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RANT: High Software Prices!
pro3carp3:
There seems to be some who believe that it is ok to steal as long as you can get away with it and you 'feel' that you have a right to have the stolen item. If you carry this to it's logical conclusion then, it is ok to steal anything under the same pretense. A car, house, or the money out of the bank teller's drawer. Take it a little further, and you can rationalize murder. Where does it stop? It's either wrong or it isn't, no matter what the object.
Perry Mowbray:
in general i guess i evaluate companies and get a feeling for if i think they are trying to jack up their prices and update charges in order to maximize profits with no real "love" of their customers. i want to support companies which balance making a profit with having happy users. show me a company trying to bleed their users dry to squeeze the last drop of potential profits, and i'll show you a company whose users are looking for an excuse to jump ship.-mouser (April 18, 2007, 10:02 AM)
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It may depend on who they define as their "customers"...
Edward Cone's article Google's Growing Pains makes some interesting points about how a company's loyalties get split when share holders compete with customers:
From the start, however, Google has marketed itself on niceness. It trumpets an unofficial motto, "Don't be evil," publishes a detailed code of ethics for its employees, and adds playful modifications to its home page on holidays. Smart business for a company built in large part on consumer trust, but heartwarming nonetheless.
Lately, though, Google has been acting less like a collective of lovable geeks and more like a big, powerful corporation. Not surprising—it is a big, powerful corporation, one with a responsibility to its shareholders to grow ever bigger and more powerful. But it's still somewhat jarring.
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But that's what I love about DC: people coding, reviewing, helping, etc for the love of it -- which doesn't take away the need to pay the bills, but it does have a fundamentally different emphasis. It's more like selling the excess vegetables at the local market than hamburger chains taking over the world: I guess it's a much more human scale.
Perry Mowbray:
Where does it stop?-pro3carp3 (April 19, 2007, 07:32 AM)
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Moral Relativism doesn't stop, it just keeps evolving
tinjaw:
Stealing is wrong. Piracy is stealing. Piracy is wrong. If you can't afford it, don't buy it and don't steal it. If you can't afford Photoshop, use the Gimp. If you can't afford Windows, use Linux. Period.
I have no scientific evidence, but I firmly believe that those how say they "need" a feature don't *need* that feature. *Wanting* to touch up a photo for your website and Photoshop having a convenient filter to do that, is not a "need". If you have a client that will only accept documents in PDF format, then you have a true need and you buy software to do that. And if you can't afford it, you raise your prices, or you get a loan. If only businesses can afford it, then only business will by it *AND* this means the market provides an opportunity for somebody to create a "light" version and sell it to individuals. And since the one feature you claim to need is not the same as the feature somebody else "needs", if the developer is smart they build in a plugin architecture, and third-party developers will make the plugin to do what you need. You buy the inexpensive "light" version and buy your "needed" features a-la-carte.
Just to put things into perspective, I am a libertarian. Stealing - and that includes piracy, is one of the very few legitimate reasons that society requires *some* laws - that should be simple to understand and easy to enforce. This also means that even though I am against piracy, I also do not agree with almost all of the ways that it is currently enforced.
And, if you are wondering on my opinion of DRM, I almost never purchase DRM protected music, videos, etc. (When I do it is almost always for a use other than my personal enjoyment.) And if everyone practiced what they preach and did the same, DRM would disappear practically overnight. DRM, like SPAM, exists because "the market" perpetuates it. (Albeit 25% of "the market" are technically below average in intelligence).
P.S. I am tens of thousands of USD in debt, yet, somehow I am able to donate a few dollars here and there to FOSS that I use. Why, because it is the right thing to do. And that means that I occasionally have to skip a cup of coffee or a candy bar. I suspect many people could do so as well. $1USD from thousands of users adds up very quickly. Support FOSS.
Darwin:
Sorry, Hirudin - I'm STILL doing my income taxes (deadline is April 30 in Canada). I don't mind paying taxes - looks like this is a good thing :o - but why does it have to be so complex? Of course, being a geek, I am using QuickTax to do them, but I've never found sitting in front of a computer so thoroughly UNENJOYABLE. Anyway, it has left me irritable and I overreacted to your post.
I completely agree, anything I can say on the subject has been said before.
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This statement applies to me, as well...
Really, when you get down to it... Using software that you didn't pay for is actually only breaking the terms of the license. If you break the license by using academic software for commercial purposes you're just as bad as any other traditional pirate.
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Can't argue with any of that. This is why software piracy is so complex - nothing tangible has been stolen (ie no box has vanished off a shelf without being paid for) - and I as I tried to point out - in some ways it's difficult to determine how the "victim" suffers from the practice, some even argue (see above) that at least some of the "victims" actually benefit from it! - so it comes down to bandwidth and intellectual property. But even these things are difficult to nail down as having been "stolen" because many developers/vendors encourage prospective end-users to download their products and take them for a test drive, so bandwidth is not an issue (but I know the counter-argument is that if you tie up the bandwidth with the intention of stealing the software in the first place, you are not using the bandwidth as it was intended, and yada, yada, yada) and intellectual property doesn't really fit, either, because if I run a pirated copy of Office, I'm not likely to bother to 1. tell everyone that I wrote the software that I wrote my honours thesis in myself and/or 2. imply either directly or indirectly anywhere in what I have written that I used OpenOffice instead, so your comment about the licence is accurate, I think. And your comment about paying for the right to use an app in one way but using it in another amounting to the same thing is spot on, too - you've paid for a licence but by using it in a manner different from that which you paid for the right to, you're breaking the terms of the licence, which is no different than using software without paying for it at all.
And, I think I may not have worded the "different than intended" remark very well. What I mean is: as far as I know, academic software generally has some clause in the EULA that says that you cannot use the software for commercial purposes.
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No, your wording was fine. All my examples were a bit OTT and my remark about hyperbole at the end of my post was meant to apply to the whole post, not just the last paragraph, so my wording was the culprit, not yours.
Dear god, don't let this turn into a Mac vs. PC thread! These are more tired than the pro/con arguments on software piracy...
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Absolutely! I hate Mac vs. PC flamewars and REALLY don't want to see this develop into one. I also don't want to see this degenerate into a flamewar about software piracy so thanks for your measured reply :D
Perry - thanks for the link on moral relativism (I think - my head is still spinning. To paraphrase Steve Martin, I don't know what to believe anymore!).
Tinjaw -
...even though I am against piracy, I also do not agree with almost all of the ways that it is currently enforced.
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I completely agree with this statement.
Right, off to try to find more loopholes in the tax code... hang on, the government of Canada is trying to get at my money so that it can fund running the country and provide services that benefit myself and my fellow citizens and I'm trying to get off with paying as litlle (preferably nothing) for those services as I can... Kind of sounds like a software developer/consumer dynamic, doesn't it! Crud, does this make me a hypocrite?!
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