In message <20020321172610.GC6666@widomaker.com>, Charles Shannon Hendrix write
s:
>On Thu, Mar 21, 2002 at 09:07:17AM +0100, Wojciech Puchar wrote:
>
>> it's not funny. it's true. New Polish law says VAT must be payed from
>> every software licence, including that free. if free it will be 22% of
>> it's hypothetical value (ROTFL).
>
>I've heard of things like that being threatened in the USA too.
>
>I worked for a company that required you store your software licenses
>and submit them to a committee for approval.
>
>When I handed them the GNU and BSD licenses, they wanted a copy for each
>program in the system.  I said that would be hundreds of licenses and
>they would all be the same (mostly).  They said I had no reason to be
>running a machine with that many programs...
>
>They were unable to understand a license on an unpurchased program.  What
>was worse, was that I had some software with no license at all, and they
>refused to allow it.  I used it anyway, but it was strictly unofficial.

Back in the mists of time, my boss walked into my office and asked me 
where on the disk a particular software package was stored.  I was 
rather perplexed by the request, but he said he wanted to know the 
cylinders and tracks used.  (This was on OS/360.)  I asked why; he 
showed me a metal "asset tracking tag" that the Procurement Office 
insisted be attached to any purchased property...

		--Steve Bellovin, http://www.research.att.com/~smb
		Full text of "Firewalls" book now at http://www.wilyhacker.com