What's your opinion about Macwarez?!

Urgh. Nothing gets me more peeved than students whining about not being able to afford professional software....

And here's why.

If I want a copy of Final Cut Pro, I have to shell out $999. If you are a student, you can get Final Cut Pro for $249. Apple almost gives the application away to students, and yet they still insist on pirating it. So it really negates the argument of students not being able to afford these "expensive" applications. All the major developers (Apple, Adobe, Macromedia, Corel) all make their applications available for very little money through education channels.
 
Though it was way back in this thread, I wanted to share my own BSA story. I quit a job in 1993 or so and my former employer was jerking me around for my last paycheck and some commission - about $2000, and I was pissed off.

Since the owner had bragged about how he never paid for any of the software used in the company (about 30 people) I decided to rat on him, and boy was it fun! First, I got a secret code name (that I picked myself) in dealing with the BSA via the phone. I supplied them with all the information on the software (DOS, QuatroPro, WordPerfect... - can you imagine stealing that stuff?), the number and location of the machines and, of course, my bosses name - RICK something.

The BSA machine started to move, though very slowly. They had told me they contacted my former employer and they denied everything. They followed this up with numerous requests to visit the office, but were denied. They finally got a warrant and fined the SOB for all the software at list price x 3! Came out to about $24,000. Before they could collect the dirty rat ba$tard went bankrupt (he did this about once a year with one of his FOUR COMPANIES IN MADISON HEIGHTS MICHIGAN AFTER RAPING ALL HIS VENDORS AND STARTING UP A NEW COMPANY TO DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN. OF COURSE HE ALMOST CHANGED HIS WAYS AFTER HIS SHIKSA 26 YEAR OLD WIFE HIRED MOVERS AND HAD THE HOUSE CLEANED UP AND CARTED OFF ALONG WITH HER GAUDY DIAMOND RING AND JUST AS TACKY SILCON BOOBS BETWEEN THE TIME HE WENT TO WORK AND BACK!!!) - forgive me, I just had to add that for the 1 in a million chance he ever reads this post, but he always hated Macs.

Any way, the funny thing is, all of this took so long so that when it all started to happen and BSA got on his case, my former employer had just fired their $100,000 a year accountant (believe me this guy had to be a genius with play money - he probably found work at Enron) so they thought the accoutant was the rat!!! Too bad because I had this fantasy of being there for a SWAT team raid busting in the place and finding him flushing disks down the toilet - it was not meant to be I guess.
 
interesting story karavite.

but El Diablo - i am not talking about when netscape started giving the product away to everyone. i am talking about when they used to sell the browser for $30 or so. but any student could get it for free. Why couldn't other software companies do that?

Your explanation that people would just give it away is not grounded. Only the same people who accept such things today would still be accepting them then. Once anybody has a copy, they can give it away to whomever they please now. theoretically, only one copy of any software ever needs to be paid for. then that person starts the worldwide free distribution.

sound ridiculous? that's because it is. the majoity of people are always going to play by the rules. even if for no other reason than that "rules are rules" or"it's illegal". so if the majority of people pirating today are kids and real theives, then at least tomorrow it will only be real theives. because the kids are still just going to pass them around to each other. People will either be honest or not. no amount of legislating is going to change that. no amount of encoding is going to change that. and illegally using a free copy will still be a crime.

If they really wanted to crack down they would install serial number reporters that automatically registered your software and reported when more than one person was using it. it wouldn't shut down the software, but it would alert the authorities. and when the authorities have less reports to have to chase down, they might be able to put their manpower into enforcement. then the only way to avoid reporting would be to avoid using the internet which would make it harder to get more software. or else become a super geek like theed and learn how to disable it. Despite the appearances of this site, the world is not filled with super geeks yet.;)

but let the kids have the software and learn how to use it so they can be the next generation of power users, developers, designers and the lot.
 
Ed, good to have you back here. And thanks for pointing out the netscape history, I was about to do that myself.

karavite: LOL. You crack me up. That's a sweeeeeet story. Totally live by the sword, die by the sword. Ironic in both the classic and Alanis Morisette definitions! Wheeeeeee!

And a metaphor: There was this intersection where I used to live, and one of the ways of coming into the road, you could see perfectly for at least 300 feet before you merged onto it. The sign there was a stop sign, so not stopping was a crime, yet nobody stopped.

Other people were arguing that they needed to put a guard there to make everyone stop so that they obeyed the sign. I retorted with what I felt was the obvious solution, make it a yield sign instead of a stop. This situation is brought to mind by this conversation we're having here. ... I also think that if government would enforce fewer laws, we'd see greater adherence to those laws. "Pick your fights" so to speak.

ElDiablo: You mentioned corporate vs consumer piracy, and you're not getting much argument on corporate piracy. This is implicit agreement that that's bad and needs to stop. And the clarification that we've arrived at in this thread is making me want to put forth a licensing structure, should my software ever move to a shareware fee. "Current version free for unlimited time to students and anyone under 21, everyone else [X]$ per user". My enforcement plan would likely be nothing, as I have no way of knowing; and enforcing would cost more than I ever plan on making. But I really like the student and age thing. ... I'll settle for assuming innocence unless I can prove guilt.

As for being pissed at students for complaining about pricing: it's true. They get crazy discounts; but it's also true that they are often spending more money than they have already on education, and taking out loans to eat is bad enough, taking out loans for software stings extra hard, to the point of feeling like it's irresponsible to spend money on such frivolities(tm).

This has been a wonderful thread. But I feel I've come to some good conclusions, and that I have offered my piece. I'm going to try (once again)
to not post any more, though I'll probably still read. Thanks everyone for the pleasant conversation.
 
theed - I'm glad you liked the story. I'm not normally the revenge type, but this guy was so slimy (and so rich due to his slime) that I just couldn't take it.

I'm no innocent angel in the pirated software world, but I do try and support the "little guys" every time. For example, I shelled out the $7 or whatever for Fruitmenus and it is one of my most useful and used apps (for those missing the Apple Menu days of yesterday). I have bought a ton of similar little apps that are mainly system enhancments and it is system enhancements that, IMO, have always made the Mac the best "personal computer." So, if you have to steal, at least give these kind of developers the monetary recognition they deserve.

Forgive me if I haven't read this entire thread, but I haven't run across a discussion of Open Source. It seems that if you are really poor and want to not be poor you could install Linux and a bunch of apps (Star Office if you are on a PC), learn how to use Linux and then go to IBM and get a job as Linux system admin for $90k a year. Then you could buy all the software you wanted.

Seriously though, I have only been following Linux for a few years, but it is really improving and gives a real taste of what a free software world could be like in the future. After reading the Cathedral and the Bazaar, I thought things would change in a hurry, but I was wrong. However, I'm still confident that in the next few years you can get a free OS, GUI, file manager and suite of business and DTP apps that will do almost everything a person would need to do - and rarely crash!

Duh, just read the end of theed's note!
 
My PC's were always ridden with pirated software. Then, after using FreeBSD and RedHat at work for a couple years, I moved to FreeBSD at home for my primary workstation. One of the really nice things about open source OS's is that you can find pretty much anything you want for free. I started to feel really good ("clean") from not having to pirate software all the time. :)

Since moving to OS X (FreeBSD is still, and alwys will be on my fw/ap/nat box), I have purchased a few apps. No big hitters like PS7 or DreamWeaver, but some <$30 titles. If I were to use PS or DW for work, I would purchase it (or have them purchase it :) ). Thankfully, the company I work for is a strong advocate of OSS tools/apps so I should be "safe" as long as I work here. :)

- G!mpy
 
I'm all for people using/learning open source OS's, but unfortunately, the only way to get one of those nice ~$90K/yr jobs with IBM is to have a degree AND know some *nix...unless you're related to someone high up the food chain that works there. :) I lucked out getting into FreeBSD and RedHat out of high school and getting myself into a great job where I could work with both. As a result, I have no college degree. So, even though I have 4+ years of sysadmin experience with a few BSD's and Linux distros, I most likely would not get into IBM. :( It's no biggie though...I really love my current employer so I don't see not being able to get into IBM a problem (for now :) ).

Just thought I'd add my $.02...

- G!mpy

Originally posted by karavite Forgive me if I haven't read this entire thread, but I haven't run across a discussion of Open Source. It seems that if you are really poor and want to not be poor you could install Linux and a bunch of apps (Star Office if you are on a PC), learn how to use Linux and then go to IBM and get a job as Linux system admin for $90k a year. Then you could buy all the software you wanted.
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I don't mind a little software piracy of M$ products and products that are severly flawed. Of course d/l to try out is okay too.

Strange ethics, but i get by with them.
 
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