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General Public's Opinion on Software Piracy
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The general public's opinion on software piracy is based largely on the price of the software versus the originality of the software. A large number of the public, still commit software piracy even though they are aware that it is illegal and unethical. |
In our survey findings, 63.8% of the respondents are fully aware that software piracy is illegal and that 33.8% are somewhat aware that software piracy is illegal. We also found out that 76.2% of the respondents admitted of downloading and purchasing of pirated software. 92.1% of the respondents think that the main reason why people resort to use pirated software is because they are cheap.
One of the main reasons that deter most people from software piracy would be to support original work. The other reasons are that they can afford the price of the original software or that they think it is unethical to download/purchase pirated software.
Also, in one of our survey questions on whether software companies should earn back their investment returns, the majority of the people appear neutral to this issue. This reveals the fact that there are people do not entirely agree with software companies earning back what they had invested on software development.
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Basically, there are two sides of the same coin. In general, a large number of people assume they have the right to duplicate copies of their software programs. The purchase of counterfeit goods or illegal downloads is seen as normal practices. People in general are more accepting of it, even if they didn't engage it in themselves. From our survey results, only 11.4% of the respondents do not agree with lending their own software to their friends, which shows that most people do not mind committing software piracy to help their friends. Most people do not take proactive approach to prevent or stop software piracy. They do not see it as a great problem on a social or economic level. [2] |
On the other hand, there are people who are against software piracy. They state that it is only fair that software developers be able to recover their investments in the development of software through sales revenue since millions of dollars have been spent to develop new applications.
Please refer to 'Statistical Impact', 'Legal, Ethical & Social Issues', and 'Feasible Solutions' sections for the respective data analysis on the various issues regarding software piracy.
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