Dear physics computing reps,
The saga of the Mathematica continues (see below). I had a pretty low
response to my emails about this in November so please take the time to
respond this as I need these figures when college reopens.
What I need to know is:
1. How many mathematica licenses your group needs
2. How many (shared and individual) mathematica licenses you believe
that your group already has access to.
All the best and Happy Christmas to all,
david
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: FW: Imperial College and Wolfram Research - Mathematica Piracy
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 2009 16:19:05 +0000
From: Spirling, Arthur G <a.spirling(a)imperial.ac.uk>
To: Haigh, Joanna D <j.haigh(a)imperial.ac.uk>, Laptev, Ari
<a.laptev(a)imperial.ac.uk>
CC: Colling, David J <d.colling(a)imperial.ac.uk>, Moore, Dan R
<dan.moore(a)imperial.ac.uk>, Cummins, Bob D <r.cummins(a)imperial.ac.uk>,
Allatt, Paul <p.allatt(a)imperial.ac.uk>
Dear All,
Despite asking several times, Wolfram have not provided details of PCs
allegedly holding unauthorised copies of Mathematica but have instead
sent the e-mail below. I have responded as you can see and will be
taking legal advice in the new year.
In the meantime ICT is doing a proactive search to see if we can find
where these copies might be. This is not easy, and for those MS and
Linux PCs/Macs , particularly those owned by research groups, that
never access the IC domain, impossible. It may be necessary to visit
each machine and check them out by hand.
In the new year it is essential that we determine how many licensed
copies are needed in Physics and Mathematics and if the license renewal
we have undertaken is not adequate adjust it.
Regards
Arthur
*From:* Spirling, Arthur G
*Sent:* 23 December 2009 15:37
*To:* 'Eric Schacht'
*Cc:* Rector; Neil Thomas; Hancock, Jon B; Allatt, Paul
*Subject:* RE: Imperial College and Wolfram Research - Mathematica Piracy
Dear Mr Schacht,
I am in receipt of your e-mail dated 22^nd December and have passed it
to our legal advisors for comment.
I am disappointed that I have had no formal response to the four e-mails
(dated 15^th October, 28^th October, 5^th November, 13^th November
2009), that I have sent to your organisation requesting details of the
computers alleged to be holding unauthorised copies of Wolfram software.
Your failure to provide this information has hindered me in carrying out
my College’s instructions which , based on a long standing College IT
policy, are to delete all unauthorised copies of software. As soon as
you provide the information I will take immediate steps to delete the
copies.
The College is now closed until 4^th January 2010 so I regret you will
not hear further from us until after that date.
Best wishes for a very happy Christmas.
Regards
Arthur Spirling
* Arthur Spirling
* Director of ICT
* Information and Communication Technologies,
* Room 441, Sherfield Building,
* Imperial College of Science Technology and Medicine, London SW7 2BX,
* Int 46930 Dial 020 7594 6930 E-mail a.spirling(a)imperial.ac.uk
<mailto:a.spirling@imperial.ac.uk>
*From:* Eric Schacht [mailto:erics@wolfram.com]
*Sent:* 22 December 2009 16:17
*To:* Spirling, Arthur G
*Cc:* Rector; Neil Thomas
*Subject:* Imperial College and Wolfram Research - Mathematica Piracy
December 22, 2009
*SENT BY POST AND EMAIL*
Arthur Spirling, Director of ICT (a.spirling(a)imperial.ac.uk
<mailto:a.spirling@imperial.ac.uk>)
Imperial College London
This letter is in follow-up to the many discussions concerning the
pervasive software piracy Wolfram Research has identified at Imperial
College. It is sent in the spirit of our mutual desire to rectify the
situation. We have previously identified a sampling of the pirated
licenses, and your internal review revealed those, in fact, to be
pirated licenses. Furthermore, it is significant that we were first
alerted to this (possibly longstanding) piracy by a whistleblower, a
senior employee internal to Imperial.
Our demand of Imperial is that Imperial take immediate action to address
the other 280+ illegal copies of /Mathematica/ we have identified to be
in use at Imperial. We are not able to provide specific information on
these users based on the strict UK and EU protocols and regulations
concerning data protection and privacy. However if the Imperial
investigation is not able to provide answers and to remedy the
situation, we will have no choice but to turn over the information we
have to the appropriate law enforcement agency(s). It would seem as
though that course would be one of last resort for both of our
organizations.
We would like an update as to the progress of the internal Imperial
investigation into the piracy issues we’ve made you aware of, and to
have an affirmative statement from you that no staff members have been
advertizing or in any way promoting this or similar software piracy.
Additionally, we will require an authoritative statement as to the other
software piracy investigations ongoing at Imperial. We are concerned
that some of the hostility we have experienced from various factions of
Imperial over the course of our relationship has spawned or nurtured
this rampant activity with the Mathematica software.
The clear alternative to either initiating a billing against Imperial
for the illegal use, or to turning the matter over to the authorities,
is to construct a licensing scheme between our organizations which would
enable the obviously widespread /Mathematica/ use at Imperial to be
properly licensed under the umbrella of an unlimited seat Site License.
Wolfram Research stands ready to offer a pricing package on same terms
as to other similar institutions and strongly urges Imperial to consider
this action to mitigate against the illegal use that is prevalent at the
College.
Eric L. Schacht
General Counsel
Wolfram Research
cc. Sir Roy Anderson (rector(a)imperial.ac.uk
<mailto:rector@imperial.ac.uk>)