Illegit software or going legit? Open source, the beginning developers godsend

I am guilty of using illegit software in the past but realised that to run an ethical, legal and honest business I had to go legit.

This created a big problem for me, most of my software was pirated, and as a startup business I didn't have the funds to purchase what I needed. Photoshop, Illustrator, dreamweaver, Flash, 3DS Max 5 and WS_FTP Pro would have cost me $9500+. This is a lot of money to come up with upfront.

I purchased a few must-have items like Uleads Photoimpact, which is a cheap raster art editor and a second hand copy of Adobe Illustrator 9.0 from a designer friend (this was legit) Also Swish 2.0 (Flash's cheap brother) and Color Impact. All for $500.

I then found myself looking into free open source software and have never looked back. All of the open source software I have used thus far has been better to use than the pirated products.

The free open source products I use on an amost daily basis are:

Crimson Editor for hand coding
Filezilla for remote site maintenance
Terragen for 3D landscapes
Blender3D for all other 3D design

I have also heard great things about GIMP being almost as good as photoshop and other fantastic free open source software.

If you are looking at going legit then I suggest you check out open source software first.

Or you can just download the free trials and set your clock back No forget that.

But most of my software is legit but I thought it was not illegal to download the unlicenced stuff its the person providing it thats breaking the law?

its piracy downloading or provding the software... Only way is to buy it legally.

I used to use illegtimate software as well but then after a while I didn't feel right about it because it is stealing...especially if you're making money out of using that software.
That's why everything I use now is free.

I use GIMP sometimes. It's pretty good...but after almost 6 years of using Adobe Photoshop it's hard to get used to another program especially when hitting the short-cut keys in Photoshop almost became a reflex action.
For illustration, I like Inkscape. You can save the files in SVG format so there's XML compatibility right there.
The OS I use is Ubuntu Linux and it comes with a whole bunch of packages that are installable and that's all I need.
I've even stopped using Windows because I can't afford it (even if I could, I don't think I would have bought it. Not worth it IMO) but I have a small 5GB partition that has a very minimal installation of Windows on it so that I don't have too many compatibility issues with files that clients using Windows send me...but I haven't booted it for over 4 months.

This means I've also stopped playing games :/
I want to buy the Star Wars games from Lucas Arts though...Star Wars Pod Racer was nice

I'm glad there's so much open source software floating about. I've even started two open source projects at Sourceforge and I hope that once it's done, it will help someone out there so that I can give something back.

i used to run a bit of extended trial software

but now i dont need too as much. my windows is cracked but ive paid for it. its an activation copy of windows i paid for but after 5 activations it told me that i needed to phone ms to get it activated. last time i did that i was on the phone for ages and was really annoying so i just downloaded an activation crack.

i have no problem with paying for software its just i have a problem with the prices.

I agree....
If the prices were reasonable everyone would buy legit software...
How companies can expect a small start up business with limited investment to be able to afford to buy and use original software is anyone's guess?
Once u start making money on a regular basis I guess you can then save and buy the original one at a time.
But there is still the problem of updating and spending money on the next version.
It is a really non stop process once you decide to go legit on non open source software.
which is why i guess people are moving towards to Linux and other such open source things

yni420, you don't have to upgrade your software on a regular basis. I would estimate my software upgrades are happening every 3-4 years.

But most of my software is legit but I thought it was not illegal to download the unlicenced stuff its the person providing it thats breaking the law?

If you have software on your computer that you haven't paid for, you're breaking the law.

If the prices were reasonable everyone would buy legit software...

That's true, sometimes I wish the whole "warez" fad didn't exist. Sure, there would be far less designers around, but think of the market and demand available to those who actually purchased photoshop

I'm guilty when it comes to illegal software (i'm sure about 90% of internet users have something on their computer they didn't purchase off the shelf) look at mp3's for example, same principle. I do try to purchase products I use on a regular basis when I can.

I can safely say I don't have a single piece of illegitimate software on my PC right now...but I do have a bunch of MP3's :/

Originally Posted by Koobi I can safely say I don't have a single piece of illegitimate software on my PC right now

Well done koobi, that's a rare thing