Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Introduces Pay-as-You-Go Computing
An anonymous reader writes "Geekzone is reporting that Microsoft is introducing a new business model for 'pay-as-you-go computing.' From the article: 'The pay-as-you-go computing model enabled by Microsoft's FlexGo technology allows customers to have a fully featured PC at home by paying only for the time as they use it through the purchase of prepaid activation cards or tokens. Microsoft has been running trials of the program in Brazil for more than a year and will soon be expanding to select markets in India, Russia, China and Mexico.'" This makes me giggle, because it's basically the return of time-sharing; in the past it was for for mainframe systems, but I suppose the same concept behind the mainframe idea would be true in developing countries today with PC systems.
Not exactly time-sharing, but "on-demand" computing. Unisys and IBM are doing this now - it's actually a new concept for them as well...
Why does it seem Microsoft is running out of good ideas? Pay as you go computing? How long would it be before you actually pay the amount that a new PC/Windows would cost for this? Is Microsoft going to be the next Rent-a-Center, where you pay $5000 for a PC that costs $500? Or pay $1000 for windows when it is in reality $200? heh, bad idea I say.
-- Josh
"Whoopie! Man, that may have been a small one for Neil, but that's a long one for me!" - Pete Conrad
It seems they've spotted a good niche. From MS website:
In many countries around the world, people face two main barriers to owning a PC: the entry cost of buying a computer is too high and the fixed monthly payments associated with traditional financing are beyond their ability to pay- if they can get financing at all. And even in countries where consumer credit is available, many people are reluctant to incur the obligation of fixed monthly payments because they have unpredictable or variable incomes.
All fair points.. it will be interesting others in the industry take up the idea.
This makes me giggle, because it's basically the return of time-sharing; in the past it was for for mainframe systems
When you stop giggling you may as well notice both have nothing in common.
One is a payment model for using licensed software (but time is not limited by demand, just by your money), and the other is an early form of multitasking, allowing more efficient use of the mainframe resources.
It's the same tactic used to lease-to-own cars to people who can't really afford them
FTFA:
In other words, if you don't qualify for the loan as per item 1, you don't get to "long-ter lease" the box. So why not just borrow it outright and not be stuck paying per hour? Or take that 1/3 cash down and buy a used PC.
I can't for the life of me imagine how they are going to enforce this except with Trusted Computing. The only way that they are going to prevent someone
* Imaging the drive
* Installing another OS of their choice
* Using the computer as much as they like
* When the agreement ends, replace the drive image.
Ok, if you sick a lawyer on the poor user, you can sting them for their minimum 800 hours fees. But the only way they could prevent the above is by locking the machine down at the BIOS level with TCPM support.
Pay-as-You-Go rates force you to shutdown/reboot long before the computer crashes on its own.
Definatly just shaddy financing with a new lable. Purchase only the time you need only works for a centrally located service. Cell phones work that way because you buy the phone (more or less) and then you are purchasing the network which you phyically don't own. Same with mainframe time. You likely didn't own the mainframe when you were purchasing time on it. The only way a personal computer would be practicle (at least to me) is if it was personal. Same settings, profile, files, etc. And it would likely have to be in my residence. So you can't really have anyone else using it. This doesn't really add up as a concept. Unless microsoft is getting into the Net Cafe business.
From the Microsoft page: "makes it easier for people with modest incomes in emerging markets to buy a full-featured PC for their families"
The true is that "people with modest incomes in emerging markets" don't buy software. Even when buying a new computer, big retails shops bundle Linux, that is removed as soon as people see they can't play games or use Encarta or Word or any other well known software. On the newspapers in Argentina, you see there is a standard fee for "linux removing" (and Windows installing, not advertised). In small computers shops, they preinstall WindowsXP without even asking (without licence). Most software is available for u$2 on CD-R (is advertised on any newspaper and even phone booth).
Only big companies (mostly from overseas) can afford to buy software.
DNA in your Linux: DNALinux
... As soon as they read this, thousands of CIOs, PHBs, and Microsoftie system administrators realize Linux IS ready for the desktop, and introduce large-scale plans to switch all their users to ______________ [insert favourite distribution here], stat.
:-)
Panic seizes Wall Street, Microsoft stock dives, NASDAQ tanks, Bill Gates become the 100th richest man in the world, and Congress introduces law designed to protect "American innovation and competitiveness against the evil, communist, terrorist-sponsored opensource software".
Hey, one can dream, right?
The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
You mean a PC that includes:
An office suite.
A standards compliant browswer
Maybe a simple image editor
And maybe a couple of small utility programs.
Yeah, I guess that would be worth paying for....
I mean, it's not like people are giving it away for free.
$7.95/mo, 200 GB disk, 2TBxfer, MySQL, PHP, RoR.
And cue the anti-Slashdot trolls bitching about how we see everything MS does as evil...
They can't do that now, how do you expect them to do that in the future?
Besides, if you look at how it works, you'll see that it really is the shits ... you get a 12-character code every time you want to "add minutes." How much you want to bet there'll be a keygen and spoofed add-time servers if this catches on?
Isn't it getting to the point now where us lucky ones in the first world are throwing away enough old-but-still-working hardware that people in the third world CAN have a PC that works just fine with the right setup and just isn't the latest and greatest quad-core offering from Intel?
I guess it makes a lot of sense from Microsofts point of view.. instead of letting them have cheap home PCs and "free" Windows software (aka piracy), make them pay outlanding sums of money over the long-term without realizing it, while offering the usual sub-standard software and being able to fall back on "ooh, it must be network problems, cause our centralized Office products are perfect!" excuses as required.
Whatever happened to all these $100 PCs bundled with Linux? They can't be much more expensive than a thin-client PC + broadband connection required to deliver the new Microsoft centralised services at any decent speed?
I hope M$ has thought this one through - if they start actually forcing those who cannot afford it to pay for M$ products, those who cannot afford it will quickly migrate to something they can afford, eg. Linux. Perhaps once the end-user moves, corporations will feel more secure about moving and before you know it, M$ isn't turning a profit in either of their two truly profitable offerings any more (Windows and Office)
Will program for karma.
...which will be another $30/month
If the $100 computer with open source software is the liberation theology of the information revolution, this is the indentured servitude of the information revolution.
...why Microsoft is so dismissive of the $100 PC.
An office suite, a standards compliant browswer, maybe a simple image editor, and maybe a couple of small utility programs.
Yeah, I guess that would be worth paying for....
I mean, it's not like people are giving it away for free.
Actually, if you follow the links in the article to read how it works, its obvious that booting from a linux DVD bypasses their time subscription/metering servers and all the software components they had to ad to Windows to lock out the user.
Actualy, booting from one of the hacked bootable Windows DVDs (yes, its possible to run Windows from a DVD - you can make your own bootable one by going here :http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/) also bypasses their time metering system.
This is a really terrible idea. I have one that even better than a pet rock: each year tens of thousands of computers are junked out and replaced by new ones. Know where they end up? At a trash heap. Why not salvage the parts, create a bunch of decent machines out of them, throw on a free OS, sell em for next to nothing to those who can't afford a few hundred bucks for a PC. Sure as hell beats this pay out your butt method. What good is a computer if you can't sit around and play with it for hours on end without worrying about how much it'll cost you?
Wow, you have to hand it to the Microsoft marketing guys. Microsoft finds a way to allow banks to squeeze an extra 20% (my guess) out of low-income people, which of course also increases sales for Microsoft, and they manage to spin this as a benefit to those low-income people.
I may be ignorant, but what do low-income people need PCs for anyway? Do they really need sofware to balance their checkbooks, or file their taxes? Are they really cranking out a lot of documents? It seems to me that the real need for PCs in emerging markets is for students. If Microsoft or the banks want to help these students, they should provide them with financial assistance, or no-interest loans to buy them. They shouldn't cripple them with lockouts. "I'm sorry, I couldn't finish my paper because my parents couldn't afford to pay for the computer this month".
In fact I writing this from an MS PAYG machine right now. You can even able to purchase denominations as low as 30 seconds which ought be more than enough time to
MS has been trying that concept for years. Some might remember when Gates introduced the idea that you won't even have to install Office or any Program anymore, you just stream it from the 'net. Someone must've told him that this would mean load times of a few minutes, or we'd have seen something like that by now. But when you look at the Office Document format, you'll notice it is actually a streaming format. Not necessarily something you'd expect in an "ordinary" file format, more something to be expected in a format that is supposedly loaded through a slow net connection.
That MS-Office can't "open" a document until it has loaded it entirely is a different matter. But in theory you can stream docs.
But back on topic. MS has been dreaming in this direction for a while now. After all, look at the advantages for them: First and foremost, full application control. It would even be possible to limit the capabilities later. Currently, you have the "problem" that, if something is possible to the user that the user deems beneficial but you don't enjoy in your software, you have a VERY hard time convincing him to upgrade to the next version, that has more features you want but less of what the user wants.
Then of course recurring revenue. Now, you buy Office and you use it. Forever. I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who still has an Office97 running somewhere. Why upgrade? Newer versions don't offer any benefit. The only ones who do actually upgrade are companies that already fell for the "corporate agreement" bundle. But that doesn't offer ANY benefit for the average person.
This is just an attempt to force this kind of "agreement" down our throats. Since, after all, it's just a few cents every time you use your Word...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
I see from all the -1 Flamebait mods that Team99 is out in force this morning ...
The simple fact of the matter is that this whole plan shouldn't be called "Pay as you go" but "Pain as you go."
Its targeted to people who can't afford it and would be better off using a free OS on hardware they can buy outright for the 1/3 down that this thing goes for ... or they can buy a used box if the really really really want Windows.
A $120 case/PSU is far from the lowest end. You can get a "450W Power Supply Mid Tower ATX Case W/ AMD and P4 Compatible front USB 2.0 and Audio 6bay aluminum P4 (Beige) midtower atx" for ~$30 and free shipping. Will the power supply have been put together with scrap wire by child labor in Elbonia? Perhaps. Will the case have sharp edges and rattle? Entirely possible, but there is almost $100 you just "overspent". (Check Pricewatch for several examples)
Many brand new laptops and desktops (check a Best Buy/ComUSA ad) are shipping with 256MB of memory, not 512. That's $15 for PC3200 DDR (this is a value box, remember) $25 for some others, including DDR2. ($25 after shipping at newegg, cheaper can be found on pricewatch)
A celeron D can be had for less than $50 from Newegg.
A 80GB HD can easily be found for ~$50 rather than $60. (NE)
So.. $30 Case/PSU + $50CPU + $80MB + $15 RAM + $50 HDD + $20 DVD/CD ends up at $245 (plus really, a mouse and keyboard would be nice, so we'll say $260). That is still far less than your $400 estimate, though over the $200 mark. I'm sure a few more dollars could be saved with a cheaper motherboard, as well...
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
And what about Total Cost of Ownership... Oh wait, that's Microsoft's TCO, not the users... ;-)
"Enjoy what you're doing! If it becomes drudgery, you're doing it wrong!" - Jim Butterfield
It ought to be a challenge, if nothing else.
l ?.v=1
It looks like Microsoft has chosen Transmeta to provide the processors, with some hardening features implemented within Transmeta's CMS (Code Morphing Software) technology I presume. They claim it's quite well-hardened against hack attempts.
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/060522/20060521005028.htm
Let the arms war commence!
It was a joke! When you give me that look it was a joke.
The pay as you go has no difference whatsoever on buying the OS!!! For the XP Home Editionm it costs R$1,00 (~US$ 0,40) per hour, and the OS is yours after 800 hours...
The retail Windows XP Home Edition costs around R$600,00 (~US$280,00), and can be bought in 3 payments with no interest.
In the end, it is the same as going on a personal loan...
"There is always an easy solution to every human problem -- neat, plausible, and wrong."
H. L. Mencken
Mac laptops are routinely way more expensive then offerings from Dell. Specially when Dell has their sales that include ram/HD upgrades.
When I bought my inspiron 630m it came with 1GB of ram, 100GB disk, 2Ghz Pentium M and the three year warranty for 2300$ [with taxes]. That was when the BASELINE Mac laptop was $2000 on its own, that is 1.5Ghz G4, 512MB of ram, 60GB disk, etc... Upgrading and warrantying the thing would have cost [iirc] about $2850 or so.
Granted they're not $5000 each they are routinely more expensive.
As for the Mac Mini, it's $699 [CDN] for a 1.5Ghz single core processor with 512MB of ram. Big deal. I could buy a 2Ghz dual-core AMD64, 1GB of ram and a proper case (e.g. one where I can install new stuff) for about the same price.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
When I bought my inspiron 630m it came with 1GB of ram, 100GB disk, 2Ghz Pentium M and the three year warranty for 2300$ [with taxes]. That was when the BASELINE Mac laptop was $2000 on its own, that is 1.5Ghz G4, 512MB of ram, 60GB disk, etc... Upgrading and warrantying the thing would have cost [iirc] about $2850 or so.
I'm not talking about the past, I'm talking about the present where the Macbook is actually a really good value - and you don't need to pay Apple to upgrade the HD since it's so easy to replace.
As for the Mac Mini, it's $699 [CDN] for a 1.5Ghz single core processor with 512MB of ram. Big deal. I could buy a 2Ghz dual-core AMD64, 1GB of ram and a proper case (e.g. one where I can install new stuff) for about the same price.
Would you really buy that for your mom? What about software? That's where the real value of the lower end Macs comes in, very high quality hardware with a great set of software for most users.
And parents would appreciate the MUCH smaller mini form factor rather than that huge holking noisy AMD box. If all they want to do is use emaail and a web browser and manage photos, why choose a desktop?
Remember that I am not talking about more technical users who may well be more suited to the AMD box, I am talking about family members that only get by with computers because you, the tech guy, help them out.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Now, the question becomes whether you can extract 1/3 of the value of the PC in parts. Transmeta has a press release on the subject. Here is a quote from the press release: "The specialized microprocessor is an enhanced version of Transmeta's 90 nanometer Efficeon microprocessor that includes instruction set extensions developed with Microsoft to support the FlexGo technology, which enables both pay-as-you-go and subscription computing models in emerging markets. This new Efficeon processor provides a secure foundation for Microsoft's FlexGo technology and associated business models. The design of the processor offers robust protection from repurposing and protects the business investment in subsidized systems."