Report: Software piracy costs $34 billion

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losing money?

The idea that money lost on a software maker's part due to piracy is the piracy figure times the cost of legitimate software is bogus. Many of the people who pirate software would not have bought the software anyway. True, another large portion of pirates probably could have afforded the software, but in some cases piracy can actually help sales on an individual level. Say John pirates a copy of windows XP (or any other piece of software), and has a great experience with the software. John then goes in to his office and in conversation tells people about how great this piece of software is. John's freinds or even employers, perhaps, then contemplate and go out and purchase the software (in the case of an employer, a mass purchase for the office). The software maker has just made many licenses' worth of sales off of John's one case of piracy.

The line blurs when talking about OS software, but like the piracy of music early on when the only way to get it was from grossly overpriced CDs, the cost drives people to want to pirate more, especially when not buying systems that come prepackaged with software. Building a computer is the best thing you can do to get a quality system, and if you have the connections, at very low hardware cost. Say you've just spent 800 dollars on hardware for your new computer. Suddenly you have to pay 200 dollars for the operating system you want? That's hardly a bargain. Get linux, why not, but windows runs just about EVERYTHING. Bottom line is software makers need to quit complaining so much about piracy of their products when the people using the pirated copies often give them good PR.

Posted by: threegoalman   Posted on: 09/11/06 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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