Thread
How do you feel about old software licenses?
If it's impossible to find a piece of software you're looking for, and it's no longer for sale, how do you feel about finding it, or serial numbers, in the underworlds of the net? Do you just do it and not think twice, do you feel bad about it, or do you not do it at all and sometimes miss out?
I know some boards don't like new users starting polls or whatever, but I thought it could be interesting.
I know some boards don't like new users starting polls or whatever, but I thought it could be interesting.
Whatever one may think of the 'licence' system, as opposed to a much more rational patent system (and I admit unashamedly that I think that the licence system should never have been accepted by users and defended by governments), it is a fact that licences exist. No forum owner can afford to be seen to tolerate, let alone encourage, piracy of software.
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It's not piracy if the company is out of business and nobody bought or took over the old software. Then it becomes public domain.
If the company exists in any way and the software went with it - for example Maxis which is now Electronic Arts - it's technically piracy. You can buy SimCity Classic and stuff off eBay, hell, in sealed boxes even. So in that case you should buy it. But if you can't buy it anywhere within a reasonable distance or online at a reasonable price (at or below the original retail), just acquire it through "special means".
If the company exists in any way and the software went with it - for example Maxis which is now Electronic Arts - it's technically piracy. You can buy SimCity Classic and stuff off eBay, hell, in sealed boxes even. So in that case you should buy it. But if you can't buy it anywhere within a reasonable distance or online at a reasonable price (at or below the original retail), just acquire it through "special means".
Do I agree with the current laws and system in regards to old software? No. I think software copyright terms should be 12 years with the option to renew for another 8.
However, just because I don't agree doesn't mean I can go and do what I want. The law is the law and even if we don't agree with it we must follow it. This means that even ancient software must be acquired legally.
I buy all my software, including that from an out of business company. Yes, some say it's ridiculous to buy three copies of Battle Chess for my trio of Mac Classics but it's the only legal way to do it. And I must admit, it felt very rewarding to be able to hunt down those old Battle Chesses.
Yes, I am the one guy who voted for "never ever" because I obey the laws whether I like them or not.
However, just because I don't agree doesn't mean I can go and do what I want. The law is the law and even if we don't agree with it we must follow it. This means that even ancient software must be acquired legally.
I buy all my software, including that from an out of business company. Yes, some say it's ridiculous to buy three copies of Battle Chess for my trio of Mac Classics but it's the only legal way to do it. And I must admit, it felt very rewarding to be able to hunt down those old Battle Chesses.
Yes, I am the one guy who voted for "never ever" because I obey the laws whether I like them or not.
We should all attempt to find a legal copy before using a warez site, but sometimes it just isn't possible. Copyrights should be allowed to expire at some point when it is no longer profiting anyone to keep them. An old piece of software that hasn't been sold for 15 years and has no more modern equivalent should be free for all.
Perhaps we differ as to the base premise of the patent process. In origin and application a patent is a (time-)limited monopoly. After n years, according to taste and legislation, the content passes into the public domain. It becomes a part of 'the prior art'. Modern (especially US) application of the concept is to try to stretch limited into perpetual, but that doesn't invalidate the utility of the base premise.
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Run for Prime minister of Canada (Or as the recording industry calls us, cam-ada)! I would go door to door for that!
As for my stance on this matter, I don't care. If it is abandoned, who gives a damn! Would EA games really break my door down and tell me to put my hands on my head because I uploaded SimCity Classic to my website for a small group of hobbiests to download? Most likely No.
If they are not making money off of me, why should they care. It isn't like they are making money off of ebay when someone buys a copy. Most of the time it is not cheap to get the original software, so you have to download it. Plus, you don't even know if you like the program you are buying! If you downloaded it and you don't like it, drag and drop it into the trash.
I do download current software sometimes, though most of the time it is because I want to know if I should buy the software without a silly "Trial" version with limted features.
There are some times that you do it that you just think it should be right, like say when I stuck Windows XP on my PC, I had to get a copy from questionable sources, though I should be able to get a copy since the computer came with XP in the first place, somebody paid for a licence and I should be able to use that licence. Or if you have lost a disk, with my SimCity 4, my second disk is gone, so I got a copy of that from questionable sources.
What I think the government should do is just run the current copyright laws through a paper shredder and start fresh from ideas from the taxpayers. The new copyright laws for Canada are just stupid, I USE TORRENTS, COME GET MY MR.ROBOTO...Ahem, Steven Harper.
The patent system has been established to aid spreading of technologic progress in the first place. As porter pointed out, the patent system is perverted to something protecting commercial interests, thus being an encumbrance to anyone who needs to make use of new technology. If there was an option for anyone to use the patent system for free, I might agree to a protection of commercial use of intellectual property up to a certain degree. But many individual persons can not afford patent fees, while some huge companies churn patents out as soon somebody got an idea about an idea. So one might dismiss the whole patent system without doing something bad, as mankind could freely use any improvement all over the world.
But I agree that there should be some protection for actually designed and manufactured products. A given piece of software may be protected from piracy, of course. As it comes to obsolete software products, there might be place for a law allowing to expire license restrictions when the product is not supported any more.
I download all my old software. Usually the disc is not available, and even if it were I wouldn't pay for it anyway. It's old, well past its prime and if the developer still exists, they're making money off their newest product. If not, they've given up on it a long time ago.
I'm sure that would infuriate quite a few, but that's my system.
I'm sure that would infuriate quite a few, but that's my system.
Again, patents, or more correctly 'letters patent', or 'an open licence to monopoly at the sovereign's pleasure' was intended to sanction a limited monopoly. In our time it can reasonably be interpreted as 'a reward for intellectual innovation, protected from competition for a limited time. Given the life of software, that fits the need. Patents also, at least nominally, reward and encourage innovation. Innovations are a bit long in the tooth 16 years later. Commercial interest has degraded the idea and the practice, especially in the C20, but far more disgusting than patent law is the change to copyright law, which now gives a meal-ticket to 'heirs, assigns and successors' for up to 70 years' after the death of the (original creator of the 'work') copyright owner. We consumers of software could be worse off than we are, in the same boat as lovers of music, literature, graphic art and so on.
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And to answer the original question by the OP, I don't claim any special purity of thought or action in the matter, but my preference is always for s/w on original, functional medium. That's what I aim to get, but it doesn't stop me from paying for downloadable shareware, either.
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I tend to avoid pirating old software for three reasons, only one of which has to do with the law:
1. Piracy almost never preserves the original software, documentation, and packaging in its original form.
2. I found that pirating software leads to hoarding. Hoarding meant that I was spending more time playing and managing my software collection, but accomplishing nothing of value.
3. It may just be against the wishes of the creator. Note that I'm saying wishes, not financial benefit of. Copyrights cover many types of work, not all of which are produced for financial gain. Note that I'm saying creators here, not publishers.
In my heart, I really do feel that there is something wrong with copyright, particularly from the pecuniary benefit end. I teach people for a living, and if I want to continue to eat I have to continue to teach. I don't get royalties from my students. Heck, sometimes they even take my job! But I wouldn't want it any other way, because the thought of someone working for 10 years then striking it lucky (big record deal, big book deal, or whatever) and making more money than I will in a lifetime strikes me as offensive. Not because of their wealth, but because they are a social parisite thereafter.
1. Piracy almost never preserves the original software, documentation, and packaging in its original form.
2. I found that pirating software leads to hoarding. Hoarding meant that I was spending more time playing and managing my software collection, but accomplishing nothing of value.
3. It may just be against the wishes of the creator. Note that I'm saying wishes, not financial benefit of. Copyrights cover many types of work, not all of which are produced for financial gain. Note that I'm saying creators here, not publishers.
In my heart, I really do feel that there is something wrong with copyright, particularly from the pecuniary benefit end. I teach people for a living, and if I want to continue to eat I have to continue to teach. I don't get royalties from my students. Heck, sometimes they even take my job! But I wouldn't want it any other way, because the thought of someone working for 10 years then striking it lucky (big record deal, big book deal, or whatever) and making more money than I will in a lifetime strikes me as offensive. Not because of their wealth, but because they are a social parisite thereafter.
I disagree quite strong with the idea that the law should be obeyed just because it's the law. Free men engaging in free relations with one another are quite capable of discerning reasonable from the unreasonable if it is within a framework of trust and coorporation, instead of present societies, whose law fetishism and love of competition caters to the most hateful impulses of man.
I've still yet to figure out the best way to compensate software developers, but it is quite obvious to me that it does not involve a system where one could be fined or even jailed from the completely victimless crime of copying 15 year old software out of curiosity or nostalgia.
I've still yet to figure out the best way to compensate software developers, but it is quite obvious to me that it does not involve a system where one could be fined or even jailed from the completely victimless crime of copying 15 year old software out of curiosity or nostalgia.
I try to buy whenever possible. A vintage software purchase is not just the bytes, but the manual and packaging. Often I get more pleasure from reading the manual than using the application. Apple II and early Mac developers were often quirky folks, and there can be a lot of humour and computing intelligence in a manual. Beagle Brothers are an obvious example.
I voted for option 3. I have the money to buy stuff and believe that anyone who has hoarded a copy of some useful software deserves compensation, however nominal. The existence of a second hand or NOS software market encourages sales and keeps the old apps alive. We all know that some software is impossible to locate, even on the darkest side of the internet: many people post here in search of drivers for early Mac hardware. If old software is universally considered as "free", the incentive to sell installation disks and software packs diminishes, and some software will be lost entirely. I don't know whether it is still online, but Herb Johnson wrote a great essay about how free copies of S-100 documentation could make it impossible to make money from manuals in which he had invested substantially.
On the other hand, if software is difficult to find, I'll run a pirate copy until a legitimate copy becomes available. And it is a difficult problem to balance, from both a moral or economic point of view. I publish a few scanned manuals on the web that are still subject to copyright. The copyright owners no longer have a commercial interest in the products, but the manuals may help a few hobbyists. Technically I have broken the law, but my actions are morally reasonable. And if somebody popped up to say that they own 50 manuals that they wish to sell and my action is affecting their business, I'd pull the download.
I voted for option 3. I have the money to buy stuff and believe that anyone who has hoarded a copy of some useful software deserves compensation, however nominal. The existence of a second hand or NOS software market encourages sales and keeps the old apps alive. We all know that some software is impossible to locate, even on the darkest side of the internet: many people post here in search of drivers for early Mac hardware. If old software is universally considered as "free", the incentive to sell installation disks and software packs diminishes, and some software will be lost entirely. I don't know whether it is still online, but Herb Johnson wrote a great essay about how free copies of S-100 documentation could make it impossible to make money from manuals in which he had invested substantially.
On the other hand, if software is difficult to find, I'll run a pirate copy until a legitimate copy becomes available. And it is a difficult problem to balance, from both a moral or economic point of view. I publish a few scanned manuals on the web that are still subject to copyright. The copyright owners no longer have a commercial interest in the products, but the manuals may help a few hobbyists. Technically I have broken the law, but my actions are morally reasonable. And if somebody popped up to say that they own 50 manuals that they wish to sell and my action is affecting their business, I'd pull the download.
Err, no, in most places in the world. Copyright is very different between nations: book publishers, for example, sell separate rights in geographical regions.
In the UK, you automatically gain copyright for any original work. You don't need to put provisos on your work; protection is just there, unless you provide a copying licence.
A few years ago, you could "establish your copyright" by posting a copy of your work to specified UK libraries and one of the Dublin colleges (the law was not ammended to cope with the idea of an independent Ireland). "Establishing copyright" just means judgement against the copier can be very quick. The publication of private letters has been successfully challenged in UK courts for breach of copyright, and everything is copyright. Even your hand written note to the cleaner.
If a UK software company goes out of business, who knows who owns what? The copyright is an asset and so it depends on who inherits it.
Uncertainty of ownership is a problem with many old software. Recently I tried to buy a software upgrade for a piece of classic Mac software. After finding the current address of the company and asking for an upgrade, the business manager told me neither an upgrade nor any license for this product will be available any more. They do not even have a copy of the source or a master disk. And often enough you will not even find an address to ask for a license.
To copy and recirculate such software most likely will break law. It is a juristic problem with jurassic software, not a commercial one. Some clarification from a lawyer's point of view would be most welcome.
I discovered something a while back: laws are often put into place for a reason. A person's failure to understand those reasons does not really negate the value of the law. As such, I don't like the idea of people indiscriminantly breaking laws (although it is hard to breath these days without breaking at least a few laws).
Now if you disagree with a law, have considered it thoroughly, and are breaking it as a political statement, that's something different. If you are breaking a law for purposes other than your own gain, that's something different. But the sad thing is, most people don't think about breaking laws for larger purposes. They usually just think about their own immediate needs.
We are unable to consume ideas because they only exist as a neurological entity. Somebody else can have the same idea or something like it. I have to agree because I have never eaten a dream.
But software is more than an idea or an electronic entity. It is a machine created by a human and the machine has a purpose designed by the creator. The creator wrote many lines of code (a physical entity if you print them out), and then a machine called a compiler turned them into a new machine called an application. This process requires copyright protection in order to reward creators. The argument about copyright protection is "how long?"
BTW I have never consumed a computer manual, because so few are published on rice paper. And I don't think that manuals can be consumed in the same way as electricity or ink. They are like software.
Software is an idea that can be represented in ones and zeros on a computer.
If I eat a doughnut, then nobody else can eat that doughnut. I have consumed it. If I buy a computer, nobody else can have that physical computer.
If I have an arrangement of ones and zeroes on my machine, I am not preventing anybody else having that same arrangement of ones and zeroes on their machine.
Well, copyright violation has become a sort of political protest (however ineffective) when the spasms of violence that the software industry coax out of our governments are one of the best examples of how commercial interests are gaining an influence that they do not deserve.
I don't follow laws that are passed by corporations with deep pockets of money to pay off Congressman and the like. I do this in protest. that's the reason I download most music (illegally) and am rather doing this in protest, mainly as the RIAA/MPAA just pocket all the money, with a few table scraps to the artist. However, I will try to go and spend money on merchandise if the Band is in town. As far as movies, I don't want to encourage bad movies making obscene amounts of money. I download it, if I like it (and watch the whole thing) and decide it's worth the money, I will go pay for it. that's how I accumulate most of my movies. But if I get 1/3rd to 1/2 the way through it and find it atrocious, I just delete it and don't even keep it. I want to preview stuff and not spend money on absolute junk. I have found good movies that way, but I won't think twice about downloading and if finding it's so god-awful bad, I just delete it.
With the trash the movie studios put out on film, I don't want to encourage the idea of dumb humor and senseless violence of "Fan Service" when it's not needed. Therefore, I don't buy much. but if I deem that the movie is a masterpiece, I will go out and buy it and probably memorabilia that goes with it.
I don't want to encourage bad decisions, nor MPAA/RIAA for paying someone to make the laws. So I choose to ignore any law that corporations set. I am not going to live my life by who has more money to bribe someone
I selected download without thinking twice.
It really depends on how desperate I am for the software, e.g. Do I need it today? Will I use it much?
Then there is the situation of is it avaliable? If I can get a second hand copy at a reasonable price I would be quite tempted to go for it, assuming it is something that i am going to make quite a bit of use of and I would like a boxed copy of it. I can be nice to have a genuine boxed copy of something. Otherwise I would just download it. Or get someone to copy it for me.
It really depends on how desperate I am for the software, e.g. Do I need it today? Will I use it much?
Then there is the situation of is it avaliable? If I can get a second hand copy at a reasonable price I would be quite tempted to go for it, assuming it is something that i am going to make quite a bit of use of and I would like a boxed copy of it. I can be nice to have a genuine boxed copy of something. Otherwise I would just download it. Or get someone to copy it for me.
I would argue that pirating music, movies, and software is not a form of protest. Well, at least in most cases. In those cases, you aren't playing a 21st century Robin Hood. You are just taking something for your own benefit. If you don't agree with copyright law, there are a couple of things that you can do. You can avoid using copywritten content altogether, or you can use stuff like open source software or creative commons licensed materials.
Also, most piracy is committed in what people believe is the privacy of their own home. Protests in private aren't protests at all.
Also, most piracy is committed in what people believe is the privacy of their own home. Protests in private aren't protests at all.
Lat. sumere = to take up, to bear, to adopt. Con, an intensifying prefix = together, altogether. 'To ingest' is only one extension of that idea. Modern commercial consumerism, implying acquisition (principally) and exploitation (literally, not emotively) makes the root meaning very clear. I cannot concur with your understanding of the term.
And frankly, I am no-one's client until I choose to be, and before I petition them and am accepted as a client = dependant. I am a customer if I bestow my custom upon a supplier. I happily admit to being a user of software in that I feed it to my ravening flock of Macs.
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Though producers produce until they are red in the bottom (line), without consumers' acquisition of that produce there is no 'sink' available to the producers but a real or virtual landfill and a bankruptcy court. Not even a benevolent (or beholden) government can tolerate or support endless production without consumption of the product. Do we but appreciate it, we the customers (and consumers if we choose to be so) have potential control, not the suppliers.
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No one in his mind is going to bother enforcing copyright law if both:
- the original copyright owner is no longer profiting from the product
- you, the potential infringer is not profiting from the product
Taking people to court costs money, and if no one's making any money off the program, then there' really no point.
Therefore, I "Download without thinking twice."
- the original copyright owner is no longer profiting from the product
- you, the potential infringer is not profiting from the product
Taking people to court costs money, and if no one's making any money off the program, then there' really no point.
Therefore, I "Download without thinking twice."
The owner has to show losses to recover anything after you are found guilty. So without knowing who the owner is and not being able to prove losses because they item is no longer available for sale even if the owner wanted to sell it (code was lost) I can't see it going to court at all.
It takes somebody to press charges to even get a court case. For example if I walked over to a neighbor and beat the living hell out of them, while the act is illegal there is no prosecution unless the one getting beat down presses charges.
It takes somebody to press charges to even get a court case. For example if I walked over to a neighbor and beat the living hell out of them, while the act is illegal there is no prosecution unless the one getting beat down presses charges.
In my opinion, copyright law in its current state is atrocious (95 year terms?). I think the companies bribing our congresspeople through "donations" should be the ones getting in trouble, not the people who download 15 year old programs from some abandonware site. I believe copyright terms were done correctly the *first* time in 1790 (14-years with an optional extension) and the expansions (especially the DMCA) are atrocious abominations pushed by the RIAA, MPAA, BSA, and Disney.
Food for thought: Is Microsoft making anything from Office 4.2.1 for Mac?
BTW this is US copyright law
Food for thought: Is Microsoft making anything from Office 4.2.1 for Mac?
BTW this is US copyright law