ethics (was Re: Building a rackmount looping computer as an alternative to the Receptor for Mobius)

[Sean Echevarria <sean.loop@creepingfog.com>]

Take with a grain of a salt...

The implied question wasn't one of legality - reverse engineering itself 
is 
not illegal (though I'm not sure if disassembly or decompilation make it 
so).

The question implied was one of ethics.

Is there an ethical issue here?

The fact that Mobius took a lot of effort to create has no bearing.
The fact that it was not built through disassembly is beside the point as 
well.
It doesn't matter whether it is free or paid - again, no bearing.
That lots of people like it is beside the point too.

Are you saying that because you don't think Mobius negatively affects EDP 
sales, then there is no ethical dilemma?  That would mean there is a 
question (which I'm not sure you agree there is) and the answer is 
measured 
in dollars?


At 2005.10.17 01:46 PM, Jeff Larson wrote:
> > Well, you also have to consider the whole ethical dilemma there, and
> > what your conscience allows.
>
>Ok I'll bite.  Ethical dilemma?  Oh I get it, did I "steal" your ideas?
>Well, they weren't hard to steal, they were all published quite nicely.
>Everyone on this list whines about how manufacturers aren't listening
>to the looping community by failing to incorporate some popular feature
>into their product.  If they did would that be stealing?  Do you
>own the concept of "multiply"?
>
>Some people believe I somehow copied the actual assembly code off the
>EDP ROMs and built an emulator to run that in Windows.  This is untrue
>and I would in fact consider that unethical.  Mobius was a *lot* of
>work.  I have invested well over a thousand hours in it.  Had I chosen
>to make my usual consulting rate during those hours I could have made
>a lot of money.  Now I give it away for free for the benefit of
>those that can't afford to spend thousands of dollars on hardware.
>I'm sorry if you consider that unethical, I don't.
>
>And as I've said before, I really don't think Mobius is affecting the
>sales of EDPs at all.  Based on some of the feedback I get I've
>probably even sold a few EDPs for you.  There are plenty of people out
>there that are curious about the EDP but they're not going to spend
>a thousand dollars to find out.  Now they can get a pretty good idea,
>but for all the reasons you so eloquently point out they don't
>want to deal with a laptop on stage.  So they decide to buy an EDP.
>You're welcome.