Linked by Thom Holwerda on Sun 19th Feb 2006 16:26 UTC
This week, one of the most-commented stories on OSNews was the story about how 'Maxxus' cracked/hacked (take your pick) the Intel version of Apple's OSX once again. This sparked a lively debate over whether we should encourage Maxxus, or condemn his actions. I made myself clear from the get-go: I condemn his actions. Note: This is the Sunday Eve Column of the week.
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Member since:
2005-07-02
Yes, that is a most important distinction considering the states of the USA aren't in the world.
Usually when one says "in the world", one means "throughout the world," otherwise it's pretty meaningless. Anyway, that's the general opinion in the world, and by that I mean in front of my computer. :-)
The fact is... In some places on the earth (I am not aware of how many) EULAs are legal despite what you say.
All that I say is that in most places of the world, i.e. the vast majority of it, the legality of EULAs is dubious at best. Even in those few places where they are apparently backed by UCITA, they've never been tested in court, and I wouldn't bet money on them holding up.
The rest of your posts doesn't contain arguments, but restates that one should be expected to know what's in a EULA because there's so many of them, which I already indicated means absolutely nothing in a court of law. Nothing. It's not a real argument, it's a bad analogy between real laws (to which you're subject even if you don't know about them) and contracts (to which you can't be bound if you can't have the terms).
As for stores refusing to refund you, many of them will refuse to refund you if the package is opened and not defective. It has nothing to do with piracy, because the same rule apples to non-software items.