Nigel Goodwin said:
'Pirate' is rather the wrong word, they include the software that MicroChip have available on their website for free download - which hardly constitutes piracy?.
from the MPLAB license agreement:
"You may not reverse engineer (by disassembly, decompilation, translation, or otherwise) Software and
may not copy or reproduce all or any portion of Software, except to the extent that such activity is specifically allowed by this agreement or expressly permitted by applicable law notwithstanding the foregoing limitations."
... reading the rest of the document, in no place does it specifically grant permission to copy or reproduce the firmware included with the MPLab ICD 2.
I agree that Microchip is hardly being harmed by persons redistributing the firmware for PIC programmers, as you say, it just means more people out there using PIC microcontrollers.
However, that excuse is often used to defend software piracy, such as the unofficial policy of Microsoft in the early 90's, they didn't care if you bought or stole Windows, another windows user is all they wanted to see.
Just because we feel some action might be benefiting a company, that doesn't make it right to violate a license agreement the company put forth in good faith when they provided the software.