Hello,

These apples and oranges have what to do with software piracy?

Those oranges and apples are covered by copyright like books ,softwares, engeneering stuff and others and are sell in many parts of the world like the FS addons.I'm curious to know the average of orders for FS addon's issued from India,Africa and parts of the asian world....And I take for granted ..asians africans and indians have computers and are "playing" FS with addon's. (but maybe they have not soo much internet connections)The market is not limited to USA's and EU.I remember one condition asked to the mauritian governement by Microsoft for establish their commercial centre for Africa there was "the Mauritius governement must fight actively the piracy of softwares"Indeed at this time pirated softwares were sell in a open way in stores you can compare to Best Buy or Stapples in USA :)And I see there many FS paywares pirated on the shelfs of those stores (in nice boxes)Regards.Gus.

These apples and oranges have what to do with software piracy?

That was written in the context of a sub-thread about the relationaship between ethics and the law in relationship to copyright infringement.

Since the creation of man and his subsequent fall we have practiced certain unacceptable behaviours.We were then provided a 10 point edict from the mountain top which served as a mirror for us to recognize those behaviours and voluntarily obey the edict and change said behaviours.Of course to be relevent here, the "Thou shalt not steal" edict must be raised. Let's look at the ethic involved. The essential element is voluntary obedience to the edict.If one, by his own volition, chooses to disobey the edict, the result usually tends to the antithesis of the edict in what we commonly call theft.To compound the problem in the case of music, software, IP, etc, is the redistribution of stolen property.The resulting dilema is one in which human law attempts to modify the illicit behaviour by various penalties. While these laws and penalties tend to mitigate the illicit practice it can never be eradicated because the underlying issue is human choice.This leads us to the question of what remedies can sought by the victim of the illicit practice. Our human laws are less than perfect in this area as well.It is expensive and time consuming for law enforcement and victims to pursue such legal recourse and the result is a standoff between thieves and law enforcement/theft victims.I seriously doubt that "joining ourselves" to parties who steal and distribute stolen property with the vain hope that we will somehow "outsmart them" is viable solution to these challenges. :(

Hello,Indeed at this time pirated softwares were sell in a open way in stores you can compare to Best Buy or Stapples in USA :)And I see there many FS paywares pirated on the shelfs of those stores (in nice boxes)Regards.Gus.

Where were these being sold Gus?

The 6th edict is "Thou shalt not kill". Note that there are no exceptions. Disobeying it is surely what we commonly call murder. However, every government and mainstream Christian church ignores this. For example, governments authorise soldiers to kill and churches bless them. They rely on the law to define what is lawful and unlawful killing.In the UK, at least, software piracy is generally not a criminal offence but the civil offence of infringement of copyright. That is unlikely to change because the government isn't going to give the police wide-ranging powers to search hard-drives for infringing software. - even if they wanted to, the police don't have the rersources to do that on a wide scale. The government certainly isn't going to let the music and movie industries (and even less the add-on industry) seach hard-drives.My point is that we have to rely on the law as it is, or may be allowing for possible practicable changes, and our own efforts. The software industry has to take whatever measures it thinks necessary to get piracy down to an acceptable level. Merely complaining about it won't achieve much, if anything.

Hello,

Where were these being sold Gus?

Republic of MauritiusAt this time the sell in open stores of pirated softwares and other fake materials go dow .. but you can always find anything in the "back store" :)From a pirated software to a Rolex ROFLMany people don't have internet connections there (too much expensive for ordinary people) so they rely on pirated softwares on CD's or DVD's.Regards.Gus.

The 6th edict is "Thou shalt not kill". Note that there are no exceptions. Disobeying it is surely what we commonly call murder. However, every government and mainstream Christian church ignores this. For example, governments authorise soldiers to kill and churches bless them. They rely on the law to define what is lawful and unlawful killing.In the UK, at least, software piracy is generally not a criminal offence but the civil offence of infringement of copyright. That is unlikely to change because the government isn't going to give the police wide-ranging powers to search hard-drives for infringing software. - even if they wanted to, the police don't have the rersources to do that on a wide scale. The government certainly isn't going to let the music and movie industries (and even less the add-on industry) seach hard-drives.My point is that we have to rely on the law as it is, or may be allowing for possible practicable changes, and our own efforts. The software industry has to take whatever measures it thinks necessary to get piracy down to an acceptable level. Merely complaining about it won't achieve much, if anything.

That edict properly translated literally means "Thou shalt do no murder". It does not cover war else David would have violated it while taking Goliaths head.We agree that judicious use of the human law/penalty system as written and practiced approximates a limited remedy but would add that it is not an actual solution to folks choosing to ignore the "Thou shalt not steal edict" and redistributing stolen property.In addition our laws fail miserably with regard to making victim "whole". An example would be that Bernie Madoff might be found guilty and pay heavy fines and restitution to a government entity which then chooses to not distribute those funds to the victim in order to make them "whole" again.We agree to the extent that whatever remedies are effective and available after the fact should be pursued with vigor.Our primary interest is to address the question prior to the fact and have posted to that effect in previous discussions about what we call theft and others call "piracy".While on that track, consider the solution to recent high sea piracy. Would you or others prefer to arm trained personel to prevent boarding by "pirates" who then hold nations to hostage extortion or try to pursue them after they've murdered innocents for evil purposes and introduce them to the legal/penal system? My choice would be to train and arm those who would stand watch to prevent boarding. :( The practice of kidnapping is the act of stealing a person and holding for their lives for ransom and is one of the most despicable acts on the planet.

You argue that killing people in war is not murder because David killed Goliath and therefore it's legal.Is killing people in an act of genocide also not murder and therefore legal because the Israelites killed every breathing thing when they took possesion of the Promised Land?But of the cities of these people, which the Lord thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth: But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee (Deuteronomy 20 16-17)Ethics can be terribly flexible!

You argue that killing people in war is not murder because David killed Goliath and therefore it's legal.Is killing people in an act of genocide also not murder and therefore legal because the Israelites killed every breathing thing when they took possesion of the Promised Land?But of the cities of these people, which the Lord thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth: But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee (Deuteronomy 20 16-17)Ethics can be terribly flexible!

This really needs to go a different direction in a hurry.

Here

If God created everything then surely noone owns anything as God owns it. If he created us then we are as individual as everything that is not human. Therefore we cannot steal anything from anyone or anything as they do not own it to begin with and neither do we :(

Here's a short article referring to ISP's monitoring file sharing in the UK.Many are adamant policing the internet is wrong but is it feasible?...Possibly.link

I find it worrying that Virgin is proposing to monitor individual's internet traffic to protect the profits of the music and movie industry. Why not open every letter or package in the mail that has a CD or DVD in it to chck its contents too. Once it's been done for this purpose, we can be pretty sure governments will find they need to extend it for other purposes. In the UK anti-terrorism is being used as a justification for a lot of doubtful police activity.However, there are suggestions that it would be illegal under the present law. I hope so!

If God created everything then surely noone owns anything as God owns it. If he created us then we are as individual as everything that is not human. Therefore we cannot steal anything from anyone or anything as they do not own it to begin with and neither do we :(

Sort of conflicts with that whole render on to Ceaser thing, doesn't it? But I digress. Folks, we have nearly 69,000 members here from all walks of life, religions, races, nationalities, etc. It's really best to keep things relatively close to the theme of simulation here. PMs work great when you want to stray a little.

I find it worrying that Virgin is proposing to monitor individual's internet traffic to protect the profits of the music and movie industry. Why not open every letter or package in the mail that has a CD or DVD in it to chck its contents too. Once it's been done for this purpose, we can be pretty sure governments will find they need to extend it for other purposes. In the UK anti-terrorism is being used as a justification for a lot of doubtful police activity.However, there are suggestions that it would be illegal under the present law. I hope so!

mgh, Internet aside for the moment...if you

Hello,Losing freedom and privacy for security ... I'm not part of this silly game even if this is for protect myself.Can we admit the beginning of new "dictatures" or "police states" camoflaged as "democraty" for protect some goods ?It's already too many countries where police use and abuse of illegitimate power.BTW it's already enough laws for fighting piracy and copyright infrigement and power to the police for enforce them .. no need to create news .. Regards.Gus.