Microsoft brought back Copy Protection

During the early days of the PCs in the 1980s, software manufacturers battled with consumers over copy protection.  Floppy drives and the 5.25″ floppy made it possible to very easily create illegal copies of software. This resulted in a boom in training books that were targeted to buyers of pirated software. The leading word processing software, the application that invented the term “WYSIWYG” was called Wordstar. Wordstar rapidly grew into the leading and best-selling word processor of the early 1980s. And as it grew in popularity, many users were also copying the software.

Wordstar decided to copy-protected their product just as WordPerfect was gaining in popularity. WordPerfect was shipping without copy protection and ultimately became the leading word In the Lotus 1-2-3 followed suit and also abandoned copy protection. In the highly competitive software world of the 1980s, the most successful companies were learning that copy protection was bad for business. Wordstar disappeared many years ago.

Stu Kushner

Stu Kushner began his career at Boeing Commercial Aircraft and then on to Hexcel and Case/Rixon where he specialized in CAD/CAM (computer design and robotics). In 1986, he started Progressive Office. The earliest years were about networking small businesses and providing IT support. But since 2008, the company has concentrated exclusively on providing office network cabling solutions.

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