What's your opinion about Macwarez?!

**jokell82** · February 14th, 2002, 10:58 AM

Originally posted by testuser

Piracy as a concept is wrong, but the devil is in the deails:
* I already own a copy, and want to put it on my second Mac

Check your licenses, you do not OWN a copy of any of the software you have. What you own is permission to use the software.

**ElDiabloConCaca** · February 14th, 2002, 11:08 AM

Originally posted by testuser
ElDiablo,

You have surprised me!

I guess in the end we actually do agree:
Piracy as a concept is wrong, but the devil is in the deails:
* I already own a copy, and want to put it on my second Mac
* I want to try a friends version of X for 1 week to decide if I want to buy it
* They are no longer selling X, and I can't find another way to buy it
* Is it fair for companies to inflate the price that honest users pay, to recoup the losses to piracy?

Hehe... surprised you? Well, it's nice to know that we can see eye-to-eye! I guess this is the same problem me and my girlfriend run into time and time again -- I'm a firm believer (yup, I like using that phrase a lot!) in the belief that there isn't one best way to do anything (or rather, many unique different ways for many, unique different people), and that there is more than one path one can take to reach a common goal.

At any rate, I think I'm interjecting too much damn philosophy into this thread. I'll keep it simple from now on, promise!

Ok -- here we go:

Originally posted by testuser
ElDiablo,

You have surprised me!

I guess in the end we actually do agree:
Piracy as a concept is wrong, but the devil is in the deails:
* I already own a copy, and want to put it on my second Mac

Hmmm... a definite gray-area. Most licenses nowadays provide for installing a single purchased copy of a piece of software on more than one home machine, granted that only one copy is in use at any particular time. Similarly for workgroups. Other software companies are explicit in saying that it can only be installed at one place at one time. This is example number one.

Originally posted by testuser
* I want to try a friends version of X for 1 week to decide if I want to buy it

Hmmm... software companies would say, "Invite the friend over for a week." Yet another gray area, involving our friend ethics, because if this were the case, the friend would borrow the copy, install it, like it, delete the copy and buy the software. Software company gains customer, but might have not had the licensing terms been strictly abided by. Ethics portion: can you live with the fact that you broke the law by lending your copy of the software out? You broke the law in FAVOR of the software company. Ouch. That's a tough one.

Originally posted by testuser
* They are no longer selling X, and I can't find another way to buy it

Easy one. Wait until the software company releases said outdated software to the general public, like Apple did with System 7. However, what if said company goes out of business, and all the copies they released are all that exist, and said company no longer supports said software? So you download it from a warez site: would the now-defunct company be able to sue you, even though the company no longer exists? Does thier software licensing exist even though their software and company no longer exists? Where am I? What's going on? My head is spinning!

Originally posted by testuser
* Is it fair for companies to inflate the price that honest users pay, to recoup the losses to piracy?

Yup. Plain and simple. Capitalism at its worst. Is it fair for the customers to take advantage of a downturn in the computer market and buy RAM dirt cheap when, just a year ago, RAM was almost 10x its cost today? Yup. Most definitely, coming from someone who did just that. If the customers feel ok in taking advantage of certain situations where the company is taking a loss and the customers are the ones gaining, then the other side to that is that the companies can raise prices due to the dishonesty of some of their customers (er, I guess they really wouldn't be customers, but "potential" customers) to recoup losses incurred by their customer base.

These are all the grey-area thingies that need to be sorted out. Case-in-point was the licensing for multiple copies of software where one is in use at one time, or a single copy residing on a single machine. Are customers expected to read through that 2 pt., 10,000,000 word fine print in the licensing agreement in order to find out whether they're complying completely with the terms? At the moment, yes, they are... but the fine print varies so greatly from one software package to the next that some sort of "base" model needs to be established -- software, no matter what it is, CAN or CANNOT be installed on multiple machines. You CAN or CANNOT sell the box and CDs and keep a copy on your drive. You CAN or CANNOT use outdated or out-of-production software. This should be common among all packages, not as greatly varied as it is today.

**themacko** · February 14th, 2002, 11:11 AM

Well yeah. But lets say I have a family with a wife in business and two kids in high-school. Through the grace of God each of us has our own computer (it goes without saying that they're all Macs). Am I going to drop over $1500 just so we can all use MS Word/Office on our computers? You're sadly mistaken if you think I am that law-abiding.

If you do drop that kind of money on software you are not being a good consumer, you're being economically retarded.

**ElDiabloConCaca** · February 14th, 2002, 11:29 AM

True -- and I reiterate, this is where BETTER SOFTWARE LICENSING TERMS need to be established, and they need to be agreed upon. Under this circumstance, in order to NOT fork out $1500 so everyone could use Office AND be in compliance with their licensing terms, you'd have to sit on the phone for 6 days straight with some retarded, high-school dropout Microsoft representative trying to get two educational discounts and a mobile home-to-office family pack deal.

I think this is one of the problems .NET is trying to tackle.

Oh, and Office is $499, isn't it? Straight-up without upgrade discounts or anything? Damn... a family of 6 would pay more for the software than for a high-end Macintosh! (Maybe it's $399... I dunno... Got mine through school, so it was HEAVILY discounted!)

**jokell82** · February 14th, 2002, 11:32 AM

Originally posted by themacko
Well yeah. But lets say I have a family with a wife in business and two kids in high-school. Through the grace of God each of us has our own computer (it goes without saying that they're all Macs). Am I going to drop over $1500 just so we can all use MS Word/Office on our computers? You're sadly mistaken if you think I am that law-abiding.

If you do drop that kind of money on software you are not being a good consumer, you're being economically retarded.

This is what Microsoft calls "casual piracy," and is what they are out to stop right now. But they are going about it the wrong way. If they want you to buy 4 copies for 4 machines, they need to sell it to you cheaper than $400-$500 a piece. Say you buy the first copy for $400, then each additional licenses are $50 (this is still way too high for an office suite IMO). I would think that less people (although still some) would "casually pirate" software , due to the extra LEGAL copies being not so expensive.

I'm just glad I'm a student and can get software relatively cheap.

**ElDiabloConCaca** · February 14th, 2002, 11:38 AM

Originally posted by jokell82
I'm just glad I'm a student and can get software relatively cheap.

RELATIVELY cheap? What school do you go to? UTSA down here in Texas sells copies of Office 2001 for $12! Visual Studio, all 3 disks, for $8! Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional for $40! My head was spinning when I saw these prices. Needless to say I bought them all...

**jokell82** · February 14th, 2002, 11:43 AM

Originally posted by ElDiabloConCaca

RELATIVELY cheap? What school do you go to? UTSA down here in Texas sells copies of Office 2001 for $12! Visual Studio, all 3 disks, for $8! Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional for $40! My head was spinning when I saw these prices. Needless to say I bought them all...

Yeh, my school doesn't have a very big mac selection, but what they do have is dirt cheap (I think I've seen a total of 5 macs at a school of 26,000). I got Office v.X for $129, and some vampire game for free (apparently they just couldn't sell it). Too bad the game only runs on 9, which I don't have installed.

**themacko** · February 14th, 2002, 12:56 PM

Holy crap man .. I bought all my software (and my iBook for that matter) from my school and Office cost me $299! I thought I was getting a deal at $150 off but I guess not...