Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!looking!brad From: brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) Newsgroups: comp.misc Subject: Re: Matter Duplicator Message-ID: <1620@looking.UUCP> Date: 7 May 88 05:33:05 GMT References: <23935@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> Reply-To: brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) Organization: Looking Glass Software Ltd. Lines: 33 In article <23935@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU> oster@dewey.soe.berkeley.edu.UUCP (David Phillip Oster) writes: >It is immoral to steal software by duplicating it without paying the >designers. The reason it is immmoral is that if you use a dup, instead of >paying for the design, then you penalize the designers, and so discourage >innovation. Actually, this is probably why it's illegal. It's immoral, by one school of thought, because the software *belongs* to its creator, and you shouldn't do things with other people's creations and property without their permission. Money doesn't have to enter into it. I could write a piece of software exclusively for my friends, or for any other specific subset of folks, and not charge them for that use. It would still be wrong for you to take a copy if I haven't said you could have one. Think of how the authors of the "free distribution but copyright" software, or the GNU folks do it. If you take the software, and do something prohibited by the creator (like charge for it), you aren't depriving them of a dime, but you still shouldn't do it. Depriving the author of the right to charge for use of software is only one of the things you do when copying software. What you're really depriving the author of is the right to control the products of his or her own mind. (Besides, the $ argument often leads to stupid rationalizations, like, "I wouldn't have bought it anyway, so I'm not doing anything wrong." or "They charge an obscene amount, so I'm stealing it for justice." or "If they would charge a fair, media cost+ type price for the software, nobody would pirate it, just like nobody tapes record albums.") -- Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. - Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473