Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!iuvax!rutgers!apple!sun-barr!newstop!sun!pepper!cmcmanis From: cmcmanis%pepper@Sun.COM (Chuck McManis) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Piracy Message-ID: <119606@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> Date: 4 Aug 89 20:16:35 GMT References: <119399@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> <4030@cps3xx.UUCP> Sender: news@sun.Eng.Sun.COM Reply-To: cmcmanis@sun.UUCP (Chuck McManis) Organization: Sun Microsystems, Mountain View Lines: 36 In article <4030@cps3xx.UUCP> porkka@frith.UUCP (Joe Porkka) writes: >True everybody is debateing what essentially is >a question of morality. > >Some people think it is ok to copy software, some don't. From that point on you missed the point. A society as a whole has morals, and those morals are written down in the laws they make. Copying software is undeniably illegal, and by definition, society as a whole considers it to be immoral. Be _definition_, anyone breaking the law is antisocial. That's true if you go 60MPH in a 55MPH zone, or you pirate software. All the discussion about "Software costs to much" or "I wouldn't have bought it anyway." stuff is bullshit. You copy software without the authors permission and you're a crook, period. If you are caught you can be put into prision, just as easily as if you robbed a bank. Don't bother trying to convince yourself it was justified, there is no justification. And don't piss and moan when you get thrown into jail or have your machine confiscated. No one cares. Just like the highway patrol doesn't care that you were on a straight road, on a clear day, with 20 mile visibility. To the person who walked into the science fiction convention with all of the pirate software. Call the cops, throw them in jail. Every person in the room with a disk can be tried and convicted of receiving stolen property, and the people who put on the convention can just be convicted of theft. If it is the moral responsibility of every citizen to obey the laws it is also the moral responsibility to report to the enforcement arm of society when they are broken. --Chuck McManis uucp: {anywhere}!sun!cmcmanis BIX: cmcmanis ARPAnet: cmcmanis@sun.com These opinions are my own and no one elses, but you knew that didn't you. "A most excellent barbarian ... Genghis Kahn!"