Mathew's comments - Latest Comments in Pirates bugging you? Get more efficient

Re: Pirates bugging you? Get more efficient

mathewi — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 21:00:01 -0000

There's a comment in this Fortune piece
(http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_...)
about how tolerating piracy was the best move Microsoft ever made in
China, and the quote I'm thinking of appeared in an LA Times story
that is posted here:
http://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?showtopic...

Re: Pirates bugging you? Get more efficient

antje — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 20:48:43 -0000

M - really? Do you by chance recall where that might have been (dag he's softening in his old age... lol). My Indian colleagues tell me that MSFT is one of the biggest proponents and supporters of the piracy police via the government and continues to push them to crackdown, but then again many of them are the same folks who like to bash MSFT for all the evils in the world.

Re: Pirates bugging you? Get more efficient

mathewi — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 20:11:02 -0000

Thanks for the link, Antje -- I think your boss makes a good point
about the disparities between the developed world and the
less-developed world when it comes to pricing. The problem, as she
points out, is that if there were different prices then everyone would
want the cheaper version.

On a related note, I came across a quote from Bill Gates awhile back
in which he said that piracy in China and India didn't really bother
him, because he saw it as kind of a trial program, and that he
expected eventually those people would wind up buying the real thing.

Re: Pirates bugging you? Get more efficient

antje — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 19:08:56 -0000

Mathew would love to hear your thoughts on my boss's take on a related topic of software piracy:
http://www.storyofmylife.com/User/user_journals...
(yeah yeah, just hoping for some work related brownie points) ;)