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From: Stephen Horne on 17 May 2010 16:28

*Many* years ago, I heard a Bill Gates quote to the effect that piracy
in Hong Kong, China and other areas was a good thing. The basic idea
was that he'd rather people pirated and became dependent on Microsoft
products rather than paying for something cheaper. A "the first dose
is free" kind of argument. That's as close as I can remember, of
course, and this could easily be plain wrong.

The "first dose" thing I stole from things written about more recent
quote, including one in 1998, which can be found here.

http://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/452150-bill-gates-isnt-too-bothered-by-piracy/

Time period - I think around the late 80s, but that's when I heard it
- it may have been said even earlier.

I've been tring to find the quote (or rather a quote along similar
lines) from that period, but the web is flooded with more recent
quotes about how much Gates loves/hates piracy depending on context
and whether Microsoft benefits or loses. This despite the fact that
Gates has been Microsoft history for how long?

Oh - and it's possible my memory is decieving me. That 1998 quote
wasn't exactly yesterday, so maybe I'm confusing that. But I'm pretty
sure that there was a similar late 80s quote referring to Hong Kong. I
think. Maybe.

Interesting to find out about his 1976 open letter where he criticised
pirates - and his admission that he used to pirate snippets of code
from listings picked out of bins at the back of computer centres. And
more recent quotes that suggest that selectively encouraging piracy
was a deliberate strategy to fight open source.

Funny how the loudest complainers are often offenders themselves.

Anyway, does anyone have a reference to something from that late 80s
time period?

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