It is great that I have nothing major to correct or edit.  It seems that you like to write editorial stuff.  Care to venture into creative writing or even poetry?  Need to be all well rounded.

Why Piracy Is a Friend To Microsoft?

Microsoft definitely hates piracy. As the world largest software vendor, Microsoft rakes in billions of dollars each year by selling software licenses. Piracy circumvents software copy restrictions, thus let people get software for near-zero cost. Piracy disrupts Microsoft business model and costs the company great losses. It seems the remotest possible that piracy becomes a friend to Microsoft. However, this is true.

First of all, piracy does not always mean revenue loss for Microsoft. In some low-income countries, most people cannot afford expensive software licenses. Even though there is no piracy, the poor people still won't be able to be paying customers to Microsoft. So strictly prohibiting software piracy does not necessarily add new customers to Microsoft.

As for those who cannot afford expensive software, Microsoft basically has two options. Either can they proactively strengthen anti-piracy policy thus push the users over to low-cost / free-of-charge alternative software solutions. Or can they tolerate piracy to some extent in order to foster potential customers and thwart competition. The unique cost structure of software industry allows Microsoft to go for the second option without incurring additional cost. Unlike other physical goods, making a software copy almost costs nothing.

More importantly, piracy generally does more harm to Microsoft competitors than Microsoft. This is because piracy takes out price from the equation during the process that consumers pick up software. For instance, consumers may choose low-cost or free-of-charge word processor over the high-price Microsoft Office Suite in piracy-free markets. In piracy prevailing markets, everything costs the same and Microsoft software becomes the easy choice. Without price as a key differentiator, Microsoft competitors are more vulnerable to piracy.

In summary, piracy is paradoxically both a enemy and a friend to Microsoft. It has been well known about the enemy side. However, it is equally important to understand that piracy can be a friend to Microsoft under some circumstances.