CRACKDOWN ON SOFTWARE PIRACY

Crackdowns don’t help...

Piracy raids help in creating fear in the user’s minds. But this does not
mean that our business grows. In fact despite crackdowns and raids by vendors,
the piracy levels are increasing. Earlier there was 20% piracy in the software
business. Today this has increased to over 30% and the share of pirated products
is growing vis-a-vis legal software.

"Though vendors conduct raids, only 20% of the raided companies go for legal versions of the same software." Harinder Salwan Proprietor, Tricom Multimedia

Reduce software prices...

The main culprit for piracy is the high price of software. Today, the
software costs 40% of the entire system. Even big corporates balk at the the
idea of paying such high prices for legal software. As for home users, they have
their budget considerations and would rather buy peripherals than go for legal
software.

Vendors should reduce these prices and effectively, we can convince customers
to go for legal software. Vendors should develop software in India and then sell
it at low prices. Why should they pay royalty for the software to their overseas
office and inflate the prices of the products? After all, they only have to
replicate the software and distribute it.

Low conversion rates...

Though vendors conduct raids, only 20% of the raided companies go for legal
versions of the same software. The rest either shift to other brands or continue
using pirated software. In short, these raids only succeed in instilling fear in
the user’s mind, there is no productive outcome.

Not enough raids...

Vendors conduct barely two to three raids a year and most of that is
targeted at training institutes. They should have frequent raids and should
focus more on corporates. Today almost 50% of the software piracy is evident in
the big business houses, which can afford to buy software legally.

Also most of these raids are concentrated in metros. But what about the small
cities and towns where the PC penetration is increasing?

Government authorities are un-cooperative...

More than the vendors, it is government authorities who are not cooperating
in conduction of raids. Vendors should lobby for stringent piracy laws to be
passed with the government and demand for some anti-piracy enforcement team
which will pro-actively conduct raids and software audits of companies. Vendors
should form a consortium which will formulate anti-piracy recommendations for
the government to follow.

Vendors should also pass on tips to the police about people using pirated
software and follow it up to ensure that the user is raided and made to buy
legal software or pay heavy fines.

Crackdowns instill fear...

We have noticed that whenever there is a piracy raid, the business in that
locality sees a spike. This is because these raids create a fear factor in the
user’s minds. Most of these crackdowns are targeted at people who duplicate
the original CDs, rather than the end-users. So once they have been raided these
duplicators think twice before pirating software again.

When it comes to raiding users, vendors face the difficulty of
identification. This is because for software like Adobe, it can be installed
legally on only one machine, and the software installed is not proportional to
the number of users.

Reducing prices won’t help...

The high price of software is a misnomer. At the moment, a user can get
pirated office utility software for as less as Rs 50. It is not possible for a
vendor to sell legal software at this price. And even if the price of legitimate
software is brought down to let’s say Rs 5,000, not many users will go for it.
This is because they have a perception that software should come for free, while
they will willingly pay for hardware.

Also software like Adobe Photoshop is used in a business environment where
buyers make several times more money with that software than the price of the
software itself. Still they are unwilling to pay for the software.

"What is truly needed is a nodal governmental agency that can conduct surprise software audits in corporates." Sandeep Mehrotra Channel Account Manager, Adobe India

Conversion cannot be quantified...

It is not possible to quantify the success of a raid and its resultant
conversion by speaking to a few partners. The raided party might go for legal
software from a reseller in that vicinity or he could buy it from elsewhere.
Just because one reseller does not see his sales increase after a raid, does not
mean that raids don’t help business.

Raids are conducted by cops, not vendors...

Raids are conducted by the police, often in conjunction with BSA or Nasscom.
Vendors do not conduct these raids. If vendors target one buyer based on some
information and raid him, subsequently finding him innocent, they might lose
that customer forever. For a software like Adobe identification of pirated
software users becomes difficult because the software installed is not
proportional to the number of users.

Also if a user gets wind about an imminent raid, he can un-install the
software from all machines, except the licensed ones.

Nodal government agency required...

There is a need to have a nodal government agency which will conduct
surprise software audits on users. The guilty can be fined or made to shift to
legal software. This will build up the fear among users and they will prefer to
use legal software rather than face prosecution.