I was thinking of starting up a small poll on my web site, but I was
wondering what people in the POV community especially think about this
subject, Pov-Ray being freeway and all. The poll is: What do you think
about Warez software? For those that don't know Warez= pirated software.
I'm not talking about large scale sale a distribution but small scale
pirating, things like cracked versions of 3D Studio and such. Just
curious as to what the Pov community thinks. :-)

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I don't think there is much, per se, to unite POVers as a  community in this
matter. I mean, the MAX community, for example, is naturally pissed at
people who use pirate copies of MAX. But you _can't_ steal copy of POV (now
that's copy-protection, eh?), so you may be a legal POVer, yet a frequent
visitor to warez sites.
Don't know if what I said made sense. I'm just in an argumentative (and
otherwise weird) mood right now.

Margus

Thomas Lake wrote in message <37190D33.C6CC3825@home.com>...
>I was thinking of starting up a small poll on my web site, but I was
>wondering what people in the POV community especially think about this
>subject, Pov-Ray being freeway and all. The poll is: What do you think
>about Warez software? For those that don't know Warez= pirated software.
>I'm not talking about large scale sale a distribution but small scale
>pirating, things like cracked versions of 3D Studio and such. Just
>curious as to what the Pov community thinks. :-)
>

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Hmm, let me think... It's illegal?

Personally I hate people that pirate MAX... mainly because it raises the
price for me... and also because I'm sick of seeing terrible work made with
MAX because it was made by some idiot that isn't committed to 3D graphics
and just stole a program that they thought would make them good...

The bottom line is, the artist must be good for the image to be good.

--
Lance.


---
For the latest 3D Studio MAX plug-ins, images and much more, go to:
The Zone - http://come.to/the.zone
For a totally different experience, visit my Chroma Key Website:
Colorblind - http://www.fortunecity.com/skyscraper/parallax/359/colorblind

Thomas Lake wrote in message <37190D33.C6CC3825@home.com>...
>I was thinking of starting up a small poll on my web site, but I was
>wondering what people in the POV community especially think about this
>subject, Pov-Ray being freeway and all. The poll is: What do you think
>about Warez software? For those that don't know Warez= pirated software.
>I'm not talking about large scale sale a distribution but small scale
>pirating, things like cracked versions of 3D Studio and such. Just
>curious as to what the Pov community thinks. :-)
>

Post a reply to this message

Lance Birch wrote:
> 
> Hmm, let me think... It's illegal?
> 
> Personally I hate people that pirate MAX... mainly because it raises the
> price for me... and also because I'm sick of seeing terrible work made with

naw, thats a convenient excuse for Autodesk to charge a ridiculous
amount of money for it.   I've access to Max, Maya and others and prefer
to work with POV even with my limited understanding of the code and
reliance on the modeller because I can get my ideas out easier than with
the high-end stuff.  I've legal copy of Dream3D and it's nice, but POV
is better.

Post a reply to this message

Scott McDonald wrote:
> 
> Lance Birch wrote:
> >
> > Hmm, let me think... It's illegal?
> >
> > Personally I hate people that pirate MAX... mainly because it raises the
> > price for me... and also because I'm sick of seeing terrible work made with
> 
> naw, thats a convenient excuse for Autodesk to charge a ridiculous
> amount of money for it.   I've access to Max, Maya and others and prefer
> to work with POV even with my limited understanding of the code and
> reliance on the modeller because I can get my ideas out easier than with
> the high-end stuff.  I've legal copy of Dream3D and it's nice, but POV
> is better.

add to that that it doesn't feel right publishing pics i've done with
something i don't legally own.

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>and just stole a program that they thought would make them good...


You mean it won't?

Damn - there goes my hope of ever being a half-decent 3D artist..... :(

;)

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I know many don't go for the whole idea of warez, I'm guilty of trying
out a Ad banner remover of a free Ad-based (unnamed here. oh-oh. see?
hiding already...) ISP myself (and that's about the only thing I've ever
touched, honest). Btw, it was total crap (pardon me) to use it, slow and
buggy. I'm not sure what this has to do with freeware at all anyway.
Especially is the fact that most people that use programs for art or
such would be appalled by the illegal use of programs they buy (for more
reasons than the money factor).
Even a penniless (well, maybe not penniless of course) starving artist
is on the road to criminal behavior if pirating software for the sake of
using a 3D renderer. If there's POV-Ray to use, the person is either
greedy or insanely addicted to 3D modeling (aren't we all though).
In other words, take the Chinese CD pirating in the news a while back,
they were in it for money, far different thing. And someone trying
desperately to do 3D renders for the reason of making images is not
nearly the same thing. I think this always remains the distinction, yet
I have to say the paths are both the same.
You mention "small" warez things like cracked versions of 3DS. Can't see
that as being a small thing myself.


Thomas Lake wrote:
> 
> I was thinking of starting up a small poll on my web site, but I was
> wondering what people in the POV community especially think about this
> subject, Pov-Ray being freeway and all. The poll is: What do you think
> about Warez software? For those that don't know Warez= pirated software.
> I'm not talking about large scale sale a distribution but small scale
> pirating, things like cracked versions of 3D Studio and such. Just
> curious as to what the Pov community thinks. :-)

-- 
 omniVERSE: beyond the universe
  http://members.aol.com/inversez/homepage.htm
 mailto:inv### [at] aolcom?Subject=PoV-News

Post a reply to this message

Bob Hughes wrote:

> I know many don't go for the whole idea of warez, I'm guilty of trying
> out a Ad banner remover of a free Ad-based (unnamed here. oh-oh. see?
> hiding already...) ISP myself (and that's about the only thing I've ever
> touched, honest). Btw, it was total crap (pardon me) to use it, slow and
> buggy. I'm not sure what this has to do with freeware at all anyway.
> Especially is the fact that most people that use programs for art or
> such would be appalled by the illegal use of programs they buy (for more
> reasons than the money factor).
> Even a penniless (well, maybe not penniless of course) starving artist
> is on the road to criminal behavior if pirating software for the sake of
> using a 3D renderer. If there's POV-Ray to use, the person is either
> greedy or insanely addicted to 3D modeling (aren't we all though).
> In other words, take the Chinese CD pirating in the news a while back,
> they were in it for money, far different thing. And someone trying
> desperately to do 3D renders for the reason of making images is not
> nearly the same thing. I think this always remains the distinction, yet
> I have to say the paths are both the same.
> You mention "small" warez things like cracked versions of 3DS. Can't see
> that as being a small thing myself.

I meant the distinction between large scale pirating operations for money and
people cracking programs on their home pc.

>
>
> Thomas Lake wrote:
> >
> > I was thinking of starting up a small poll on my web site, but I was
> > wondering what people in the POV community especially think about this
> > subject, Pov-Ray being freeway and all. The poll is: What do you think
> > about Warez software? For those that don't know Warez= pirated software.
> > I'm not talking about large scale sale a distribution but small scale
> > pirating, things like cracked versions of 3D Studio and such. Just
> > curious as to what the Pov community thinks. :-)
>
> --
>  omniVERSE: beyond the universe
>   http://members.aol.com/inversez/homepage.htm
>  mailto:inv### [at] aolcom?Subject=PoV-News

Post a reply to this message

Thomas Lake wrote in message <37199110.D024DB48@home.com>...
>Bob Hughes wrote:
>
[snip]
>> You mention "small" warez things like cracked versions of 3DS. Can't see
>> that as being a small thing myself.
>
>I meant the distinction between large scale pirating operations for money
and
>people cracking programs on their home pc.


The problem with warez ("people cracking programs on their home pc") is not
that those people are cracking the software - if it was for their own use!
Usually they don't "crack-to-use" anyway, but just to crack. They are not
really interested in actually using the cracked software much anyway - which
means: They wouldn't have bought the software anyway - no harm done!

At the first view!

But what *really* pisses me off is, that those "home pc" crackers (which you
define as "small") then *publish* the software on warez-sites, making the
"cracked-for-fun-and-the-determintation-to-show-that-it-can-be-done"
software available to unscrupulous users, like 3D artists without a
conscience (hopefully there are only a few) that would otherwise actually
have bought the product because they really need and use it, or even to
those "we-are-in-it-for-the-money" software pirates that you say are bad.

Do you really think that those pirates do their own cracks? Why should they?
There are enough cracks around done by those oh-so-innocent "home-pc"
crackers!

Johannes.

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Scott McDonald wrote in message <37193873.8F4B0122@metrolink.com>...
>Lance Birch wrote:
>>
>> Hmm, let me think... It's illegal?
>>
>> Personally I hate people that pirate MAX... mainly because it raises the
>> price for me... and also because I'm sick of seeing terrible work made
with
>
>naw, thats a convenient excuse for Autodesk to charge a ridiculous
>amount of money for it.
[snip]

Crap!

This is one of the dumbest but unfortunately most used arguments in the
discussion about pirate copies.

And it just isn't true!

Mark well, I don't want to defend the price of MAX here in particular (I am
certain that part of the money you pay goes into the "image" and the "name"
of the product, just as SGI workstations or Apple Computers [or many other
high-tech prodcuts from elite-brands - anyone bought a pair of Nike shoes
lateley? See, you paid for the image too!] are not really worth the money
they cost - if you simply add up the cost for the hardware components.

The point I want to make is, that software is not expensive because software
firms are asking ridiculous prices which they only can get away with because
there is no alternative. In reality, software is so expensive because it
simply *is* very expensive to develop.
Especially such large projects as MAX. I would guess (totally without
underlying facts, but close to the truth I guess) that there easily went
several centuries of man-work into the development of MAX. (A small team of
25 working for 4 years would already add up to one century!)
And the people developing the software are not some underpaid and exploited
third-world "slaves" but highly educated professionals that, justily, demand
good money for good work. Add this together with the costs for promotion
etc., and you will soon see why a software that is sold in such
(comparativly) small numbers as MAX will always cost a *lot*.

And Lance is right:

Kinetix is putting effort (and money!) into developing protection (dongles
etc.) which they wouldn't need in a perfect world. It is clear that at the
end the customer pays for this added costs.
This doesn't even count the lost revenues from pirated software that was not
sold (and therefor did not add to the total income made with the product).


Johannes.

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