What's your opinion about Macwarez?!

**ksv** · February 10th, 2002, 03:16 PM

Oh, forget it

**edX** · February 10th, 2002, 03:36 PM

ed's been sleeping in this morning.

wow, did this thread ever take off!!

i'm not sure, but i think ericbrian finally figured part of it out.

I guess i'm mostly with testuser on this one. I am impressed that my opinion means so much that my reaction is awaited with anticipation

Applewatcher - your post titled "what about students" seemed to imply to me that you were supportive of the "i'm too poor to buy it" rationale. you certainly seem to know some of the more popular pirated software. I am a student. so i either take advantage of student prices or do without. for a good online student discount vendor goto www.creationengine.com

and as far as m$ software - it's not even worth stealing

so applewatcher - what is your point?

**AppleWatcher** · February 11th, 2002, 01:57 AM

Applewatcher - your post titled "what about students" seemed to imply to me that you were supportive of the "i'm too poor to buy it" rationale. you certainly seem to know some of the more popular pirated software. I am a student. so i either take advantage of student prices or do without. for a good online student discount vendor goto www.creationengine.com

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I think you've interpreted my post wrong. Let it rest now.

you certainly seem to know some of the more popular pirated software

YES! Of course I do! Everyone does!

I am a student. so i either take advantage of student prices or do without.

That's nice. But, I think there are students who don't...

AppleWatcher

**edX** · February 11th, 2002, 02:13 AM

yea, duuuuh!!

so you responded to all my points and i accept your answers at face value. i have nothing to gain by doubting you. so how about answering my question - what was your point in posting this? was it just a joke as Admiral claims?

i'm also still a bit perplexed - first you want my reaction, and then your reaction to my reaction is to "let it rest now". odd

**AppleWatcher** · February 11th, 2002, 02:25 AM

You see Ed,

We had/have some guys around here that ask for links to warez blabla...

Now I thought: What's the opinion of the Macusers around here?

You get it?

AppleWatcher

**edX** · February 11th, 2002, 02:54 AM

yea i get it. thanks for answering. i apologize for any misreading of your posts and the implications i made. it has been interesting. of course it's the same old arguments that still don't hold water and only amount to a lot of rationalization for doing something one knows one shouldn't. i think kids are going to do that with a lot of things, not just this issue. Seems like most of the adults, or at least professionals, on the site realize that it only hurts them in the long run.

so AdmiralAk had a good question back there about betas which i think is also relevant to this discussion. I can remember when shareware was distributed on the honor system. There was no expiration date. i admot i was guilty of using some of those programs without ever paying . Too lazy to even send postcard for some of them. I am sure i hurt some developers by not supporting them. It was before i, like some people here, really figured out the implications of it.
but now beta's are released all the time, many with the expectation that you pay for it right away. but often that beta version you try isn't worth buying. so you just leave that app on your HD or trash it. then a while later, a new versioon comes out. you want to reevaluate it. only it tells you that your trial has expired. is it right of you to hunt down those info files and trash them so yoou can start again, or is it wrong of the developer to have put them there without making them version specific? or at all?
Once i wrote to a dev. about this very issue. i was a bit cranky at the time and it wasn't the nicest of emails. but while he jumped me for being accusing of him, he also gave me the name of every file to get rid of and start again. i ended up buying the app the version after that one. but should i have had to go thru this in the 1st place?

**fryke** · February 11th, 2002, 06:26 AM

The BSA tends to count every copied version of an application as a loss in money, as if every user running a copied version of a particular application would have bought it if he hadn't copied it. This is - of course - wrong, and thus the numbers the BSA gives out are in fact wrong.

But it's not that difficult, really. It's plainly forbidden to copy copyrighted software. It's forbidden to run software that you need a license for if you don't have one.

Also the reasoning that 'if you use software and make a profit with it' of course can't apply to games at all (or other entertainment software titles). Also the statement that 'I use Photoshop now for free and will buy it when I'm a graphics professional' can't be applied to games.

Another philosophical problem is that 'times have changed'. I remember the times when I had my Atari ST and the internet was not part of my life at all. (The 80s.) I only had two friends who also possessed an Atari ST, my other friends either did not have computers or used Macs or Amigas. So getting your hands on software titles for free (by warezing) was a completely different thing then. One of three would buy the software, two copies were made. Like that the software developer still made money, albeit less than if every one of us would have bought a copy.

Nowadays a kid connects to Hotline or Carracho servers and finds - with a bit of sweet talking and trading - archives with the newest titles. And oh so many of them. In the 80s I needed like 5 software titles plus maybe a game or 20. If I didn't find a title that did what I needed, I used GFA Basic to write it myself, if it wasn't too big a task.

So while back in the 80s software wasn't just available some klicks away and sharing software was mostly a private thing with (small) group dynamics and basically a positive feeling towards the developers, this has changed. People just grab everything they can. I know people who have every Photoshop and After Effects plugin ever made. Just to have them. They don't use it. But it's always a good trading argument for them. Actually, they don't really do anything productive on their computers. They're traders. They're addicted.

Sounds dumb? I remember myself. The summer of love, when Mac OS 8.0 Betas were the big hit on early Hotline servers. I would stay up half the night just to make sure that the 30 or so MB would dribble in through my 28.8Kbps leased line. In the morning I would - again - destroy the System of my PowerBook with it. And in the evening I would find a newer build on some or other Hotline server. Addiction? Yes, of course. I would have had a better time if I only downloaded one build per week or month, I could have done a lot more work on my computer (and gotten some sleep, too), but I was addicted to it. What excitement it was to test the themes 'Gizmo' and 'HiTech' with early builds of 8.0. How loud was the scream of everyone when they were removed before the final candidate stage. Hilarious, how the 'Special' menu in the Finder changed its name with every build ('Sunrise', 'Steve', 'S...'). It was a great time - and I was addicted to it.

My reasoning goes like this: Addicted traders don't really harm developers directly. They wouldn't buy the software titles. But they do indirectly by making the titles more widely available to users who *could* pay for the software but *don't*.

Kids who *need* expensive software for fun don't harm developers, because they could never afford to buy a license. But what they don't see is that there are alternatives. Do kids really *need* Microsoft Office v. X? They could use AppleWorks which is much less expensive. And they could buy the software or let their parents buy it for christmas. Photoshop? The 'Elements' version would be enough for most of the tasks. Use Graphics Converter for most of the missing features. But I didn't go that way myself when I was a teen, so I understand why people don't.

The people who *really* harm software development companies are the ones who sell copied titles. I know that in the late 80s a couple of friends of mine bought 150 games on about 200 floppy disks for their Amigas. An italian BBS sold such packages at a price we would pay for the empty disks. Many of the games sucked, but among them were at least ten titles they would else have bought themselves or gotten for christmas/birthdays, so actually there was money lost. And there are people selling copies of Adobe or Microsoft titles. Big time. Those are the criminals. And the buyers of course are the dumbasses, because they pay for something without earning the right to use the software.

I'm a bit sorry for the long post, but I think it's important to say in a thread like this what's really happening. Posts like 'where do I find macwarez' should not be in such a thread. Posts like 'I do warez but I don't worry' should not be here, either.

What could 'the industry' *really* do to make it better? I have a suggestion. As an example I'll use Photoshop, for it is about the most traded title in the WarezWorld:

Photoshop Elements (with even less features): Free.
Photoshop Basic (with a bit more features than Elements today, perfect for Webdesign but not Print): 90$.
Photoshop Full (like today's version): 299$.

Everyone would download the Elements version. Because it'd be free. It would be enough to learn how Photoshop works. If you'd really like what Elements would do, chances are high you'd spend the 90$ for the Basic version some day. And the lower price for the Full version would make professionals buy the licenses earlier in their cycle.

Similar models could be made for almost all graphics professional software titles like Illustrator, FreeHand, Flash (!), GoLive etc.

**ksv** · February 11th, 2002, 08:15 AM

Good words, fryke

As a "kid" myself (as I'm tired of being classified as), I have to correct you a little. "Kids" (at least us with macs

) also use software for creative stuff. Already when I was 7 or something, I started messing around with the system, apps etc with ResEdit. I've also made graphics to Escape Velocity plug-ins (Battle of Valhalla), and made my own. Back when I was 11, I had my own local newspaper (which I sold hundreds of copies of in total), and made some money on designing/printing business cards, CD covers etc. All that with legal software

What would I have done if I had a PC, and never touched a mac? Oh, I don't even want to think about it...