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A story of MATLAB piracy

I would just like to share a story, and probably an opinion as well. When I was doing my STEM undergraduate degree a couple of years ago, I took a course in which I had to use MATLAB. I won’t disclose too much information, but it was a course involving computation.

Well, we (the students) weren’t given a student/institutional license of any sort, but the course coordinator still insisted on using MATLAB. We took it as an implicit instruction to “somehow” obtain MATLAB. In the end, one guy in our class pirated it and distributed it the whole class.

Before that though, I did approach my course coordinator, asking them if it’s possible to use other software like GNU Octave, which is a clone of MATLAB. Personally I think it should also possible to use any other programming language like Python for example, since the important part is the computation part, in my opinion. They refused any discussion and did not even consider alternatives, instead basically forcing us to “obtain” MATLAB. How else? Well.

As I have said, we all pirated it in the end.

I did something quite interesting though, which is that for every quiz, assignment, and projects that we had, I’ll run the same exact MATLAB code on GNU Octave, to see if it’s compatible. And it is. It works flawlessly. There’s only one function that GNU Octave didn’t support back the (this was a couple of years ago), and even then, it wasn’t an essential feature, you could use other software for that function as well.

By the end of that semester, I had compiled almost all input/output of the MATLAB code alongside its GNU Octave’s counterpart, to demonstrate that we didn’t need to pirate MATLAB to get through this undergraduate course.

Regrettably though, I didn’t follow through. So sad!

Do you think piracy is justified in this case?

0421008445828ceb46f496700a5fa6 ,
@0421008445828ceb46f496700a5fa6@kbin.social avatar

The biggest downside I've seen with gnu octave is the exact same code will execute much slower

mafbar OP ,

I’ve seen people mention this before. This will be troublesome if you require massive computing speed, otherwise it is still acceptable, since you’re basically using a MATLAB clone.

dewritoninja ,

Not from the US am from Ecuador . In my numerical analysis class my professor showd us how to pirate mathlab the first class and gave us a bunch of pdfs so we wouldn’t have to buy any books. I already had my bf’s uni’s licence so i didn’t do that but I did dabble with octave a bit on my Linux laptop. Piracy is so widespread in public universities here that nobody thinks about it as being wrong. Personally I always believe that piracy is the tool for the democratization of knowledge. I wouldn’t know half of the stuff I know if it wasn’t for pirated books. It’s literally the reason a lot of us in south America can scape poverty.

Chadus_Maximus ,

Based eastern European professors do the same. Doubly hilarious because there was some freshman who was afraid of being kicked out of he were to be caught pirating by probably the same professor who showed the art of pirating for those who don’t know how.

I showed the professor how to use Jackett so that was neat.

mafbar OP ,

Piracy is so widespread in public universities here that nobody thinks about it as being wrong.

That’s interesting to me. So it has spread towards the public institution level, where many or most people think it’s just normal.

It’s literally the reason a lot of us in south America can scape poverty.

Probably one of the biggest examples of justified piracy. I’m not sure if it’s fully justifiable, but it is really hard to deny its benefits. One thing though, piracy as a means may be justified, but I’m unsure if it’s for the ends.

Out of curiosity, what is your field of work?

randy ,

From a quick search, a MATLAB student license is $50 (USD, probably), which is less than most textbooks but still not nothing. Whether piracy is justified or not, I just want to point out that this is how they get you. Microsoft gives cheap Office licenses to schools and Adobe turns a blind eye to amateur piracy of Photoshop because they know that getting you comfortable with their software early means you’re more likely to pay to keep using it professionally later. I don’t know if MathWorks had a hand in the MATLAB requirement (I would bet it was just a prof who wants to stick with what they know), but good on you for trying to push for alternatives and testing against Octave.

fkn ,

Most schools that require Matlab in the US provide it for free to their students via their student license servers… It’s practically free for the university if they have any sort of research program at all.

Although, this might have changed… During my time a rotating student license only cost the university like 15 bucks and the university only needed enough for one class at a time usually.

iconic_admin ,

I couldn’t agree more, this is how they get you. One of the things I miss the most about being a student is access to software. Auto desk gives you completely free access to their entire catalog as long as you’re a student. A professional license for AutoCAD or Revit will set you back $2000 a year or more, every year. However, If you work for a company they will probably pick that up but if you’re a freelancer or even if you work for a small firm, that licensing fee can be really costly.

minimar ,

Piracy is always justified

mafbar OP ,

What do you say to people that maintains the POV that it’s theft?

QuarterlySushi ,
@QuarterlySushi@kbin.social avatar

Theft is always justified, then, clearly!

minimar ,

I call them a cuck and walk away

Umbra ,

Of course it's justified. If anything, your faculty should have provided the software for free!

krellor ,

I used to manage site licenses for a large university and these software companies really rake you over the coals. For example, Adobe and MatLab wouldn't license software for just lab computers or to a subset of the student population. They required we purchase total headcount licenses that covered everyone at the institution. In the case of MatLab you also pick out about a dozen of the toolbox add-ons, so it becomes a difficult task of getting the faculty to rank sort all of the packages.

We ultimately ended up purchasing the licenses for the institution but I can understand an institution saying they can't afford it and passing it on to the students in the classes that need it.

30021190 ,

Thanks for this, I will look at deploying Octave on our systems alongside MATLAB. I was unaware they were the same/similar package (I don’t use the software, only deploy it) and had never been asked for it.

BautAufWasEuchAufbaut ,
@BautAufWasEuchAufbaut@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

For differences, see: wiki.octave.org/Differences_between_Octave_and_Ma…

mtcerio ,

Thanks for your story. I used both MATLAB and Octave, and while the language syntax is the same and most of the built in functions and basic toolbox functions are similar, Octave come short as soon as you start using graphics and more advanced toolboxes.

BautAufWasEuchAufbaut ,
@BautAufWasEuchAufbaut@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Can you elaborate? I looked at wiki.octave.org/Differences_between_Octave_and_Ma… and most stuff seemed minor.

Thwompthwomp ,

Not the op, but syntactly they are ver similar. And so for minor things like looping over a matrix or making a plot or some calculations, It’ll be the same. Your intro numerical course will not really know the difference. It’s when you get to the packages that there’s massive divergence. Matlab really sells packages that have all sorts of libraries and gui things built in to do some advanced calculations or pre-Canned tool. They also change the package syntax from time to time. For things like signal processing or filter design, the tools reign and most scripts depend on them. Octave has a totally difference package ecosystem and syntax for loading packages.

So for basic things, you can go between the two fairly easily. For anything advanced or for 90% of scripts you download from papers, octave will not work.

mafbar OP ,

Yeah, I imagine this’d be the case. Especially since MATLAB is designed for heavyweight computation in engineering industries, not merely simple looping or graphs. I’ll be honest and say that I neither use MATLAB nor GNU Octave since my work does not require it; I was just recalling a particular story during my student days that I thought would be interesting to share. For such heavy, niche and always evolving set of toolboxes and libraries, we can reasonable expect no open-source alternative will be able to “replace” MATLAB in any meaningful sense, it’s just too powerful and big.

I’m mostly okay with that though. These sorts of work are done in institutions or industries that can and should be able to afford them. It’s the reason why I don’t reasonably expect GIMP to overthrow Photoshop or Kdenlive/Openshot/Shotcut to overthrow Premiere Pro, unless somehow massive funds are channeled to their development. Rare cases like Linux or Blender or Firefox do happen, but they have massive backings.

mafbar OP ,

You’re welcome!

I’d imagine that for some high-level computational work, GNU Octave may not fare that well. For an introductory computational course, I think it’s more than enough, probably? It reminds me of many other open-source projects - they may not be up to par when it comes to their proprietary counterpart.

puckpuckpuckow ,

deleted_by_author

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    mafbar OP ,

    What do you say to people whose position is “you are stealing their work; nothing is free”?

    elmicha ,

    You already pointed out that there is a free alternative, so anyone who says “nothing is free” is a bit mentally challenged.

    mafbar OP ,

    Yea of course but we’re talking about piracy, so when we pirate proprietary software, they’ll of object with “nothing is free, you gotta pay”. It’s either we pay for that, or fundamentally uphold piracy as some means or some ends, or use and support open-source software. Not a lot of choices, really.

    vin ,

    Umm actually, lots of things are free. Those who did the work got paid a salary anyway.

    puckpuckpuckow ,

    deleted_by_author

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    mafbar OP ,

    I think I get that as well. I used to talk quite a bit about open-source to my friends, but looking back, it seemed quite preachy (maybe because I was quite young at the time), and it never really changed anything. This is especially the case since open-source (or free software) is a philosophical approach to technology that many people might be unfamiliar with or simply don’t care about. I just simply use open-source software, supports devs/foundations, and only will talk the necessary bits if someone asks me about it.

    PixelOfLife ,
    @PixelOfLife@lemmy.world avatar

    If paying isn’t owning, piracy isn’t stealing.

    steeph ,
    @steeph@todon.eu avatar

    @PixelOfLife @mafbar Copying data never equals stealing. Using that term is either laziness or falling for the manipulative spin of intellectual property holders.

    mafbar OP ,

    That’s an interesting perspective actually, since it gets into all sorts of weirdness and trickiness of the intellectual property concept. Perhaps because of two factors: (i) we treat digital data as fundamentally different from physical objects, and (ii) theft intuitively implies that the original object is no longer with the owner, but with piracy, you’re simply making a copy-and-paste, rather than a cut-and-paste.

    sab ,

    In the end it’s all just a linguistics game though - you’re profiting off the work somebody did, without paying the rate they charge for it.

    But that’s exactly the kind of answer you’ll get in a community focused on piracy. Most people wouldn’t be here if they hadn’t already justified piracy.

    mafbar OP ,

    Yeah, the theft comes from stealing someone’s labour, rather than their products. But it depends on the situation though.

    desconectado ,

    I hear that everywhere in here, but it doesn’t make any sense. Do you own the electricity network? Do you own the maid that clean your house? Do you own the room in the hotel? Is it justified not to pay for those services?

    fabian ,
    @fabian@lemmy.world avatar

    When you steal electricity, someone else can’t use it, the capacity is consumed. When you won’t pay the maid, he can’t get his labor and time back to use elsewhere. When you squat in a hotel room, someone else can’t use it and it needs to be cleaned afterwards.

    When you “buy” a piece of software or a digital copy of media, you’re really just renting the license to use it as long as the company that rented it you feels like it.

    The difference is that when you make a copy of something digital, the original is still completely intact. The thing is not consumed, you can copy that file 10,000 times on your own machine and see for yourself.

    desconectado ,

    Yeah, but that piece of software didn’t came up to existence out of nowhere. Someone invested time, or paid for infrastructure to complete it. When you steal electricity, most of the cost is because of the infrastructure you used, which you will never own anyway.

    I agree information should be free, as long as the generator of that information agrees with it.

    Saying that, I still pirate things, not because I think I’m entitled to do it, that’s a very poor excuse.

    fabian , (edited )
    @fabian@lemmy.world avatar

    You are right, of course, the people who labored to make the things should be compensated if they want to be.

    What’s at issue is that if you own something you can do as you please with it. Once the electricity has been delivered I can charge batteries with it or power lights or give it to my neighbor for free if we agree to do so. I should be able to buy a piece of software and back it up or give it to my neighbor, or any random person I choose if I own it. I would buy much more media if I could just own it and do as I please with it, but because of DRM and the greed of companies that distribute the media most times you can only rent it. Piracy is in resurgence because it is becoming so difficult and expensive to just pay for the media.

    I pay for Netflix, so I think I am entitled to whatever is on the service. If I have a copy of a Netflix show on my hard drive in 4k, am I taking something from Netflix? What about when I watch that show in VLC because I’m on an airplane? What about when I let the man next to me have a copy so he can watch it on his device?

    While I have plenty of disposable income these days to spend on media, they simply do not sell the product that I want, and if I did not have the other means of accessing that content I doubt I would pay for Netflix.

    –

    I hope the tone of my comments do not come across as negative, I am trying to illustrate my thoughts on the subject, not argue, and I find questions more illuminating than just explanations.

    –

    edit: i guess the OP was about software and this rant doesnt really apply

    Software-wise I dont pirate that because I try to only use open source software, for mostly the same reasons of disliking DRM and prefering to own things.

    InternetCitizen2 ,

    Paying for things these days does not grant ownership either way.

    PipedLinkBot ,

    Here is an alternative Piped link(s): piped.video/watch?v=DEP_7_gx6M8&

    Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.

    I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.

    stebo02 ,
    @stebo02@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

    not blaming op but the institution should provide licenses to the students or propose free alternatives if they exist

    hydroel ,

    I see no reason to use Matlab in education nowadays: both Octave and Python provide as many features, are as easy to use, and free. The teacher could have verified or made his class accessible through Octave with minimal effort, as OP pointed out. But they wouldn’t be bothered and required all the students in their class to buy a 70€ license each.

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