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Is bootlegging really so bad?
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[Jeremy Garchow] “Here’s what happens when you give the people what they want for a fair price:”
I agree with this. I bet piracy of FCPX took it on the nose with the drastic price drop.
Adobe may have some success with Creative Cloud.
Still the analogy of bootlegging with theft is right on some marks and wrong on others. If companies use ownership to drive prices up and gouge the consumer, where is the ethics in that? That is why we have anti-monopoly and price-fixing laws.
As to the morals of intellectual properties (such as the aforementioned fictional reel of DC) that is a whole nother can of worms.
And as to bootlegged software –perhaps I am just being more honest here and perhaps not. Are you guys really saying you have never used a friend’s licence to get a software that was expensive (Jeremy at least fessed up)? Are we all really all that pure? Right or wrong I have a feeling more people that will admit have dirty hands in this respect.
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Have you ever done work for a client (to standard) and they’ve vanished with it, and your fee, burning a hole in their pocket? If you’ve been around for any length of time, you’ve had this happen.
It sucks.
Having said that, there are ways to access software legally when one (for whatever reason) can’t afford a license. For example, my partner and I, are always open to letting filmmakers use our tools (at night usually or sometimes during the day when machines are free) at no cost, to make their short films. The thought behind it being, people can usually use a break, and if things work out well, then they can afford to buy their own tools.
So that’s what I tell people just starting out. There’s no harm in asking for a favour, everyone in this business has benefited from others generosity in some way.
Respect your tools, as they are your means to an end.
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[Jeremy Garchow] ” You are asking if theft is bad.”
No, you are telling him he is a thief. He is asking about copyright/EULA infringement.
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[Gary Huff] “No, you are telling him he is a thief. He is asking about copyright/EULA infringement.”
That’s what bootlegging is?
Apologies.
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[Jeremy Garchow] ” You are asking if theft is bad”
Not being judeo-christian or tied to the ten commandments, I can say there are time when theft is not bad. Sometimes it is the moral thing to do.
I am not saying using bootlegged software is one of them (although some of my more militant open-source friends might believe so). But the real question is not whether it is right or wrong. Morality was not what I was looking for.
My question was if it was harmful? And if so, just how harmful?
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[Jeremy Garchow] “That’s what bootlegging is?”
Who was denied use of the copy he bootlegged from his action?
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[Clint Wardlow] “My question was if it was harmful? And if so, just how harmful?”
Aren’t the people who actually do the work on salary? So they got paid, and if Photoshop sells a zillion copies, well they already got their salary.
The CEO gets a bonus, stocks go up, the developer gets some cred, but otherwise it’s not like that pirated copy, which has been pointed out, it usually copyright infringed by people who can’t afford it in the first place, is taking food from anyone’s mouths.
I appreciate the desire to do the right thing, but let’s not bullshit ourselves in the process.
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What I find interesting is that by eliminating perpetual licensing, Adobe actually creates a new incentive for piracy. The same hack that eliminates reliance on Adobe’s authentication servers is also a safeguard against future price gouging and guarantees future access to files. I’m not advocating piracy here, but if a goal of Creative Cloud is to combat illegal copies, I think it may have an unintended opposite effect.
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David Lawrence
art~media~design~research
propaganda.com
publicmattersgroup.com
facebook.com/dlawrence
twitter.com/dhl -
“if i take the same shots of Washington DC”
But you can do that – without stealing my work…..it cost you your time and creativity….but if you take someone else’s time and creativity without paying for it…that’s theft…
it was theft when Napster let people get away without paying for the hard work artists put into their songs…and it’s theft when someone doesn’t pay to license software that a company spends millions on R and D creating.
Andy Field
FieldVision Productions
N. Bethesda, Maryland 20852 -
“it usually copyright infringed by people who can’t afford it in the first place, is taking food from anyone’s mouths.”
Astonished that this conversation’s taking place between creative professionals.
People who can’t afford it – that’s the justification for taking something and using it without paying for it?
Hey, I can’t afford a Mercedes – guess I’ll go to the lot and steal it. Would have paid for it if I had enough money.
Would love that sirloin steak — but my boss doesn’t pay me enough. Time for the five fingered discount.
Stealing software DOES hurt a company – it devalues the intellectual property they’ve spent millions creating.
If you are a musician and create a song and sell it on itunes – but everyone just shares or finds a way to download it for free — are you jumping for joy to help the person who couldn’t afford the 99 cent download? No – you’ve just lost money on something you created.
Andy Field
FieldVision Productions
N. Bethesda, Maryland 20852
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