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Reasons for Software Piracy
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In Singapore , there is one main reason that people resort to piracy and that is the price of original software is way too expensive. From the survey, 95% of the respondents choose to use pirated software because they are either cheap or free. Another factor is due to the local culture. Singaporeans simply cannot resist the urge to buy stuffs that are cheaper than the original ones. And this applies especially to software. On top of the low price of pirated software, users of pirated software are seldom caught. All these lead to the high usages of pirated software in Singapore. |
Price has been the single most quoted reason for people who resort to piracy. Take for example the Microsoft Office Suite. An original copy costs at least three hundred dollars from the authorized store while a pirated one cost fifteen dollars from a roadside stall. And there are free ones on the internet available for downloading. For the average home user, there is no logic in buying a legal copy when a pirated one can be bought for just a fraction of that price. Checks on home user are also rare and infrequent.
Coupled with lack of strict law enforcement, piracy issues have been growing at a tremendous rate. 76.2% of the respondents from the survey admitted to have downloaded and used pirated software before. One factor that has led to the increase is the low risk that pirated software users seem to enjoy. Currently only a handful of people have been caught and charged for copyright infringement issues. And those are mainly distributors and runners, not the users of the software themselves. It is rumored that those users that were called had been given warning letters before, telling them their internet traffic has been monitored and it is illegal to use or download illegal software. Apparently these letters went unheeded and this is why actions have to be taken to stop their illegal activities. Many people have this mentality that it is alright to use pirated software as long as they are not discovered. If they do receive a warning letter, then they will stop their illegal activities and they would not have to face the legal consequences of software piracy. This mindset must be eradicated if we want to stop piracy at its roots.
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