You could only steal from Bill if he actually sold the damn things. ;-)
Yes, of course. But that just ties back into my position that people see it as big guy vs small guy. Bill discontinued the Centaur Professional Overdrive. By the prevailing sense of ethics, that would me it's now fair game for cloning. But yet people still get fired up that there are guys out there cloning this now-discontinued circuit. So it's NOT about a given pedal not being available. It's about the "small guy" getting a bit more bias (har-har) than the big guys.
Muffs are so insanely inconsistent that god knows what it's going to sound like.
See, I see the opposite. There's so much feedback built in to the Muff that you can just about throw any parts in there and it will still sound like a Muff. Different strokes, I guess.
I guess I can sum it up as "if you are gonna steal, do it from the best, but put something of yourself into it and make it your own". 
That said, I definitely reserve the right to express some disgust with well known boutique companies who mercilessly clone their peers
I guess I wasn't really talking about *your* PCBs being used so much as cloning in general. I'm definitely in the "make your own shit" camp when it comes to taking your pedals pro. And honestly, I can't think of anything more boring than straight-up cloning any given circuit. So we are in agreement all around.

I don't see it as a big guy vs. little guy debate, I see it as an undercutting issue and that's where I draw my moral line.
Well, as you've already pointed out, that's just business. I'll bet that in many areas of your own purchasing, you go with the undercutter rather than the original. I don't know anybody that pays as much as possible for everything they buy. I buy store-brand medication, crackers, soda, deli meats/cheeses, etc. It's cheaper than the big-name brand, and as far as I'm concerned, it's practically identical. We all do it. And I don't see why pedals should be a special case with a special set of ethics. But, I can see where some people would feel that way.
Granted, I don't necessarily like when any given company is a total chicken-hawk on other people's circuits. But it's business, and there's nothing inherently unethical in such tactics. If you stand still, you're dead. You have to keep moving if you're an innovator. Copycats can sit on their fat asses and wait, but innovators have to keep moving forward. It might not be nice, but it's just how it is.
Part for part clones aren't exactly ok with me from big companies, but if you can take a rat and improve it, or remove/improve the buffer in a TS and offer that with some different clipping configs, that's enough to set your product apart.
I see that kind of thing as a slightly modified copy of the original, and not a new product. But I also see nothing unethical about selling such things. It's just not very creative. In my opinion, of course.
