How do you feel about old software licenses?

[II2II]

I tend to avoid pirating old software for three reasons, only one of which has to do with the law:

1. Piracy almost never preserves the original software, documentation, and packaging in its original form.

2. I found that pirating software leads to hoarding. Hoarding meant that I was spending more time playing and managing my software collection, but accomplishing nothing of value.

3. It may just be against the wishes of the creator. Note that I'm saying wishes, not financial benefit of. Copyrights cover many types of work, not all of which are produced for financial gain. Note that I'm saying creators here, not publishers.

In my heart, I really do feel that there is something wrong with copyright, particularly from the pecuniary benefit end. I teach people for a living, and if I want to continue to eat I have to continue to teach. I don't get royalties from my students. Heck, sometimes they even take my job! But I wouldn't want it any other way, because the thought of someone working for 10 years then striking it lucky (big record deal, big book deal, or whatever) and making more money than I will in a lifetime strikes me as offensive. Not because of their wealth, but because they are a social parisite thereafter.

 

[paws]

I disagree quite strong with the idea that the law should be obeyed just because it's the law. Free men engaging in free relations with one another are quite capable of discerning reasonable from the unreasonable if it is within a framework of trust and coorporation, instead of present societies, whose law fetishism and love of competition caters to the most hateful impulses of man.

I've still yet to figure out the best way to compensate software developers, but it is quite obvious to me that it does not involve a system where one could be fined or even jailed from the completely victimless crime of copying 15 year old software out of curiosity or nostalgia.

 

[Bunsen]

It's not piracy if the company is out of business and nobody bought or took over the old software. Then it becomes public domain.

I have a hunch that, whatever it becomes, "public domain" isn't it.

I was oscillating between voting 1/ and 2/, until I re-read "and it's no longer available"

 

[Charlieman]

I try to buy whenever possible. A vintage software purchase is not just the bytes, but the manual and packaging. Often I get more pleasure from reading the manual than using the application. Apple II and early Mac developers were often quirky folks, and there can be a lot of humour and computing intelligence in a manual. Beagle Brothers are an obvious example.

I voted for option 3. I have the money to buy stuff and believe that anyone who has hoarded a copy of some useful software deserves compensation, however nominal. The existence of a second hand or NOS software market encourages sales and keeps the old apps alive. We all know that some software is impossible to locate, even on the darkest side of the internet: many people post here in search of drivers for early Mac hardware. If old software is universally considered as "free", the incentive to sell installation disks and software packs diminishes, and some software will be lost entirely. I don't know whether it is still online, but Herb Johnson wrote a great essay about how free copies of S-100 documentation could make it impossible to make money from manuals in which he had invested substantially.

On the other hand, if software is difficult to find, I'll run a pirate copy until a legitimate copy becomes available. And it is a difficult problem to balance, from both a moral or economic point of view. I publish a few scanned manuals on the web that are still subject to copyright. The copyright owners no longer have a commercial interest in the products, but the manuals may help a few hobbyists. Technically I have broken the law, but my actions are morally reasonable. And if somebody popped up to say that they own 50 manuals that they wish to sell and my action is affecting their business, I'd pull the download.

 

[porter]

We consumers of software could be worse off than we are, in the same boat as lovers of music, literature, graphic art and so on.

We are not consumers of software, we are clients, customers or users.

We may consume media, electricity, hardware, ink, physical manuals, but not software.

Just like you can't be a "consumer of ideas".

 

[Charlieman]

It's not piracy if the company is out of business and nobody bought or took over the old software. Then it becomes public domain.

Err, no, in most places in the world. Copyright is very different between nations: book publishers, for example, sell separate rights in geographical regions.

In the UK, you automatically gain copyright for any original work. You don't need to put provisos on your work; protection is just there, unless you provide a copying licence.

A few years ago, you could "establish your copyright" by posting a copy of your work to specified UK libraries and one of the Dublin colleges (the law was not ammended to cope with the idea of an independent Ireland). "Establishing copyright" just means judgement against the copier can be very quick. The publication of private letters has been successfully challenged in UK courts for breach of copyright, and everything is copyright. Even your hand written note to the cleaner.

If a UK software company goes out of business, who knows who owns what? The copyright is an asset and so it depends on who inherits it.

 

[register]

I have a hunch that, whatever it becomes, "public domain" isn't it.

Uncertainty of ownership is a problem with many old software. Recently I tried to buy a software upgrade for a piece of classic Mac software. After finding the current address of the company and asking for an upgrade, the business manager told me neither an upgrade nor any license for this product will be available any more. They do not even have a copy of the source or a master disk. And often enough you will not even find an address to ask for a license.
To copy and recirculate such software most likely will break law. It is a juristic problem with jurassic software, not a commercial one. Some clarification from a lawyer's point of view would be most welcome.

 

[II2II]

I disagree quite strong with the idea that the law should be obeyed just because it's the law.

I discovered something a while back: laws are often put into place for a reason. A person's failure to understand those reasons does not really negate the value of the law. As such, I don't like the idea of people indiscriminantly breaking laws (although it is hard to breath these days without breaking at least a few laws).

Now if you disagree with a law, have considered it thoroughly, and are breaking it as a political statement, that's something different. If you are breaking a law for purposes other than your own gain, that's something different. But the sad thing is, most people don't think about breaking laws for larger purposes. They usually just think about their own immediate needs.

 

[Charlieman]

We are not consumers of software, we are clients, customers or users.
We may consume media, electricity, hardware, ink, physical manuals, but not software.

Just like you can't be a "consumer of ideas".

We are unable to consume ideas because they only exist as a neurological entity. Somebody else can have the same idea or something like it. I have to agree because I have never eaten a dream.

But software is more than an idea or an electronic entity. It is a machine created by a human and the machine has a purpose designed by the creator. The creator wrote many lines of code (a physical entity if you print them out), and then a machine called a compiler turned them into a new machine called an application. This process requires copyright protection in order to reward creators. The argument about copyright protection is "how long?"

BTW I have never consumed a computer manual, because so few are published on rice paper. And I don't think that manuals can be consumed in the same way as electricity or ink. They are like software.

 

[porter]

But software is more than an idea or an electronic entity.

Software is an idea that can be represented in ones and zeros on a computer.

If I eat a doughnut, then nobody else can eat that doughnut. I have consumed it. If I buy a computer, nobody else can have that physical computer.

If I have an arrangement of ones and zeroes on my machine, I am not preventing anybody else having that same arrangement of ones and zeroes on their machine.

 

[paws]

Now if you disagree with a law, have considered it thoroughly, and are breaking it as a political statement, that's something different. If you are breaking a law for purposes other than your own gain, that's something different. But the sad thing is, most people don't think about breaking laws for larger purposes. They usually just think about their own immediate needs.

Well, copyright violation has become a sort of political protest (however ineffective) when the spasms of violence that the software industry coax out of our governments are one of the best examples of how commercial interests are gaining an influence that they do not deserve.

 

[coius]

I disagree quite strong with the idea that the law should be obeyed just because it's the law.

I discovered something a while back: laws are often put into place for a reason. A person's failure to understand those reasons does not really negate the value of the law. As such, I don't like the idea of people indiscriminantly breaking laws (although it is hard to breath these days without breaking at least a few laws).

I don't follow laws that are passed by corporations with deep pockets of money to pay off Congressman and the like. I do this in protest. that's the reason I download most music (illegally) and am rather doing this in protest, mainly as the RIAA/MPAA just pocket all the money, with a few table scraps to the artist. However, I will try to go and spend money on merchandise if the Band is in town. As far as movies, I don't want to encourage bad movies making obscene amounts of money. I download it, if I like it (and watch the whole thing) and decide it's worth the money, I will go pay for it. that's how I accumulate most of my movies. But if I get 1/3rd to 1/2 the way through it and find it atrocious, I just delete it and don't even keep it. I want to preview stuff and not spend money on absolute junk. I have found good movies that way, but I won't think twice about downloading and if finding it's so god-awful bad, I just delete it.

With the trash the movie studios put out on film, I don't want to encourage the idea of dumb humor and senseless violence of "Fan Service" when it's not needed. Therefore, I don't buy much. but if I deem that the movie is a masterpiece, I will go out and buy it and probably memorabilia that goes with it.

I don't want to encourage bad decisions, nor MPAA/RIAA for paying someone to make the laws. So I choose to ignore any law that corporations set. I am not going to live my life by who has more money to bribe someone

 

[porter]

I discovered something a while back: laws are often put into place for a reason.

What do you mean often? :

 

[steve30]

I selected download without thinking twice.

It really depends on how desperate I am for the software, e.g. Do I need it today? Will I use it much?

Then there is the situation of is it avaliable? If I can get a second hand copy at a reasonable price I would be quite tempted to go for it, assuming it is something that i am going to make quite a bit of use of and I would like a boxed copy of it. I can be nice to have a genuine boxed copy of something. Otherwise I would just download it. Or get someone to copy it for me.

 

[II2II]

I would argue that pirating music, movies, and software is not a form of protest. Well, at least in most cases. In those cases, you aren't playing a 21st century Robin Hood. You are just taking something for your own benefit. If you don't agree with copyright law, there are a couple of things that you can do. You can avoid using copywritten content altogether, or you can use stuff like open source software or creative commons licensed materials.

Also, most piracy is committed in what people believe is the privacy of their own home. Protests in private aren't protests at all.

 

[porter]

Protests in private aren't protests at all.

They are if many do it and it hits a corporations bottom line.

For example, boycotts can be done in private, you don't have to make a song and dance about it, you just refuse to abide by certain peoples expectations.

 

[equill]

... We are not consumers of software, we are clients, customers or users.
We may consume media, electricity, hardware, ink, physical manuals, but not software.

Just like you can't be a "consumer of ideas".

Lat. sumere = to take up, to bear, to adopt. Con, an intensifying prefix = together, altogether. 'To ingest' is only one extension of that idea. Modern commercial consumerism, implying acquisition (principally) and exploitation (literally, not emotively) makes the root meaning very clear. I cannot concur with your understanding of the term.

And frankly, I am no-one's client until I choose to be, and before I petition them and am accepted as a client = dependant. I am a customer if I bestow my custom upon a supplier. I happily admit to being a user of software in that I feed it to my ravening flock of Macs.

de

 

[porter]

Modern commercial consumerism, implying acquisition (principally)

Consumerism is not about aquisition, it's about providing an endless sink for production.

 

[equill]

Though producers produce until they are red in the bottom (line), without consumers' acquisition of that produce there is no 'sink' available to the producers but a real or virtual landfill and a bankruptcy court. Not even a benevolent (or beholden) government can tolerate or support endless production without consumption of the product. Do we but appreciate it, we the customers (and consumers if we choose to be so) have potential control, not the suppliers.

de

 

[porter]

Not even a benevolent (or beholden) government can tolerate or support endless production without consumption of the product.

What was the response demanded by the POTUS to 911, "Go Shopping!". The greatest fear is people stop consuming.