Diamonds are forever; old Macs seem to last nearly as long. The
problem isn't the hardware, but finding a copy of ClarisWorks,
Photoshop, Illustrator, Excel, or Word that can run on a Mac Plus,
Classic II, PowerBook 180, or Quadra 650. The new versions often
won't run on pre-PowerPC Macs, and the old versions are long since
discontinued.
The Abandonware Project seeks a solution to this problem. We
believe their proposal is a reasonable one and offer our support.
Dan Knight, publisher, Low End Mac
Software piracy. The phrase raises hackles on the necks of
software company execs and brings gleams to the eyes of their company
lawyers, but it elicits mere shrugs from computer users unwilling or
unable to pay exorbitant fees for popular software packages.
And then, beyond the realm of the usual piracy headlines, there's
us. By "us," I mean folks with computers so old that the
exorbitant cost of Photoshop 5.5 isn't the issue. My Mac Plus
couldn't even begin to decipher the code.
I want to get my hands on a copy of Photoshop 1 or 2. But how?
The same license agreements that hang over the head of
cutting-edge software pirates also hang over ours. Although we're not
the ones causing the loss of millions of software dollars a year, we
face the same legal dangers as the traffickers in new titles (who
supposedly greatly endanger the coffers of software companies
everywhere).
We can't buy older versions at a discounted price, because the
companies say they wouldn't make enough profit to justify providing
packaging and support for such old products. Many titles are so old,
it's virtually impossible to find an intact "legal" copy to buy
secondhand. We've got virtually no aboveboard options for acquiring
commercial software our long discontinued machines can run.
The license holders are no longer making a dime off the software
we need, but those pesky license agreements linger on. For what
reason? Who knows. Aldus, now part of Adobe, wouldn't lose a dime
from the free trade of FreeHand 3. Macromedia, the new owner of the
title, wouldn't suffer either. No graphics professional would argue
that FreeHand 3 is an adequate substitute for the latest version.
In fact, the license holders of these older titles could
conceivably benefit from wider use of their old versions. Children
who's families can't afford the newest versions could grow up using
older titles, making the new versions a natural choice when they
enter the professional realm.
I could argue, make analogies, and generally carry on about this
subject all day. Instead, I will simply propose a solution. Software
manufacturers should release their obsolete versions as shareware or
freeware, and allow them to be copied at will.
An arbitrary "release age" could be set across the board. For a
bakery, day old bread is sold at a discount, and two day old bread is
often given to the local food bank. For software, one version number
back could be sold at a steep discount; anything older could become
freeware.
There would be no technical support agreements or fancy packaging
to drain the license-holders' purses, but there is a monumental
opportunity for good press and legions of up-and-coming loyal users
to purchase their newest releases later in life.
The publishers would retain all copyrights to the products, just
as current shareware and freeware authors do. They could limit
authorized distribution to copies containing all the original
installers and electronic documentation. They could attach all the
strings they wanted to and put up all the hoops we could possibly
jump through, as long as the end result was to allow free copying and
distribution of their obsolete software.
No bakery's business has ever suffered from giving their old bread
to the food bank. No software company is going to suffer by doing
this.
Teresa Knezek is the author and coordinator of the Abandonware
Petition, an effort to release old software titles for free
distribution. You can read and sign the petition by visiting
http://mivox.com/essays and
clicking the abandonware petition link.
Share your perspective on the Mac by emailing with "My Turn" as your subject.
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