Piracy In The 21st Century :: essays research papers fc

Merriam-Websters Collegiate Dictionary defines plagiarism as, an act of robbery on the high seas or an act resembling such robbery (885). From this we kindle define parcel piracy as an act of robbery on the information superhighway. Many people do not see it as such. Even though the average person would never consider passing play into a convenience store and stealing a stick of gum, numerous have no qualms about stealing thousands of dollars worth of software. In a study d maven by the Canadian Alliance Against Software Theft, 43 percent of adult Canadians who were asked thought that pirating software for personal use was OK. This whim has come about in several ways. Older computer users, with Unix backgrounds, commend many a(prenominal) of the applications they used as freeware. Software pirating also results from users having access to freely knock downloadable applications, evaluation copies, and public betas. This leads users to believe that whole software is free. W hile many downloadable applications carry expiration dates, many companies rely on nag messages quite an then a disabling mechanism. These messages are easily ignored and forfeit the user to continue use of the product (Stevenson 18).Despite these factors global software piracy rates are on the decline. However, the number of illegal applications installed continues to grow, fit to the Business Software Alliance (BSA) and the Software and Information Industry crosstie (SIIA). In 1998, 38 percent of applications in use globally were pirated, down from 49 percent in 1994. Yet, 231 one thousand million business software applications installed were pirated, 2.5 million more than in 1997. This led to an eleven billion dollar deviation in tax income by software companies (Paquet). Jason Penchoff, a BSA spokesperson, states, Software piracy affects company productivity and jobs. For every free package or unauthorized package of software, companies are losing money. If an automaker lost 38 percent of its revenue, in that respect would be a huge outcry (qtd. in).So how are users obtaining all this illegal software? Consumers now have the ability to purchase goods from their computer. in the main when we think of electronic commerce, we mostly think of business to consumer transactions. But one of the most speedyly growing developments in electronic commerce is the consumer-to-consumer market. The rapid growth of Internet auction sites has created shopping opportunities for online consumers that were never before available. consort to SIIAs Piracy on Internet Auction Sites, consumer-to-consumer online auction revenue will climb from $4 billion in 1999 to more than $15 billion in 2004 (3).