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Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

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Re: Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

#41

Post by angersock »

cremnob wrote: post #27
Devilboy wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stealing a car deprives someone of a car. Copying a car does not.

This trope comes up every time piracy is discussed. The point is no one is talking about the legal meaning of "stealing" versus "copyright infringement". What people are saying is that it's immoral. The fact that a content company's product is easily stolen simply because the nature of his business means it is effortless to do through the internet doesn't change anything. If you go to a lawyer for legal advice and th…

Then they need to say it is immoral--a position which may arguably be correct--and not say that it is stealing--a position which is intellectually dishonest and trivially shown to be incorrect.

Choice of words here is very, very important. If you want to start staking out a moral claim on information, you damned well had better choose your message carefully.

Re: Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

#42

Post by CoryG89 »

Until Microsoft Dreamspark, this is how I was able to teach myself to program. This really happens. However, I think programs like Dreamspark are the answer to this. Microsoft will let you download Visual Studio if you go to school. Not word (but it's only $99 for a student, affordable). Article is a little misleading when it comes to paying for Adobe CS in general. If you are a student you can usually pick it up for $199. Still a little much for Adobe to be selling it to students in my opinion though.

Re: Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

#43

Post by angersock »

chasing wrote: post #16
Devilboy wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Piracy for personal use is a 'victimless' (don't bite my head off please) crime, that's why it's OK here. Stealing is not.

Piracy is different from stealing, yeah. But I find it kind of short-sighted this notion that it's "victimless." Not intending to bite your head off. :-)

A very simple thought experiment:

A rap artist is hired by a label to create an album. Said artist later dies. The label goes bankrupt soon thereafter, or perhaps simply folds up shop and leaves the business without auctioning off its assets.

I have produced a copy of the album, which I host at my own cost from my server, once these events have transpired. There is no reasonable "victim" left for this crime of infringement, and indeed I'm helping to reduce the scarcity of this product in the world.

While somewhat contrived, this thought experiment is not particularly far off from reality.

Re: Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

#44

Post by angersock »

Tyrant505 wrote: post #40
meritt wrote: post #9

It's always been rumored that Adobe software, especially Photoshop, has been easy to pirate to encourage adoption with a user base that might otherwise seek alternatives. As those people hone their skills and eventually find jobs, Photoshop is the norm and what their employers purchase licensing for.

What exactly is HARD to pirate? edit: More specifically, Crack. I remember x-force having sources in all the major places ready to dump it to their cracker division.

Skype for a very long time had some absurd protection against things like attaching debuggers, adding code, and whatnot (as I recall). There was a great presentation about it, but I cannot for the life of me find it.

Re: Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

#45

Post by takeda64 »

reidrac wrote: post #36
lumberjack wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same with Windows and Office. It's better to have them pirate your program than run somebody's else.

Definitely, but I think is just Microsoft investing in their ecosystem. In schools students learn "Word" and not "a word processor". I've seen high schools getting software licences with special deals (way cheaper), and thanks to that other solutions are discouraged (ie. "Word" is the standard and it will be required by any future job offer) Can all students afford a Word licence? (ie. practice at home) It really doe…

I agree with you about the last thing somewhat, but not entirely. While RedHat benefits from people switching from CentOS to RHEL, it's not illegal to run CentOS, and the other direction is also available.

My company is currently using RedHat in a very large number (let say, we pay a lot to them...), but looks like we might end up switching to CentOS. Basically the price vs. amount of support we get from them does not seem to be worth it. And it is very close to what we would get from an Open Source community or by using Google.

But I do agree with the rest what you said.

Re: Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

#46

Post by Tyrant505 »

angersock wrote: post #44
Tyrant505 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly is HARD to pirate? edit: More specifically, Crack. I remember x-force having sources in all the major places ready to dump it to their cracker division.

Skype for a very long time had some absurd protection against things like attaching debuggers, adding code, and whatnot (as I recall). There was a great presentation about it, but I cannot for the life of me find it.

Ok, but not exactly the type of standalone software we are speaking upon, yes? edit: as an aside, adobe's subscription based model could be seen as a way to curtail.

Re: Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

#47

Post by autarch »

chasing wrote: post #5

I'm glad things worked out for Vlad -- when I was younger, I pirated a fair amount of software and games, and, like him, I think it enabled me to get inspired to learn more about computers in general and, indeed, now I stare at them all day for work. But. I'm not sure what the bigger point is, here. Should we be okay with piracy as long as the pirate is using it for self-betterment? Do games count for that? What abou…

You seem to be assuming that simply because something is a crime it is therefore morally wrong. I don't think piracy needs justification because copying something is not morally wrong. OTOH, stealing a car (without justificaiton) is morally wrong.

Re: Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

#48

Post by reidrac »

takeda64 wrote: post #45
reidrac wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Definitely, but I think is just Microsoft investing in their ecosystem. In schools students learn "Word" and not "a word processor". I've seen high schools getting software licences with special deals (way cheaper), and thanks to that other solutions are discouraged (ie. "Word" is the standard and it will be required by any future job offer) Can all students afford a Word licence? (ie. practice at home) It really doe…

I agree with you about the last thing somewhat, but not entirely. While RedHat benefits from people switching from CentOS to RHEL, it's not illegal to run CentOS, and the other direction is also available. My company is currently using RedHat in a very large number (let say, we pay a lot to them...), but looks like we might end up switching to CentOS. Basically the price vs. amount of support we get from them does no…

I know it's not illegal, I didn't say that at all. I said it's the same strategy. Although a customer that can move from RHEL to CentOS can be seen as a problem, I think it's just an investment.

Look at the consequences of CentOS. There are mailing lists, forums, IRC channels, blog posts, lots of people providing support and training for free.

That rich ecosystem is translated into business for Red Hat.

EDIT: ate a word.

Re: Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

#49

Post by ender7 »

meritt wrote: post #9

It's always been rumored that Adobe software, especially Photoshop, has been easy to pirate to encourage adoption with a user base that might otherwise seek alternatives. As those people hone their skills and eventually find jobs, Photoshop is the norm and what their employers purchase licensing for.

Well, I must admit that when I was a kid I taught myself how to use most of the Creative Suite via pirated copies (back then it was the Macromedia Suite plus whatever Adobe was calling its software at the time). I'm now employed because of those skills, and my employer has to purchase annual copies of said software for me to use.

Re: Editorial: "How piracy changed my life"

#50

Post by gizmo686 »

Devilboy wrote: post #38
cremnob wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This trope comes up every time piracy is discussed. The point is no one is talking about the legal meaning of "stealing" versus "copyright infringement". What people are saying is that it's immoral. The fact that a content company's product is easily stolen simply because the nature of his business means it is effortless to do through the internet doesn't change anything. If you go to a lawyer for legal advice and th…

I'll stop bringing it up when people stop saying that piracy is the same as car theft. Otherwise why not go all the way and say piracy is genocide.

Becuase saying piracy is theft has truthiness, whereas saying piracy is genocide does not.
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