Ethics with Style

Lately I've been considering the fact that I am using a lot of software that has been provided to me for free, and some of it I have been providing myself with for free. I'm coming to the realization that some day when I'm working on little side projects for my own satisfaction and passing them around to anyone who finds it useful, it would be nice if someone would throw me a couple bucks.

For example, tonight I wanted to use VNC, so I went to their site to use their utility that they not only provide for free, but provide a small download so that I can use their software from anywhere at anytime. That was pretty nice of them. They also pledge that their software is and will continue to be free of cost. I totally respect that. They call for donations "if you find their software useful." Judging from the millions of times I've used their software, I'd say I find it pretty damn useful.

Ethically, I've decided I should donate. Checking out their donation options I found that you can just hand them over a little money, or give them a bit more and get a cool T-shirt in return. I definitely opt for the T. So I'm gonna buy myself a T-shirt and support the coding of freely provided software too (cause that's the way I think it should be).

This does not mean I'll be going legit, however. It's still and will remain to be a pirate's life for me, just so long as Microsoft charges the cost of a small child on the human slave market for their software. I think the current software situation is analogous to feudalism in that if I don't steal then I would have had to have to have started with a ton of money in order to get to where I am today (no comments from the peanut gallery) just like you couldn't be a knight unless you were a noble mainly because you couldn't afford a horse and armor and weapons and training (Ok, I know it was a class value thing too and if you weren't a noble but still had that stuff you still couldn't be a knight, but it's a decent analogy).

*Jon voice* "But I digress", My point is that in order to ethically use code that I would want to be paid for some day I'm gonna start donating online (and getting T-shirts to boot) and buying software that is withing my means (i.e. I actually paid for half-life and I'm gonna pay for BF1942).