The fact is pirating software; another person(s) intellectual property is a bad thing. Mean, somebody worked hard to get this done, and how do we expect such person to move forward in developing that particular program if he know its eventually going to stolen!!
Piracy as we all know could be done for gain…which is the very bad side of piracy. Its like reaping where you did not sow… like stealing from somebody and I whole-heartedly oppose that!!
The other part, which by the way is the most common type, is what I can't say I entirely disapprove. Pirating because one simply can't afford the product (full stop). It doesn't seem to make sense really, but considering the fact that the majority of the big software manufacturers (Microsoft in particular, Adobe, e.t.c.) are rich any way, there anti-piracy measures only encourage hackers to really prove that they can't stop them.
In a country like Nigeria, an average person, who is still struggling to have a PC just can't afford $300-$400 for an operating system. I didn't say he doesn't have, I said he can't afford it for that course….and by the way he probably doesn't have it too. The president of Romania recently said the IT sector of his country is developed because of pirated softwares… Funny it seems, but that's just the very fact for a lot of countries, developing and just developed!! He's just bold (or stupid, as the case may be) enough to say it publicly. India is another perfect example. For every India that wasn't born rich, working in Microsoft or any where else, I would assume that the major part of his software development life was mastered on pirated softwares; not a fact, but a very sound assumption, considering the fact that I was first made to really know about software piracy by a brilliant Indian friend!!!
Buying hundreds or thousands dollar worth of software isn't just viable in this place, and the very next option is to look for it free or pay very little for.
A copy of Microsoft windows vista ultimate (the preferred version) cost $400, officially. On the piracy market, you can get it for about N500 (500 Naira) in Nigeria (about $4!!).But then that's just for the software on DVD, the main issue is the activation, and windows update. Microsoft pulled out this stunt first with XP, and as of today, it doesn't affect any body who knows a little work around to it any way. There are various cracks popping up for windows Vista, and my guess is very soon, very very soon, if not already, there will be a UNIVERSALLY accepted one - just like there is for XP - that Microsoft herself can't break, that's if there isn't already!!
The bottom line is software piracy is bad for upcoming developer, and they should be encouraged to give us wonderful creativity…
Its also bad for the big boys too, but they are things that are even worse!! They already have all the money anyway, how rich do they want to be!!!
