Computer Piracy
Computer Piracy is software that is copied without permission from the copyright holder. This means that the copyright holder, usually the one who makes the software, will not get any reward for his/hers product. It is illegal to infringe the copyright law and can result in imprisonment and/or fines.
Every time a computer program is pirated, the software developers lose money that would have been put
into designing better quality software(1). There are five types of software piracy. The first is soft lifting which consists of a person purchasing a licensed copy of the software and loads it on several computers such as friends or co-workers. Users can make one backup copy for themselves. Hard disk loading is the next type, where unauthorized copies of software are placed on the disk when a person buys a new computer. The computer market is competitive and dealers' sell PC's that include software and hardware with a low price, to boost their sales.
English: Rally in Stockholm, Sweden, in support of...
What's in the bag? Business of Software 2010
English: This photo shows a UniKey Time - real tim...The renting is the third type. Software is rented for temporary use and given back for others to rent. It is illegal to rent software. Downloading another form of piracy is available on some electronic bulletin boards where people can load files into the bulletin board database and you can retrieve files from the board. Unauthorized copyrighted software can easily spread out to users connected by a modem.
Software counterfeiting is the last type, when a duplication of software is made to be sold or used by another user. Sometimes it can be really difficult determined if software is the original. Users of copied or counterfeit software usually get inadequate documentation, lack of technical support and software upgrades.
I feel software piracy is wrong because software companies lose a lot of money because...