EmulationCentral wrote:Either that, or a legit disk that the PearPC user has for their own Mac, or has borrowed from someone with a Mac, is used, which is surely also technically illegal, as usually you're only allowed to install software once at any one time (or is it OK to install 2 copies on 2 PCs which are both used by you only, and never at the same time)?
I'm always surprised that Mac OS X doesn't have any anti-piracy features, like product keys, activation or checking upon updating like Windows has and increases with every version (starting with product keys in Windows 95) - do Apple just care less about piracy than Microsoft, or is it that Mac users tend to want to support Apple more than Windows users want to support MS, so there is much less of a piracy problem?
Using one disc copy on two machines is illegal in the USA. Some companies licence their software for more than one machine so long as it's only actually in use on one machine at a time, but not Apple. It's not illegal in some other countries, though. I specifically bought a copy of OS X for PearPC (I don't have a real Mac, alas).
I think Apple knows that piracy is impossible to stop in the long run, unlike some other companies. They just make it harder to run the software on other brands of hardware by technical means. The thing is, Apple makes most of its money on hardware sales, not software. So they are more concerned about the piracy of the OS on non-Apple hardware than they are on Apple hardware. With PearPC, they know that it will never be able to truly compete with real Apple hardware, because by the time PCs are fast enough to run OS X at near-PowerPC speeds, the PowerPC line will be dead and the Apple hardware will all be running on the same technology as the PCs -- and much faster than PearPC anyway. But PearPC does give Apple some extra exposure to PC users, which is good for Apple. Many of the people here have bought real Macs after using OS X in PearPC (I can't afford a real Mac, or I would).
