Call me prejudiced, but from what I know, I’d say you could well be a criminal.
If you’re computer-literate enough to be reading this, there’s a strong chance you will know how to copy expensive design software from your friends, or download alien-shooting games from the net without paying. And if you know how to, then the chances are you’ve done it.
Am I wrong? Don’t worry, I won’t tell.
The likes of you and me wouldn’t normally like to think of ourselves as thieves. We don’t pocket CDs in HMV or triple chocolate muffins in Tescos. So why are we happy to steal electronically?
According to the industry, it’s because we’re a pack of immoral cyber bandits. Developers across the world lose $11bn a year in business software alone, says the Business Software Alliance. It estimates nine out of 10 programs sold on auction sites are pirated.
The booty on your hard drive cost Americans 111,000 jobs in 2001, $5.6bn in lost wages and $1.5bn in unpaid tax. If that doesn’t make you feel a twinge of guilt, you’re obviously a hardened crook and should consider becoming a career criminal or an oil executive.
Admittedly, the figures may be inflated. How do they know you would have bought the software if you hadn’t half-inched it? And how do we know that if you’d paid for it they would have spent the money on creating new jobs, rather than on executive jacuzzis or a new laser corkscrew for Mrs Gates?
Deflate the figures if you like, deep down they still remind us of what we always knew: our virtual shoplifting may feel safe, respectable and innocuous, but that doesn’t stop it harming anyone.
When you make it out of the doors of cyberspace with your Mac bulging, someone somewhere loses out.
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