Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!emory!mephisto!udel!mmdf
From: pfaff@mercury.asd.contel.com (Ray Pfaff - Oakwood 457 934-8162)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: One more try...
Message-ID: <15031@snow-white.udel.EDU>
Date: 26 Mar 90 22:14:44 GMT
Sender: mmdf@udel.EDU
Lines: 24

Chuck McManis writes:
>Therefore the only way to curb piracy today is to flame them mercilessly
>and publiclly. When a pirate reads how much shit someone caught for not
>knowing what ECM meant is he or she going to risk asking a question themselves?
>The answer is no, they won't.
 
As an interested bystander, how would you feel if I called you a thief because
you asked a question that's in the AmigaDos manual?  That's certainly proof
that you must have stole your Amiga since the information should be availible
to you.
You make the assumtion that everyone completely reads the documenation;
they don't.  Most of the time it's obvious if somebody has a pirated copy 
of something, but I just politely tell them that the answer to their question
is in their manual (giving a page reference, if I have the product).
I think that amiga-relay is a very useful mechanism for transfering infor-
mation about the Amiga and it shouldn't be used as a flamming mechanism
just due to the fact that you *suspect* piracy.
I really don't want to start a flame war on the network, I think that since
piracy is percieved to be a "minor" crime that people don't really understand
that they are slandering other people; in effect, calling them a thief.
If you really want to start an argument, please mail me direct.

Raymond Pfaff
pfaff@europa.asd.contel.com