Re: [NTLK] Abandonware (was Newtools)

From: Eric L. Strobel (fyzycyst_at_home.com)
Date: Wed Jul 11 2001 - 16:11:23 EDT


on or about 7/11/01 3:29 PM, the following may or may not have been typed by
Jeremy Bond Shepherd at jbond_at_eskimo.com:

> If you're worried about personal liability for using a commercial program
> you didn't pay for, then why not put an amount of money equal to the price
> of the software in escrow for the copyright holder? Then if they sue you for
> damages (individual copyright violations are subject to civil, not criminal,
> action) you can offer to settle for the money in escrow. If they take you to
> court you can move to have settled through arbitration (which judges love
> because it keeps $50 lawsuits out of the courts) or, if you lose, you'll
> have a judgment against you for the damages, which will probably be covered
> by the amount you've already put in escrow.

It's not really civil actions against end-users I'm worried about. You're
right that most reasonable folks will decide that your effort to put payment
in escrow is good-faith. The problem comes if someone decides that, as a
group, we've been pursuing wholesale piracy by cracking registration codes
and distributing the means to register copyrighted software. The key
question is whether that is an ongoing criminal activity that some
prosecutor who decides to be difficult could take action on. Remember that
the court system may call itself a "justice" system, but it's really just a
LEGAL system. Such things may seem far-fetched, but there's always someone
out there looking to make a name for themselves.

Not that I want to pour water on the idea, but until the idea is fully
explored, we're all groping in the dark as to the magnitude and probability
of the risks.

- Eric.

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