Software piracy: an analysis of protection strategies
Management Science
Preventive and deterrent controls for software piracy
Journal of Management Information Systems
To purchase or to pirate software: an empirical study
Journal of Management Information Systems
Internet portals' strategic utilization of UCC and Web 2.0 Ecology
Decision Support Systems
Pricing schemes for digital content with DRM mechanisms
Decision Support Systems
The Journal of Strategic Information Systems
Optimal software pricing in the presence of piracy and word-of-mouth effect
Decision Support Systems
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The software protection strategy of software developer and the inherent risk to end user in using pirated software are two major factors that affect a user's decision on whether to purchase or pirate a software product. This paper analyzes the optimal protection strategy for software developer in horizontally and vertically differentiated markets. We find that the implementation cost of software protection constitutes the primary factor for software developers to determine their software protection strategies. However, in a vertically differentiated market, the lower quality product should always adopt a non-protection strategy, regardless of the protection implementation cost. In other cases, protection would only be optimal if the protection implementation cost to the software developer is relatively small. These findings are consistent with anecdotal evidence.