You'd be a bit foolish to be gigging with a cracked copy of Ableton.


1. It could f*ck up at any time.

Seriously - no matter how solid you think it is, programmers are crafty f*ckers, and the stuff they build into their software to make it hard for you to use it illegally is insanely complicated and often very effective.

See how hard it can be just to make a computer behave as expected? See what a miracle it is that computers can achieve the things they do, through the millions of tiny calculations? Now imagine how easy it is for someone who's competent to break it from the inside if they so desire...


2. They'll be watching.

It's rumoured heavily that Ableton aren't above sending representatives out to gigs / club nights where an artist is billed as doing an Ableton set / live PA, to check their licences are all in order. It's as quick as them checking your serial number against their database, and if you refuse they can get a court order.

....

Besides, those people at Ableton are legends - they've put together one of the most brilliant pieces of software to emerge in the last few years, and they deserve the credit and the profit.