Does preventive control really modify behaviours?

-Does preventive control really modify behaviours? Are there attitudes
towards piracy really impacted or are they just discouraged, and will
backslide with another less protected piece of software?

again, just to clarify and start the discussion: preventive control is an internal control that is used to prevent undesirable events, errors and other occurrences than an organisation has determined could have a negative material effect on a process or end product.
In our case it is defined in terms of technology-based (hardware/software) control, so as to make piracy more difficult. This includes: license key, online registration, limited number of installations, activation via telephone. On the other hand, they are costly for the producers hence they increase price of the final product.

So how do you see it: does these kind of controls do stop people from illegal copying, or on contrary, they encourage them? Or maybe because of that some people simply will not be interested and will switch to some other product or just figure out how to live without it?

Preventive control can make piracy harder but either ways pirates will find a way. Cracked softwares are plenty ! You have to persuade that piracy is unethical, when forbidden or hard to get, it becomes attractive to infringe !

For the control we have to distinguish between different kind of hardware.

a) Desktop computers, Notebooks, (PDA)
b) Printer, Scanner, Playstation, and more

The main difference between a) and b) is the fact that you can run your own software and applications on computers so that every kind of control of copying can be circumvent by another software. Even it might take some time (usually not more than some weeks) to crack a program, all the well known software applications are available as a copy in the internet.

The problem with hardware-based control that it cannot exist independentely. All the hardware is used by software and software is crack-prone. So if one can run own programs on a device, most of the control concepts fail.

It is different with the devices in section b) because the user is not able to circumvent controls by his own software. Even though we just discuss software at computers this post should clarify why technology-based control is not very effective.

Janick_Edinger wrote:For the control we have to distinguish between different kind of hardware.

b) Printer, Scanner, Playstation, and more

It is different with the devices in section b) because the user is not able to circumvent controls by his own software. Even though we just discuss software at computers this post should clarify why technology-based control is not very effective.

Just about that: Printers, scanners, telephones are indeed hard to crack;) but this cannot be said about palystation, X Box , Wii, PSP. games on these modules are hacked al the time and producers are running out of ideas how to stop pirates. How do you think - will there be a time when there will be no piracy in games as well?

to florent_lefevre:

it is great that you suggest that ethics are the problem here, but can you think of a way to persuade people that hacking/cracking/copying/pirating is illegal?

For me it's really annoying when I buy a product and I have to call the company or anything similar. I just want to buy and use the product. These kind of prevention can be an incentive to download piracy products or OS. So preventie control can modify behaviour in my opinion.

I am not sure that preventive control modify behaviours. It can lower the piracy softer for a while, but some people like finding a way to pirate software, so you will have the all time to find new way to control. This has a cost for the company.

I think preventive controls modify behavior for a small group of people. Hackers almost always find ways around the controls and manage to crack a program, they not not care about morals or ethical behavior and since are not effected by preventive controls. For the rest of people that rely on the hackers providing them with the pirate versions, well, they do not really notice the difference. And the ones paying for the software, they might change their mind if they are annoyed about additional controls and switch to OS. However, they might also feel better about the fact that they bought an original product, when additional controls are installed. For those people it is important to strike a balance between too much and too little control (as mentioned in the case) so that the controls do not backfire.

There is something to be precised in this question.
Is this going to modify my behavior, or would it modify my behavior if i was a hacker?
Because the question to the first question is clear, it is no.
I am just an user of a lot of pograms, and can't hack anything (my knowledges are indeed wayy too small). The preventive control could also just bother me if i wanna make a copy of a cd and if it does not work.
The preventive control should also be here to avoid real hackers to spread programs on the webnet. But today'society is mainly oriented towards the technology, so we can t be surprised if some young people just wanna see how strong they are.
Preventive control would for me not play a real role, or at least not in the next 5 or 10 years

florent_lefevre wrote:Preventive control can make piracy harder but either ways pirates will find a way. Cracked softwares are plenty ! You have to persuade that piracy is unethical, when forbidden or hard to get, it becomes attractive to infringe !

Well, I don't believe if you make it hard to obtain pirated software, it will be become more attractive to infringe. I think the opposite is the case. When you have to spend more energy and time to obtain the pirated software, people are less interested to use it, simply because they have to put more effort into it.

What do you people think?

Chi Fai, the only difference is that :
as users, we are not bothered by those problems, we just have to go and look on the internet after a few weeks, and somebody will have cracked the program for sure.
When people can get access to the secret files of the pentagone, trust me, they can crack a software...

Chi Fai_Cheng wrote:

florent_lefevre wrote:Preventive control can make piracy harder but either ways pirates will find a way. Cracked softwares are plenty ! You have to persuade that piracy is unethical, when forbidden or hard to get, it becomes attractive to infringe !

Well, I don't believe if you make it hard to obtain pirated software, it will be become more attractive to infringe. I think the opposite is the case. When you have to spend more energy and time to obtain the pirated software, people are less interested to use it, simply because they have to put more effort into it.

What do you people think?

Your point at issue might only apply to those who are proficient in cracking software.
Perhaps, no matter what the software companies do, there will always be some guys who can crack the software.

Preventive control and deterrence control can only increase the cost of piracy and slightly decrease the possibility of using pirated software. The most useful way to root out piracy is to educate people and improve the quality of the software; meanwhile, the software companies must make their customers aware of the benefit of the product.

Although it is not strictly a preventitive control as defined by the case (i.e. tech based), I will still post this question here as ethical issues and behaviour have already been brought up:

Deterrence controls such as the social-based control of asking consumers to refrain from distributing and using pirated material have been widely used of late. Indeed, the governments of many countries have spent large amounts of tax payer's money on advertising campaigns in attempts to discourage people from using pirated products, be they software or other media such as music or video.

My question: does the fact that we as consumers now see a wide range of OSS and FS alternatives available to use free of charge, with equivalent if not superior functionality, largely negate any ethical claim the propietary software producers have to extend so much control over our use of the product once we purchase it?

The game has changed, so why should we continue paying a few humdred dollars for the microsoft package, when the reality is that this stuff does not need to be so costly. Perhaps Microsoft are trying to place value on something that has in effect lost much of its value...

I really think that preventive controls can modify (constrain effectively) behaviours for the majority of users.
iPod/iTunes music store business model shows that it is still possible to consider highly locked software solutions in a mass consumption business environment. Inexpert users (the majority of final customers) will show high acceptance to poorly flexible solutions as long as they provide reliable added value.

It is certainly possible for companies such as Apple to consider the above mentioned models, however as people's conception of the monetary value of products such as music is evolving, such inflexibility may not be viable in the future.

Andrew_Sharkey wrote:The game has changed, so why should we continue paying a few humdred dollars for the microsoft package, when the reality is that this stuff does not need to be so costly. Perhaps Microsoft are trying to place value on something that has in effect lost much of its value...

I agree with this statement. The main issue to most people is cost and value added. But even with itunes products, they are easily passed around. Even if one person buys direct from Itunes, they can just email the music file to 20 of their closest friends. How could you prevent that from happening?

Personally, I think the best way to modify behaviors and prevent piracy is by scaring people with severe sanctions. If more news stories came out about people going to jail, huge monetary fines, etc., then I think people would start thinking twice.

Baptiste Marchis wrote:I really think that preventive controls can modify (constrain effectively) behaviours for the majority of users.
iPod/iTunes music store business model shows that it is still possible to consider highly locked software solutions in a mass consumption business environment. Inexpert users (the majority of final customers) will show high acceptance to poorly flexible solutions as long as they provide reliable added value.

I find "constrain" much more appropriate: as long as there is a technical barrier, users might be willing to pay, but that doesn't actually mean they have changed there "standpoint" on using pirated software. I definitely think preventive control won't have any effect of convincing users.

As for huge fines/sanctions to make examples, I agree it could deter people from downloading illegally but would end up having the opposite effect and encourage to test free software alternatives; tolerating piracy to a certain extent has its advantages for software companies...

I think preventive control have an effect on behaviour. But, I don't think this will be significant enough to call it useful.

I think that preventive control can be efficient, it depends on which customers the controllers focus on. I mean if the goverment wants to prevent big crakers from pirating softwares, it's obviously useless. They will work to find another way, they will pursue their actions. However editing laws for inexpert users who only illegally download musics or movies is a great idea because they easily tend to be scared and quickly stop these illegal actions.