Well, I'm a student.. so I cant afford anything. I disagree with the comparrison of software piracy and house painting for two reasons. First.. painting a house is done in labour. They might get 14.50 per hour for their work, which is reasonable. Software is a product, and it probably costs and 3 dollers a package in mass production, and they often sell it at around 400. Thhats too much of a mark up and they can piss off if they expect me to do them any favours. Especially consider the following fact. when you steal "software" of the internet is's not at all like stealing a product like a CD or a Telivision.. because a download doesn't actuall exist. It's just a piece of information. If I have it now, that does not mean that somebody else does not have it, or that sombody has to make another one, or even that somebody had to make it in the first place. There is not one iota of displacement in the world after you download a crack on kazza apart from the person who downloaded it has a better computer. Since I can never afford to buy software like cool edit pro, weather I download it free or not has no effect on the maker at all. If i didn't download it, they would still not get any money out of me... so who really cares? In fact, since I am using their product, it's likley that I am going to engage other people into discussions about the product, and use it with friends, I am going to be activly networking for the company, possibly reccomending it to others, and If I like it im likly to buy the product one day when I do have some money. So, even from the software makers perspective, it's far better that I have the so called "illegal" version of their product then none at all. And finally, anybody that thinks ejhics are a relevant part of the computer industry, especially software, is seriously delusional.