NO SOFTWARE is FREE daw o!

[gtechmyk]

Piracy is a crime and you are a criminal if you are using a pirated software..


But u can avoid committing crime by supporting open source software

linux is not holding back your kids but linux is teaching your kids to be a HUMAN BEING and not to be a criminal.

[Samhain13]

i guess the reaction of that teacher is normal, since most of the computer user uses Windows OS and they are fully aware that the software they are using is "not free" and giving out copies of it means "Piracy"!.

The teacher says in her letter that she had tried Linux when she was in college; therefore, she must know that the kid wasn't distributing pirated software, nor advocating piracy.

Jepong: Heto, interesting find... (hehehe!)

185.1. The fair use of a copyrighted work for criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching including multiple copies for classroom use, scholarship, research, and similar purposes is not an infringement of copyright. Decompilation, which is understood here to be the reproduction of the code and translation of the forms of the computer program to achieve the inter-operability of an independently created computer program with other programs may also constitute fair use. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is fair use, the factors to be considered shall include:

(a) The purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for non-profit education purposes;
(b) The nature of the copyrighted work;
(c) The amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
(d) The effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

http://www.chanrobles.com/legal7ipcp.htm

I take it that this means that in the Philippines, if you have the know-how, every computer application that you can get your hands on is Open Source. What you can't do though is sell your modified work nor give it away; because that will have a commercial nature or affect the potential market value of the computer application, respectively.

But you can always teach other people how to modify their own (legitimately acquired) copies of the software that you worked on. Or perhaps, release your own patches for the software. Or maybe, build your own software that is analogous to the one you decompiled.

Hehehe!