Paul Thurrott's WGA Woes Solved

David Horn writes "Last week Slashdot ran an article regarding the trouble Paul Thurrott had with WGA. It turns out that after talking to Microsoft, he was actually running a pirated version of Windows, legitimately purchased from an online vendor. Paul admits that 'the truth is, I just made a mistake. If we learn something from that mistake, fantastic, but I wasn't trying to set up a life lesson for anyone, let alone myself.'"

Comments

Huh?

[rjhubs]

What kind of self-respected techie doesn't realize a pirated windows disk when he sees it? This story doesn't add up.

Re:Huh?

[BushCheney08]

Seriously. I read through the article, and he goes on about how he doesn't remember the details about installing it. Then he goes on to mention that the version he installed used a known pirated key and required an altered winlogon.exe. I find that humorous because the pirated copies I've come across require the user to swap out the winlogon.exe file themselves. Something I'm sure he'd remember doing. No, his story really doesn't add up.

Re:You can't cheat an honest man.

[Bing Tsher E]

Purchasing a Windows OEM version 'bundled' with a piece of hardware is not 'bending the rules.' It is living by the rules as specifically laid out. I have had no contact whatsoever (except for the POS machine at work that runs it) with Windows XP. But I know for certain that the 'piece of hardware bundled' rule applies to Windows 2000 and Windows 98 OEM versions. It sounds like he thought he was getting an OEM version, and the vendor ripped him off (shipped him an illegal copy instead.)

The company was willing to 'break the rules' (obviously) by selling a dodgy copy of an OEM CD. This was doubtless not brought to his attention while he was doing business with them.

loss of control of supply chain

[fermion]

The real problem here is that MS has lost control of it's supply chain, and as a result has been reduced to forcing the customer to act as an uncompensated QC agent. I see no overall benefit to the enduser, it is not like these things can't be checked at registration, and I see not program like 'your purchase is free if you get no receipt.'

No, all that is happening here is MS creating such a complex system of distribution and prices, with registration codes that are long and difficult, all while trying to personalize a commodity product. Start with the first item. MS fought for regulations that mean that any manufactured PC must, for all intents and purposes, have Windows installed. So, even if a site license exists, you are still paying for windows. Yet even in light of this, MS still insists on selling upgrade and full products, even though the percentage of people who have not bought a previous copy of windows is small. Of course a copy of windows is linked to a machine, which is another senseless complication. Such complications as upgrade versions, home versions, pro versions, etc, simply allows the crooks an opportunity to manipulate the already confused end user.

Which leads to the second issue. MS Windows is now a fully commoditized product. It owes it's success to being part of fully interchangeable system, which allows beneficial cost reductions for all concerned. The problem is, of course, that MS does not want MS Windows to be a commodity, and therefore treats it as a vertical market application. So, I can't take my copy of MS windows and choose to install it on a single given machine. I am told which machine it belongs to. This does not happen with any other component of the system. OTOH, every copy of MS Windows is all but identical, so the machinations necessary to create this leads to a rube goldberg machine.

If MS would just sell MS Windows for $100 and get over all the hubris that somehow MS WIndows is a special thing would go away. If they want to continue the fantasy that somehow MS WIndows is not a cheap commodity, then they should do something like individualized DVDs, each encoded with their own ID.