Software pirate gets six years

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A drug dealer would do less time: First, I?ll say: Piracy is Wrong!! Bad!! No, I don?t Pirate! Ok, lets continue?.

As usual, it's all dependent upon who is valuating the product. According to an article in InfoWorld, "The Web site sold more than $2.47 million of copyrighted software, resulting in potential losses of nearly $20 million to the software developers, the DOJ said." It looks like they were selling at about 10-20% of retail, varied with the package.
The industry allowed it to go on too long, the prison sentence is too long, and this is nothing new or "surprising". The only thing out of the ordinary is that they were operating here in the states and not in Europe or Russia, as usual.

The whole software piracy sham is a crock as it is flagellated in its currant itineration. The industry claims billions lost only by valuating the claims at their maximum sales prices in their highest markets, without taking into account the glaring fact that the vast majority of the bogus sales that are knowingly made at deeply discounted prices, would never have been made at the full retail price in the first place.

The software industry conveniently ignores the very real world economic reality of the matter that most people that knowingly purchase hi-ticket programs for pennies on the dollar, do so because they are curious about them, or would like to try them out of for the purpose of learning about the program (or thinking about learning it), but could never afford to even think about forking over the retail price for the program. I don't know anyone who can afford to dump $300-1500+ just to see if they would be interested in learning the program. I do know people who would spend $50-75 and if they found that they could use it and liked it, would go ahead and purchase the full retail package for the $$ just so that they would have the full support of the developer and the updates/upgrades.

In the real world though, the billions that the software industry claims to loose every year to piracy, is a joke, the majority of those bogus sales that they claim to have lost to fake retailers, would never have taken place at full retail price, so they have not lost probably at least 80% of what they claim. In a "perfect" world, without the pirates, they would find that those sales that they claim that they have "lost", would for the most part, never have taken place with the pricing structure that they have in place.

If they want to put a crimp in the software pirates' sales, the industry needs to price their products in a more realistic manor, in order to maximize their sales. They don't have to give the software away, but if the buyer isn't going to be using the program for the purpose of generating income, it shouldn't cost more than the computer that it's going to run on. Too many developers just blanket price their software with the attitude that it can be used to generate income, so they are going to get their "cut" up front, regardless of whether or not that is the way it is used. That cuts the throat of the "hobbyist" who likes to learn and dabble in various types of software in different venues.

Piracy is Wrong!! Bad!! No, I still don?t Pirate!

There are solutions, but the industry has to be willing to be objective and quit blaming everyone else, as if they themselves are angelic victims.; Posted by: robertk2 Posted on: 08/29/06 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use