> Does this not deprive the software makers of a bit of sales? I'd welcome a more neutral phrasing for this though. Yes, it may change people's behavior. But

> Does this not deprive the software makers of a bit of sales? I'd welcome a more neutral phrasing for this though. Yes, it may change people's behavior. But depriving someone of something sounds like something they had is taken away from them; but these are not sales or property they had, rather it's something they perhaps would have had if the world were different. Now, a lot of things can "deprive" me of things that I'd like to have but never did.. As you say, it's very difficult to measure. Actually, it's not something that can be measured, because it's a world of hypotheticals. It's like measuring how tall you would be if you had lived in the 1500s. You don't measure that. If piracy isn't a choice, then I might look for an alternative.. and if I find an alternative that pleases me, then I'm less likely to deal with the author of the original un-pirateable software, thus "depriving" them of something they perhaps could have had if they had first gained me as a user somehow.