Fine unlicensed software users, says BSA
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Lobby calls for 'harder enforcement stick' Software industry lobby group the Business Software Alliance (BSA) has called for government to mandate stiff penalties for companies using unlicensed software.â¦
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Industry Comment So begins the era of 'Unbound Compute'
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I will turn down free beer software in favor of freedom software when both exist. If you don't know the difference, that's OK. You cannot see the source code for the video drivers from ATI, for example. You can get them for free but they are not freed. The same with Adobe Acrobat Reader and plugins for the Firefox web browser.
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UK users will be able to replace pirated versions of Windows that they have purchased. Software pirates&#39; increasing skill at creating counterfeit versions of Windows XP has prompted Microsoft to introduce
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AppleStore buyers' ratings scheme limited to non-Apple products
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(InfoWorld) - Earlier this month the Business Software Alliance (BSA) upped the ante from $200,000 to $1 million for anyone who turns in a company that is illegally circumventing software licensing agreements. BSA members include a who's who of the software and hardware industry, including Apple, Adobe, Dell, HP, Microsoft, SAP, and dozens more. The bounty for uncovering cheaters is not just a marketing ploy. The Association can, in fact, put some bite into uncovering cheaters, according to Kris Barker, CEO of Express Metrix. Express Metrix is a company that does hardware and software auditing to help companies keep in compliance with their software licenses. "Most software licensing agreements include a provision that allows a software vendor or its agent, which can be the BSA, to do an audit of end-user agreements," said Barker. The BSA increased the reward as software piracy continues to grow. According to IDC, U.S. software vendors lost $7.3 billion in 2006 as a result of piracy. However, turning in the man or woman in the cubicle next to you is not how an informer can earn the top reward. The BSA has 22 terms and conditions that must be met before the $1 million payoff is awarded. The rewards are based on sums received in out-of-court settlements, which is the most common way a company avoids any more punitive prosecution for piracy. In order to earn the $1 million, a company would have to settle out of court with the BSA for anywhere between $10,000,001 to $15,000,000. The terms and conditions also state, that "no reward is payable unless the BSA pursues a case and, as a direct result of the information provided by you, receives a monetary payment from the reported organization." A far more modest reward, up to $5,000, is given to anyone whose information leads to a settlement of $15,000 to $100,000. Despite many restrictions, BSA says that since 2005, out-of-court settlements have totaled $22 million. Another requirement of the terms and conditions states that an employee who has installed unlicensed software is not eligible for a reward unless "you were directed by your supervisor to do so." The rewards are part of a larger BSA campaign, which is appropriately titled, "Blow the Whistle."
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The Free Software Foundation's new license gets a major endorsement from a major server software project.
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InfoWorld - The Business Software Alliance (BSA) has temporarily raised the reward that&#39;s part of controversial program encouraging people to report software piracy from $200,000 to $1 million, the trade group announced Monday.
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Online auction giant eBay has been slow to respond to concerns about pirated software being sold there, prompting the Software &amp; Information Industry Association (SIIA)&#160;to file nine lawsuits against eBay-based software sellers, an SIIA official said.The SIIA believes it is necessary to file the lawsuits because eBay has been largely uncooperative in cracking down on software piracy, said Keith Kupferschmid, senior vice president of the trade group&#39;s antipiracy division.&quot;We haven&#39;t had very much success in getting [eBay] to work with us,&quot; he said.SIIA has asked eBay to stop &quot;buy it now&quot; and one-day auctions for software, but eBay has not complied, Kupferschmid said. In many cases, sellers offering pirated software are looking to sell it quickly, he said. SIIA also asked eBay if the trade group could buy banner advertisements warning about piracy when a user is looking at software, but the auction site declined, Kupferschmid added. &quot;We shouldn&#39;t have to do that,&quot; he said. &quot;eBay should do that themselves.&quot;Two eBay spokespeople didn&#39;t immediately respond to a request for comments on SIIA&#39;s position.The lawsuits, filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, are the largest round the SIIA has filed since launching its auction-site antipiracy program two years ago, the trade group said in a news release. Seven of the lawsuits were filed Wednesday, the SIIA said. Two others were filed two weeks ago. Most of the lawsuits target eBay sellers of Abobe PhotoShop CS3; one of the lawsuits targets a seller of several Symantec software packages.The defendants are from Texas, California, Washington state, Illinois, and New Jersey.&quot;SIIA has declared war against those who continue to sell pirated software on auction sites such as eBay,&quot; Kupferschmid said. &quot;Our goal is to give illegal software sellers a rude awakening so that unsuspecting software buyers and legitimate sellers are protected. For too long, auction sellers have been able to sell pirated software while risking only the removal of their auction.&quot;Since launching its Auction Litigation Program about two years ago, SIIA has filed about 20 lawsuits, not including the nine from the last two weeks, Kupferschmid said. The SIIA has won about six of those lawsuits in court, but in every case, the lawsuits have resulted in the seller stopping unauthorized sales of software, he said.&quot;Ultimately, they have stopped selling the illegal software, and that&#39;s what we&#39;re trying to do here,&quot; he said.
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By Miguel Helft  Millions of people enjoy free Web-based software programs, but they have a drawback in that they are available to users only when they are online.
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The settlements with the three companies also require them to delete all unlicensed copies of software installed on their computers, acquire any needed licenses and implement stronger software licensing management practices.
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The world-leading business software group, Germany&#39;s SAP, on Tuesday rejected accusations by its US rival Oracle that it had stolen software, but admitted &quot;some inappropriate downloads.&quot;
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Apps upgrades will need policies, even if you don't want them Further indications that the coming upgrades of the major business applications such as SAP and Oracle could cause unsuspecting IT managers more problems than they have planned for, first noted here, have come from SOA Software.â¦
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Beta users can access the OpenOffice.org suite using a Web browser on Windows, Linux, or Mac OS X--no download necessary.
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A Microsoft representative made it quite clear what Vista pirates can expect to happen to their unlicensed installations.
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SANTA CLARA, CALIF. -- Noting two evolving areas of software licensing, Microsoft is pondering how to license when multiple instances of an application are run on a single computer, but is not eyeing a plan for utility-based computing, in which charges are based on individual usage.
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Vista adoption in schools 'high risk' The British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (Becta) has signed a secrecy clause with Microsoft which prevents it from disclosing the prices schools are paying for software licences.â¦