Morals and law often donīt mix.

I morally support the kid that downloads software X because he/she canīt afford it (and uses it only for personal knowledge gaining), but "stealing" software is a crime.

Hereīs a definition problem as well: What is stealing?
 If someone steals my VCR, my VCR is not longer in my possesion but if someone steals my software he/she gets a copy but I still have it.
Is all copying stealing unless the software etc is realease under, say, the GPL?
(Yes iīm oversimplifying, but you get the point).

Supporting the community
I run GNU/Linux (SuSE 7.2 even) and Perl is installed as default, it also comes with great Perl documentation. It even includes a whole damn book (Thank you).
Even though I probably didnīt need any more docs (got the default stuff and joined Perlmonks) I bought Programming Perl (OīReilly). Why? To support the community.
I think this is one important lesson to be learned: Even if most software/docs is free when it comes to GNU/Linux people need money. So instead of stealing docs or software, buy it, because the long run I think the GNU/Linux (and Perl and ...) will flurish even more.

In reply to Re: Re: Software piracy- what would you do? by PixelRat
in thread Software piracy- what would you do? by scottstef

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