| Piracy
Information
Virtually everyone reading this knows of someone using pirated
software or has used or is using pirated software themselves.
Is it wrong? Of course it is. Teams of people work many hours
to create software products. They do this professionally.
This means they live from their paychecks. If everyone pirated
software then these teams would not dissappear and lots of
software titles will vanish because people working in software
development will have to find another ways to feed themselves
and their families.
A recent survey of the National Association of
Music Merchants revealed a troubling trend. While sound card
sales have doubled from 2002 to 2003, software sales have
remained stagnant - out of step with the increase sales of
a related product. Afterall, sound cards are no good without
software.
If you factor out the segment of software owners
who are upgrading their audio hardware, or the segment who
use the software bundled with the soundcard, you are still
left with a big chunk of people buying high quality sound
cards without making the accompanying software purchase.
No matter how many ways you look at this there
is no way to escape the fact that for the first time we can
see concrete indications that a large segment of people involved
in high quality audio production [i.e. they visit a music
store to buy an audio card] are choosing not to buy software.
They buy the hardware and use a crack of the software.
An informal survey of music retailers in the
United States shows that an average of 13 sound cards are
sold for every software application.
Even in big studios charging hundreds of dollars
per hour choose not to buy a $200 virtual instrument but instead
use a cracked copy. Many hours are lost in these studios to
problems related to combining cracked and legitimte software.
It is shameful and inexplicable that professionals involved
in the creation of intellectual property fail to make the
connection between the sanctity of musical and visual content
and code. Both are intellectual property and both are protected
by law.
If you are unconvinced that software theft in
the music software world is at epidemic proportions, conduct
a survey of your peers. You might be surprised at how many
people are using cracked software. The worst part is that
many of the people using cracks can well afford to buy the
legitimate copies but choose to use a crack out of pure moral
failure.
If you find that everyone in your peer group
is using legitimate software then we salute you because it
is honest, responsible people like you and your peers who
make it possible to have the amazing software the world enjoys.
Thank you.
What's the solution?
We don't have a solution but we do have a starting
point. We have to begin to acknowledge that software is a
valuable component of the music making process. No less than
a mixer, guitar or powered speakers. We have to begin to buy
all the software that we use. We have to begin to ask the
people around us to buy all the software they use and to keep
pirated software away from our workspace.
Apart from the fact that software theft is illegal, the
moral argument carries equal weight. If you are serious about
your work, serious about music and serious about your career
then you must be a contributing part of the industry and not
a liability. You do have a role to play, you do have a function
and c responsibility to make sure the industry is here for
the next generations of musicians and creative people. No
one likes to have their music downloaded when it's for sale.
No software company can stay in business in the face of rampant
and unchallenged software theft.
Do the right thing - buy the software you use.
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