File-sharing Felon Forced to Use Windows

Man must either ditch Linux or ditch his computer
By Sam Biddle,  Newser Staff
Posted Aug 24, 2007 6:36 PM CDT
File-sharing Felon Forced to Use Windows
McCausland pleaded guilty in 2006 to two copyright-related charges over the uploading of Star Wars: Episode III to the internet. Now, terms of his supervised computer usage, he argues, fall into the cruel and unusual.    (Shutterstock.com)

An individual convicted of operating an illegal BitTorrent site shut down by the FBI will be forced to either make the switch from Linux to Windows or give up his computer altogether, ZDNet reports. Scott McCausland had previously been a user of the Ubuntu OS, a popular open-source Linux variant, with which his probation-mandated monitoring software isn't compatible.

He and his attorney will fight the decision. "It isn't the fact that I have to be monitored that bothers me, it is the fact that I have to restructure my life. . . purchase software while I am currently unemployed and relatively unemployable with the two felonies that they gave me," he laments. "It is just a ridiculous situation." (More Linux stories.)

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