Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Will Pay If Its Bugs Damage Your Data
RMX writes "CNet is reporting on
a new Microsoft policy where
they will pay if their software damages your data
. There's a pretty low limit on what they will cover and "it also applies even if Microsoft knew or should have known about the possibility of the damages" but at least it's nice that they're specifying exactly to what length they'll go to cover their customers. Is this the "support" from proprietary vendors that corporations like so much?"
Really, the only way any software could damage data would be a) if it deleted it, b) if it took a data file, mangled it, and wrote over the original, or c) did something wacky to the hardware to cause drive/media damage. I truly cannot recall having data ever mangled by a bad piece of software. MS stuff is also pretty good about making backup copies of whatever, prompting the user for saving, deleting, etc.
I think this is a pretty safe bet on their part. So much so that they'd probably be safe upping the ante to like $50 or $100 or more.
"Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
Well. Then what is it they pay for?
- Bug fixes? Not a chance - when I called Oracle or Microsoft about bugs / crashes in their databases the best answer I get is "Wait for our next release" and the worst answer I get is "ok, i've logged your report". When I ask the same to Postgresql's mailinglist, I get a patch the next day.
- Risk of end of life software? Not a chance - when a commercial software vendor does poorly (HP) support for much of their software is killed, when a commmercial software vendor does well (peoplesoft) many of their product lines are killed. When a product is open source, regardless of if it does well (Ximian) or poorly (Blender) it's products survive.
If it's not for this generous monitary guarantee, what is the appeal?According to the AntiSpyware Beta end-user license agreement (EULA), Microsoft will reimburse direct damages up to $5 for problems associated with the new downloadable tool that wards off spyware, adware and any other "potentially unwanted software."
/. post seems to make it look like it's MS software in general. Sorry, you only get money if the Anit-Spyware program screws up your stuff.
They are talking only about the Beta for the MS Anti-Spyware. Everything in this
I've seen that $5 liability limit before in other Microsoft EULAs. It's nothing new -- been there for years. I wonder why CNet is only now mentioning it???
Bullshit on oracle. we have support, yes we pay for it. When our data was corrupted we spent 8 hours on the phone with oracle support and they got it back for us. When we find a bug, we get a patch quickly or a work around.
Yes, MS provide no support. Oracle actually does.
Push the button Max!!!!
Recovery in cases like this that have mostly worked: Dual boot or use knoppix or some such, what I do when this happens is run strings over the drive with some creative use of grep / less / more / awk etc... The 'vanished' code usually turns up duplicated across the drive in several places and states of completion. You'll still need to tidy up, mostly re-add all your comments and spacings, but often this is better than a total rewrite.
Then again, sometimes the re-write ends up much better than the original version...
Don't worry - it's been moderated correctly. First of all, all the links all go to www.getfirefox.com, a Firefox advocacy website with no details of 'security holes' supposedly rife.
"Installing Firefox requires downloading an unsigned binary from a random web server" - unsigned binary, true, but you can check MD5 hashes if you want confirmation that you've downloaded the right file. The 'random web servers' are all known mirrors.
"Installing unsigned extensions is the default action in the Extensions dialog" - Let's try installing a random extension from Mozilla Update. If this site wasn't explicitly whitelisted, I wouldn't be able to download an extension at all - and despite being whitelisted, I still get a warning dialogue popped up - with "Install Now" unselectable for three seconds, and warnings that this is an unsigned extension.
"There is no way to check the signature on downloaded program files" - Internet Explorer certainly doesn't, either.
"There is no obvious way to turn off plug-ins once they are installed" - Go to Tools, Extensions. You can remove them from here, or alter preferences if there are any to be changed.
"There is an easy way to bypass the "This might be a virus" dialog" - This requires the user to have actually downloaded an executable, tried to run it, been warned, and explicitly asked not to be told again.
"Firefox has also killed Linux" - Linux goes from strength to strength. A good, open-source web browser is one thing, but is no substitute for running the same browser on a better operating system - be that Linux, Mac OS X, Solaris, or whatever else constitutes 'better', even Windows.
And tomorrow the stock exchange will be the human race
My guess is that this is Microsoft's way of saying they don't think your data is worth anything.
$5? That doesn't pay for a case of soft drinks these days.
They seem to be saying that even if everything is wiped out, they only owe you $5. What's more now that you know this, you legally acknowledge this is all the liability MS has.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
Hold on. They are not giving away $5 for lost data, they are capping the damages. $5 is the most you can get. You accepted the EULA that says $5 is the most you can get from them.
The insult is not that they think you data is worth $5, but telling you that $5 is all you get.
--
Kevin Marquette
Antispyware
Im a gamer, not a grammer major. This post is full of spelling and grammer mistakes.
Will Linux distros pay if bugs cause you to lose your data?
Well, this only applies to data loss caused by the beta version of MicroSoft's anti-spyware. Guess how hard it's going to be to prove which element of the system actually caused the data loss, then estimate how many rebates they'll pay...I predict none. This is simply more weasle-work from the PR hacks.
OH WAIT it's open source so there's no accountability!
As it stands, nobody is truly accountable for anything, and look at the quality work that's inspired in so far Redmond. But, IMO, if Red Hat (for example) sells you a distro with known flaws, then they should be accountable because they're the one offering you a product not of merchantable quality but taking your money (the fact they didn't write the software is irrelevant; consumers shouldn't pay for mistakes that aren't their fault). But if you aren't paying, the merchant/customer contractual relationship isn't invoked; there is no implicit obligation on the part of the supplier to provide anything for free, let alone anything that works.
Nice FUD...now if you can just explain to me what kind of data loss I can suffer that would only represent $5 worth of time and why I should consider this offer anything more than an insult, I'll switch to Windows.
Blank until
2nd on the Oracle bit.
Maybe the org. poster paid for Standard Edition?
If you have enterprise level support, you can get Oracle Experts (and yes, capitial E-experts -- these guys are _bad asses_) onsite in four hours.
We had a netapp crash -- not Oracle's fault -- and they were onsight like *that*, helping us get everything back up.
T
microsoft does provide support. you have to pay for it, same as oracle, but you can talk to ms on the phone for 8 hours until you get resolution as well.
Emory: Uh..we're still..beta testing that.
Oglethorpe: What you're testing is me and my patience!