I'd like to hear of other people's experience regarding the JWs inclination to pirating software, music, films.
This of course is relative to your country. Because I live in a relatively poor country, the rate of piracy is extremely high, individuals practically never buy software, music and films are bought now and then. This of course is against the law here too.
So what do JWs do? Pirate their ass off. There's absolutely no difference whatsoever between them and those evil worldlies. Because of my knowledge in the IT field I was asked by several people in the congregation, including elders, the PO, and the CO too to help them out with their PC. None of them had one single licensed software on their personal machine.
Because I'm a software developer I understand if everyone was pirating I would be out of job, so I buy most of the software I need, or find free alternatives. In a casual talk with a JW I mentioned I bought Windows Vista, and he looked at me with big eyes: "I never met anyone who bought Windows for his home PC!" (and no, that's not because JWs use Linux...)
The funny thing is the Society doesn't care. There was a QFR about software piracy in the w01 2/15. Guess what? In the version published here, that QFR was missing! It was replaced with some generic article. The Society knows JWs are breaking the law, and doesn't care.
The JWs know they're breaking the law, and what do they do? Rationalize... They usually say "well, those prices are not for us anyway, we have low income..." or "the price of software is actually included in the price of hardware and/or CDs". The law is for suckers. Now the thing is many of these people who complain about the price, have super computers of the last generation, spend hundreds of dollars each year to keep up with the most modern IT equipment. Not to mention there are many free alternatives too...