Microsoft Runs Out Of Windows XP Family Licenses

TrAvELAr writes: "'There is a backlog,' says Mark Croft, lead product manager for Windows XP. According to this article on IDG, Microsoft has underestimated it's popularity of the new Windows XP family license. In an effort to slow piracy within single households, Microsoft has introduced the family license which will allow the user to install multiple copies of it's Windows XP operating system at a slightly discounted price of a $10 savings. Croft also states that the savings reflects the cost of Microsoft not having to produce another disc."

Comments

Ooh, Ten Dollars.

[The Raven]

I don't think a ten dollar savings is going to stave off piracy on a 90+ dollar OS. Leaving off production costs is the START of sane pricing, not the END of a plan to give a price break for multiple purchases.

Re:Ooh, Ten Dollars.

[guusbosman]

I assume this 10$ discount wouldn't make a huge difference for many people deciding to buy or not buy. However, Microsoft makes a more 'friendly' impression offering a license like this one. I think there are many people who actually don't mind paying for licenses, and they would get a good feeling: 'wow, I just saved 10 dollar!'. So it's a matter of customer friendliness, not so much as anti-piracy policy.

So What?

[m_evanchik]

Why is everyone always bitching when Microsoft tries to milk its customers? The more people get milked, the more they consider their alternatives.

Let Microsoft double its price for the second installation and make software piracy a capital offense. I assure you that would increase the use of open-source software.

licensing poorly thought out

[47PHA60]

I am not sure why they could not could not have tied the activation scheme into a credit card system to allow you to purchase additional licenses at install time.

Just tell the SSL web page how many computers you want to install on, pay $10-$15 for each additional license (not $80), and receive an activation code that you transmit to the central server each time you install on a new machine (and will work up to the number of licenses you bought).

I seems foolish to charge $90 for the upgrade, then another $80 for each additional, since MS only needs to sell one CD per household. With the lower price, MS still makes more money than they would off of a pirated copy, and the customer gets a licensing cost that is only slightly more torturous than the MacOS or Linux.

Regardless of what one thinks of MS' predatory behavior towards other software/hardware makers, it's in any company's interest to carefully think out and plan their consumer sales channel. MS' scheme looks pretty half-baked, indicating that it waqs not well-planned, and that nobody who actually works for the company has ever actually been a customer, and seen what it's like.

PR Stunt?

[pen]

Does it seem weird to anyone else that MS would have a limited number of licenses on an OS? Isn't this just a serial number generated by a script/program within a few seconds?

"Wow, Windows XP is so popular, Microsoft ran out of licenses!"

Not $10 off $99. $10 off $199.

[kfg]

The family pack license is ONLY available on the full retail version of Windows XP. It cannot be purchased for the upgrade version.

Thus, to buy a family pack for two seats you must spend a minimum of $388.

Compare this to buying two over the counter upgrades for $198.

The family license itself, and the so called demand for it, is a pure marketing and PR ploy. It wasn't too hard for sales to be greater than expected, MS didn't expect too many people to actually go for this bugger at all!

Also note that demand isn't *consumer* demand, it's *retailer* demand. No telling how many of these are sitting on back room shelves, unasked for, and unloved, by actual retail customers.

As someone else has already pointed out The Reg has a good article on this.

KFG