Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!att!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!yale!Horne-Scott
From: Horne-Scott@cs.yale.edu (Scott Horne)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: Software: why does sales tax apply?
Message-ID: <68902@yale-celray.yale.UUCP>
Date: 7 Aug 89 16:58:58 GMT
References: <5050@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu>
Sender: root@yale.UUCP
Reply-To: Horne-Scott@cs.yale.edu (Scott Horne)
Organization: Yale University Computer Science Dept, New Haven, CT   06520-2158
Lines: 29
In-reply-to: cck@deneb.ucdavis.edu (Earl H. Kinmonth)

In article <5050@ucdavis.ucdavis.edu>, cck@deneb (Earl H. Kinmonth) writes:
> I was installing a piece of software today, and in reading through the
> copyright claim, it asserted that the publisher retained ownership and
> the user was only ~renting~.  Nevertheless, my colleague was charged
> ~sales~ tax by the vendor, although in California, ~sales~ tax is not
> (as far as I know) collected on ~rent~.

Demand a refund at the store, and tell them that they shouldn't be paying
taxes on the "rented" merchandise.

What goes around comes around.  If software vendors want to get cagey with
their words, then let's just see them explain these "rentals" to the
government.  Is rental permitted in the business licenses of these software
companies?  Why aren't the terms of the "rental" specified more clearly?
If the software is being "rented", then aren't we "lessees" entitled to some
maintenance (upgrades) at the expense of the "lessors"?  And isn't it
interesting that one isn't informed that he is "renting" the software until
he opens the package--long after he has given his money on the assumption that
he *purchased* the software?

Someone has some explaining to do.

					--Scott

Scott Horne                     Undergraduate programmer, Yale CS Dept Facility
horne@cs.Yale.edu                         ...!{harvard,cmcl2,decvax}!yale!horne
Home: 203 789-0877     SnailMail:  Box 7196 Yale Station, New Haven, CT   06520
Work: 203 432-1260              Summer residence:  175 Dwight St, New Haven, CT
Dare I speak for the amorphous gallimaufry of intellectual thought called Yale?