I have not followed this thread either, but the thing that never
seems to get mentioned in this type of discussion is predatory
pricing. People tend to use software they did not pay for when it is
priced for corporate use like MS Office or Adobe Creative Suite. If
ordinary pricing standards were followed you would have a choice
between Elements for $99 and PS for $199. You are right that it is
not worth its price. When people feel screwed over by pricing they
tend to justify taking matters into their own hands. It may be
morally reprehensible, but it could be argued that so is the official
pricing.
My unregistered old version of PS with a buy it now of $99 was
upgraded to CS for a fairly reasonable cost compared to the full
retail price. So there are other ways to skin a cat.
Some photographers on the web who fear the theft of their
intellectual property put such small images on their sites that you
have no idea how good they are. That practice seems silly to me. They
hurt their sales because of poor display because they are so
determined to stop someone who might download one of THEIR images for
their desktop, about the only use that could be made of that kind of
image. I yet to see one of these sites attempt to sell wallpaper
images. So they are not losing money either and may be losing the
exposure of their images to a potential customer. So many times the
arguments acquire the quality of a preteen screaming, "It's mine."
Winsor
Long Beach, California, USA
On Jul 27, 2006, at 8:54 AM, Walt Wayman wrote:
> I thought this thread had ended, and I don't want to get into this
> BS or stir stuff up, but I don't think that's entirely so. And this
> may well be putting too fine a point on it, but folks who copy or
> download or otherwise obtain software, music, or whatever, without
> paying for it are the very same folks who wouldn't ever buy it
> anyway, so although the creator has a right to be pissed, there's
> probably actually no money out of his pocket. I got my copy of
> Photoshop CS from my son after he no longer needed it. Otherwise, I
> wouldn't have it, because, IMO, it's not worth even half what it
> costs. If there's somebody here who thinks I "stole" it, then they
> can pucker up and ... Never mind.
>
> "Stealing" intellectual property may technically be theft, but it's
> not nearly the same as having your home burglarized, your car
> stolen, or even just broken into for the CDs, all of which I have
> had happen. There's a big difference between being the victim of a
> real crime and lying awake nights thinking maybe somebody got away
> with something you don't even know about and that didn't really
> cost you anyway.
>
> Now, if somebody takes your so-called intellectual property and
> claims it as their own or sells it, like the Chinese are so adept
> at doing, that's a whole 'nother thing and they should be shot.
>
> Just my opinion.
>
> Walt
>
> --
> "Anything more than 500 yards from
> the car just isn't photogenic." --
> Edward Weston
>
> -------------- Original message ----------------------
> From: "Barry B. Bean" <bbbean@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>>
>
>> When my intellectual property is distributed without my
>> permission, someone is
>> taking money from my pocket.
>>
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