From: payner@netcom.com (Rich Payne)
Subject: The //, was (Re: The Perennial Piracy Debate)
Date: Thu, 30 Jul 92 14:34:10 GMT
Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest)

In article <bazyar.712470809@teal> bazyar@teal.csn.org (Jawaid Bazyar) writes:
>payner@netcom.com (Rich Payne) writes:
>
>
>>This is what I am arguing, the "lost profits" argument, as presented by the
>>software industry. Any agrument which claims losses beyond expendable
>>income in bogus. The money does not exist, and never did, how could it
>>be lost?
>
>>Piracy is another issue, which I will not argue about, and have -not- been
>>talking about. 
>
>>And who the hell are -you- to judge that "there's still a lot of money that 
>
>   ^^^^^^^^^^
>I thought we were going to chill out?

OK, sorry, lets do.
 
>>Americans _do_ have to spend that isn't going where it belongs"? You have
>>every right to make your own financial decisions, and less than no right
>>to make them for others. It is none of your business.
>
>  It _is_ my business if Joe Schmoe buys three $10 CD's, then decides
>he "doesn't have enough money" to buy a game, so he pirates it.  But,
>since I misread what you were saying earlier, we'll drop it.

This is not what you said. And I do not see that this neccessarily
follows, it is just one of a near-infinite number of possible situations.
Regardless, you have no right to judge how others should specd their
money. You have every right to judge for yourself.
   
>>>  Yes, it's really me.  I got off on a tangent, one that's becoming 
>>>very important to me.  I apologize if I insinuated anything about you
>>>in particular, but it's sad to see any IIgs enthusiast _not_ come
>>>up in arms against piracy.
>
>>Yeah, just like the crusades. It is just as wrong to do evil in the name of
>>fighting piracy as is to pirate itself. BTW, piracy did not kill the Apple //,
>>Apple did. 
>
>  I see. Apple killed the II with System 6.0.  They killed the II with
>the Ethernet card.  They killed the II with the incredible, source-level
>developer support from DTS.  

Apple is doing some strange things. There was a long debate which asked
the quite reasonable question, why System 6.0?

Why Apple continues to do development on a computer that they refuse
to advertise and that most MAC dealers would probably be unable to order 
is an open question.

BTW, the ethernet card has not been released, so is still vaporware.

And from what I hear, the support for the // development is nothing
compared to the support for the MAC software. And are not some of the
major DTS players working on the MAC now?

>                              That doesn't fly.  Developers left the II
>for one reason: they couldn't make enough money on it.  Now, whether
>"enough money" means > $10M or not even enough to cover development,
>piracy is a big part of this problem.  

You don't think that it's possible that Apple //gs wares did not sell 
because they were incredibly sluggish, the OS was an 8-bit OS with extensions 
till long after the market had died, the computer came without enough memory 
to run any reasonable programs till long after the market had died, Apple
fixed the //gs by breaking the entire software base with the ROM 3, etc... 

There are a thousand reasons, and I do not think that piracy was a major
reason. In fact, I am positive that the ROM3 upgrade did more damage to
the //gs than piracy.

>                                         DreamGrafix and Pick'n'Pile are
>being sold, illegally, in France.  By ex-members of the FTA and Toolbox.
>These people are almost universally worshipped here in the states, but
>they're hardcore pirates and just as responsible as Apple (along with all
>the other pirates) for developers leaving the II.  When new software is
>distributed across the nation in two days, thousands upon thousands of
>illegal copies, then there's a problem that needs to be addressed.

And piracy has killed the MAC markets and the PC markets as well, right?
It is no different there. 

>  Apple is at this point giving third party developers the opportunity
>to take over the IIgs, in spirit if not in name or in new hardware.

How so? Avatar is Burger Bill's idea, and it remains to be seen if
he will get to dance with Apples Legal department. Let's wait and see.

>That's awfully hard to do with pirates running around all over the place.

I think you have placed responsibility for the current situation in
the wrong area. 

>Let me give you an example.  I went to a user's group meeting in
>Champaign, Illinois.  Someone there asked if they could make a photocopy
>of the AppleWorks 3.0 manual, since theirs was "slightly warm".  It's
>this kind of nonchalance, this kind of "well, piracy is bad, but it's
>okay _sometimes_" that upsets me.  Piracy is _never_ okay. 

If IBM handled the PC like Apple handled the //, MAC would rule today.
And evil done in the name of fighting piracy is still evil. 
  
>-- 
> Jawaid Bazyar              |   Ask me about the GNO Multitasking Environment
> Procyon, Inc.              |   for the Apple IIgs!   
> bazyar@cs.uiuc.edu         |   P.O Box 620334
> --Apple II Forever!--      |   Littleton, CO 80162-0334   (303) 933-4649

Rich

payner@netcom.com


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