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Microsoft Piracy Plan Means Concerns for IT

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the think-this-one-through dept.

coondoggie writes to mention an article on Information Week about possible unintended consequences of the Microsoft Software Protection Plan (SPP) discussed on Slashdot on Wednesday. The new initiative is intended to protect consumers from pirated software, but may cause major headaches for IT shops. From the article: "Microsoft will support SPP in current and future reporting and asset management tools such as System Center Operations Manager. 'On paper it might sound pretty good, but we have to see how it works,' says Jeff Allred, manager of network services for the Duke University Cancer Center. One of his concerns is that a reduced functionality mode kicks in three days after changing out a motherboard in a server if the software is not revalidated. 'That really jumped out at me. We change out motherboards in our servers all the time,' he says. The provision only covers a swap with a non-OEM motherboard, which Allred admits doesn't happen often."

6 of 278 comments (clear)

  1. Hey Ed's... by shoolz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Do you guys do that crazy thing where you, you know, verify the links in a story before clicking the Post button?

  2. HUH?? by abscissa · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Protect consumers from pirated software??? What if I don't want to be protected???

    1. Re:HUH?? by SecurityGuy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I so wish companies would stop the useless, transparent lies.

      "This $FOO is for your protection." No it's not. It's for THEIR protection, and most of the time that's fine. What's wrong with "We're videotaping you because we want to deter robbers."

  3. "...designed to protect consumers.. by wwiiol_toofless · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...from pirated software"

    Yes, Microsoft designed and built that to protect us hmmhmmm.

    --
    the mods may say you posted flamebait, but to me it's a flame that warms my heart. rock on, brother! --chebucto
  4. Don't need research by nine-times · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Well, the article is Slashdotted, but I don't need any expert opinion or research to tell me what it means for IT. I'm the head of an IT department, and it means that I'll be avoiding updates to any Microsoft technology with any "Piracy Prevention", and when I do need an upgrade, I'll be looking for Microsoft alternatives. I have friends who head IT departments, and I'm getting the same sentiment from them.

    Not because we pirate. We're too afraid of the BSA sniffing around to do that. The problem is, these things cause problems, artificially created by Microsoft, for no reason. To stop piracy? If I pirated software, then I'd know where to find cracks for these things. Microsoft's "protection" wouldn't stop me.

    But I've made a general policy in my department that we've stopped purchasing or installing software that requires "activation" or any other kind of phoning-home. I've run into too many problems where an otherwise working computer breaks itself by the developers own purposeful code because I've done a normal, legal repair job. In a large organization, an instance of the IT dept. replacing some hardware or imaging a disk shouldn't trigger a flag as "suspicious activity".

    In my organization, I think we're likely to have more Macintosh purchases. Users like them, they're easy to fix, disk imaging is INCREDIBLY easy, they're reliable, and they work great with our Windows and Linux servers. And we'll see more Linux servers. If Microsoft wants my business back, they can stop trying to limit their OS to do less for me, and start working on how they can improve it to do more for me.

    1. Re:Don't need research by nine-times · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I'll tolerate Firefox's checking for updates because I have no reason to believe that anything nefarious is going on, I can disable it, and in no foreseeable case will Firefox's developers purposefully sabotage Firefox in the update because they're trying to extort money from me.

      That said, I still disable the automatic updates. I like having a button that says, "Check for updates". It makes it easy to update the software when I choose to do so. I hate automatic updates, however. Even assuming I trust them, they always seem to drain system/network resources at inopportune times.

      And a printer driver looking for updates? I wouldn't tolerate that. If my printer is working, I don't need an update, unless it's a security issue. And if the printer is capable of causing a security issue, you need to change your OS.