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Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

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Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#31

Post by 2636381321 »

cruntly wrote: post #20
sigg3 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cracking software doesn't warrant hard prison sentences. That's a double negative for society.

He ruined the lives of many hard-working software developers who relied on selling their code to feed their families. This was back when programming was a highly skilled and difficult job that only a few could do, so cracking was even more harshly targeting people.

More like telling the whole world "you're not allowed to copy this, because I wrote it" and threatening everyone with imprisonment or fines if you do. So everyone has to buy it through him, or else. To feed his family.

That is what copyright law fundamentally is.

We all learn from other people, just because I came up with an idea, I cannot tell other people "you're not allowed to use it". It violates other peoples natural right to autonomy to do so.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#32

Post by beardedwizard »

abigail95 wrote: post #19

Why do people like him think copyright laws are bad and made by rich people, but also support open source software, which relies on the same copyright laws to exist. If hes an anarchist then fine, but it looks like he wants laws that benefit him and not people that actually write software. I read the whole thing and I still don't know why he did it. He says there was no money incentive and his work had no impact on p…

They did it for the thrill and because they could. It was a different time.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#33

Post by bentley »

abigail95 wrote: post #19

Why do people like him think copyright laws are bad and made by rich people, but also support open source software, which relies on the same copyright laws to exist. If hes an anarchist then fine, but it looks like he wants laws that benefit him and not people that actually write software. I read the whole thing and I still don't know why he did it. He says there was no money incentive and his work had no impact on p…

Only some free software licenses rely heavily on copyright law as their primary mechanism. Permissive licensing, or something like it, would continue to exist if copyright as a concept disappeared tomorrow.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#34

Post by blooalien »

shmde wrote: post #13

My childhood hero. Sad to read what he went through in prison. The warez scene is still active and there's no slowing down so this bust doesn't really mean shit. Shoutout to the OGs RELOADED, SKIDROW, RAZOR, PARADOX,CODEX.

Wow! When you say "OGs", and then follow it up with a list of THE actual "OGs" like that? *Nostalgia for those childhood days of dialup modems and all-night long downloads…*

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#35

Post by tptacek »

tpmx wrote: post #18
DeathArrow wrote: post #14

What was the crime he was sentenced for?

https://www.justice.gov/archive/criminal/cybercrime/press-re... [2003] > announced today that Shane E. Pitman, age 31, of Conover, North Carolina, was sentenced to 18 months in federal prison by the Honorable James C. Cacheris, United States District Judge, for conspiring to violate criminal copyright laws as the former leader of the oldest game software piracy ring on the Internet. Btw: Coming from Europe - this who…

For whatever it's worth, the disposition of the case on PACER says the sentence was reduced to 12 months. There's not much of a docket to read, because it looks like he immediately pled out.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#36

Post by kube-system »

pharmakom wrote: post #23
abigail95 wrote: post #19

Why do people like him think copyright laws are bad and made by rich people, but also support open source software, which relies on the same copyright laws to exist. If hes an anarchist then fine, but it looks like he wants laws that benefit him and not people that actually write software. I read the whole thing and I still don't know why he did it. He says there was no money incentive and his work had no impact on p…

Copyleft is a defensive measure in a hostile environment. If there were no copy laws at all then they wouldn't argue for them.

I think you're painting with quite a broad brush. There are absolutely people who support copyleft because they do not want 'intermediaries' to be able to distribute binaries alone. e.g. GNU.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#37

Post by sedatk »

abigail95 wrote: post #19

Why do people like him think copyright laws are bad and made by rich people, but also support open source software, which relies on the same copyright laws to exist. If hes an anarchist then fine, but it looks like he wants laws that benefit him and not people that actually write software. I read the whole thing and I still don't know why he did it. He says there was no money incentive and his work had no impact on p…

> What was its purpose then?

Clout, reputation, group identity, coolness factor. It's similar to how demoscene operates.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#38

Post by cruntly »

2636381321 wrote: post #31
cruntly wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He ruined the lives of many hard-working software developers who relied on selling their code to feed their families. This was back when programming was a highly skilled and difficult job that only a few could do, so cracking was even more harshly targeting people.

More like telling the whole world "you're not allowed to copy this, because I wrote it" and threatening everyone with imprisonment or fines if you do. So everyone has to buy it through him, or else. To feed his family. That is what copyright law fundamentally is. We all learn from other people, just because I came up with an idea, I cannot tell other people "you're not allowed to use it". It violates other peoples na…

Yes and that's why copyright is a good thing, so you have the opportunity to enjoy the fruits of your intellectual labour.

Re: Shane Pitman, leader of the warez group Razor 1911: life after prison (2005)

#39

Post by Clubber »

cruntly wrote: post #20
sigg3 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cracking software doesn't warrant hard prison sentences. That's a double negative for society.

He ruined the lives of many hard-working software developers who relied on selling their code to feed their families. This was back when programming was a highly skilled and difficult job that only a few could do, so cracking was even more harshly targeting people.

I like how companies conned the government to enforce what used to be a civil matter into a criminal matter. They don't even have to write a cease and desist letter. Evil genius.
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