Author: Dann Corbit
Date: 11:16:52 06/12/03
Go up one level in this thread
On June 11, 2003 at 20:07:59, Jerry Winters wrote:
> I'm doing a College research paper on Software piracy, i was wondering if
>anyone could guess the percentage of people that visit this site, who use
>illegal chess software on their computer? Any guesses? Based on visiting RGGC
>and other sites i was guess about 90% is that reasonable?
90% is absurd.
It's really quite pointless anyway, for the following reasons:
1. You can get a free system consisting of:
A. Ruffian/Crafty/Yace {and other strong engines} that is close in strength to
the commercial systems
B. Winboard that allows simple and free online play
C. Scid that gives good database access to chess information.
Since all of the above is pure gratis, stealing is nothing but stupidity.
2. You can get ChessMaster 9000 for about $30 or so. The King is a very
strong engine (strong enough to beat 99.999% of the people who play it every
game they attempt). It also has lots of usability features that make operation
simple and pleasurable.
If your integrity isn't worth $30 to you, then you are a pretty pathetic excuse
for a human being.
3. The expensive commercial systems like ChessBase and Chess Assistant are well
worth the cost. And if you can't afford to cough up $150 or so, then use one of
the above systems instead.
Considering the difficulty and danger associated with software piracy, and the
banal stupidity of the entire exercise, I think it is probably pretty rare.
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