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Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!brl-tgr!tgr!topaz!RU-BLUE!BRAIL@SEISMO.CSS.GOV
From: BRAIL@SEISMO.CSS.GOV
Newsgroups: net.micro
Subject: Re: Tires and Software and Right and Wrong
Message-ID: <358@brl-tgr.ARPA>
Date: Thu, 1-Aug-85 01:46:40 EDT
Article-I.D.: brl-tgr.358
Posted: Thu Aug  1 01:46:40 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 2-Aug-85 22:30:13 EDT
Sender: news@brl-tgr.ARPA
Lines: 63

I posted:

>>A car
>>without tires as about as useless as a computer without software. If
>>someone buys tires for their car, there is no law stopping them from
>>selling them to a friend, or putting them on another car. This is not
>>considered theft. 

Then read:

>Computer software, cassette tapes, and video tapes are a class of
>product which our nation's laws do not cover very well. The
>characteristics of that class are that the medium costs little, and an
>original item is easily duplicated with little or no (in the case of
>computer disks) degredation. The difference between software and
>tires, then, is that when you sell tires, you no longer have the use
>of them, while in selling software, you do.

>If you have two cars, you are free to buy just one set of tires, and
>put the tires on one car or the other as the Spirit moves you. As you
>point out, you are also free to do this with software (except in the
>case of CPU-keyed dangles). The key to the copy-protection issue is
>that you can copy the item AND GIVE IT AWAY TO SOMEBODY WHO WOULD
>OTHERWISE HAVE TO BUY IT.

	This is all true, and I fully understand (understood) and
agree with it.

>The argument that he would not, in fact, pay the price to buy it, and
>the manufacturer is therefore not losing a sale, doesn't hold water.
>If you want to live in a capitalistic society, you have to play by
>certain rules. When the price of something is too high, people don't
>buy it, and the manufacturer has to lower his price, or make the item
>more valuable at the same price, or go out of business. Piracy is not
>a valid (moral, ethical) alternative. To say that it is not illegal is
>to pick nits with lawyers. Regardless of how the legislature in your
>State or in Washington happens to define it, the Capitalist judgement
>of Right and Wrong must judge that practice Wrong, because you are
>denying the purveyor his due.
>
>
>					-- Allan Pratt

	I feel as if I have just been flamed for advocating piracy.
Unfortunately, I never advocated piracy in the first place. I did
point out that the manufacturer of software has a responsibility to
provide consumers with a reasonably defect-free, useable product, and
to fix any defects which may later appear. This responsibility exists
in any market in a capitalistic society. I did point out that software
is different from tires, eggs or whatever, and agree completely that
software licensing is not yet covered adequately by law. (Computer
bulletin boards aren't either, but that's another matter, and another
possible set of flames.)
	However, I did *not* advocate piracy at any point in my
original article. I did mention that shrink-wrap licences are (to my
limited legal knowledge) of questionable validity. I believe that
there must be a better way to licence software. Perhaps site-licensing
will solve some problems. Perhaps dongles (but not ones that are keyed
to an individual CPU) will solve others.
	Actually, I think Allan Pratt has posted a good explanation of
piracy, capitalism, right, and wrong. However, I would appreciate if I
were not the one insinuated as the pirate.
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