IP Outreach Research > IP Crime
Reference
Title: | A reversed context analysis of software piracy issues in Singapore |
Author: | Trevor T Moores [University of Nevada Las Vegas], Jasbir Dhaliwal [Northern Kentucky University] |
Source: | Information & Management 41, no. 8: 1037-1042 |
Year: | 2004 |
Details
Subject/Type: | Piracy |
Focus: | Software |
Country/Territory: | Singapore |
Objective: | To study the level of software piracy and the reasons underlying this behaviour among students in Singapore and to compare the results with those of a similar study conducted in Hong Kong. |
Sample: | 462 undergraduate and postgraduate business students |
Methodology: | Questionnaire made up of context and reversed context statements |
Main Findings
48% of the respondents claimed to buy pirated software regularly, a substantially lower number relative to Hong Kong (where 81% declared acquiring pirated software on a regular basis). The high availability of pirated software, the relatively high cost of legal software and a perceived lack of censure involved in buying pirated software are factors motivating software piracy, with cost being the dominant factor (though Singaporean pirates, relative to their Hong Kong peers, seem less willing to accept cheaper prices as a reason to stop buying software illegally). Accordingly, piracy fighting efforts should be directed at these issues.
Even in culturally and economically similar contexts, attitudes towards piracy differ. Thus, successful anti-piracy campaigns need to focus on local issues driving software piracy instead of adopting a one-size-fits-all approach. Finally, given that cost is the most important justification for piracy, the authors argue that (Asian) piracy is a rational economic decision, rather than a product of different Eastern and Western cultural attitudes towards copying.
[Date Added: Aug 12, 2008 ]