Microsoft Calls Today Global Anti-Piracy Day

Good Morning SuperForesterinos y SuperForesterinas!

Microsoft says that today is Global Anti-Piracy Day.

How very interesting. I have spent many hours trying to reconcile my feelings about piracy (digital, not seafaring.)

Yesterday I saw this wonderful article on wired.com.

It is a brief interview with Matt Mason, whose book The Pirate's Dilemma: How Youth Culture Is Reinventing Capitalism, discusses ways in which businesses can learn from piracy.

Matt says:

“The whole point of the book is that piracy is often highlighting some kind of market failure. When the market’s not doing something that most people want to see happening, that’s when you see piracy on a massive scale.”

Ah ha!

The grey area between what the public wants and what it is offered is the fertile breeding ground for pirate behavior. If media companies were giving us exactly what we wanted, there wouldn't be nearly as much piracy as there is now.

If people around the world are pirating copies of Microsoft Vista, then perhaps Microsoft should be looking into why exactly that is occurring. Then, the energy spent organizing and promoting "Global Anti-Piracy Day" could be better used organizing and promoting "Global Vista for Cheap. (And Easily Customizable Too!) Day."

(Why waste your time being anti anything? Be ridiculously "Pro" the things you find worth your time and energy!)

Piracy is the symptom, not the disease.

Interesting.

How do you feel about that? How does that info resonate with you?

Let's discuss!

Love,

Jackson

p.s. Appropriately enough, Matt's book is available as a pay-what-you-like free download from his website.