Shayon's Labyrinth

With every passing hour, I find more and more people supporting a certain old man in his fight against corruption. With every hour, I find more people getting agitated against the government because of their inability to clear out corruption in this country. 

But along with all of those sentiments, I also find people requesting for license keys for software and mobile apps from each other. And I wonder, isn’t that stealing? Isn’t that corruption too? When a certain developer has copyrighted his code and has decided to sell his efforts for his living, isn’t it stealing when one uses methods to use that app without paying the concerned developer/publisher?

I have come across people who can afford even half a lakh of rupees for a mobile phone! There are even those who spend fortunes for a Swarovski or Louis Vitton mobile cover! And yet, we wish not to pay just Rs 50/100 for an app just because someone else we know has a license key that’ll help crack the code? 

There are people who argue that the software developer had his chances of protecting his code. I am smarter, so I cracked it. Which sounds exactly like even if I lock my door and yet my house gets robbed, it is my mistake not to erect a door made of iron, rather than of wood! Is this really fair? 

I am sure a lot many of us are developers ourselves. Tell me, would you like it if your employer didn’t pay you for the services you render? If you are a photographer, would you really like someone else to siphon off your hard work and publish them online on their own websites?

Sure, some software cause tens of thousands of rupees that might be unaffordable, or maybe not even worth it. But that should never warrant stealing as an alternative. Switch to Open Source software. If that’s too radical, then there are at least enough freewares to help you glide through comfortably. All you need to do is invest a bit of time to learn them. And trust me, more often than not, the open source alternatives are better coded and supported software than the proprietary ones!

We speak of eradicating corruption from this country. We are ready to die for a man we hadn’t even heard of for most of our lives. And yet we aren’t ready to be honest men ourselves? 

Is this how we plan to bring in a revolution in this country? Remember, that single corrupt politician up there is actually one man among the billions of us! If we are corrupt ourselves, he is also bound to be! 

Epilogue - I usually do not impose my thoughts and ideals onto others. But yesterday someone on Blackberry Messenger had asked me for the license key of an app and that triggered the nagging worm within me. Sorry for the rant, but I am truly worried for sure! I wonder if there will ever come a day when we’ll realize that there is nothing called “free lunch!” 

I, kinda, have a Mac Mini lying around, ignored. Getting very tempted to convert it into a media Center, powered by Plex. Maybe next month!

I recently reinstalled OS X (Mountain Lion) on my laptop. And right since today morning, I have been struggling to make iTunes appear on my home media server. I use Plex, by the way. I finally managed to make that happen, after hours of scouring through their forums. Huff!

I wish there was a Rotten Tomatoes app for Indian movie fans!

And no, IMDB is not as satisfying.