Can we reduce piracy by having "morality reminders" in software? For example, every once in a while, you could ask the user whether they paid for the app. If they did not, you might tell them that piracy is not all that common and that most people are actually more honest than they are.
I was employed by a company that makes bible software, and they did exactly this. Very rarely, while the user was reading the bible using this software, it would pop up a dialog box reminding the user how wrong it is to copy software illegally. They actually got people calling them and apologizing, apparently in real agony over their sin. It must have seemed like a message from god.
Like with many other measures to prevent piracy, the crackers would find ways to remove the morality reminders and the paying customers would get stuck with them.
Wow, honestly I was just going to watch bits and pieces of this video to "check out" the topic.
Instead I got sucked in pretty quickly with his stories/experiments/results.
It is fascinating that Dan Ariely studies society to the degree that he does. Kind of comforting.
* Most people cheat a little and more often compared to cheating a lot and less often.
* When reminded of morality, people cheat less.
* The greater the distance from cheating to reward the more likely people are to cheat.