🚀 go-pugleaf

Bruceki asks for opinions about shareware on useNet.

(Sorry about posting this, but I tried several times and couldn't get
the address you gave to work.  There do exist some of us that use
domain-style names and don't uucp-speak well.  Wouldn'tw ant to bias
the poll by omitting all of us).

My 2c is that I think shareware is a great concept and I like to see it
encouraged.  I think it should be allowed on the net with no restrivtions.

My understanding is that I can't be legally forced to pay for the stuff.
However, I do feel ethically obligated to pay for the stuff that is good
and I use.  I'm really not sure how people can mention law and ethics
in the same discussion, like there was any correlation other than often
a negative one.  In addition to the ethical question, I feel it is in
my own best interest to encourage stuff I like by paying for it.

Those who disagree with the above opinions and ethical judgements are
free to do so.  I wrote this to cast my "vote", but I refuse to get
drawn into the holy war.  Flames to $null, please (pretty please?).

I feel that shareware is quite different from "other commercial software".
I do not approve of other commercial software on the net.  Specifically,
it should be possible for me to freely run anything that appears on the
net, leaving it for me to then decide whether the product is worth using
and/or paying for.  If, however, a program cannot be run without me first
paying for it, then I consider that a commercial abuse of the net and
something to be either disallowed or restricted.

The most blatant case I can think of of things I'd disapprove of would be
a program that was encoded in such a way that I needed to buy a decryption
key from the vendor before I could use it.  I don't know if anything like
that has actually happened, but if it has, I strongly disapprove.

"Crippleware", (where you get a demo version that illustrates how the real
one looks, but is not really itself functional) is close to the line.  I
don't really approve, but I'd hesitate to say that I favor a blanket
prohibition of all cases.  It probably at least ought to be in a separate
group or something.  Put me down as wishy-washy on this part of the question.

---
Richard Maine
maine@elxsi.dfrf.nasa.gov [130.134.64.6]


--

Richard Maine
maine@elxsi.dfrf.nasa.gov [130.134.64.6]