Re: [Samplestation] TRADING SAMPLES CD

["Devious D_MasterMixer" <dj_devious_d@hotmail.com>]

Hey, brother man, this aint my swap list ! I am a member of a news thread, (like Loopers Delight), and I saw this thread in my mailbox. It bought up a few ethical question, and I released the thread to get you guys comments.

I am a Software Engineer (ole skool mainframe -COBOL MVS/JCL) so all these PC applications are very intriguing to me. I really feel for the Software companies, (especially with the Market, and Tech Stocks and things), so I know they need every bit of revenue they can muster. And with that thought, we must remember, unless these companies make money, they won't have the revenue to invest in new programmers, technologies, etc., to better their products. Look at how stringent Sonic Foundry is with their CD key's and software registrations. If they did not do this, everybody and their Momma would have their products for free, and R/D (research and development) would had died for the company years ago, and we WOULD NOT have the cool version of Sound Forge we have today, in fact, just think if all we had was that blasted "Sound Recorder" application that comes with your Windows operating system... editing, Looping all of that would be in the dark ages! Now, there has been times when I was tempted to get a cracked version of an app, just because the Demo was so limited, and I was not completly sure that piece of software would be right for me. Even in those extreme cases, I did eventually BUY the legal version, mainly because it was the right thing to do, and  because I like being able to get the legal updates !

Now, back to reality, is this sort of thing RIGHT. And if it is not, why post this in a thread, for a group that is not a "WAREZ" based group. If the FBI wanted to make an example of someone, and we got pinched for it, our hole News Thread could be in jeopardy !!! Have you guys THOUGHT about that ! Software piracy is not to be taken lightly, and when you post this stuff out in the open like this, the establishment thinks you are thumbin' your noses at it, and they will not take that lightly !

So, why do (we), do this. Piracy, steal, etc.? I have no idea.

----Original Message Follows----

From: Richard Zvonar

Reply-To: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com

To: dj_devious_d@hotmail.com, Samplestation@yahoogroups.com

CC: Loopers-Delight@annihilist.com

Subject: Re: [Samplestation] TRADING SAMPLES CD

Date: Tue, 27 Mar 2001 13:35:50 -0800

At 8:34 PM +0000 3/27/01, Devious D_MasterMixer wrote:

>I am curious ? Is this even legal ? After all that hallabaloo about

>Napster and electronic trading of media, can we sell, trade or even

>give away "software" ., even if we buy it ? For example, I have an

>old copy of Sonic Foundry Sound Forge 4.5 that I purchased. I

>recently purchased Sound Forge 5.0, now I no longer need 4.5, can I

>sell that ? Or trade it, if so what's the difference between that

>and trading on Napster (except that Napster has 1,000's of people

>trading 100,000's of files, and I have just 1 Sound Forge 4.5). Does

>the volume of the trade matter, or is it the principle of it all?

Selling, or even giving away, a copy of software is theft if you also

retain a copy for yourself. When you purchase a copy of software you

are not buying the software outright. You are paying for a license to

use the software.

Different software companies have different policies concerning such

licenses. Some are quite strict and consider it a breach of the

license if you even run the software on more than one computer, and

some companies even forbid the transfer of the license to another

party. Other companies are more lenient and it is relatively common

for transfer of a license to be authorized by the company. In this

case you would have to give up all use of the software yourself,

transfer your serial number and/or authorization code to the new

licensee, and in some cases the new user would pay a fee for the

transfer.

So in your specific case, if you bought Sound Forge 4.5 at full price

and then you also bought Sound Forge 5.0 a full price, you could

probably sell or give away the older version. But if you bought an

upgrade from Sound Forge 4.5 to 5.0 at a special upgrade price, then

your selling or giving away the older version is theft (or "piracy"

if you prefer that term).

During my first year or so of using the Mac I stole all the software

I had. I felt justified because I was poor and because I assumed that

the software companies were probably rich (and anyway, they were

probably bad people because they wanted money for their products). I

took great delight in being able to "crack" copy protection and make

copies of key disks. Then one day at the NAMM show I met someone I

knew who had just started a software company and had two very "kewl"

interactive MIDI programs for the Mac. I HAD to have them, and I

couldn't wait for someone to crack the copy protection. Besides, here

was somebody I actually knew and he was creating something really

great. I whipped out my newly-acquired credit card and bought both

programs on the spot.

These days I'm less poor than I was, and I have personal and

sometimes professional relationships with a lot of the people whose

software I use. I have legitimate paid-for licenses for all the

software I use. I recommend you do the same.

P.S. I'll be interested in what my friends at Steinberg, Cakewalk,

E-mu, Nemesys, eMagic, Spectrasonics, et al think about your "swap

lists."

--

______________________________________________________________

Richard Zvonar, PhD zvonar@zvonar.com

(818) 788-2202 voice zvonar@LCSaudio.com

(818) 788-2203 fax zvonar@well.com

http://www.zvonar.com

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