Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Ordered to Pay Chinese Writers in eBook Settlement
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
MATLAB student version costs $100. And surely the university provides computers in labs with this kind of software installed! I've studies maths at uni and never had to install MATLAB at home. If we required it, we could vpn into the uni servers.
And if they're desperate to have MATLAB on their personal computers, either buy a few less beers a week and pay $100, or consider using R....
You must be joking, right? It deprives the author of money they have earned, and have worked hard for.
See also Kaibelf below.
Why didn't the writers sue the people who uploaded the books directly instead of going after Apple ? Answer - Apple has more money. I would not be surprised if it was a scam where the group of writers arranged to have someone upload the books so the writers could sue.
Hmmm....makes you wonder.
Well, aside from the fact that in some cultures (the US) higher education is not a universal right for rich or poor, the main issue here is that as far as I know Matlab is available on an academic license which can be transferred to students. If your university is not providing that for you, then they IMO are the ones guilty of depriving the Matlab makers of rightful income. Teaching Matlab, without providing Matlab isn't fair.
Would it be right for him to manufacture counterfeit patented drugs? Yes of course! Except, no, because that devalues those drugs, jeopardising the drug company's revenue and threatening future research. At the very least, the availability of free versions, constricts the available market for the legitimate version, causing the producers to increase the price to cover the fixed cost of development. If you encourage counterfeiting your ultimate scenarios are either a two tier system, where some doctors have unlimited free drugs, and some have constrained expensive drugs, which is horribly unfair on patients, or a utopian free-for-all followed by a rapid collapse in the development of new treatments. If one or two guys quietly do this without a fuss, the end scenarios are unlikely to come true, although harm is still done. If people on the Internet, reaching audiences of millions actually vociferously advocate this kind of thing, then what's the stop it ending every badly for us all?
Its exactly the same. One guy buys fancy goods that his peers can't afford - with fake money. One guy earns a degree thar his peers can't - using fake software licenses. One guy saves lives (allegedly) that his peers can't save - again with fake licenses. You can't have it both ways. Piracy affects the real world or it doesn't change anything. Pick one.
Also, the real concern is that one pirated copy reduces the available market in the real world by one person/institution. That has a real tangible effect in the value of the product. It becomes less valuable in the eyes of every single person who knows that free version is available. That decreases the likelihood of further sales, especially when idiots go on the net bragging about it.
I admit my mistake about MATLAB. However, Multisim still costs $600.
And you also need: Microsoft Visual Studio, Embarcadero RAD Studio, Oracle Database, and much, much more.
Yes, our university provides lab computers, but the homework still should be done at home.
We have VPN as well. But, the license agreement of many expensive software products
does not allow to set up a remote access to them. As result, students could access a VPN,
but only a limited set of software is available through VPN to them.
And, because the license agreements are the same for all the universities,
this situation is not exclusive to our university.
In a country where I live, for $1 you could buy a 1 litre bottle of beer.
For $100, you could buy 100 bottles, or 5 boxes of beer.
I cannot imagine that someone would follow your advice.
I admit my mistake about MATLAB. However, Multisim still costs $600.
And you also need: Microsoft Visual Studio, Embarcadero RAD Studio, Oracle Database, and much, much more.
Yes, our university provides lab computers, but the homework still should be done at home.
We have VPN as well. But, the license agreement of many expensive software products
does not allow to set up a remote access to them. As result, students could access a VPN,
but only a limited set of software is available through VPN to them.
And, because the license agreements are the same for all the universities,
this situation is not exclusive to our university.
In a country where I live, for $1 you could buy a 1 litre bottle of beer.
For $100, you could buy 100 bottles, or 5 boxes of beer.
I cannot imagine that someone would follow your advice.
Hmm, my university had Solaris workstations. They had 'homework' which could only be completed on Solaris workstations. No student bought (or stole) a Solaris workstation to complete his/her homework. Can you figure out what happened? Clue: we didn't quibble about the exact definition of 'homework'
This is in my mind is a really good analogy for effect of piracy. It's an agent that illegitimately increases inflation / devalues currency since you spend the money you save on other goods and services.
Medical software is not used for making drugs by yourself.
Learn more about it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_software
There are a lot of students, both morning and evening.
All the available machine time is devoted to class work.
Example with money was proven false in my previous post.
I do not know a single student who have prefered to lose a chance to get a degree instead of using pirated software.
All my students got their degrees with the help of pirated software.
Wait, are you telling us that it is better to let people die than to use the pirated software to save their lives?
Piracy makes a world a better place to live for most people.
People who cannot afford buying your overpriced software are not in your available market!
If they would not have an opportunity to pirate your software, they would not have bought it anyway!
Medical software is not used for making drugs by yourself.
Learn more about it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_software
There are a lot of students, both morning and evening.
All the available machine time is devoted to class work.
Example with money was proven false in my previous post.
I do not know a single student who have prefered to lose a chance to get a degree instead of using pirated software.
All my students got their degrees with the help of pirated software.
Wait, are you telling us that it is better to let people die than to use the pirated software to save their lives?
Piracy makes a world a better place to live for most people.
People who cannot afford buying your overpriced software are not in your available market!
If they would not have an opportunity to pirate your software, they would not have bought it anyway!
Ok, you don't really seem to have a single clue what I'm talking about. Good luck with that education.
Dude your ignorance does not know any limits!
Probably you watched too many piracy commercials.
Watch this one and your mind will not stay the same:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALZZx1xmAzg
Dude your ignorance does not know any limits!
Probably you watched too many piracy commercials.
Watch this one and your mind will not stay the same:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALZZx1xmAzg
No thanks. Got anything to say in your own words?
If my opinion is completely the same, there is no need to waste time to say in my own words.
A picture worth a thousand words, and a video - even more!
Just click on the image above. You won't be disappointed
Last edited:
If my opinion is completely the same, there is no need to waste time to say in my own words.
A picture worth a thousand words, and a video - even more!
[url=http://img855.imageshack.us/img855/9788/itcrowd.png]Image[/URL]
Just click on the image above. You won't be disappointed
I had low expectations, but was still disappointed. Wanna try adding adding a proper URL so your link works?
Ah, okay, The IT Crowd, I didn't expect that. You win this round Internet thievery apologist, but I'll be back.
And it would have cost you $200 billion since you were the one paying all the costs for the PEOPLE who spent their time developing everything that went into it to make that one car.
----------
That is the nature of a CHOICE. You can buy one thing now, the beer, or wait, and do something productive with your money such as improve yourself via education.
Just because you choose to purchase beer instead of software does not mean it is your right to make someone else provide it for you. That is called slavery.
----------
Until developers stop writing software because their work has been stolen by others. Then it makes the world a much worse place to live for everyone.
----------
That is the nature of a CHOICE. You can buy one thing now, the beer, or wait, and do something productive with your money such as improve yourself via education.
Just because you choose to purchase beer instead of software does not mean it is your right to make someone else provide it for you. That is called slavery.
----------
Until developers stop writing software because their work has been stolen by others. Then it makes the world a much worse place to live for everyone.
People copied my car after I have bought it. I paid a normal price for it.
By the way, picture could tell you that it was a sarcasm
Since nobody is enslaved, where is slavery?
Don't worry, my friend: there are still a lot of users, which belong to one or more of the following groups:
1) Don't know how to pirate
2) Too scared of FBI to pirate
3) Too rich and can afford anything
I will leave them the honor to support the developers.
Last edited:
When I said "quite obvious that Apple should pay 70%" that was the base line, where there is no reasonable argument that Apple shouldn't pay that money. There can obviously be arguments that Apple should pay more.
----------
The development cost doesn't go away. And the development cost has to be shared by the paying customers. By stealing the software you increase the cost for all honest customers.
So if University 1 pays extra for all the licenses it needs for its students and University 2 pirates (or encourages its students to pirate) the licenses you dont see the ethical issue there... yes the agreements are the same, and some schools follow them and others don't.... sounds fishy to me
you dont by much beer do you... depending on brand in the US a beer cost about 1.50 for a 12oz can.... you can by 24 cans (a case) for about $15.00... so buying in volume lowers the price per can... in your country $1 a liter seems a great price, but $100 for 100 liters seems steep compared the per liter price...
If...
If it's worth the time that is costs to do it. What may happen is the devs are just prevented from distributing through Apple again (preventing the liability issue from them).
If it's worth the time that is costs to do it. What may happen is the devs are just prevented from distributing through Apple again (preventing the liability issue from them).
Oh that makes sense. I read it differently
Actually your analogies were quite reasonable as they didn't compare to tangible goods.
Same thing here in NA. I don't see it being any different for college/university students here. There are TONS of photocopy shops around campus for a reason, and LOTS of those shops will print you a popular text book if you ask for it. How many students honestly can afford several hundred dollar textbooks without familial support? Now-a-days, the combined threat of expensive schooling costs, working extra jobs and managing class/student life puts many students on great despair and depression. There are many typical peer-support groups on campus to help students deal with depression, academic burn-out and even suicidal tendencies. When I was in my undergrad, I didn't care at all about the bundled CDs, glossy paper and hard covers, give me an international copy from eBay for 5 bucks, I'll learn what is necessary. The publishers are constantly changing the revisions of the textbooks year to year, in the hopes that each year, the students will HAVE to buy a new copy. Has basic chemistry/biology/calculus really changed that much each year? The occasional 2nd hand book for real cheap does help as well when the editions do not change too much. You can also just pirate books in large packs from the internet and print it. And for licensing, we STILL do not have enough software licenses on campus for even basic tasks like teaching. Requests to have more licenses are met with red-tape, regulation, and administration retardation. The provided computers have limited hours, not to mention sharing between different classes. You can VPN, but only for data, not application.
One of the most popular recent additions to the campus life is the food bank. Between saving money for books and getting some decent food, I think the answer is clear.
The point is, media conglomerates makes money from selling media, replicas of the same information over and over. At some point of time, the profit incentive of business starts to encroach on the well being of individuals or becomes unworthy of their market value. I think that point is determined on a per-person and per-income basis; no law can change your perception of this.
As for textbooks, I rather like the idea of new, open-textbooks that are fundamentally free. Crafted by those with no other intentions in mind like profit, these textbooks are absolutely perfect for students. MIT also has something interesting: entire online archives of courses with free lecture notes, exams, assignments and video lectures. This should be the way of the future.
Last edited: