Russian software theft. What a difficult decision to make.

[Loose rivets]

How can MS make an exception...but is there a case for compassion?

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/06/technology/06pirate.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

[Gertrude the Wombat]

The sentence is a matter for the Russian courts. In a civilised system it's not up to the victim to choose the sentence!

[forget]

What breathtaking pomposity Wombat. You are obviously personally involved?:*

[P.Pilcher]

Well, for what it's worth, IMHO, the guilty party is the manufacturer who sold the computers with the illicit windoze software insstalled, not the poor, possibly innocent head teacher.

P.P.

[Keef]

When I click on that link, I get a page asking for my details.

[terryJones]

With a personal fortune of over 44 BILLION dollars from price bloated software, I feel someone else might be a little morally responsible.
Remember that most computer products have dropped dramatically in the few years that personal computers have been with us. Not 15 years ago I paid almost £100 for 1Meg (ONE MEGABYTE) of memory. My Commodore PET cost almost £550, with 8Kb of memory and a calculator type keyboard.
How much, pro rata, has Micro$oft reduced its prices...The answer is a negative number.
One article I read about Vista actually compared the price and quantity sold of Win95 to Vista and its predicted sales figures, and guess what, Vista is approximately 5 (FIVE) time more expensive. I for one call that GREED.
A little like the cost of tobacco products in the UK, I for one would have no compunction accepting 2 oz of Golden Virginia for £4.50 were I still smoking.

[Saab Dastard]

It would appear that much of the posturing is ill-informed.

It seems that the case "was initiated and investigated by the public prosecutor’s office in Russia". According to MS, anyway ;)

So this is all in accordance with Russian Law.

So why then does Mr. Putin say:
“To grab someone for buying a computer somewhere and start threatening him with prison is complete nonsense, simply ridiculous."

Either he is ignorant of the law in his own country or of the facts of the case - or both, or else he simply wishes to embarrass MS and / or the Capitalist West.

But he goes on to say that:
"The law recognizes the concept of someone who purchased the product in good faith.”

Well in that case WTF is all the fuss about? The saintly teacher will get off scot free, and the Russians can go on about their business of stealing software that they "can't afford".

That is just like the untaxed, uninsured and non-MOTed cars on Britains roads (2.15 million), whose owners - if caught - claim that they can't afford those niceties. Well walk, my son!

I think this is simply manipulating the circumstances to try to force MS to lower its prices.
SD

[Mac the Knife]

All in all I reckon the cops did 'em a favour - they're now switching to Linux - http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=37460

"Microsoft says that the incident has nothing to do with them, but it appears that Russian schools in the area are so scared about being shipped off to a Siberian Gulag, that they are buying Linux gear instead.
Schools in the Perm region will soon quit buying software from commercial companies, said the region’s Education Minister Nikolay Karpushin. The announcement was made in line with the report on ensuring 'license purity' in the region’s schools.
According to Karpushin, schools would start using freely distributed software like the Linux OS, Russky office and Open office desktop apps, Ekho Moskvi (http://eng.cnews.ru/news/top/indexEn.shtml?2007/02/05/234178) reports.
The flavour of Linux being used will be one of the cheap localised Russian Linux distributives in Russia."

:ok: