Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!pro-houston.cts.com!jabernathy
From: jabernathy@pro-houston.cts.com (Joe Abernathy)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple
Subject: Re: RE: piracy
Message-ID: <2485.cortland.info-apple@pro-houston>
Date: 12 Nov 89 09:31:34 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 31

In-Reply-To: message from ericmcg@pro-generic.cts.com

> The point is, you only have the rights outlined by the company from
> whom you purchased the product.

Wrong. Your rights and liabilities under copyright law depend almost entirely
upon the laws of the state in which you reside.

To be completely legal, write to your state attorney general for the laws
pertaining to documents published electronically and to shrink-wrap licensing
(which is what you are referring to ... and which is illegal almost everywhere
except California, thank goodness).

In practice, of course, you can do just about anything you're smart enough to
do. My general rule is that if I buy something that's copy protected, I take
it back. If I have to have it, or really want it, and can't get something
similar elsewhere, I'll do what's necessary to make it completely useable on
my computer system. The fact is that copy protection renders software useless
in conjunction with almost every performance enhancer. These days, any decent
computer has at least one such device, and some of us have several such
devices whose value runs into thousands of dollars.

If you want to copy protect your software, write something good enough that
they need the manual. I've been doing that for years, and I haven't been
disappointed yet. Good after-sale support really encourages people to get
legal, also.


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