The mind of an office cracker

[BadBigBen]

I would conjecture that he means the Business Software Alliance...

http://www.bsa.org

Ben
"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."
How to ask a question, when posting them to a professional forum.
Only ask questions with yes/no answers if you want "yes" or "no"

 

[edfair]

You haven't been invited to do a BSA audit?

From a page on the net:

Howdy all,

Just curious: has anyone survived a BSA audit and lived to tell about it? There are many horror stories about disgruntled employees (or ex-employees) calling in bogus (or valid) complaints. This can become expensive, as companies are either forced to take valuable time themselves, hire expensive consultants, and pay fines for unlicensed software.

And, the term 'unlicensed' is used very loosely: if you do not have the original CD, the certificate of authenticity, AND an invoice showing that you purchased the software, you will be required to pay for it and also a fine. Here are some examples and more information:

http://www.infoworld.com/articles/op...3opfoster.html

http://www.groklaw.net/comment.php?m...&pid=0#c473174

http://news.com.com/2008-1082_3-5065859.html

http://www.infoworld.com/articles/op...7opfoster.html

http://www.infoworld.com/articles/op...9opfoster.html

http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/...5estrat_1.html

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[goombawaho]

So, the point is "taking it too far", I guess. Everybody understands that. But also look at the chinese blatantly copying software and flea market vendors selling bootleg software and some companies that are more blatant. We understand some people get audited unfairly or because of a crappy ex-employee. What can you do about that?

There's a nice fat juicy percentage of people or companies that need to be cracked down on and then there are the casual bootleggers (installing the same piece of software on three of your computers because the software isn't smart enough to know) which is not a major deal.

I'm just against all these people that throw a blanket over every software maker or anti-piracy group because their opinion is that everything should be free. They're like modern day anarchists.

On the other hand, I don't want to get in trouble for minor infringements. The meat on the bone are the people that I mentioned in my first paragraph, not the casual bootlegger.

 

[edfair]

So, the point is "taking it too far", I guess. "

Yeah. The software companies involved are giving the BSA a huge incentive to nitpick the issues. The record keeping and storage requirements to meet their demands can get a little burdensome.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[goombawaho]

If the requirements are like you said they are, every company I've worked for would fail. Nobody kept their receipts for the purchases. Plus lots of times we kept only one or two CDs and kept all the license keys/codes/COAs separate to save space.

 

[edfair]

Yep, you would have failed.

Requirements included in this article:

http://www.networkworld.com/columni...l?source=NWWNLE_nlt_small_business_2009-10-15

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[gbaughma]

I assumed that BSA meant "Boy Scouts of America". (since we do many products that are licensed by BSA)... shows how the context of what you are surrounded by can influence the meaning that you perceive.



Just my 2¢

"What the captain doesn't realize is that we've secretly replaced his Dilithium Crystals with new Folger's Crystals."

--Greg

http://parallel.tzo.com

 

[biglebowski]

I'll paraphrase your argument to explain why I disagree with it:

"For many city dwellers, the historical asking price of cars is not justifiable. Most city dwellers need/want to occasionally travel to somewhere not reachable by public transport. The occasional nature of this requirement simply doesn't warrant expenditures that range in the several thousands of dollars. In this type of environment, car stealing is going to flourish. Right or wrong, until rather recently, there haven't been a lot of seriously viable alternatives either: public transport used to be a joke and Google's personal teleportation service didn't exist."

No they'd just catch a taxi.

Perhaps there's an oportunity here for someone to start an online version of office that is pay per use.

Biglebowskis Razor - with all things being equal if you still can't find the answer have a shave and go down the pub.

 

[Noway2]

Google Docs (http://docs.google.com/&followup=http://docs.google.com/&ltmpl=homepage]link[/url])?

Open office, Libre Office, or even Koffice?

The only times I use MS office anymore are when I am at work. Thanks to the new and improved ribbon interface I can even get my tasks done in only twice the time.

 

[Noway2]

Just saw this link on slashdot:

http://yro.slashdot.org/story/11/05/12/1214252/BSA-2010-Piracy-Report-588-Billion

It caught my attention for this thread because of the reference to the Boy Scouts... er ... BSA. Apparently their annual software piracy report is out.

 

[flyboytim]

Thanks to the new and improved ribbon interface I can even get my tasks done in only twice the time.

Reminds me of an advert from many years ago, in the days of Windows 3.11, which went something like this:

Man, with beaming smile, speaking on telephone: "I'll be home early tonight, darling - I'm using Microsoft software!"

Our office refrain at the time was: "Crashed at three - home for tea!"

Of course nothing was further from the truth: the disasters always occurred at around ten-to-five, and took about two or three hours to put right, and I would stagger home at about 9pm.

http://www.fxxxingcomputers.co.uk

 

[gbaughma]

Well, on the upside, USA is only at 21%, which is the lowest in the world, according to their little rotating globe thingy.



Just my 2¢

"What the captain doesn't realize is that we've secretly replaced his Dilithium Crystals with new Folger's Crystals."

--Greg

http://parallel.tzo.com

 

[goombawaho]

Maybe that's why software prices are high - to cover all the theft. That's what they say about regular store prices - they have to cover the loss prevention employees salaries and the lost merchandise.

Every moocher is giving the rest of us the shaft by bootlegging.

 

[Noway2]

The three takeaways I received from the article are:
1) The question as to whether or not cultural differences are at play here. What I mean by this is the locations where software piracy is most rampant are also ones that are known to not respect the the Western concept of intellectual property.

2) The method of computing the actual lost dollar value is bogus and is inflated to underscore their point. Specifically, claiming that someone using the pirated copy of the software is a loss at the full retail value of the product is not true. For one, this assumes that this person would have otherwise purchased the product while many would not have.

3) The method of computing the number of operating systems in use is flawed. It is based upon the number of computers sold and the number of computers estimated in use versus the number of purchased copies of Windows and Mac-OS. My one word response to this is: Linux. The machine I write this post on being a prime example (it is running Slackware64). The market share figures touted in cases like this typically point to OS sales, which grossly under estimates the real market share and misses the server market all together.

This is not to say that there isn't a problem, which there is. However, wild exaggerations from a firm known to be a PR front for an industry don't exactly carry a lot of weight either, except perhaps with the politicians that have been bribed, .. er, lobbied to support them.

 

[Glenn9999]

and

4) How many sales that they post were driven by the original presence of the "questionably obtained" product? I know in my travels I've witnessed a number of people who found something they wouldn't have ordinarily bought and then liked it and bought it (and in some cases more than just that "questionably obtained" product). They'll say, too, that they would have never considered buying the product had they not gotten to sample it. (Specific examples withheld for obvious reasons)

It is not possible for anyone to acknowledge truth when their salary depends on them not doing it.

 

[Noway2]

A couple of weeks ago, I questioned whether there is a cultural aspect of this issue. Interestingly, Arstechnica published this article yesterday:

http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/ne...t-95-percent-of-potential-chinese-revenue.ars

From the article

Microsoft CEO said that the company earned revenue in China amounting to only five percent of that earned in the US, in spite of comparable sales of personal computers between the two countries. The reason for the difference? Piracy

 

[goombawaho]

I'm sure the discrepancy has nothing to do with piracy. Cough.