At 01:02 PM 03/08/2005, Ben Ruset wrote:
Microsoft is not going to stop piracy by shutting down Mom & Pop shops. The amount of money they need to invest in the court system vs. the amount of money they will get is low. What Microsoft is more interested in are the people selling counterfeit copies into the channel, selling software that is licenced wrong to the channel, etc.
Let's take a Mom and Pop store that sells, say, 3 computers a week. Say they stay in business 5 years. That's 780 copies of Windows. I have no idea what MS charges distributors for Windows, but let's assume it's about $45 (about half of what I pay - I'm betting it's more.) MS saves $35,100 by shutting this Mom and Pop down. Plus they scare all the others in the town (I'll bet there's at least two more that are pirating software) so that comes to a grand total of $105,300 saved by MS. I have no idea what it costs to go after a small company like this, but I'm guessing at the first hint of a court case, they cave. I don't have the money to fight MS, and I know it.
It might be better to get the coke distributors, but the police still go after the little guy dealing on the street.
T
