Hackers crack Windows 7 activation

[Perfectionist]

22 years of being a homebrew / professional techie, I have only bought 1 OS in my life. It was a free copy of Windows 3.0 that came with my $59 MS Mouse.

My MS video editting suite is Ultimate 64, my surfing machine is still a patched XP Pro, nothing I can't run. I do the same with my Apple video suite. The cost of video/movie apps are insane for a video enthusiast to afford. I must have $8k worth of tools on that one. Luckily the arts community are bigger Avid & Apple pirates than even MS home users are.

As for Torrent Sites.... Demonoid 4 ever!

 

[Hobbyer]

My take on pirated, whether O/S or application software, is that if you use them for fun, i.e. hobby, etc... then whatever, buy or pirate. Chances are, if you could not pirate it, you'd never buy it anyway cuz you don't really need it, so the company really isn't losing sales.

But seriously, if you rely on it to earn a living, like earn more than 75% of your income from it, it makes sense to me that you should pay for it. Afterall, you're charging clients and expect to be paid for your services, so you should pay for your tools. Software, afterall, is just a tool.

Windows 7 was going for just $60 a short while ago, I mean, if you earn a living using a Windows dedicated box it makes sense to pay for it, save the hassles