Re: Morality and Pirated Software

 Do you expect me to feel sorry for Bill Gates? :-)
But you really don't hurt the payroll of the people that make the software.
Unless they get some kind of a commission out of how much the product sells.
Of course, if NOBODY bought the software, and everyone "borrowed" it, then
yes, the company would go out of business. But not everybody "borrows" it as
we have seen in this disscussion.


>  > >You just don't hurt Microsoft or
>  > >Macromedia when you steal software.  You hurt the folks that came up
with
>  > >the ideas and wrote the code, the folks that did the packaging and
> shipping
>  > >and even the lady that does payroll.
>  >
>  > hmm....
>  >
>  > If you mean I'm taking their payroll away by sharing a file with others
> who
>  > can not purchase their software in the first place, I think you may not
be
>  > thinking it through all the way. If I share a file with someone who can
> not
>  > afford to buy it (and as such will not be giving any money to the
company
>  > at any time) how is this taking money out of the company's employee's
> pockets?
>
> Easy. If a person does not buy a program, but rather "borrows" it, then
that
> is $20 or $150 or $2,000 that didn't go to the company who produced the
> program. Now, granted, a very small percentage of that money might
actually
> filter down to the individual employee, but if you take 1,000 of those
$150
> programs that weren't bought because people "borrowed" them, then that
adds
> up. Then again, think about this....what about the small software
designer?
> The company who might only produce one program, and who has a small number
> of employees doing the work? The rampant "borrowing" of that program might
> mean the difference between staying in business or not. Think about that.
>  >
>
> Dusty
> http://www.tiadon.com/designsbydusty/default.htm

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