost the California economy an estimated 18,000 jobs and $244 million in lost tax revenue in 1998. The estimated rate of illegal software installed statewide last year was about 29 percent, about eight percentage points higher than in 1997.
The reality:
All those pirated copies would of never been purchased anyway, so how can they claim a loss? You can't lose anything you never had.
I have seen him running around SF since I have got here. Does anybody know his story... That would be interesting... ..Another Laid Back Aussie ;-)
Therefore, rather than simple pirating, we must use other methods to bring the evil empire to it's knees. Support emulation projects along the line of WINE, and ports of third party commercial software, so that windows loses it it's lock on extremely easy to use, mildy versatile software, that runs on all those Intel chips that someone bought for some reason. As this particular AC pointed out, M$ cannot survive without it's profit. Let's take that profit away from them, but let's do in the way that's not only legal, but has the additional effect of grinding the notion that not only do we not need the shoddy M$ OS, we don't want it either. Pirating sends the message that we do want it, but not on M$'s terms.
Simply put, I think we should stop spitting in Billy boy's eye, in order to punch that same eye.
Effort can temper a man's body, but only experience can temper his soul.
I read your article on microsoft's failed attempt to crack down on piracy, and was a bit disturbed about your figures... Time and time again, there are figures released about the staggering amounts of jobs/money software/music/whatever piracy costs the state, and they're all nonsense. The vast majority of these "statistics" are released/publicized by software companies themselves. Even worse, none of the statistics truely address the ramifications of software piracy. All they do is go "we think there are roughly X number of pirated copies out there." (which is *always* a wild guess) "each copy of software costs $Y." "Thus, we've lost $X * Y, which is a huge amount of money, and just think about how many jobs that could have funded."
First, the reality is, 90%, if not more, of the people who are "pirating" software wouldn't be using the software in the first place. The gentleman who was listed in your article as giving his copy of chessmaster 3000 out to his friends had every right to do that if each person was using the software consecutively. And how many of those friends would have actually paid $49.95 for their own copy of chessmaster if they didn't have access to it for free? Very, very few. Yet, all of those people are counted as posessing pirated software for the statistics.
Second, even if there is a large theoretical cost from software piracy, why is it an issue? Our economy is a closed system. If all of a sudden all of the supposed pirates went out and bought copies of the software, the money they used to pay for the software had to come from somewhere. The statistics the public sees imply it magically appears, to then be used for the benefit of all concerned. Not true... it comes from private individual's pockets, one way or another. Would there be more benefit if it remained in those pockets? Maybe. Maybe not. It could be positive or negative, but it certainly isn't as clear as we're supposed to believe.
Third, even if all of those pirates went out and bought software, and it wouldn't be more useful in their hands, why would it be beneficial to give it to the software companies? They have zero obligation or interest to use it for anything resembling the public good, and the directors of those companies would and should be fired if they used it for anything but the benefit of their company. Microsoft, the biggest crier of wolf, has over (if I remember correctly) 10 BILLION dollars sitting in banks earning interest. How does this provide jobs? Does an extra 500 million mean an extra 10 thousand jobs? Or does it mean a big bonus for the directors and a 2 cents per share dividend? How, then, is software piracy a *problem* for the public?
Finally, none of the statistics or articles I read deal at all with the *positive* aspects of piracy. Software piracy increases awareness of the software. Period. Going back to the chessmaster 3000 example above, is it likely that the ten other individuals who "pirated" chessmaster 3000 will go out and buy a full version? Not really. However, is it *more* likely than if they had never used it? Depends on the quality of the software, doesn't it? If someone "pirates" a piece of software, and then finds it to be the best, most highly-crafted, most stable, etc. etc., piece of software they've ever used, odds are they'll go out and buy a copy of the software, for the documentation, or for the next upgrade, or even out of a sense of thanks for the great value they got. Who will software piracy absolutely not benefit? Companys who make critical (people have to have it), but crappy (people have a low, if not negative perception of it's value) software. Ring a bell? Microsoft's operating system, perhaps? And surprise, microsoft is one of the biggest fighters of software piracy.
Software piracy is not an issue if the software's percieved value matches or exceeds the value the customer is forced to fork over. The negative aspects of software piracy are overinflated, and the fight is entirely one-sided. It really makes you wonder what the "cost" of all that copy-protecting and lawsuits is...
From the article:
She said a similar event in San Diego drew about 40 computer sellers who wanted to see if their software was legit, and ``the vast majority was counterfeit.'
Honesty compels me to admit skepticism. But I'll set it aside for long enough to ask the obvious questions:
Where are commputer sellers getting MS software, under circumstances that they wouldn't be sure it was legit? Surely not from MS. From middleman distributors? If so, and if "the vast majority" of what they're selling is counterfeit, and if they're selling it openly enough that 40 computer sellers in one town can get hooked up for a steady supply... then why isn't the FBI all over the racket?
I'm dubious about the claims, but perhaps I merely don't have all the facts to judge them by. (For example, is the FBI making frequent busts that don't make the news?)
Any clarification would be appreciated.
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Of course, there is no way to know for sure, but I believe that had Microsoft not monopolized the industry, there would have been a more money made, and a healthier industry.
--
Interested in XFMail? New XFMail home page
To summarize: Users pay for it, it's not at all abstract, and it's a hell of a lot more than a few bucks per machine.
Educate yourself and then step back into the ring when you have something valid to say
What you say is true, but it's not like what he says is not true. No need to be mean about it. Think: How many normal computer purchasers actually notice the price of Windows? With Dell, Gateway, Compaq, etc., I seriously doubt they do. So that leaves someone shopping at a place like yours, where it is specifically itemized on the bill. His point was not that the cost of Windows is not actually substantial or is not passed onto consumers, but that in almost every case they don't notice, at least not to the point where they would buy a pirated copy, even if they had the technical knowledge to install it.
Nope. That just proves you're in denial.
-- .sig files go when they die?
Child: Mommy, where do
Mother: HELL! Straight to hell!
I've never been the same since.
Just like driving a car:
(D) to go forward
(R) to go backward
Or how about those that have a working linux partition but due to the winmodem that was included with our computers we are unable to do much of anything?
--Have a Johsonville brat.
Funny(+1) isn't enough anymore. We need Funny(+1) and Funny(-1), depending on the situation. They could be represented as "Funny (laugh with)" and "Funny (laugh at)". To balance the extra option, merge the Troll(-1) and Flamebait(-1), because they're Redundant(-1).
Gates' Law: Every 18 months, the speed of software halves.
1.) How's it "shitty"? Give me SPECIFIC examples. Aside from the fact that it probably escapes your comprehension.
Also, how is it 100% zealot? We've probably got some Windows users who moderated you down simply because you're a drooling moron with nothing better to do.
2.) I think you are most likely just a moron.
Bill Gates could let m$ fly and he wouldn't care. He's set.
3.) We don't care about your sex life.
Your'e still a moron.