I'm with you here. If they want CS3 badly enough, they can buy a valid license or run it on their personal laptop. You're already out thousands of $$$ per month to keep a roof over everything and the lights on. You also have a greater responsibility to keep the organization out of trouble. Providing warez is not part of your charter. <br>
<br>If there's interest, maybe you can suggest that those folks work on getting a grant proposal written or educational licensing. I know that the concept of "delayed gratification" will be new to some users, but this could be a good way to get people motivated.<br>
<br>Arclight<br>23b Shop<br><a href="http://shop.23b.org">http://shop.23b.org</a><br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Nov 11, 2009 at 10:38 AM, tetsu yatsu <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:tetsuharu@gmail.com">tetsuharu@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><div>Members and non-members are asking that we get proprietary software on our systems, like Adobe CS3, Windows XP, and OSX. I've actually been exclusively using open-source software the past few years, and didn't really consider that someone would want to run these things.</div>
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<div>Naturally, they feel that being a 'hacker'space, we have no concept of intellectual property and have no problems stealing software and installing pirated, potentially infected software on our lab computers. But, being a nonprofit, we are going to get audited at some point, and I wouldn't want a bunch of bootleg installs of Windows to ruin our message.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Likewise, a lot of people try to offer us pirated software and MSDN access. (Is it legal to share MSDN access? Shouldn't we just get our own MSDN account?)</div>
<div> </div>
<div>So far, I'm considering a policy where we only install software we have valid licenses for on lab computers, hopefully with a non-profit discount, but members may run whatever they want on their own machines they bring in since the space is not liable. </div>
<div> </div>
<div> </div>
<div> </div>
<div>I know some of you are very supportive of changes in intellectual property laws, but those of us following the laws until then, any advice?</div>
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