TechLahore

And I don’t think you can afford to exhibit the bravado Axl Rose once did when he said, “They’re outta get me, they won’t catch me…”. Rest assured, the Business Software Alliance means business and they WILL catch you.  The BSA has made some strides in the last few years and increasingly, smaller IT shops are complying with licensing requirements. You may remember, that we predicted back in January that 2008 was going to be a big year for anti-piracy drives. We continue to think that in the next 24 months or so, even small companies in the 30-50 employee range won’t really be able to get away with the kind of large scale piracy that used to exist in earlier years. As the Pakistani market is becoming larger for the companies that comprise the BSA – giants like Microsoft, Adobe, Dell and HP – their focus on bringing that 86% piracy rate down is also increasing. It’s going to start with businesses, but it’ll get to the consumer too.

The Business Recorder has a lot more details on the anti-piracy drive that was launched this Thursday, April 17, 2008. Check it out.

Read the full story in the Business Recorder:

BSA legal software promotion drive to be launched on April 17
RECORDER REPORT KARACHI (April 15 2008): The ‘Business Software Alliance, (BSA) has announced to launch legal software promotion drive across the country with a view to scale down 86 percent piracy rate through public awareness and incentives for installation of licensed software.

Addressing a press conference at Karachi Press Club on Monday, BSA spokesman for East Mediterranean and Pakistan Committee, Aly Harakeh, said that a 45-day nation-wide drive would be launched from Thursday, April 17.

He said that it would be aimed to acquaint the computer users, particularly the corporate sector, with the benefits of licensed software, besides the disadvantages of piracy. He added that increasing piracy had inflicted $143 million losses on Pakistan during 2006.

He said that BSA member companies would also give special discounts on purchase of licensed software up to June 1, 2008. BSA members are Adobe, Apple, Autodesk, Avid, Bentley Systems, Cisco Systems, Dell, HP, IBM, Intel, Macromedia, McAfee, Microsoft, Solid Works, Sybase and Symantec.

Aly said he hoped that software piracy cut by 10 percent during the next four years could generate about 11,700 highly paid jobs, $160 million in economic growth and $23 million in tax revenues. He expressed fears that the global annual losses to software industry have now reached $40 billion.

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