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From: mwm@eris (Mike (My watch has windows) Meyer)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga,comp.sys.misc,comp.sys.ibm.pc,comp.sys.mac,comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: Shareware & Honesty (Was: Software (and other kinds of) copying)
Message-ID: <6665@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: 22 Jan 88 22:22:52 GMT
References: <8055@g.ms.uky.edu> <174@piring.cwi.nl> <39450@sun.uucp> <6649@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <469@aimt.UUCP>
Sender: usenet@agate.BERKELEY.EDU
Reply-To: mwm@eris.UUCP (Mike (My watch has windows) Meyer)
Organization: Missionaria Phonibalonica
Lines: 53

In article <469@aimt.UUCP> breck@aimt.UUCP (Robert Breckinridge Beatie) writes:
<In article <6649@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>, I wrote:
<> As for fair, that means according to the rules. The rules (laws) in
<> the US state that if you give somebody something, it's *theirs*. You
<> can get neither payment nor the return of the thing, unless there's a
<> prior agreement about such.
<
<I think that the laws state that you can not be required to pay for unsolicited
<stuff that you get in the mail.  But you do not get to keep the stuff.
<Of course, I'm not a lawyer.  This is just what I've been led to understand
<by people who have received (for example) unsolicited magazine "trial
<subscriptions".

You mean they actually had to give the magazines back!? Somehow, I
doubt that. Of course, once the scam doesn't work, the publishers quit
sending them magazines.

<Just use the free programs that people are standing in line to let you
<(you wonderful guy you) use.

No, nobody stands in line - they just write the software for whatever
reasons they have (like they need the tool, or think it would be
educational, or ...), and don't feel like doing the extra work
required to turn it into a commercial product. So they drop it into
the PD distribution channels *without* trying to make a quick buck by
putting in a "send me money or you'll pay in the afterlife" message.

<Continue to sponge off the hard work of people around you.

Considering that some of that work is done using tools that I wrote &
gave away, I don't have any problem doing so. That the distribution
channels are funded in part with my dollars, and run on software and
hardware that I help maintain doesn't hurt any. I'm just collecting
the (indirect) fruits of my labors.

<Be a man and don't give in to the blatant extortion implicit in shareware.

Damn straight. But that's not really hard. Most of the stuff
distributed under the misnomer "shareware" isn't usable anyway. Or
isn't as good as *true* shareware - software that people share because
they want to, not because they hope to shame you into giving them
money.

<America will be proud of you for it.

Glad to know that someone appreciates my stand.

	<mike
--
Teddies good friend has his two o'clock feast		Mike Meyer
And he's making Teddies ex girl friend come		mwm@berkeley.edu
They mistook Teddies good trust				ucbvax!mwm
Just for proof that Teddy was dumb.			mwm@ucbjade.BITNET