The commandment "Thou Shall Not Steal" does not apply to Software and Music.

I know some people on the internet firmly believe this statement when it comes to torrenting music, movies, and other media off of the internet. But, believe it or not, this statement has not been formed by the net pirates I have encountered.

In fact, this statement comes from people I delt with while working at the small tech shop and the big box store in the service department (I got out of sales once I got my A+ certification. Yes..that long ago).



The most notable case was the time we had a minister come in looking for a new computer because his machine was failing and was not worth fixing. The sales person dealing with him called me in to answer some of the guy's questions.

His asked if the software that had been on the old computer could be moved to the new one. Of course my answer was: "As long as you have your original software discs that came with the system and their product keys, if any."

And so begins a story we have heard over and over again. It is the story of a man who has his computer built by "some guy" that he has no way of finding nor contacting. The minister was amazed at the price of the computer, especially since it was preloaded with great software like Microsoft Office Professional, among others. But, alas, the man had never given him any software discs or product keys for any of it. Since the computer was up and running and ready to go, he had not known that he needed things like "discs" and "product keys".

So I tell him that, unfortunately, he was likely sold stolen goods. If the person he bought the computer from did not include the discs and product keys, then the software was pirated. Just to be clear I even defined piracy, to make sure he knew it was stealing and that he was, unknowingly, receiving stolen property.

He nodded his head, as if he understood, and then asked me if we had copies of the main pieces of software that he needed back on the computer so he could continue his work. I say sure, and proceed to give him pricing. After I finish he looks back to me and says, "But, can't you just load them back on for nothing?". I then have to explain that we did not give illegal copies of software out, and we could not just load software on his new computer. He was quite annoyed that I would not do it.

So that is where today's moral comes from, my friends. The commandment "Thou Shall Not Steal" does not apply to Software and Music.