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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!floyd!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix!Little@HI-MULTICS.ARPA
From: Little@HI-MULTICS.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.micro
Subject: Software Piracy
Message-ID: <12101@sri-arpa.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 9-Apr-84 00:07:00 EST
Article-I.D.: sri-arpa.12101
Posted: Mon Apr  9 00:07:00 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 13-Apr-84 20:46:38 EST
Lines: 38


 (my my ain't it interesting what happens when one keys down with 80
watts on 2 meters side-band in the same room with the modem)

Ok, you don't like auto theft as an analogy, because one deprives where
as the is tied up in litigation.  Sooooo, it is neat and spiffy for
some nerdling to be able to copy what ever his/her/its itty bitty
little heart desires on his Byte Cruncher 1000, huhh?   I suppose then
that it is perfectly all right for me to acquire YOUR marvy doctoral
thesis on why the African Testes Fly is sterile between 0200 and 0300,
acquire copios amounts of white out, spend about 2 hours with scissors,
rulers, erasers, and a DUPLICATING machine called a XEROX, or KODAK, and
come up with my Masters thesis.  After all, if the club in Podunk, Missouri
can, for the price of one, pass out 100 copies of 1-2-3 with
documentation and updates - no charge mind you, just "back-ups
(heh,heh)", then why should I bother with piddling little things like
copyright.

My gosh, just think what I could do.  "Lucifer's Hammer" could become
"Fly Swatter", by Gary G. Little.  I could rename "Ringworld" to "World
Wheel" and develope an epic that would make "Star Wars" (which becomes
"Day of the Yugi's") pale in insignificance.

Seriously, making backups is one thing, and I think you should be able
to make an unlimited number of them, because disks do crap out, and
people do make mistakes, but to pass a copy off as a back-up and then
give that backup to a friend is a cop-out.  My rule of thumb is that if
you want to see how it works, stop by and fiddle with it all that you want.
But no you can not have the updates that I paid for, nor copies of the
documents.  As to the groups that buy one and copy 100, it would be
equitable if each one only got on hundredth of the product -- half a
page and a corner of the jacket.  

Ah well, somuch for moralizing.  Besides, you won't change your mind,
the same as I won't change mine -- you losy commie pinko spy.

                                        Gary
                                        Little.Fleas@HI-MULTICS