🚀 go-pugleaf

 >Reply to Item    3580365                 93/12/03        14:29
 >From:   COCO@PUCC.PRINCETON.EDU@INET#   Internet Gateway
 >Sub:      History of Software Pirac
 >From <@PUCC.PRINCETON.EDU:COCO@PUCC.PRINCETON.EDU> Sat Dec  4 00:31:36

 >--There was plenty of Coco SW piracy back in the pre-OS9 days,   but no
 >more than any of the other 8-bit machines.

Even when I "borrowed" (okay, STOLE) software I still bought stuff.  I
purchase software occassionally when I 1) knew it was something that I would
actually want to keep and use and 2) thought it had some "value" to owning
the manual.  I got ripped off on most cases, spending $34 for a game that
turned out to suck and was in BASIC.  This turned me off from buying
software for so long.  At that time, it was easy to see the "other" side -
pirates ripped off good vendors, but other bad vendors where ripping off
buyers.

 >--Either Commodore or Atari had a rep as the worst machine to   write
 >games for, piracy being so heavy.

Hear hear.  The Commodore guys (and Apples, since back then ALL the boards
in Houston practically where Apple NetWork systems - and most all of them
had pirate message areas) where big on trading...even at the CHUG (Commodore
Houston Users Group or something like that) group meetings [I went to one
and was amazed at what all was going on that the sponsors tried to prevent!]

 >--PClone/MSDOG world still runs on the credo "Only fools BUY software."

If the East Texas market is any example, I am AMAZED that PC software
actually gets sold.  We have NO store in the area that is "into" software
except sections at stores like WalMart.  Every BBS in town seems to have
some connection with pirated software one way or the other for PCs.

 >--OS-9 world was surprisingly free of piracy.  Thank heavens,   since

And still is, seemingly.  No virusii either <GRIN>.

 >--Based on the first and last stmts above, I get offended when   anyone
 >singles out the Coco community as a bunch of pirates.

Well, there where alot of 12-14 year olds trading games on tape wayback when.

>UME) that they hadn't bought.  Ed just kept a record of names and
>addresses, not serial numbers.  If your name wasn't on his list, he'd say
 >"What's your name & no, I'll call you back."  Usually this got a CLICK!

<grin>  Easy enough to do.  Serial numbers deter better.  It seems like it
would take a real fool to call in wanting support for a stolen program.
With a serial #, you could track it down to who let it out if you ran across
it on a BBS or whatever.

 >Oncer some dope even gave him that info, whereupon Ed offered to sell him
 >a fresh copy right on the spot and he'd drop the matter.  Instant sale.

Well done!

My, how views have changed, even for me.  I guess it really changed once I
was old enough to work and had money to actually spend...  ;-)

          Allen C. Huffman -/- Sub-Etha Software

Oh, back in my trading days, there is one program I really wanted but never
kept a copy of (and never got around to buying it and the company
vanished...unfortunately!).  It was a text adventure game and it had a
"guilt" message on it saying "alot of hard work has gone into this program.
please don't give copies away as it hurts" or something along those lines.
THAT I respected and thus deleted my copy.  (Pity, 'cause I don't know of a
way to get it nowdays... ;)  Most of my Sub-Etha programs have a message to
the effect of "Support the future of the CoCo and OS-9.  Please do not
pirate this program."  With that said, it's up to the user to control the
fate of me as a vendor.