The definition of Warez:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&defl=en&q=define:WAREZ&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title
Every Definition states illegal as a condition of the word Warez. Therefor we are NOT talking about Warez...
Its not that I disagree with your statement above, but the language in the rules are not consistant to the details in this thread. However, I feel we are walking a VERY tight rope here, in that if we provide too much info, then we may be providing information that could be misused, and thus become a discussion of Warez. Thats why I wouldnt provide a single link to anything.
Now we need to talk about the
INTENTION of the rule, which is
KINDA clear. However in this instance we are walking a tight rope. We are so close to the fuzzy aspect of the rule; that its a individual (my) judgement call on how WE (or I) respond.
I am against stealing, though I am no saint in this area... I must admit that this is NOT the place to be talking about Warez, with or without a rule stating this. We talk about OCing, and help people with their software problems, for reasons I dont know, other then I rather enjoy these topics.
Its a hard conversation, because we are talking about a activity that is completely legal. We are talking about software (bittorrent) that is completely legal, but again may be, and probably most often, misused.
So I dont disagree with the rule, but this is a case we are too close to either side of the intention of the rule. We talked about the morality and the rule (as you can see) In the above thread and no one seemed to have a issue.
The above statement was made to help everyone understand the delema I (we) faced in responding to this issue. I have no intention in discrediting the decision the Moderator made in this issue, and will support his statement. Moderators are suppose to Moderate, so its nice to see that they Moderate. Moderators help keep this site clean and fun.
So any moderators may feel free to edit my above statements, and know that I give you full support to do so. But please
HIGHLIGHT IN RED any changes made. Or put "statement/sentince deleted" in red. Just out of respect for my time and effort, and to make sure that my statements remain mine and not yours.
I do feel that this topic was fair to the parties involved (Microsoft and the User). Maybe the rule should be changed to "Warez and or any sharing of copyrighted material, either legal or illegal." Then we would DEFINATELY and CLEARLY have violated the rule. Well then again, could we talk about BitTorrent... so we would have to clarrify that in the rule... Eventually we would end up with statements of rules that read like legal statements, that no one would possibly read.
Mike
Edit: As I think about this. The truth becomes clear, that the use of Bittorrent to download a copy of Windows 98 will be illegal simply because, Bittorrent clients upload what you already downloaded. Since you dont know if the person your uploading to has a legal version of the software, you would thus probably be violating the law.
However, this conversation has turned into a great topic of the morality, software and the different aspects of this specific situation and of Warez in general. So maybe this topic has become of great value to thoose who are looking for a moral, legal, and ethical solutions. Think of it this way. The intention of the rule was probably not to talk about ILLEGAL activities and or how to commit them. I dont think the
intention of the rule was to limit the ability to talk about how to avoid illegal behavior.
Edit 2: Using a disk (your Dell Disk) as a disk to upgrade XP, if that dell is currently beign used, and if that dell is running that software (or running an upgrade version of windows) that utilized that current software license would be illegal. The upgrade license states that you must be using a legal copy of X software, which is not used for multiple upgrades. However, IF you have a version of 98, then bought a version of 2000, then upgraded to XP. You could LEGALLY use the copy of 98 on one XP installation, and one cooy of 2000 for another instance of XP... I think