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Microsoft's Guide to Accepting Donated PCs
An anonymous reader links us to Microsoft's Guide to Accepting Donated Computers
for Your School, which contains humorous statements such as
"If a company or individual donates a machine to your school, it must be donated with the operating system that was installed on the PC. "
It's just an amusing little read that basically amounts to keeping the license
with the PC. Also neglects to mention the Naked PC discussed in this slashdot story.
No, but the licence agreement with the copy of Windows that was installed on the PC almost certainly specifies that it can only be used with that PC.
What MS is saying is that it is illegal to buy a PC with, say, Windows 2000 pre-installed, then later give the PC away but keep the copy of Windows 2000. That would be in violation of the terms of the licence.
Now, personally I feel that that's a crock, but that's a discussion for another thread...
they are not requiring them to KEEP the OS, they are requiring that if you have windows 95 installed on it, and you donate the machine, you are donating your copy of windows 95 and can't use it anymore.
MARIJUANA, SHROOMS, X: ONLINE?! - E
Keeping the OS with the machine is the same thing as keeping those tags matresses. They are required to be on there if you are a company that sells matresses, but once an individual buys the matress, they can do whatever they like to the tag. It's their property at that point.
If they then give away or donate the matress, the lack of the tag really doesn't matter.
I'm really curious what law they are referring to when they saw "legal requirement". If they're going to say stuff like that, I'd like to see where it was written. Anyone can just say that something is "legally required". I can say it's "legally required" to mod all my posts up. That don't make it true, tho.
psmylie's dictionary: Godzillion (noun) Any number large enough to destroy Tokyo
I've done work for about half a dozen schools (junior highs and high schools) that have quite substantial commitments to computers in the classroom.
;-)
In my experience, whenever donated computers arrive, that's all that arrives. I've never seen a computer arrive with the documentation that probably accompanied it when it was purchased by the donating company. All you get is the computer and associated peripherals if you're lucky (often they forget to send mice).
At one school, they have about 120 donated PCs, and I think there is maybe half a dozen valid Windows licenses in the whole place. Of course, there are numerous burned copies too, which makes imaging these machines really easy (thank you Norton Ghost).
I find it rather surprising that some enterprising person/persons haven't started to produce an educational Linux distribution... just pile on a lot of idiot proofing
What MS is saying is that it is illegal to buy a PC with, say, Windows 2000 pre-installed, then later give the PC away but keep the copy of Windows 2000.
No. That is not what they are saying. They are saying that you must include the OS that was originally installed on the machine, per this statement on the page: make sure that the hardware donation includes the original operating system software.... it is a legal requirement.
This is a gross overstatement and misleading. If there is a legal burden when selling a computer, it applies to the seller, not the buyer. The buyer has NO idea what was originally on the computer and cannot be expected to know. The buyer never saw the original agreement, let alone clicked on the Accept button. In addition, if the original OS is Linux, BSD or other Free OS, there is no such agreement.
You can read your own motives into this.
Nothing to see here. Move along.
It is a legal requirement that pre-installed operating systems remain with a machine for the life of the machine. If a company or individual donates a machine to your school, it must be donated with the operating system that was installed on the PC.
Which law states this? A state law? Federal law? Decree of the UN?
What if I donate PCs that I built myself without an OS "installed"?
A "legal requirement" sounds very much like a scare tactic. If anything, you'd think they'd want the opposite - they'd want a school to get a bunch of PCs, but then REPURCHASE more Windows licenses 'just to be sure', upping MS' sales.
They pretty much get a sale for every PC in the US now anyway. I'd be interested to know what their license sales are per year vs the number of PCs sold that year. I've a hunch Windows license sales may be higher than PC sales.
creation science book
The Microsoft statement is that the preinstalled OS must remain with the machine throughout its lifetime. This is not true.
It is true that the OEM copy of the OS that came with the new machine is only licensed for use on that machine. Therefore, if someone donates you the machine, but not the OS, then you can't use the OS and neither can they. There is no requirement that the OS stay with the machine, though.
Microsoft is making false claims here in their efforts to simplify the matter.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
Yes, the license agreement of OEM software typically ties it to the hardware it was sold with. In other words, if you buy a PC with Windows XP installed on it, the license says that the copy of Windows XP can only be used on that PC (and the recovery discs tend to "enforce" that too).
This "guide" reverses the statement to say that the hardware is tied to the software. It says that schools should not (the baseless legal threats turn that into a "can not") accept donated computer hardware unless it includes the origial software with accompanying media and documentation.
That is pure shit.
Microsoft does have a program that gives a school a site-license for software upgrades, provided that the systems that they are installed on have a license for the original software. In other words, if the hardware has a license for Windows 98, the school can install their site-licensed Windows 2000 upgrade on it. If the system does not have an existing license, the school can not.
This is pure Microsoft FUD. I actually laughed when I read it the first time. Then I realized that some educator somewhere will read this and actually believe it and get rid of donated computers because of this. Microsoft is not trying to be charitable here by helping to prevent schools from getting into legal trouble. They're trying to take used computers out of schools so that the schools are forced to buy new ones and new Microsoft software licesnes.
but the difference is that if you strip a computer of its preinstalled M$OS, and instead install FreeBSD, then microsoft HAVE some ability to restrict you (the giver) from installing this spare OS on another computer, but they have absolutely NO ability to restrict the recipient from accepting the cleansed computer.
The licence doesn't have to stay with the computer, but it can't be used with any other computers. BIG difference.
Basically, microsoft are completely misrepresenting the burden of copyright verification, hoping (with reason) that educators will be too spineless to question the webpage.
I have a computer with a pre-installed version of Windows. It's a package deal. This Is Significant And Important (TM). I donate the PC to a school. The Windows license must accompany it.
...
I don't know if that is so under US-Law, but in germany software can (still) be "debundled" from a PC, so you can sell your OEM-Windows independent of the computer. All the EULA-stuff simply doesn't apply, since the customer makes his contract when he buys the software, and not when he opens some shrinkwrapped package. Thus the software is covered by basic copyrights (which does well enough IMHO) but no more. AFAIR there was even a court ruling for this, basically saying, that Microsoft has no say in how a software is sold on, once it's sold. There was even a case of an assembler buying used licenses.
Note that the case isn't so easy if you have to fiddle with copyright-protections (like those BIOS-locked HD-recovery w/o proper windowsmedia), but if you have a full windows install disk it shouldn't be a (legal) problem. Another thing is, that Microsoft doesn't really "license" their software here, since then they'd have to guarantee that it works properly (and Microsoft wouldn't want that). I don't know if similar law applies in the US, but then they could always lock the software to the PC and make it a DMCA-case
"By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself." -- Bill Hicks
This is just not true. Not in any way. Right of first sale says I can do ANYTHING i damn well please with a physical item I purchased. If I want to take the computer apart and sell each individual circuit, I can. That includes not including origional license to the OS that came with it.
Lets think about what a "license" is. A license gives the licensee the right to copy the software. Simple, eh. There are two things to note here. If the owner NEVER copies the software, they have never been bound to a license terms (in theory anyhow). The ONLY time a user copies the software is on the OS install. If the user, as per the License Agreement, decides that they no longer accept the license agreement, it is null and void.
Meaning quite simply, there is no necissity for me to ship my PC with the original software, as per the right of first sale. Even if somehow the License "forces" the individual to transfer the license, the person to receives the hardware without the license has no broken no law.
Burn Hollywood Burn
In West Virginia, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation just handed the state department of education 16 million dollars.
In return, the state board of ed sold out the public schools.
They handed down a memo saying that all students *must* take part in a questionaire administered by the teachers during school time. One teacher I know estimated that it would take 20 minutes per student, given that there are issues with reading ability at the age of the students being given the test.
This questionaire:
* Was given online. Teachers were required to have Internet Explorer (not "a browser", Internet Explorer) installed on all school computers used in this. Cute way for a monopolist to propogate their products.
* Involved asking students the number and type of products such as camcorders and computers they have at home. Many parents are not willing to give out this information, so building profiles of families by asking adults doesn't work very well. However, when students, children, are required to take an questionare like this by a teacher, they don't have much of a choice, though I suppose they could lie if their parents have taught them the importance of privacy. Microsoft was given the go-ahead to repeat this study two and four years from this point in time. All results get sent to Microsoft.
* Was given during school time. Taxpayers spend enormous amounts of money to pay for *children to be educated*. State laws are put in place to require students to be in school *to be educated*. These resources are supposed to go to education, not to (in my opinion, rather invasive) Microsoft marketing studies.
* Finally, MS made another coup for those 16 million dollars -- they were given a right to appoint a consultant to conduct overviews and approve or deny technology education curriculum. Now, it's possible that this consultant is a totally objective person who really *will* choose Linux or the Mac OS over Windows, or competing office/database products over MS's offerings if those things are better choices in a given scenerio. However, I rather doubt it. This is traditionally a large Apple market, but in one fell swoop, MS cut the legs out from Apple throughout the entire state.
I'm wondering whether this is just my state, or whether this is happening elsewhere. Anyone else hear about similar things in their own states? I could be a new Microsoft offensive against Apple, or just something that's been going on for a while, but I feel more than a little uncomfortable with it, and I doubt any letters I write are going to quite measure up to 16 million dollars in terms of legislators' decisions.
May we never see th
Q. How does the PC owner transfer their license rights for the operating system?
Sinple, just sell the computer. You have the right, under Copyright law, of first sale. If the license says otherwise, the license is wrong. Unless the copyright holder has a signed contract with your signature on it, you have not relinquished the rights that the laws guarantees you.
Too many software companies are preying on the public's ignorance of the law. And I'm not talking about just Microsoft. I'm talking about Sun, IBM, HP, Adobe, Apple, and even several Open Source companies and foundations. The public doesn't know anything, so when someone comes along and pretends to be an expert, they are believed, even if they are telling the biggest pack of lies since Hitler talked with Chamberlain.
You cannot forfeit your rights just because you use software you legally own, or because you read some words on an install screen, or because you tore open some mylar wrap, or even because you clicked a button that says "yes".
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned