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MS Zone Users Must Use Passport Accounts
pathos writes: "CNet reports in this article that Microsoft, in its continued obsession to get everyone and his/her mother to be a registered Passport user, forced all of it's MS Zone gaming site users (including players of 'Asheron's Call') to open accounts in Passport in order to keep using the service... too bad that a bug with their .NET deployment kept many users not being able to access the service..." Of course, if you run the hotel, you get to say who uses the pool ...
Wouldn't be amusing if somebody registerred a generic account and released the name/password onto the public?
Maybe when MS sees 4 million people logged on as $L4$hd0t it'll realize that the people don't want to be uniquely identified in EVERYTHING they do.
"Derp de derp."
Zone is different in that we still have our Zone names. Now I'm fortunate enough to have to remember one for the .Net Passport, one to associate my Zone name to it (once its associated, its just window dressing), and a different name for my Hotmail account.
Through the beauty (ha!) of .net, I now have 4 passport logins, so that my hotmail / msn messanger account is in no way attached to my Asheron's Call account (which has a credit card connected to it) or my ISDN account (I used to be a M$ admin in a former life), or my regular Zone account.
The beauty of it all is that NOONE can easily get into games - Again Microsuck underestimated the load that thousands of players would have on NT servers. Poor Microsuck. I'm writing them for a credit to my account. Bastages.
Clinton made me a Republican. Bush made me a Libertarian. Trump is making me question reality.
The MSN gaming zone is a microsoft site. I can see why Microsoft wants one universal system like passport to use for their various sites (MSDN switched a while ago). It saves them support costs in the long run. I'm also not sure how AC players lost any privacy through this move. Microsoft already had the credit card info from the previous zone accounts. It would be nice if Microsoft would accept some other form of payment other than credit cards for AC.
I thought you weren't allowed to use a monopoly in one area to create a monopoly in another area?
How is it that Microsoft is able to take it's monopoly in Office Suites and require you to create a Passport account in order to register them? Isn't that just creating a monopoly in online Registration?
Once everyone has been forced to register their Office and Windows with Passport, why whould they bother to register with another service? It is just like bundling the browser, only this time they are bundling the online registration.
It's crap of the highest order. It is even worse than the monopoly movie theatres have on food and drink. They state that you cannot bring in outside food or drink and make you pay extortionist prices for the crap that they do offer. It is not a free choice, in the sense that I went there for the movie, not food, but if I want food with my movie I have to pay out the whazoo. This would only be fair if I had the choice of brining in outside food and drink.
Same thing for amusement park food pricing.
So when I do not agree with terms of service of Passport, can I return Asheron's call since I cannot play it now? I want my money refunded.
If programs would be read like poetry, most programmers would be Vogons.
I agree, I try to avoid using microsoft software as much as possible, but perhaps taking this a step further would be more useful. The fact of the matter is that the average person won't boycott microsoft for various reasons. What we need to do is help average computer users learn why they should boycott microsoft and given them what they need to do it.
What does this translate into? Helping people learn other operating systems. Contributing to software projects that improve the usability of those other operating systems. This does not mean going out a proseletyzing and shouting "Windows sucks!" That sort of approach just makes you look arrogant and turns people off. Until we can get the masses on board, a boycott is nearly useless.
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Really? Do you want one key to open all your doors. Do you need the same level of security for advert laden email as you do for real identity protection? Sometimes seperation is a good idea. Sometimes it happens because you bought everyone and were too dumb to fix things as you did it.
Logic asside, if they do it you would hope that they could use something that worked (what is it, Kerebos?). They has proven incapable of protecting anything, from credit card info to Hotmail to individual PCs. Who would trust them as they move all their services to the system first used for Hotmail that has been broken already? They should realize that this is just one more reason not to do business with Micro~.
M$ is evil but, as usual, they are not very good at it.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
All of us who do not like Microsoft obviously do not want .NET and passport to prevail. We have a shot against .NET because there are many alternatives coming out. However, there is no technology competing with passport right now. Microsoft is forcing people who want to use their services to sign on.
.NET servers.
Let's consider for a moment how Microsoft has tried to take on the instant messenger market. They've bundled MSN messenger with Windows XP, but many people already have been using ICQ or AIM for years. They won't bother signing up for MSN messenger because they wouldn't be able to talk to their buddies on the other services. But with Passport, there is no alternative around. Sure people may reluctantly sign up for it, but once they have it, they've already gone through the painful process of giving away information. Now they'll be more likely to use other passport services.
But we don't have a good competitor for passport because close to 100% of the slashdot readers, and *nix people in general, don't like the idea of passport. If we don't like the idea, then we won't bother implementing it. Maybe there should be a movement for a competitor to passport. You don't have to use it immediately, or at all. I highly doubt Bill Gates has his credit card number sitting out on those oh so vulnerable