Piracy Paranoia By Seth Jayson July 9, 2004 Yesterday, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) released results of what it called a "worldwide" study on movie piracy through downloading. This self-serving release is obviously crafted to paint a scary picture, and the methodology isn't well explained. (By world, for instance, the MPAA means eight countries.) » www.fool.com/News/mft/2004/mft04070942.htm
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  2kmaroThinkPremium,ExMod 1 BC
join:2000-07-11
ColossalCave | Stolen Goods Cost Us All While I have little, if any, sympathy for the MPAA the fact of the matter is that so-called 'piracy' is still theft, it's still illegal and quite frankly, the efforts to stop it or make up for losses from it (be it movies, audio CDs or computer software) simply puts the bite on the honest folks who pay for what they use.
Am I whistling in the dark? Making up ghost stories? Not so - if you'll check the recent demise of Motherboard Monitor (a piece of software designed to monitor system temperatures, fan speeds and voltages in a computer) you'll find that one of the top two reasons for stopping further development and support for this fine product was financial: few people were helping pay for the time and effort. MBM was shareware/donate-ware.
So what happens in the world of commercial software? The costs of development, distribution and maintenance have to be paid for. Stolen software doesn't help get it paid for.
Lets look at an ultra simple example with very small numbers so we can get our hands around it. Lets say we have an application that we figure 4 people in the world need really badly. Development cost $100, maintenance until the next release will cost $200. Add another $100 for profit and stuff. So we need an income of $400 to survive until the next release. Lets see, 4 copies to be sold, $400 needed so we price it at $100/copy. Now, along comes buyer #2, he puts it on the internet and potential buyers 3 and 4 steal it. Total income from project $200 - we're out of business and there is no version 2.0.
But we saw that thing coming, so we priced it at $200/copy, and we got our required $400 income off of the 2 legitimately sold copies. However, buyers 1 and 2 just paid for the stolen copies (that were given to potential buyers 3 and 4 by dumb-ass #2). Think about that next time you 'loan' a friend your copy of Windows.
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Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment. Barry LePatner | |
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