Yes, the topic on prostitution caused a rash of complaints. Or, was that complaints of (yawn) rashes?
It’s not causing a rash, but it’s leaving a bad taste in my mouth.
Or was that the other thread again ?
[quote=“matthewh”]It’s not causing a rash, but it’s leaving a bad taste in my mouth.
[/quote]
Yes, that’s quite common among zhen zhu slurpers. 
I went through and “waxed” some of the information that some are complaining about.
Many of you make assertions without facts. Many of you think that even a discussion about this topic, even without links, is illegal. OK, you may be right, but we’d all appreciate it if you’d provide supporting evidence, instead of ranting and raving about what you ‘think’.
What I’d like to know is this:
- Is it illegal to mention pirated sites?
- Or is it illegal to write out the URL?
- Or is it illegal to make them clickable links?
- Or is it illegal to suggest someone go there?
- Or is it illegal to talk about piracy?
- Is it illegal, not premitted or unethical?
- What rules or what jurisdiction?
I don’t know about this one. If I tell my friend he can get pirate DVDs somewhere in Taipei, am I committing an offence by providing that information ? Surely it is wrong to distribute software without the distributor’s permission, and wrong to use it without paying the licence fee, but is simply telling someone where to get it wrong ?
None of the discussion was illegal, it was just inappropriate and unethical.
I’m not sure why anyone would want to download pirated software off the internet anyway. The legitimately-distributed stuff has enough spyware (and occasionally viruses) to make it annoying. IMHO, getting it from a public board where any pimple-faced geek could have added a trojan horse, hard-drive reformatter, scanning software to try to ferret out your credit card info, or backdoor to it is pretty dumb.
There’s probably a grey area in the law.
I remember in NZ there was the case of a very wealthy American man busted for marijuana. His name was supressed in NZ courts and the media was forbidden from providing links to overseas sites that had his name, naming overseas newspapers that had his name, or providing enough background to identify him. Of course anyone with brains could jump on google and search, but how much infromation could a newspaper write. Could they say “go to google, type ‘new zealand marijuana bust’ and see what you get”?
So it’d definitely be illegal for Forumosa to supply pirated software. In most countries it’s probably illegal to post links (it is for child porn ofr example), but what about naming the sites, or just telling people how to do it. What if I tell you, download kazaa and do a search for underage girls and you’ll find heaps of pedophile porn? Am I breaking the law?
Brian
According to Netcraft.com, Forumosa is hosted by Dreamhost.com located in Huntington Park, California. As such, it is under US law. I couldn’t find Dreamhost’s hosting agreement but below is a typical example from another US site. Whether or not warez links are illegal in the US, if it violates the hosting agreement, Forumosa can be cut off.
reverian.com/hostingagreement.html
All services provided by Reverian.com may be used for lawful purposes only. Transmission, storage, or presentation of any information, data or material in violation of any United States Federal, State or City law is prohibited. This includes, but is not limited to: copyrighted material, material we judge to be threatening or obscene, unlicensed software or files, or material protected by trade secret and other statue. The subscriber agrees to indemnify and hold harmless Reverian.com from any claims resulting from the use of the service which damages the subscriber or any other party.
Note: Pornography and sex-related merchandising are prohibited on any Reverian.com server. This includes sites that may infur sexual content, or links to adult content elsewhere. This is also true for sites that promote any illegal activity or content that may be damaging to Reverian.com servers or any other server on the Internet. Links to such materials are also prohibited.
Examples of non-acceptable content or links:
Pirated software
“Illegal MP3’s”
Hackers programs or archives
Warez Sites
Child Pornography
Reverian.com will be the sole arbiter as to what constitutes a violation of this provision.
Jeremy, maybe it’s not illegal, but definately unethical. Are you saying that this is a suitable subject for forumosa ? Do those links have your blessing ? because by doing nothing, you appear to me to be condoning it.
[EDIT: Just noticed you edited the links out, I’ll forgive you, can we kiss and make up now ?]
Dreamhost’s terms of service are here for your pleasure
In general, I think this is an excellent topic for discussion. That’s why I came up with the idea of changing the topic title and waxing a few of the overt links. If I hadn’t let it stand, then the topic would have died without bringing attention to a serious topic of the times. And now the topic can actually do some public service by letting people actively debate the ethics (and dare I say morality) of pirated intellectual property. Sometimes as a moderator you have to push things just to the edge in order to really get the most out of a thread.
… I know what I’m doing here. I’m a professional. 
I meant to do that.
The trouble really happens when the makers of the software start looking for the sites that are promoting those who are ripping them off. Swish is pretty pi@#ed that no one is paying for their software because of the key generators out there that crack its sophisticated reg. key system. The stuff isn’t expensive and if you really need to use it why not pay for it.
Using software that you don’t pay for is theft 
Of course there is none of that in my computer However, I do care about Forumosa and would hate to see anyone going after it.
Here is the problem as I see it. We have past banned members, such as Aris#$tle, who still keep a close eye on what goes on with Forumosa. This small and pathetic group of people have at times attempted hacking Forumosa and claim to have been able to log in as a moderator after cracking a password. Now, if we give them the needed ammo to make a complaint then we are playing into their hands. A normal person wouldn’t do it but these idiots would.
On the point of the topic being illegal - it is not, this is an interesting topic.
In Taiwan is it fair to rip off Microsoft because the prices for MS software in Taiwan are some of the most expensive in Asia?
Why do we pay more?
If we pay more is it fair to copy? They rob us, we rob them?
Right or wrong?
On Forumosa we all accepted, when we joined, not to use forumosa to promote illegal activities etc. Sure when can discuss the ethics but not promote the activity.
On the subject of “it doesn’t matter what ISP you use Pirate sites are illegal” - I guess I should be more specific. The internet has a lot of loop holes but it is getting tighter. In the past hacking in NZ was not a crime. If I hacked your net account in NZ and ran up your bill the police couldn’t touch me, hacking was outside the law. 2 young guys did this and went to the papers and confessed to running up over $60 000 NZ in internet bills on other users accounts and there was nothing that could be done about it. This kind of loop hole really got the USA’s goat as they couldn’t take hackers from NZ to the US for trial. However, now most companies and countries protect intellectual and all other forms of property and this in almost every country includes the electronic media such as the internet. To fight about this in court is difficult but most people are not going to go to the expense necessary to go to court. Can you imagine Forumosa going to court over links to pirate sites if it’s ISP decided to shut it down. I don’t think so. I think Forumosa would just try and find another ISP.
If you get shut down on one ISP do you get black listed?
There are loop holes that can be exploited - search for limewire and you’ll find file sharing on a huge scale and from what I can see it’s legal. How is it legal? What loop holes do they exploit?
It seems to be the place for mp3 files now - the new Napster.
No, I am not promoting these sites, I would like to discuss how they can continue and if it is ethical for them to do what they are doing.
Aren’t those links to legal software ? Or is there a dodgy link there ?
no they’re links to all sorts of stuff
[quote=“hexuan”]Will need to nix this thread perhaps ?
forumosa.com/3/viewtopic.php?t=7176[/quote]
There was nothing questionable about that thread until links to warez sites were introduced.
[quote=“Boss Hogg”]
In Taiwan is it fair to rip off Microsoft because the prices for MS software in Taiwan are some of the most expensive in Asia?
Why do we pay more?[/quote]
M$ software tends to be more expensive in Taiwan because you have a very limited market here (22 million population) because of language. Development costs as well as support costs will therefore be more expensive. In addition, piracy is rampant here. What’s the point in investing money in a product with very little return in profit? Indonesia is a case in point. Although Indonesia/Malaysia has a population of way over 250 million, there is no Bahasa Indonesia version of Windows. Why? Well, what’s the point? M$ is not a charity.*
[quote=“Boss Hogg”]If we pay more is it fair to copy? They rob us, we rob them?
Right or wrong?[/quote]
No one is forcing anyone to use M$ products. I doubt if Bill Gates has a gun stuck to anybody’s head. If people don’t like the price, then they can use something else. Check out tenlong.com.tw/
The simply fact is Theft is Theft. Porsches are expensive. Because I can’t afford to buy one, does that make it right for me to steal? Let’s take it a bit further. I want an air conditioner. I guess no one will mind if I drop over someday when they’re not at home and “borrow” their’s. If there is a differnce, someone please explain it to me.
BTW, there’s a reason why there’s virtually no Taiwanese software industry to speak of. Why waste your money and time on a product any thief with a CD burner can copy and sell with impunity?
*And this is Adobe’s take on the situation:
theregister.co.uk/content/4/23661.html
Adobe chief threatens to abandon Asia over piracy
Adobe Systems Inc last week threatened to stop supporting Chinese language versions of its software because of persistent pirating of its products in China and other Asian markets. The threat was made by Adobe’s CEO Bruce Chizen in an interview with the Hong Kong English language newspaper, the South China Morning Post.
In the interview, Chizen said piracy was causing Adobe to lose money in some Asian markets. “It is a simple business decision. It costs $750,000 to localize an application for the Chinese language and if we are only going to make $500,000 in revenue it does not make sense for us to go ahead,” Chizen said, adding, “Until the Chinese Government and its citizens realize they are hurting themselves [by using illegally copied software] it is hard for us to make an investment.”
I thought PageMaker was a useful tool, and at USD600 it would have to be. Incidentally the place I used it in Taipei had a legal copy. Acrobat at USD300 is overpriced. MS Office, on the other hand, is a fine set of tools, and any business will get good value for money from it. I am also of the opinion that Windows 2000 was worth the GBP250 it retailed at when it came out. But for God’s sake Microsoft, make the multi-lingual version available for everyone !
There is a powerful set of arguments advanced by Richard Stallman and the Free Software Foundation that the application of copyright to software is not only unethical, but also wasteful. Please see RMS on “piracy” and 'protection" at gnu.org/philosophy/words-to- … #TOCPiracy.
Yes, had dinner with Richard Stallman two years ago here in Taiwan. He is really on a different channel. However, I would agree that language used continually as the means of control by classes of people. He makes a real stink about about the difference between “open soruce software” and “free software”, for example. Don’t ever make that mistake with him.
Ah yes, the old semantics game. If Stallman were into child porn instead of free software, he’d be pushing terms like “children’s rights” and “romance between people of large age differences” instead of promoting “sharing information with your neighbor”.
I went to school across the river from Stallman, and was a coworker of the guy who developed the GNU C compiler (Len Tower) at his day job (well, night job too, we were usually there until around 11pm). I got to know the GNU folks well enough to know that they’re fruitbats. Stallman’s philosophy is that of a diehard communist (and no, that’s not a right-winger’s mischaracterization; I mean that in the literal sense, although perhaps he’s a Revolutionary Socialist Worker instead of a CPUSA), with happy programmers beavering away for whatever society deigns to give them as voluntary donations. Thanks, dude, but some of us don’t get our lives paid for by MIT, and we need to pay the rent somehow. If we create something that others find useful, we expect to be compensated for our time and efforts, not get tossed a can of soda and told to enjoy it.
Even Linus Torvalds has some quite obvious distaste for Stallman’s ravings, and frankly I can’t blame him a bit.