During the period between 1998 and 2002, pirated software users declined abruptly from 3000 to 1000,
while authorized users increased sharply from 2000 to more than 8000.
Several reasons can account for this phenomenon. Compared with pirated software, authorized software
can guarantee both high quality and good aftersale service. Apart from that, authorized software is
becoming cheaper and cheaper--more and more people can afford them as a result.
However, there are still a number of people who buy pirated software, generally for two reasons. On
the one hand, they take it for granted that pirated products are cheaper than authorized ones. On
the other hand, they don't realize that their behavior will do great harm to the whole software ind-
ustry and national economy.