Lots of discussion recently regarding all of the issues with pirates. These are the real kinds, not the Johnny Depp kind and not the kind that wear patches and fly the jolly-roger. The pirates I’ve been thinking about recently though are those of the software and digital content kind.
I had a friend recently tell me not to buy a CD that I was interested in because he had a copy of it and he would let me borrow. Although they didn’t tell me to go burn the disc so I would avoid buying it, but that’s the impression I got. My opinion is that’s plainly theft and piracy. Is there any difference between stealing that data and information and stealing any other property? I don’t think so.
Let’s expand that question to software itself. Do you install legal software on your machine? Do you get hacks and codes to circumvent user registration keys? What’s the difference?
Maybe your argument is that new copy of Microsoft Office isn’t worth $900 so why should I pay for it? Because that’s the price folks. If you don’t think it’s worth that, then don’t buy. Go download OpenOffice or get what use you can from Google Docs.