Copy protection, like many types of security, always seems to fluster honest users more than impede those who would copy and steal.

The key to success is to price things reasonably. If songs on the internet cost $0.25, then they're would be a lot less copying of music and more people buying it. In software, like music, almost all of the cost is in creating it, not distributing it.

The sky is blue, smoking is bad for you, and bears defecate in the woods.

Seriously, how pathetic has our society gotten when an article that basically states "treating customers with respect and trusting them to be honest pays." is counter-intuitive news?

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Montresor wrote:
The sky is blue, smoking is bad for you, and bears defecate in the woods.

Seriously, how pathetic has our society gotten when an article that basically states "treating customers with respect and trusting them to be honest pays." is counter-intuitive news?

I think it is news because it flies in the face of "conventional wisdom" among software manufacturers...specifically a certain OS manufacturer in the Pacific Northwest. I'm one of those people who gladly ponies up the $199 each time for the 3 machines we have in our house. I appreciate Apple not treating me like I can't be trusted and I reward them with my $$.

My wife, two girls, my parents and I will "thank" Apple for reasonably pricing the Leopard Family Pack by purchasing it instead of just a single copy of the OS.

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Montresor wrote:
The sky is blue, smoking is bad for you, and bears defecate in the woods.

Seriously, how pathetic has our society gotten when an article that basically states "treating customers with respect and trusting them to be honest pays." is counter-intuitive news?

Sometimes the obvious has to be stated out loud because some people [obviously] refuse to ackowledge the obvious.

$199 for a Tiger family pack and $199 for a Leopard family pack for four notebooks and a desktop Mac. I know how I will spend part of my day tomorrow. It's much less than the money that Windoze households would spend to upgrade their XP systems to Vista. They would also have to go through Microsoft's activation scheme for each machine, as well as sending off a pile of money to Symantec each year. MacOS X is cheap at the price, and I don't mind paying the extra $83 (academic price for a single Leopard license).

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Guest wrote:
My wife, two girls, my parents and I will "thank" Apple for reasonably pricing the Leopard Family Pack by purchasing it instead of just a single copy of the OS.

I assume then that your parents or your two girls share a machine and live in your house with you. According to the license you can install it on 5 machines in one house.

Very fair, so I have to buy a separate copy for my mother...

I don't see why you would have to purchase a separate copy for your mother. yes it may state that single household thing in the licence but that was written by lawyers. I am sure if you explained the situation to Steve Jobs himself he would just say "don't worry about it" and probably thank you for your honesty.

As long as you don't install it on more than five Macs Apple are getting their money and you haven't taken the p*ss. After all, what happens if you install one copy on your teenage kids Macbook and they go off to university and live on campus? Will you have to de-install the OS to conform to licensing regs?

The ironic thing is this was proven in the late 1980's. Two companies (a giant and a smaller upstart) were battling for control of an industry. The giant was using a locked install scheme that really irritated the consumer while the smaller company came out and said "we trust our customers, so we'll sell our stuff without this c***". The smaller company with the "trust customers" attitude won and the "Giant" company is gone. Who were these companies?
Giant: Lotus 1-2-3
Smaller upstart: Microsoft Excel

I guess Microsoft has forgotten their own past.

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Guest wrote:
I don't see why you would have to purchase a separate copy for your mother. yes it may state that single household thing in the licence but that was written by lawyers. I am sure if you explained the situation to Steve Jobs himself he would just say "don't worry about it" and probably thank you for your honesty.

As long as you don't install it on more than five Macs Apple are getting their money and you haven't taken the p*ss. After all, what happens if you install one copy on your teenage kids Macbook and they go off to university and live on campus? Will you have to de-install the OS to conform to licensing regs?

Yea, lets just make Steve Jobs a nice guy in order to excuse ourselves for violating the license.

"Ethicists and cultural critics have a word for people who do bad things but don't act like it: shameless."

(See http://www.strom.clemson.edu/becker/prtm320/goodbad.html )


And by the way, the example given is covered in the license.

"By “household” we mean a person or persons who share the same housing unit such as a home, apartment, mobile home, or condominium, including student members who are primary residents of that household but reside at a separate on-campus location."

So yes, my Mother taught me to abide by the rules and since she lives in a different city, she needs her own copy.

But you go ahead, I'm sure Steve really didn't mean to pay those lawyers to craft that very fair, very generous license.

By the way, there's no way to NOT sound holier than thou when discussing these issues, but it seems to me that this issue is very clear. If you disagree, lets discuss.

I DON'T KNOW WHAT WE ARE ALL YELLING ABOUT!

Sure, the Family Pack is like a gift for everybody except the professionals!

Is there a pro licence corresponding to the Family Pack, for example to share Leopard on macs, not necessarily networking?

I'd like to install it without a server, I mean I've 3 macs using Final Cut Pro and sharing only the Wi-Fi modem. I think it's never been clear...

TIA

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sem68-19 wrote:
Sure, the Family Pack is like a gift for everybody except the professionals!

Is there a pro licence corresponding to the Family Pack, for example to share Leopard on macs, not necessarily networking?

I'd like to install it without a server, I mean I've 3 macs using Final Cut Pro and sharing only the Wi-Fi modem. I think it's never been clear...

TIA

With the "family pack," you can legally install Leopard on up to five Macs that are in a single "household." (There's a definition of "household" on Apple's web site.) It does not apply to business or commercial users. If you want to buy multiple seats in a business, you might contact Apple and see what they offer. You might start at Apple's small business site.

I have two Macs (running Tiger & iLife 06) and just bought a Mini (with Leopard & iLife 08).

Is there a way to just pay the difference between a "single" license and a "family" so that I can run Leopard & iLfe 08 on all three machines?