Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

As cold as it sounds, you always have a choice.

I've chosen to pay for my goods and services. If I can't afford them, I don't obtain them. If they're unavailable via anything but illicit means, I don't obtain them.

Start down the path of rationalization, and you find you risk undermining any ethical positions you would take on other subjects.

But some are okay with that.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Oh please...you bring up race in your argument, then act all self righteous when I thing you have a false premise. You can't be American right? Anyone from over here liberal or conservative would at least have understood that I am saying certain groups can score substancially lower on tests and still get into colleges/police depts etc with those scores, where another group would not have a chance. Debate away if it is justified or not but it is fact. Btw I spent 6 years as a case worker in the worst areas in nyc (bed stuy and bushwick). So my opinions are not out of a text book they are out of experience (oh and I do believe in some limited affirmative action too).

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

I'm invoking Podwin's law in this thread.

I think all Apple products are ok to pirate. So there.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

@Texrat actually it sucks when in 2010 no software company accepts direct purchase from your country while you can get their latest product with only 1 or 2$.

I have Ubuntu 10 on my laptop and all softwares are l have are free so I'm good software wise.

@ysss apply that rule for MS and Adobe products too and everyone will be happy.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

LOL... Man, i'm 15 and every software i use is pirated. To me it sounds weird when someone says to me he bought a program. I sometimes buy games, but most of the time, I use rapidshare. But, if you're planning on using pirated software for your college work, then I'd recommend to stick with free software. But if's it's for personal use, ... Just enter "warez" on google and see how much pirated software you find.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

I will speak from the other side and might be blamed only here or on the forum.But this should have been said.

First of all, yea I'm from Russia where only lazy doesn't steal stuff in the internet - songs, video, software, whatever else. And I admit 95% of them, if they're asked "download free"(that's how people define piracy here) or purchase it, answer "of course download it free,why the hell I'd spend my money on this". Unfortunately, it's a wild place and people tend to value only visible things(cars clothes and so on,you understand me). For stuff like software, movies and everything else people use, see or hear but can't literary touch there's no value. It's considered to be irrelevant that's why people can't think of paying somebody for movie for example.

Secondary, speaking about myself, yes I have some pirate software(W7 and CS5(i have a lame excuse for it^^) on PC) but I always try to find and use freeware applications. I also have some lossless music and few movies I downloaded via torrent. If you ask me how I sleep I honestly answer good enough. There are more serious things that may not let me sleep than piracy. You may call me bollock or whatever...

Honestly I don't want to vote in the poll. I don't want to vote "yes" because I don't want to support this way(it's like smoking. Every who smokes say to non-smokers "don't start it's very bad habit" but still smokes). And "no" isn't an option too for the reason it's everyone's own decision. Basicly you shouldn't use pirate stuff but practicaly there's an easy way and some choose it.

PS there's another reason for piracy to happen - in some contries like Russia and others you won't get punished for it. Basicly nobody cares that's why people feel free to share and use pirate stuff.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Allow me first to quote "that logic":
Now to adapt that to your Mercedes example:
See the difference? They still didn't lose a sale, but they lost actual property, so it's theft even without the dubious notion of counting hypothetical sales as stealable property.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

I've gained things through less than honest means before but I tend to go by a bit of a I have a rule of thumb, Would I have bought this otherwise?

For example i was happy to pay for starcraft 2 (even before i knew about all the copy protection) but I'm not going to pay $100 for a average PC game that I might play twice..

If a developer goes out of their way to make a superior product I am happy to go out of my way to pay for it, same goes for movies, books music whatever I'll by the things that I see a value in. but the 'average' stuff I'm not going to pay for...

Is it moral...probably not, but I don't really care, If developers put more effort into what they produce then people will see value rather than a price.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Podwin's law [a variant of Godwin's law]:

"As a tmo tthread grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Apple or iPhone approaches 1."

It was mentioned in jest.
Personally i think all pirates are ignorant of the society at large. They're able to live within pockets of community 'wealth' and become out of touch with principally important issues.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

So not pirating stuff has made you a perfect person, no slippery slope and some poor guy who got a pdf is on his way to being jack the ripper?

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

No I'm American. I didn't disagree with you that Affirmative Action allows for entry into colleges and such based on race, but they aren't given higher scores on tests, SAT's, HS / college exams and etc. Just being specific. Maybe you misstated your comment, which is fine.

Sure, happy to. still waiting for you to address my points.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

No.
But you should demand huge discount or for free student license, and get it.

For browsing the web which have Silverlight stuff which is not compatible with Moonlight...or if web pages are using some other proprietary standard and you have to use MS Windows and IE, then yes.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Well here's food for thought:

You bought a hard-back novel (lets just say The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo).
You've read it half-way until you get a Kindle as a birthday gift. You buy several novels, but now your limited to carrying 2 large items with you to work (reading on the train, bus, lunch and between waits). Your friend, having bought the novel as a digital copy, lets you illegally copy it. You now just skip to the appropriate section, and now can enjoy whatever novel you want to read conveniently and portably.
Alls good, but you've still stolen someone's IP and they're right for financial gains.

.... .... .... Take it away boys

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Sorry, I read back through the thread and didn't see anything supporting that extreme silliness.

Thanks for playing!

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

I do see the difference, but based on existing law, the dispute is still a rationalization.

When payment is expected, and circumvented, that's considered theft-- hypothetical sales or not.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

no.

just look for open source alternatives, and grow up.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Hmm. Interesting argument but that doesn't make any sense at all.

Um... no. Let me explain a bit more clearly. Theft includes the notion electronic media. It's not one or the other. It has been extended to apply for concepts not previously understood.

Ok, fine, you should't infringe on the copyrights of someone else's created media. In the case of software, even if you buy a copy of Office or Photoshop. You don't own the software, what you have purchased is an enduser licence RTU (right to use). So to your point about stealing cars, its still theft, but because you're not physically taking an object but violating the terms of the license.

Call it whatever you like, its still wrong.

I like to stagger my opponents. ;-)

I'm not sure why the actions of the publishing lobby gives you license to use software you have no right to use? My ignorance needs you to be a bit more specific. Help a brother out.

I don't understand what in the world you mean by "speculatively invest in developing a work".

So let's see, you want software developers to build product but then not sell it. And how would that work? Who's going to pay benevolently for Photoshop or Final Cut Pro to be developed? What, they're going to give it away?

I think you need to make specific examples because what you just said makes no sense.

And BTW, in case you missed it, whatever software theory you might have it still doesn't excuse illegal copy of software. In case you weren't sure where I stood on that. ;-)

Sure, but anyone would make that argument. Try going into the movie theater and doing the same. Go tell the theater owner that the movie sucks, how the studio made crap and somehow promised a great movie and didn't deliver what they promised and that you should watch it for free because you wouldn't have paid for anyways. I'm sure that would go over real well. Oh, and tell them by going to see it, you're actually helping them because the perception is that everyone wants to see the movie because you're also going to see it. I mean if you're going to see a movie, you might as well see their movie so that you don't spend time seeing a competitor's movie right?

GENIUS!

Ooh, we have common ground. What has the internet come to.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Hmmm... its one of those threads...

Well, my 2 cents worth: Simply put, it totally depends on the laws of the country in which you live in.
If they have a law against software piracy, then you're not allowed to do that - whether its OK or not is irrelevant. You either might go to jail for software piracy if you get caught, or not - simple as that IMHO.

If you think it should be OK to infringe copyrights while your country's laws forbid it, get elected to the government and change it (unless of course you do not live in a democratic country, and in this case this whole argument is void :))...

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

No, that is called rationalization. You see if something has no value, then they're not interested in it. If software has no value no one would want to use it. If a song has no value no one would want to listen to it. If a movie has no value no one would want to watch it.

What you're saying is people rationalize to themselves that they should not pay for it because they can get it for free. It has value, otherwise they wouldn't put in the time or the effort to pirate it.

I find it interesting that you know it's wrong but do it anyways. At least you know it's wrong.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

We need a new poll: whose mind has been changed as a result of points made in this thread... :D

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

I think it really does'nt matter how it was/is done. Piracy is piracy.If you pirated a long time ago and realized that was a wrong thing and changed afterwards....What is stopping me from considering that i may change as time changes?

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Well, I used the wrong word as I see now. Not value definately. I meant that people don't see the value of somebody's work or knowledge and recieve everything as given.

About myself, well it's indeed kinda wierd. I'll try to explain.

I'm studing on interpreter(although I'm not the best student as you can see in my posts^^) and I always try to be outside the native-language area as much as possible. maemo.org is such an example.
And this topic too. As I said before, almost everyone in my country wil call you an idiot if you buy software instead of using pirate one. People can't understand it and won't in the nearest future. And reading you all is a good example people are different. And I like it.

But, as I said before I still use some pirate software. There're different reasons for that, here are some:
1) Something like Win7 cost sh*tloads of money and prices aren't the same as in your country. World isn't the same everywhere, we don't have student discounts or any other similar stuff. It must be lame excuse but still.Working to get an original version of software - it sounds ridiculuos for me, ppl work for living not for things.
2) This will sound very odd. You can watch some movies on Tv for free, so I consider downloading and watching a movie that is shown on TV at the same time not a piracy.
3) Music...Well it's another place and it might sound wierd we don't have almost all foreingh music on license CDs/DVDs etc. Piracy kinda killed it and the only way to get it - order on foreingh sites and pray it arrives faster than a month or even arrives at all. Moreover, would you pay for a CD x3 price? I won't. And others too.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

I buy a DVD and every time I play it, I have to sit through a 5-10 minute clip (unskippable) telling me not to buy pirate DVDs and how doing so will fund terrorists and bring about WWIII. Would it be right (morally) for me to download a copy where the crap was removed and used that instead of the copy that I paid good money for?

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

What we need is a poll that doesn't use a question asking if it's "ok". There is no OK. There's legal, moral, possible, likely, etc.

What happens if it's legally possible and morally wrong? What do we do about precedent, since it's a limited point of view, legal-wise (not the only law)?

Should a singer get 5 million for a song? No. But they do, so if you restore the natural order of things it's a regression and they feel like they've been wronged.

Free market works by reality not by law. That is, it's a system that self-adapts to the reality, not defined by rules. As a result, it's not a rule that a company should get fifty million for a game because they pumped 40 in it. You pump whatever you feel like and get what you get - that's it.

It has always been my opinion that once you make something public, it's public, deal with it.

The worst part is, once you make some concessions, the box is open. Like, say, not allowing user to re-sell the game. What does the company care who owns the game? Why pay again to re-register online? It's still one slot.

The line between "greed" and "right" is no more.

So, which OK is it? Moral? Legal? What's "right"? "Even"? "Best"?

And since when do excuses count? Is rape OK because you "can't get a woman"? Why would theft be OK because "I can't afford it"?

I buy most of my software now that I can afford it, what I can't I pirate. Don't remember ever thinking it was OK because of it.

And since MS keeps popping out in the thread *and students), did you know MS "sells" 4$ licenses to organizations that prove the OS will be used for learning? Several universities I talked to got upgraded to W7 Pro free.

So let's be honest. Being a student does allow you access to software (we got Windows, Office, AutoCAD, and a few other mammoths). This isn't about access, this is about personal use for whatever reasons. And being a student doesn't factor into it.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Children should be seen and not heard :D

I get a headache when I hear people rationalizing the values of other people's work to their heart content, with full ignorance on how the free market works.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

I agree 100%! Everything you said is spot on. Its the absolute truth.

Anybody thinking of arguing with this should just stop, because you're wrong.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Well, I paid for an argument and all I get are contradictions.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Was that a general comment or a reply to my post?

If the latter, feel free to support your opinion, rather than just lob one over the fence. This child has a degree in said field, I'm fairly sure I can emulate an adult long enough to post. :)

Also, just to be clear, I wasn't offended. Sometimes the language barrier plays trick on me.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Well, I don't see the value of Macbook Pro's. Should I just walk in a store and take it because I see no value in it and I would not have paid for it anyways?

If you want to rationalize to me that's fine, but all you're trying to do is relieve your own guilt.

Peer pressure is not a good reason to be doing something. You should do something because you believe its right not because someone else would call you names, but if it would help, I'm happy to call you 'super idiot' if you pirate that ways you don't feel bad about paying for software. Just kidding of course.

Really? You don't buy TV's, shoes, nice clothes? Those are things, no?

I'm going to make this general statement to everyone who is on this forum that cries about being too poor to buy software. If you can afford the N900, you can probably afford software which costs a fraction of the N900. Now, this may not be true for Final Cut Pro or Photoshop but it is true for most other software. You like many others saved for the N900. You can save for software.

If you see a program on TV you're actually allowed to record it for personal use, at least here in the US.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

If God didn't want us to eat animals he wouldn't have made them out of meat. If he didn't want us to use pirated software he wouldn't have made it out of tiny little bits that can be copied with the press of a button.

Ps, I apologize to any female vegetarian athiest software developers on this forum.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

You're made out of atoms that can be separated at the press of certain buttons. Or the pull of certain triggers. Or the action or inaction of a billion different things. Extending your argument, its ok for people to kill you.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Only if you overthink it.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

It was a general comment on previous posters who'd play judge as to how much everyone else's work and properties should be valued at.

I think we (you & me) have a decent amount of agreement/overlapping views, but I'm interested in this particular sentence from your post:

If you would expand upon it, that'd be cool ;)

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

How many singers get 5 million (assuming dollars) for a song?

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

clever companies gives student versions from their software free of charge.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

if Russian dissidants had been stealing dell computers as opposewd to using pirated os's I doubt there would have been an outcry on cracking down on them, leading to blanket forgivness by the manufacturer. I think that says something.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

It is perfectly ok, I mean why not pirate software if you wouldn't buy it anyway? Would I buy Visual Studio or 3dsmax?

Hell no..

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

On that point I have to disagree. I mean, strongly disagree as opposed to slightly disagree. You see, IMO it's one thing to pirate IE and surf the net and quite another to pirate Visual Studio. As a developer tool, you write public software and, as a result, make money off it.

That isn't personal use. Assuming I had Photoshop installed (which, if you work for any agency, I don't), I'd use it to correct color and exposure on my shots. Personal use. Should I decide to sell said photos, then I make money and, IMO, a part of that should go to Adobe.

Now, if I make 5$, it's an open discussion. Still, I think that developer tools, editing software, etc should be held to a higher standard. Personal view. I have purchased all my developer tools. And they were in excess of a thousand EUR. Borland Inprise Embarcadero Delphi is cool.

If God didn't want us entertained, He wouldn't have allowed that post.

Ambiguous, that one that is.

What I meant was this: Music isn't new. Neither is writing, painting, generally speaking all consecrated art forms. History of the what made a bunch of colors on a canvas be raised to art gives us insight.

Ever since out ancestors tapped a rhythm on an empty log with a dinosaur bone, anyone could tap the same beat, better or worse. The initial beater is the artist, and everyone else can try to be just like him, better or worse. Some way better, that's how talent is discovered. Never has the beat sequence reserved to the original player.

A painting is rare and expensive because the painting, itself, is a work of art. Subsequent printed copies of La Gioconda are 2 cents each.

Similarly, if a sculpture is great, I'm free to take pictures of it and review them as I like.

If a song is nice, I should be free to sing in the shower, and make a copy of it for replay. This isn't exactly infringement, as it's how it's been done for ages.

Note I'm not talking about reselling the copies, if I do I'm making money off someone else's work, and that's for a different discussion.

If I have a book, I can borrow it, resell it, make my own personal copies. Songs are different.

Actually, every other form of art allows copying, distribution, partial or complete, recording for review, etc, as applicable. The only ones that don't obey by this rule is music (and some software), which it's why I think this to be unnatural, as it's law-enforced, as opposed to expensive, impossible or hard.

As a result of these laws, a non-natural market is generated. That's what I meant when I said 5 mil. They are just about the only breed of artists that reach those sums.

It's monopoly/trust and cartel behavior to bundle a free Internet Explorer with Microsoft Windows, but it's fine for Sony Music to bundle 22 bad songs on my compilation.

It's fraud to price a full option car as much as the lower option model, because for the same money I get an inferior product. But it's fine to price an album and a single about the same.

And that's not even getting to the fact that most top singers and bands sign up with one of the major publishers, that push and maintain unreasonable margins.

I know it's an old argument, but there it is. It costs next to nothing to press and ship a CD.

I am aware that demand is high and, as a result, you sell as high as you can - it's the way the market works. Still, when gas prices goes up with no good reason, an authority intervenes and kicks them in the ... refineries. List expenses, profits, and toned down.

I know it's a long, long post with few clear points, that's why I try to keep it at a minimum.

But it's hard to make a crystal clear point. Because there are no crystal clear violations.

I is fair to sell a game, and then charge for additional levels? Are the levels not part of the game? No? Then how many levels before it's fraud? One? Is it actually a game if you can't play it? Where's the line? The loading screen?

Little by little it shifted. From stand alone games to games with additional content, then most content, the most content and all the cool stuff. Then games that allow online gaming but the people who pay for weapons and armor have twice the firepower and thrice the armor. And finally, games that you can't really play at all, like WoW.

Nice thing that was, charging for the disk. Not cheap, either. What exactly am I paying for? Doing them a favor by going out to buy 4Gb instead of loading their servers?

Where's the line? I'm pretty sure there should be one. Actually, I'm darned sure there should be one. It's illegal to purchase game tickets and sell them at a higher price, but it's fine to buy a composition/performance and sell it at a higher price.

And since there's a difference between right, moral, legal, etc, here's one to ponder. Is it moral to have a phone at a concert and record off the stage (a la Nokia commercial)? If so, why are they banned in concerts (we're not talking the fact that they can't really apply the rule). If it is fine, why not a theater? Is it not a performance? If it isn't, didn't I pay for a performance?

If I only paid the live performance, but not the recorded, then why are security cams legal? After all, what I do in public is free when live, not when recorded. Is my choreography not my own? (Yes, choreography is subject to copyright, you can't "do the Bart" as the song suggests)

Point being, the same situation has been altered to work one way but not the other. Based on the weight, in kilograms, of the legal department.

I know that's how the market works. But then again, the strong eat the weak, that's how life works, right? And we don't do that.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Mass marketing and all these new fangled replication and distribution systems are taking our eyes off the core issues.

Let's get down to the basic. It's much simpler when the buyer and seller are dealing directly and all the intents and motivations are put on the table:

- An artist, developer, writer, teacher, musician, prostitute, whomever can create/give something that you like. It may be a drawing, song, codes (apps/games), writings, teaching, whatever.

- You like what you see/hear/experience and you want to acquire it. You talk to the seller and ask if he/she wants to sell it to you and at what price. Both agree to a price, money exchanges hand and you get what you want.

Simple, clear.

No ethical or moral issues, because both parties come to the same agreement on the spot and the transaction was carried out to mutual satisfaction.

No legal issues (except for the whoring part, in certain states/countries) as goods/services exchange hand with mutual agreement.

-----

Now, when we introduce 'modern' replication, duplication and mass distribution systems into this 'transaction', then all sorts of process artifacts, kinks and loopholes may appear. These are against the wishes of the content creators and some of them may already be covered and protected by the legal system.

So if you're getting content for free through these loopholes, you may be doing one of two things (or both):

1. Something illegal, if said loophole is already protected by the laws and you're breaking it.
2. Something unethical, if said loophole is not protected by the laws (yet) but it's against the wishes of the creator for you to do so.

Re: Is it okay for a student with limited financial resources to pirate software?
 

Of course its only for personal use, no money whatsoever involved, only the chinese pirate software for business.