Honestly and truthfully, piracy never really hurt the likes of Microsoft. Despite all the dodgy copies of Windows, William J Gates the Third Junior is one of the worlds wealthiest men and Microsoft is a huge Global Business. Sony benefited from piracy to get the Playstation into the market using by using a technology that allowed the disks to be copied as opposed to a cartridge that couldn't.
Small companies have the most to lose from piracy in the early stages, yet piracy at some point has helped companies to get a bigger market share. It is all a question of balance, and lets face it, the distribution channels used by pirates are way more efficient than the "legal" ones. There are lessons to be learned by both sides of the argument. Were things not so damned expensive and a more realistic price charged, perhaps people would be more likely to buy.
