Africa awash with pirated software

[rpm]

http://www.mybroadband.co.za/nephp/?m=show&id=4564

[ghoti]

This looks like a news article written by Captain Copyright and his shafting team, and not by anyone who actually cares about Africa.

81% of Africa has difficulty affording a loaf of bread every day, you think they give a hoot that someone like Microsoft is missing out on a few extra dollars?

The right move of Africa (in the future) is not to get legal drakonian propriety software, but rather to move to the Open Source alternative.

These news articles show that corporations are more interested in their profits than in the people of Africa.

[AK65]

Second that.

<SARCASM>My heart bleeds for poor Microsoft</SARCASM>.

I have spent a good deal of hard earned cash on "legitimate" software, and I don't see that its worth it. They still treat you like a criminal, and you have to remember codes, licences, maintain 'accounts' at numerous websites, and then there's the 'upgrades' where you have to pay more, or an annual maintenance fee for something that does exactly the same thing.

I say let's see the open source backlash. Give Africa open source and tell captain copyright to go **** himself.

I'm certainly going open source after seeing the 'trusted computing' future.

AK

[moklet]

Completly Agree

I would encourage small business owners and private people to move to open source software anytime. There is a lot of good stuff out there which can compete or better commercial available offerings

$tuff micro$oft

[nthdimension]

Bull**** Statistics Again showing their face? They seem to come out from under their rock every few months.

If Africa wants to develop as fast as possible the first thing they must do is ignore so-called intellectual property belonging to wealthy foreign nations. Doing so will be of immense benefit to their economies. They should treat all software as de facto free. Any money going out to excessively wealthy foreign companies is inherently damaging to a poorer country.

so that they can get the value of genuine software like security updates, product upgrades, warranty, technical support

Technical support? What a joke. Warranty? What warranty? The software I buy comes with no warranty. If it ****s up my business and costs me money the company from which I bought it tells me to go **** myself. The software I buy also comes fully crippled with intrusions to make the software harder to use for us paying customers. In my case, on balance, it makes sense to be paying to keep the industry's hired goons from kicking down the door, but smaller businesses are better off not paying for software until they are established.

In Zimbabwe, 90% of software in use is estimated to be pirated. Botswana and Nigeria have 82% piracy rates while Kenya fares little better at 80%

How can such wealthy countries dare to not help Microsoft make more money. Don't they understand that Microsoft is really struggling to make ends meet?

"Piracy has become a threat to copyright-based industry as it has wiped out the incentives for creators, which was offered by the copyright protection," he said. "This threatens the whole rationale of copryight system."

His nose must be miles long by now. I doubt this moron even knows the reason copyright exists. If he learned to read he could find out, but it is probably beyond his intellectual capacity.

[nthdimension]

I have spent a good deal of hard earned cash on "legitimate" software, and I don't see that its worth it. They still treat you like a criminal, and you have to remember codes, licences, maintain 'accounts' at numerous websites, and then there's the 'upgrades' where you have to pay more, or an annual maintenance fee for something that does exactly the same thing.

Same here.

These scum charge you to fix defects that in a physical product would require them to do a full recall.

Annual licenses are one of the ways they get to **** you over and over.

I'll start giving a damn when these ****ers are made legally liable for my costs when their products screw my business. They sell us defective goods and have no liability.

[teraside]

I love w1z4rd & AK65 Arrrrggghhhhh True pirates

[supersunbird]

Yarr Yarr Yarr!

Me is washing meself in a bathtub of pirated CD's and DVD's...

Yarr Yarr Yarr!

[Paul_S]

These piracy reports are a load of dribble.
I purchase my software and I think it's the right thing to do but ...

Abed Hlatshwayo, Microsoft's anti-piracy manager for Eastern and Southern Africa, said the region is awash in illegal copies and downloads worth more than $12,4-billion

And where would that $12.4 billion go if people paid?
Back into the local economy or out of the country?
Purchasing software from companies like MS is as good as disinvesting in your own country. It's money that will never come back and you're still sitting with the same merchandise.

And thinking that the local IT industry will boom if the average guy on the street pays for his software is a joke. Maybe in IT rich places like Gauteng but certainly not in the rural areas where people need a PC to do secretarial work - not run a software development company.

[LifelongGamer]

I always laugh when I read articles such as this. Do they think people cannot see right through all the BS? These articles merely highlight propriety company's whining about 'lost revenue' in a thinly veiled cover of concern for the local market.

I fully support going the legal route but there are many others that simply cannot afford the exhorbitant prices propriety software (esp. from MS) costs. As it is, a lot of uneducated people believe that having to spend small fortunes on a computer - said computer should come with the necessary software pre-installed which simply is not the case in general and even if it does, the pre-configured systems tend to cost more anyway. You'd be surprised how many people at work (as well as friends / family members) find this hard to swallow.

I have to explain that unlike buying (for example) a car, where you get the engine, steering wheel, seats, tires etc. so all one has to do is have a valid drivers license fill up on fuel and away you go. Buying a computer is firstly, getting the right hardware based upon what you intend to do (gamers requirements are lot more sophisticated and costly than a simple home-office user's). Next is choosing which additional software to purchase (since the OS is included with the hardware if buying OEM). Then comes the choice of additional peripherals (will printing be a requirement? watching DVD's? etc.) Only then can the total cost of the computer system be determined.

I still advocate that if local prices more closely matched overseas prices, piracy levels in general would drop drastically. I've often heard how colleagues say they want to go legit but simply cannot justify the cost and impact it has on their monthly budget. I know it's not a valid reason at all - but for those with home/car repayments, high telecoms bills, living expenses, etc. the temptation to spend less on software is more appealing than having to pay more for the same software that foreigners do - so I simply keep quiet, feel sorry for them and move along.

Anyone merely has to look on the internet what any software costs (USD / GBP) make a conversion into Rand and then look what local stores are asking for the same software and it becomes immediately clear that we're paying far more, including foreign markup for the same software / products. Example: MS Windows XP Pro + SP2 on CietDirect.com = $99-95 (R799-60) while DigitalPlanet.co.za = R1,311-62 ($163-95). If serious efforts to reduce piracy levels are to be undertaken, addressing this price imbalance has to form a critical role.

[supersunbird]

Anyway ,the big companies screw us (pollution/price fixing/monopolies), why cant we screw them back?

[Debbie]

see title