[Tfug] Microsoft's Mad Anti-Piracy Campaign

[John Gruenenfelder]

On Wed, Mar 12, 2003 at 01:11:59PM -0700, Jon wrote:
>On Wed, 12 Mar 2003, Angus Scott-Fleming wrote:
>
>>
>> The Ernie Ball company paid the $90,000, but it wiped all
>> traces of Microsoft Windows and Office off its PCs and
>> switched to open-source software. Can you blame them?
>>
>> http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2003-02-26-desktop_x.htm
>>
>
>This story has more of a moral to it than not using Microsoft products.
>Don't steal.
>
>I'm glad they switched to open source though.
>
>Jon

I'll agree that's a good lesson from the story, but I think it's also entirely
possible that 8 out of 80 is simply error.  Granted that's 10% of their
machines, but I'd be much more inclined to chalk that up to accidental use
than if, for example, 60% of their machines were using unlicensed copies.

In my view, the proper procedure here, if you REALLY care about legal copies,
is to tell them to register or else.  At only eight machines, I'm sure they
would comply.  I didn't see anything in the article to explain how the
interaction went.  It seems as if the BSA just called up Ball and fined them
$90K without first asking for compliance.

MS just used them as an example.  In this case, they didn't really care about
compliance.

So... don't steal, but also be wary of MS coming down on you like a ton of
bricks for even a minor infraction (yes, I think 8/80 counts as minor).


-- 
--John Gruenenfelder    Research Assistant, Steward Observatory, U of Arizona
                        johng@as.arizona.edu
Try Weasel Reader for PalmOS  --  http://gutenpalm.sf.net
"This is the most fun I've had without being drenched in the blood
of my enemies!"
        --Sam of Sam & Max