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Taiwan Forces MS To Cut Prices, Unbundle Software
bev_tech_rob writes "This article from ZDNet reports how Microsoft has agreed to cut prices on their software after a backlash from the country's effort to crack down on piracy. Seems the citizens were forced to obtain pirated copies due to the high cost and having to buy software they did not need to get the parts they DID need."
Too bad the US couldn't learn a little from Taiwan...
Seems the citizens were forced to obtain pirated copies due to the high cost
This is a problem most people under 24 seem to have...
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
Yes, but while they're free, they don't necessarily do the job. Despite what many on slashdot say, open source is not the end-all be-all of software. More to the point -- what are they supposed when someone sends them .doc files?
(I fully expect to be modded down for this, but what the hell. I have karma to burn)
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
It doesn't matter right now anyway - as there are no jobs available for when you graduate.
I would look somewhere other than programming to spend your education dollars.
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It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
Think about it. 50 million lines of code. If you were to read 1 line per second, 8 hours a day, 6 days a week, year-round, it would take you 5-1/2 years just to read it all!
Then you'd have to understand it.
By then it would be obsolete, anyway, because it would be 1 or 2 generations behind.
If you've ever gone through even a 5,000 page program, you know that just getting yourself oriented to that you know where to look takes TIME.
Back in the '80s Microsoft was in the habit of screwing up/obfuscating the symbol tables on the software they released - until the courts made them stop that practice.
Cuz we can afford it. In a lot of other countries around the world where a worker only brings home $1200 a year (and that's rich for some villagers in China), how can they afford a $100-$300USD app suite? Enter the five finger or low cost piracy. Plain and simple economics, not ethics. And since when is M$ an ethical company anyway?
Possibly, but I have a feeling that microsoft would probably remove all comments from their source code and make the variable names all meaningless.
I don't think so - there is the Shared Source initiative from Microsoft. Obuscation of the code would be unprofessional at best.
Then it would be nigh on impossible to understand how windows works.
With all of the code profilers and debuggers out there, obuscation would only be a temporary set back. (*Avoids cheap shot about the average Windows user*)
I don't say this because i think they're evil, but it's common sense for them if what you suggest might happen did happen. Their source code is a close secret, and I dont think they would even want a government of any country to see it.
I also don't think that MS is "evil", but I disagree with the rest of your statement. Along with your Shared Source agreement comes an NDA. In that NDA (AFAIK), you state that you won't use the source to make your own version of Windows, nor will you help the competition in any way, which does make perect sense from a business perspective.
However, seeing that Linux and a lot of other OSS is in direct competition with Microsoft, they've basically removed you from developing OSS. Why wouldn't they want a government to be legally bound to not develop OSS? That's part of the strategic fall out from Shared Source - stealing mindshare through NDAs.
Using a WAR3Zed copy of the Windows source code to "help" an OSS project would be even worse, since you would have used illegally obtained IP and polluted the code, giving Microsoft both legal and moral ground to kill the project you contributed to.
Please, stay away from Windows source code, unless you have no desire or need to contribute to OSS.
Soko
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
It looks like what really happened here is that the Taiwanese gov't "implied" to MSFT that, if they didn't show some flexibility in app bundling (Office apps, NOT Windows), then they Taiwanese gov't wouldn't be very supportive when it came to cracking down on piracy. So MSFT cuts prices, and the gov't continues to make some effort to reduce piracy.
Ya, and I was forced to steal cable TV and uncap my cable modem and copy videos I rented all because they're more than I can afford to pay.
Geez, just because you can't afford something doesn't give you the right to steal it (or infringe on the copyright as the case may be). There are affordable alternatives out there to most expensive things.
47% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
For most people, security is not important. Top performance is not important. Optimum configuration is not important. Control is not important. Not having to power toggle is not important.
Being able to put the CD in the CD drive, press a button a couple of times, reboot, and get what you want is VERY IMPORTANT. NOT THINKING is VERY IMPORTANT.
Users want things that work like coffee machines. You plug it in and it works. If you want a different coffee machine, you get a different coffee machine and plug it in and it works. Windows makes computers a lot more like coffee machines than Linux does. Having to turn your computer on an off to get a new feature is much less of a problem than having to know what to type to get a new feature. Linux wants you to figure stuff out. Microsoft wants your money.
For most people, giving up money is easier.
paintball