Um, the entire body of copyright law? The owner of the WinZip program has clearly stated the terms of use, and that the program is not free. And that if you continue to use it beyond the evaluation period, you are required to purchase a license. Copyright law (at least in the United States) over the last, I don’t know, 50 years or more, has clearly supported this. Do some Google searches. How about these:
So there is clearly agreement that computer software has copyright protection. Now, the copyright holder of WinZip has clearly stipulated that using the program beyond the trial period requires payment. Therefore, to not do that is violating his copyright.
Now it’s your turn: What makes you believe that I’m wrong? Do you have any cites that dispute what I’m saying?
No, that’s not true. There is no requirement in copyright law that the copyright holder must make it impossible or even difficult to violate his copyright. The copyright holder of WinZip states quite clearly in the license agreement that is a part of the documentation that comes with the software:
That’s all he needs to do, state clearly the terms of the license. You are required to pay the registration fee if you use it beyond 21 days. Using it for more than 21 days without paying the fee violates copyright law.
How can anyone dispute that? Anyone have any cites to back up a claim that the WinZip license is not legal or valid?
I don’t know about that. Copyright is a monopoly on making copies; you aren’t making a copy of WinZip simply by using it, and IIRC, copyright law specifically exempts the temporary copies in memory that your computer may make as part of running a program. It’s easy to imagine situations where you could use a shareware program without ever making a copy of it yourself - for example, you might find a CD-ROM with the program files already extracted on it, and then run the program directly off the CD.
However, if you agree to a license agreement when you install WinZip, then you will be violating that contract if you continue to use it past the evaluation period. I don’t know if they could retroactively sue you for copyright infringement for the copy you made when you installed WinZip… I’ve never heard of that being done.
Fair enough, I actually wen’t and read the license agreement. I was under the mistaken assumption that Winzip was distributed as any other shareware program wirh a nag screen in that the only restriction to using it over 21 days was that the nag screen would pop up.
Wow, “as any other shareware program”? That seems to imply that you are under the impression that if a program is labeled “shareware” it means that paying for it is optional. That is totally wrong.
Shareware is a distribution method, nothing more. Something that is called “shareware” has all of the legal copyright protections afforded to something that is called “commercial”. The WinZip program is no different than the Microsoft Word program. If you use MS Word without paying for it, you are breaking the law. If you use WinZip beyond the expressed 21 day evaluation period, you are breaking the law. Heck, I can give you any number of examples of programs that are labeled “commercial” and that their copyright holders have allowed a time-limited, free, evaluation period. There’s no difference.
Again, copyright says nothing about your rights to legally use any software program, only to copy it. You can even use Microsoft Word without paying a dime, as long as you can do so without making any copies or agreeing to any licenses.
But that same logic can be applied to any software program, regardless of whether its distribution method is labeled “shareware” or “commercial”, regardless of whether it was written and distributed by Joe in his garage or by the Microsoft Corporation.
Try applying that logic to MS Word and see how far you get. It may be argued that you are not explicitly “copying” it during the act of running, but you had to copy it onto your system’s hard drive in order to run it. And if I put an unlocked copy of MS Word on a CD and give it to you and you use it from the CD, you really think that Microsoft is going to accept the argument that you haven’t copied anything? You really believe that using MS Word directly off of a CD would make you legally entitled to use it? Send an email to Microsoft’s legal department and ask them how they’d feel about that…
Well, yeah, you do in fact agree to a license when you install WinZip. There’s nothing retroactive about it. The license states that you can use it for 21 days, and that to use it after that period of time requires payment. That’s what you agree to when you install it, so do use it after 21 days without purchase is violating what you agreed to.
In that oft-used word: Cite? Show me a law or a precedent that says that when a friend gives me an unlocked copy of MS Word on a CD, I’m not breaking any law by using it directly from the CD (my friend, though, is obviously another question).
I was of the understanding that most shareware, like applications that functionally restrict you after a certain time or pop up nag screens explicitly say that it is legal to use it after that period of time.
Correct. Installing the program on your hard drive is making a copy.
It doesn’t matter whether they “accept” it or not; they’d have no leg to stand on. You can’t violate copyright if you aren’t making any copies.
You don’t need any special legal entitlement to run a program on your computer. Do you really think there’s a law against running programs that you haven’t paid for?
Yes, you would be violating the contract you entered into with the makers of WinZip, not copyright law.
If it isn’t specifically outlawed, it’s legal. You have not pointed to any law that makes it illegal to use a program without copying it. Unless you can show that there is such a law, the only possible conclusion is that it isn’t illegal.
I don’t know if this was a typo, but either way, I think it’s pretty cool.
On the subject at hand, I feel the world would be so much happier if we could just crush all the underdogs in areas where wide-spread compatibility is important. Die, Apple! Die, Real! Die, WinRAR! Die a happy death or a most horrible one; it really doesn’t matter. Just die quickly, so we all can communicate without silly technical hinderances.
As XP has a perfectly decent ZIP interface (and no, as has already been pointed out, you don’t have to use a wizard), I fail to see why anyone would be using Winzip. Why pay for something you already have?
I sometimes use WinRar if I need to. Its features are a little more advanced than either XP’s native support or WinZip.