Microsoft Cracking Down On Indian Retailers

slashthedot writes "Microsoft caught some Indian retailers selling pirated copies of Windows by sending in a dummy customer to ask for a copy of Windows to be installed on their PC. The dealers claim that they are promoting MS software in this way. One retailer said: 'Since we are are not charging anything extra for installing the software, it means that we are actually not trading in pirated software. For us this is just a sewa (selfless act) that we are offering to our customers. Besides, the pricing of their operating systems is way too high for the Indian markets.'"

Comments

If m$ is too pricey

[ultracool]

Why don't they just install Linux?

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[revengebomber]

I'll give you a hint: it starts in m, and ends in onopoly. If they were to install Linux, they'd face the same compatibility issues as if they were in the US.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[delire]

I'm a Linux user of many years and can answer that question as easily as you can.

Unsettling as it may sound, there is obviously not (yet) enough demand. It is not their job to push an OS onto people. They are not in the business of creating new markets; they are meeting popular demand. Of course they are feeding the status quo - Linux is beside their point.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[froggero1]

no kidding... any artist will tell you that they'd rather have their works appreciated and known rather than be rich. I think this is the reason Apple software is the way it is, if you want something, and it's good enough, you'll toss a few bucks to the R&D team.

so basically, having;

1) a R&D dept that's better named search and steal
2) no vision, and
3) terrible track record (outside of shitty software as well)

is there any wonder why people rip off M$ at every opportunity they get?

joe six pack thinks that their software is worth shit, so that's what he feels obligated to pay.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[froggero1]

to summarize a poorly written post (sorry, i'm relearning dvorak again):

generally, people will pay what a product is worth.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Vicissidude]

Microsoft hasn't had a monopoly for some time. Linux runs well and is ready to take over the desktop. People will look into it if Microsoft is successful in limiting piracy, especially given the cost of the software to people in this market.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[robgig1088]

I was talking to one of my friends (who happens to be from India) the other day about computers. I mentioned that I use Linux and he was absolutely amazed and asked me why I would do that. Linux is considered the poor-man's operating system and most computers that come with it are wiped and a pirated version of Windows is installed. I'm still trying to grasp the reasoning behind it, other than I think Linux has the reputation as "too poor for Windows"

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Daniel Phillips]

Microsoft hasn't had a monopoly for some time. You say that by what authority? Certainly not a knowledge of antitrust law or case history.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Vicissidude]

By the authority of my second sentence: Linux runs well and is ready to take over the desktop.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[mikesd81]

It is? Because games run on it so well? Because it's so easy to install drivers for ATI and Nvidia video cards? Because it's easy to play HD-DVD?

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

Well then Linux should be designed for windows compatibility. The only way Linux can take over is by providing a seamless transition to the point where it doesn't matter what application you need, your data will be accessible from both operating systems. Then, and only then Linux can excel. $$$ for windows, or $0 for linux. They both do the same thing give or take, they are compatible, the apps are cross platform, and it just comes down to money.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't like it that there are no games for Linux? Program some stinking games already.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[ewl1217]

I know it might seem too crazy to be true, but not everybody uses their computer for games and movies. Many people just want to be able to email and im their friends and family, browse the web, and type up reports for school. Especially in places like India (the place in question in the article), where money is much more of a concern, your argument just doesn't hold up.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Vicissidude]

I'd say that even in 1998, Microsoft was arguably not a monopoly. A monopoly means they have the only product on the market, in this case x86 operating systems. That hasn't been true since Linux came out. At the time, Linux was solid and cutting into Microsoft's market share on x86 hardware.

Since 1998, Linux has improved dramatically, both in technology, driver support, technical support, and market share. Further, Windows now has competition from Apple's OS X and Sun's Solaris running on x86 platforms, which were not in the x86 market previously.

The fact is, with the success of all these other players on Microsoft's turf, if there ever was a Microsoft monopoly, it certainly doesn't exist today.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[smchris]

And he specifically had to say HD-DVDs. There's quite a lot of entertainment value in a MythTV box.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[franksands]

I am so sorry, but I have to say this: If linux could excel, they wouldn't have any problem, would they?

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[timmarhy]

yes because that's what poor indians who can't afford windows are going to do, play quake 4 on thier $500 video cards which they also can't afford, you fucking retard.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[kcbrown]

I'll give you a hint: it starts in m, and ends in onopoly. If they were to install Linux, they'd face the same compatibility issues as if they were in the US.

It all depends on who they need interoperability with.

In the U.S., most businesses that run Microsoft do so after having paid for it. Microsoft maintains its monopoly largely through inertia. The market is already well-established and isn't growing much, so compatibility with everyone else becomes the primary reason for choosing one piece of software over another. In the U.S., the compatibility requirements are already set and basically aren't going to change much. People run pirated copies in the U.S. in order to maintain that compatibility.

But India is more like an emerging market than an established one. That means there's a lot of room for growth, and thus a lot of room for choice. The compatibility requirements aren't as firmly set as they are in the U.S. market because the ratio of existing players to future players is much smaller.

The end result is that in India, if vendors like the one in the article really did sell Windows instead of giving it away and also offered Linux as the free alternative, the market would almost certainly choose Linux over Windows, and "compatibility" would wind up meaning compatibility with Linux, not with Windows, because as the vendor noted in the article, Windows is simply too expensive for most people to afford over there. In other words, the price of compatibility with the U.S. market would be too high for the Indian market to bear, and the Indian market would thus go its separate way.

And Microsoft would, as a result, lose an entire market. If the majority of people in India ran Linux because the price of Windows is too high, new players in the market would at that point have no particular reason to choose Windows at that point even if it were made free, because the primary compelling reason people run Windows is for compatibility with others in the market (which includes support and other benefits of compatibility). In this scenario, Linux would have the primary compatibility/support edge as well as the price edge, so Windows would be completely uncompetitive in the market.

That scenario is the one that Microsoft fears the most. Very few of Microsoft's products can win on their merits, so the dominance of Windows and the compatibility requirements of the market are really the only things keeping Microsoft in their dominant position. A market in which Windows isn't the dominant operating system is a market that Microsoft will probably do poorly in.

The bottom line is that for the Indian market, Linux is a much stronger contender than it is in the U.S. market, and it's only because of the ability (if not legality) of vendors such as the one in the article to give away Windows that Windows can do well in that market.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Daychilde]

Thank you for your well-reasoned reply to this topic of legitimate debate. I'm so glad you chose not to troll.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[babbling]

Your shouldn't say that like a question. If Windows is too costly, their only choice is Linux.

They should have seen this coming. Microsoft always tracks down retailers offering unofficial copies of their software and even offers official copies or rewards to people who dob in such retailers.

If they wanted to avoid trouble with the law, they could have just installed Ubuntu. Yes, their customers might prefer Windows, but Ubuntu is the only legal option that they are free to install.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[ozmanjusri]

If linux could interoperate, they wouldn't have any problem, would they?

Fixed that for you.

Just so we know who's really responsible for preventing reasonable competition.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[PlanetaryAC]

Pirated OS + Pirated SW = No guilt way to get even for 400 years of colonization. Didn't the Brits pirate away the crown jewels from India? Add up the Billions stolen from India, China and the rest of the former imperialist colonies and it doesn't amount to a fraction of the money supposedly lost to piracy (what's the price of the Kohinoor diamond compared to a few bits of data ?). Last I checked, MS wasn't British.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[sortius_nod]

Do you have any idea how retarded your argument is?

The reason there is no real compatability between linux & windows is the simple fact that M$ refuses to open their code to linux developers. Meanwhile, morons like you sit there and dump shit on what you have little to no chance of ever understanding. Good luck with that... maybe one day you'll be dumb enough to think that linux is just a hobby for geeks.

"We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid." Benjamin Franklin

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Gorshkov]

2) Pirated OS + Pirated SW = No guilt way to get even for 400 years of colonization. Didn't the Brits pirate away the crown jewels from India? Add up the Billions stolen from India, China and the rest of the former imperialist colonies and it doesn't amount to a fraction of the money supposedly lost to piracy (what's the price of the Kohinoor diamond compared to a few bits of data ?).

I'm sorry, but that's just silly. First, Microsoft is American, not British.

Second ... I seriously doubt that Rajib is using his pirated copy of windows to make a historical or philosophical statement about their old colonial masters.

Gotta love rationalizations ........

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Winckle]

It's all a conspiracy from the USA's oldest enemies.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Torodung]

Right, which is exactly why proprietary "trade secrets" should not outweigh basic data access. Microsoft should be forced to open up NTFS and Document file formats to the public, by the government, along with everyone else. Hard drive partition formats should be public ISO standards.

They can find other "secrets" to sell their operating system, like the UI, but access to our data should never be trumped by a *trade incentive*. Intellectual property law should not extend to the paper on which we write.

--
Toro

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

Just so we know who's really responsible for preventing fierce competition.

There, fixed that for you.

$399 (or whatever vista's at right now) vs. $0 is not reasonable competition.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

> Because it's so easy to install drivers for ATI and Nvidia video cards?

I know very little about Linux ("sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst" to get rid of "splash" and "quiet" is the most hardcore hack I've done to date) but Nvidia drivers in the latest Ubuntu are a breeze.

I was poking around the menus after a clean install (from the alternate 7.04 disc) and found the 'Desktop Effects' button, so of course I clicked it to see what it was. It said I needed the restricted drivers to use these effects, is that okay? I clicked "Yes", it did some automatic voodoo and said it needed to reboot. I rebooted and BAM, Nvidia drivers installed. Piece of cake.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to the wiggly window abuse. ;)

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[evilviper]

It is? Because games run on it so well?

Many games run fine. The fact that people will have to stick to Linux-compatible games instead of Windows-based games is not a serious limitation for 99% of people. Just as Linux users may use OpenOffice instead of Microsoft Office, there are numerous games for Linux that are mostly equivalent to their Windows counterparts.

Because it's so easy to install drivers for ATI and Nvidia video cards?

It sure is! They come installed with any X11 distro.

If you want 3D/OpenGL support, then usually you need to visit the company website (like any Windows drivers), and type a couple commands they tell you to. Not trivial, but quite easy just following their directions verbatim, and a one-time hassle.

If that's the best complaint you've got, I'd say Linux must be ready for the masses.

Because it's easy to play HD-DVD?

...because HD-DVD is the real killer-app on PCs... Huh?

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Daniel Phillips]

Microsoft hasn't had a monopoly for some time. You say that by what authority? Certainly not a knowledge of antitrust law or case history. Who modded that down, somebody who disagrees with the legally established fact that Microsoft is an illegal monopolist?

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Daniel Phillips]

I'd say that even in 1998, Microsoft was arguably not a monopoly. A monopoly means they have the only product on the market, in this case x86 operating systems.

You are making up your own definition of what is/is not a monopoly. Please educate yourself.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[ichigo 2.0]

Because games run on it so well? Because it's so easy to install drivers for ATI and Nvidia video cards?

Sadly, gamers are stuck with MS for the time being. But when GPUs are folded into the CPU, and x86 is extended with GPU commands, cross-platform solutions will be able to compete with DirectX on a level playing field. We will also be free from NVIDIA/AMD for our driver needs, which is probably the reason AMD has started flagging for open-source graphics drivers.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[darinp]

You need to reboot Ubuntu to change video drivers? Excellent piece of engineering.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[nschubach]

there are numerous games for Linux that are mostly equivalent to their Windows counterparts.

Numerous older games: but that's about where it stops. Even if you count Wine, most of those older games have to run through the compatibility layer which slows things down. I can walk into Wal-mart/Best Buy/Circuit City/etc right now and practically guarantee that I will not find one that was designed to run under Linux.

If I search online, every game for Linux I see out there is dated. Games, like many other things are designed to grab and keep your attention for a short period of time. If they made games timeless (which I will argue is an impossibility) you'd never sell any games after that. It would be like creating an automobile that never breaks, and never stops running.

The truth of the matter is that 99% of all games produced today are produced around DirectX and Windows. Once you grab the attention of the masses through entertainment, you have their undivided attention for however long you want to hold it. It's a sad but true truth. Microsoft is tuned in to that truth. Heavily hedging to grab every corner and back alley of the entertainment business as they can before people stop grappling to the Microsoft "Bread and Butter".

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[dazlari]

That's an interesting perspective I've not considered. I'm no expert on Indian society but I do know it's heavily class based and has been for centuries. I expect that any prestige an OS has will weigh far more heavily than the underlying cost, pirated or not, and independent of its quality. It would be very difficult to turn that situation around without a lot of marketing; and network marketing probably wont cut it - you need big flashy billboards for this one.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[letxa2000]

If that's the best complaint you've got, I'd say Linux must be ready for the masses.

It's not.

I was a Windows user but was using Linux on my server (Linux is great for a server). When I had some problems with a laptop that I thought were attributable to XP, I installed Linux on the laptop. I was surprised it mostly worked, but there were always some limitations. No serious power saving modes, a complete inability of the OS to turn off the backlight of my laptop screen when it should've, and when I shut the laptop screen the screen would stay on so the laptop keyboard could get a good look at the screen while I stored it in my laptop carrying case.

When I had to get a new laptop last year, it came with XP pre-installed (obviously). I gave it a few days and I just got used to everything working the way it is supposed to. My computer would actually hibernate when I closed the screen, the screen backlight would actually turn off when it was supposed to, and there were easy-to-use power-saving options.

Now I suppose it's possible everything got resolved in the last year, but I kind of doubt it. And even if those particular options work, the reality is that I still need Windows applications for what I do (specific cross-platform compilers, in-circuit specialized USB-based tools, QuickBooks, etc.). No, I'm not interested in an "equivalent" and, no, GnuCash is not even remotely equivalent to QuickBooks. I need the Windows applications in question. And last time I tried Wine on my last fresh Linux OS install, it literally didn't work with any of my applications--it wouldn't even complete the install process.

So, no, Linux is not ready for most desktops and ready for very few laptop desktops. Sure, I don't doubt that some Linux geeks and OS tweakers can make everything above work, but the fact remains that Linux is not ready for the desktop until it doesn't take a geek/OS tweaker to make these basic things work.

I used Linux for 2-3 years as my entire laptop-based desktop, but I got tired of the limitations and the work-arounds and tired of spending time dicking around with the OS rather than getting real work done. So, for now, I'm back on Windows. I hope at some point Linux truly is ready for my desktop.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[EzInKy]

It is? Because games run on it so well?


Yes, Linux runs just about every game written for it extremely well and has emulators that will run some popular titles written for foreign systems decently.


Because it's so easy to install drivers for ATI and Nvidia video cards?


Actually this one really surprised me. I've been using Linux since '99 so am accustomed to configuring things by the command line but a friend of mine installed Kubuntu last month and was astonished how simple it was to switch to the nVidia drivers...all point and click. I will admit I was a bit disappointed when I was told a reboot was "required" though.


Because it's easy to play HD-DVD?


I may have heard wrong but I could have sworn I saw somewhere that at least one of the HD-DVD players used Linux as its OS. I'd search for it but I don't think playing HD-DVDs will be much of an issue for at least a couple more years.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[eonlabs]

India, we'd like you to meet the RIAA.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Nosferatu Alucard]

You'd also be surprised at what little tiny things many users enjoy about their PC that Linux does not currently offer them. I couldn't find my windows installation CD to reformat my sister's PC, but I had a Kubuntu disk on hand, so I put that on. I installed MP3 support for her, since my collection was in MP3 format, I taught her how to use Open Office, and showed her how to use the AIM chat software and things like that. She didn't have much of a problem figuring out how to get things done, but she did run into a lot of issues along the way. For example, my music collection isn't geared towards her tastes, so she likes to go onto websites like purevolume to listen to music. Flash, last time I checked, does not have a 64bit linux driver. Any website that was flash-based was off limits to her. Drivers were difficult to install for her, and anything that involved compiling or more than a double click setup file was too difficult to understand. She's got the capabilities to understand it, she's a very smart, tech savvy person, but she, like many other users, will not be too keen on the idea of having to spent hours researching a problem that pertains to a single bit of software. Until your average user can boot up, log in, and do everything without having to open a terminal or read a paragraph to determine which file is the right one in the suppository, you won't get the people who are middle-level users. The people who won't leave things alone, but won't spent hours figuring out how to play with it.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

You are a fucking moron.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[badman99]

I'm just curious, what is the difference between a fucking retard and a retard ?

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[ZWithaPGGB]

Except Linux isn't free, when you include support costs and the reality of dealing with the leading distros. As this mail from Red Hat support to me today (regarding the fact that I can't get the bcraid driver to compile against the RHEL 4 U4 -55 errata kernel) shows, the leading Linux vendors have worse CS than MS (who will, at least, reply with something more than a brush off to Windows driver complaints, in my experience).

Quoted mail below (edited to beat the lameness filter on slashdot):

Case Title : Need to compile bcraid for errata kerne -55

Last Update Comment as of 20-MAY-2007 11:21:44 :

Greetings & Welcome to Red Hat Global Support,

I am sorry to let you know that you have only "Production Support Scope of Coverage" and this issue involves an in-compatible third party package. We will not be able to support this issue. I request you to please contact your third party vendor source of this SDK or search this issue in any of the on-line forums or mailing-lists.

Refer - http://www.redhat.com/support/policy/soc/productio n/

I am changing the status of this service request as "Pending Closure", this issue will "auto close" in next 7days. Let us know if there is something else we can help with in this issue.

Lots of extraneous bs redacted, but the gist is: we don't care, thanks for the $595/yr, now go solve it yourself.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Air-conditioned cowh]

HD-DVD? Is this really what they will be buying a PC for?

Even if some gamers will be disappointed there are probably many more customers who don't need a PC for anything more than small business apps, internet and email.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[ozmanjusri]

Just so we know who's really responsible for preventing any competition.

Even more accurate now.

http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&q=microsoft+ anticompetitive+illegal&btnG=Google+Search&meta=

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[evilviper]

Now I suppose it's possible everything got resolved in the last year, but I kind of doubt it.

No, everything worked perfectly SEVERAL years ago.

You simply didn't bother to tell the system what to do when it got the ACPI notification that the lid was closed, or some other button was pushed. Adding two lines to a config file and my laptop works exactly as it should. Perhaps some distro GUI config tool can be used instead.

Windows doesn't magically do the right thing, either. Usually it's just that a driver CD contains the proper config options. Obviously, any company providing Linux on it's Laptops would pre-configure Linux the same way.

The problem is, you're comparing pre-installed Windows with user-installed (and un-configured) Linux.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[kcbrown]

Except Linux isn't free, when you include support costs and the reality of dealing with the leading distros.

Who's talking about support costs here? We're talking about the price the vendor can offer the product for. The cost of support will be (as it is for Windows vendors) borne by the vendor, and so it will be included in the cost of product. The price to the vendor of the product itself is an additional cost. Windows isn't free after you remove the support costs, while Linux is. It's as simple as that.

And because we're talking about vendors here, who determine what hardware they sell, the problem of drivers isn't an issue: the vendor can select hardware that is compatible with the Linux distribution they choose. The successful ones would do so anyway in order to minimize their support costs (and thus make them more competitive).

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[yoasif]

You could have solved the only specific problem that you encountered by simply installing a 32bit version of Linux. I don't think any Windows PC comes with a 64bit version of Windows, so it's not as if you aren't comparing them on the same level.

Oh, and I personally find Ubuntu to be nicer for installing hardware support for certain proprietary drivers.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[letxa2000]

Well at least you addressed some of the issues I mentioned as to why Linux isn't ready for the desktop.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

There are already enough stinking games for Linux. We need some good ones.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Vicissidude]

http://www.answers.com/monopoly&r=67

There's the definition of monopoly. Figure it out yourself.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[yoasif]

Pretty sure all you really need to do is restart X (control alt backspace), but I'm guessing Ubuntu asks you to restart simply because killing X effectively kills all windowed applications... it's probably simply a usability concern.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[yoasif]

What happens in most of these OS/system debates sadly devolves into an argument about application availability. This is obviously quite a logical thing to look at, but in the computer market (unlike say, the video game console market), there is a pseudo-monopoly of sorts, and very little competition in the OS sector.

With companies like Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft, the differences in platform are a lot more interesting, as the software that comes out for those platforms use the various technologies offered by the platforms in different ways. For example, look at the Wii and how it eschews mega-cool graphics for motion sensitive gameplay, or the PS3's ability to play Blu-Ray discs and 1080p graphics.

What ends up happening is that we don't actually argue the merits of the OSes (like features like zeroconf or AppleTalk vs. Windows File Sharing, or AppleScript vs. Visual Basic Scripting), but on "can I get application (or game) X for Y platform". The deck is stacked in Microsoft's favor; as the platform gets bigger, the "pseudo monopoly" grows even stronger (note the prevalence of the DOC file format), making platform comparisons a lot less about comparing the relative merits of the OS, but more about "do i want to risk not having the OS that everyone else has".

Which sucks for anyone who is really interested in choosing the best, rather than having to stick with "what's good enough" because all the apps are on it.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[o2sd]

I'm just curious, what is the difference between a fucking retard and a retard ?

In some countries they sterilise retards to stop them from breeding.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[evilviper]

I can walk into Wal-mart/Best Buy/Circuit City/etc right now and practically guarantee that I will not find one that was designed to run under Linux.

Unlikely. Anything from ID, and anything based on one of ID's engines.

And even with that, it's quite stupid to talk about software in brick and mortar stores. You aren't likely to find OpenOffice or Firefox in Wal-Mart stores either, but they're still two incredibly popular pieces of software. The software world is changing, and Linux has been at the forefront. With people getting their music online, whether legally or illegally, it's very clear people are willing to embrace online distribution, especially when they're getting something for free, which is the case with most Linux software.

The majority of Linux games aren't commercial, but derivitives, or otherwise free open source efforts, which often produce quite good products. And should Linux gain even a little popularity, yes, you'll see game developers developing ports using Wine, in the same way Corel did, and only natively writing/optimizing the performance-critical parts. In the mean time, Wine is only a stop-gap measure, and certainly not important to the capability of Linux gaming.

If I search online, every game for Linux I see out there is dated.

You're not very good at searching. Not my problem, or Linux's.

Games, like many other things are designed to grab and keep your attention for a short period of time.

Not even remotely true. 100 years from now you'll see clones of pac-man and Tetris doing quite well in the market. Mame and other emulators seem to be incredibly popular, despite the fact that all the games it supports are several years old. And even more, small arcades all over the country have games that are more than a DECADE old, still making plenty of money. Street Fighter 2, Mortal Kombat, and Cruisin' USA come to mind immediately, though there are hundreds of others.

Incidentally, the idea that games are a killer app for an operating system is ludicrous in itself. Apple has plenty of desktop market share, with far, far fewer games than Linux supports. Millions upon millions of videogame consoles are being sold, which makes a lot of people who really aren't using their PCs for much gaming at all. Plenty of PCs more than a couple years old are still in-use, and haven't been upgraded to play the latest and greatest games released this year...

I could go on, but if you haven't got the point by now, I don't think you ever will...

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[ghouck]

Linux is just plainly and simply not for the masses. There is such a huge number of people, a huge percentage of computer users that just plainly do not have the time, desire, the way of thinking needed to use Linux long-term. For all the low-level operation, including simple configuring, program/periphial install/uninstall, , windows is just plainly easier for those not using more that 10% of their system's capabilities.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[evilviper]

Well, if you're simply going to say "No, I'm not interested"... there's not much point, is there?

Blanket refusing to accept alternatives pretty well ends any conversation. You could say the same about Linux as a whole if you wanted to. It would be any more rational, but you could.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[gsn]

Oh us "poor" Indians could afford a very nice graphics card back in the day. We just didn't pay for software. Couldn't tell you about the Q4 era but IIRC around quake 2/unreal we had S3, Matrox, Riva and 3dfx cards selling pretty well. We had to buy the video card - you couldn't exactly share that. We were all running exactly the same copy of quake 2, unreal and windows 98 though. Those games even made it onto the LAN in our computer lab and we'd play after school and before the extra "tuition" classes began.

The copy protections schemes didn't stop us then and I doubt they stop anyone now (if anything its gotten easier to pirate software). We could pay for Windows but why bother when we could get away with pirating it. As for the just try linux crowd, a lot of us did. I first tried RH7 of a cd that came with a computer magazine (PC quest IIRC), and at the time there was no contest between windows 98 and linux. I couldn't get my SB16 working and it was end of story until college. Today its a different story and I think a lot of people in India can switch to linux without too much difficulty. If windows still exists its because of games/other windows only software and inertia, and MS is only helping the latter by trying to curb piracy.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[MrLizardo]

Meh, that was *so* last year's issue. Full, reliable read/write support for NTFS is available in most major distros. I would be surprised if a few of the leading edge distros don't already enable it by default.

And, real documentation for how .doc and the new "open" xml format would be nice but I bet in most situations either google's "documents and spreadsheets" or openoffice does a perfectly reasonable job of converting it to .odt and for simple documents saving back to .doc. People like to talk about corner cases where the formatting ends up slightly off, but seem to conveniently forget that different versions of MS Office are just as bad.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[jchandra]

I'm an Indian, and I can tell you that your information is wrong.

Linux is not considered a poor man's OS. It is just that most of the software here is pirated and available almost free, that people don't have the incentive to learn Linux, except the technically oriented people.

I've seen people buying high end systems (about 800$), from local dealers with pirated window xp, ms office and loads of cracked games, and 1000s of mp3s all free as part of the deal.

In big cities like Bangalore they have started cracking down on people selling pirated CDs.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[notamisfit]

There's never been any pbjective standard on what exactly constitutes a *coercive* monopoly worthy of intervention under the Sherman Act. Basically, it boils down to a US Attorney saying "You know what? We think you're it, and we're going to bone you in the ass for it" MS's "monopoly" came into existence for one and only one reason: the complete and utter incompetence of just about everyone else in the software market (and I say this as a Linux/BSD guy). It's not like they stuck a gun in WordPerfect's back and said "Make this completely unusable in a GUI so everyone buys Word".

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[richardablitt]

You could even stick with the 64bit Linux installation and either install a 32bit version of Firefox or the 32bit version of Flash with the aid of a wrapper.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[ZWithaPGGB]

Nothing is "as simple as that". It's the TCO that matters, which takes into account the cost of staffing etc. I use Linux for my production and development platforms, exclusively, but I'm not under any illusions that it's "free". It's "free as in beer", as in I owe the community a round if I get mine.

For many environments, Windows is effectively free, since it comes pre-loaded, and there is no discount available for a "bare bones" or Linux machine. The admin cost is NOT, however. Like it or not, the average small business guy can set up a small LAN of XP systems to share files and printers, but wouldn't have a prayer of doing so with Linux.

TOTAL cost of ownership is what matters.

Now, for these "I didn't make any money so I did nothing wrong" Indian socialists, they have no excuse, except that they don't want to have to support what they sell, and more of their customers probably understand windows than Linux. Maybe RMS can explain the difference between Socialism and Theft to them.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[kcbrown]

Nothing is "as simple as that". It's the TCO that matters, which takes into account the cost of staffing etc. I use Linux for my production and development platforms, exclusively, but I'm not under any illusions that it's "free". It's "free as in beer", as in I owe the community a round if I get mine.

The TCO is what matters to the customer. It's not what matters to the vendor. It's the decision of the vendor that we're talking about here. The costs to the vendor are what determine what products the vendor offers and, ultimately, the price at which the vendor offers them.

The vendor is concerned about the acquisition cost primarily, and any difference in support costs that he must bear. Anything else is the customer's problem, and only the customer's problem.

So the fact that the acquisition cost of Linux is free is highly relevant here, because the acquisition cost is, in this case, a significant portion of the total cost of the software to the vendor, and in the case of windows, it's also a very significant portion of the total cost of the entire product to the vendor. In fact, the cost of Windows in India may be so high as to exceed the cost of the computer itself. Otherwise the vendor's comment about the high price of Windows would be irrelevant.

The situation in the U.S. is different. The largest vendors get a very deep discount for selling windows, enough so that the cost of Windows to them is a tiny fraction of the cost of the overall product. That is apparently not the case for the Indian vendors, and that is why the relative acquisition costs of Windows versus Linux is so relevant to the Indian market.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Gordonjcp]

I will admit I was a bit disappointed when I was told a reboot was "required" though.

One kernel module needs to be exchanged for another, and X needs to be restarted. While you *can* do this without a reboot, it's probably a good idea just to reboot and make sure it all comes up clean.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Gordonjcp]

So, no, Linux is not ready for most desktops and ready for very few laptop desktops

Linux isn't ready for *your* desktop, because some very Windows-specific applications won't run. I don't think "most" people actually want to run QuickBooks, or USB-driven ICP tools. You don't mention what cross-platform compilers you are using, but I'm certain that you'll find something to meet your needs.

On the other hand, Windows XP isn't ready for *my* desktop. Once they get decent audio support (my emu10k1-based sound card *still* isn't supported properly) and manufacturers start releasing *professional* audio software (sorry, but Fruity Loops just isn't professional), then I might take another look.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[jaganm]

In India, support costs are not really as important as in the west. A typical one-year maintenance for your PC would cost around 1500 rupees and that will provide a technician who will come to your house and fix the problem for you. Of course, the quality is not outstanding, but then you get what you pay for. The downtime doesn't really matter the same way as in the west, because the measure of time in India is quite different.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[shadanan]

I don't believe the author was searching for a solution to his problem. He was merely stating that for his sister, figuring out how to get her flash installed was difficult.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[AstronomicUID]

You need to reboot Windows for everything else... *ducks for cover*

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[PineGreen]

No, no, your definition is wrong as well. Here is the correct definition.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Bloke down the pub]

A monopoly means they have the only product on the market, in this case x86 operating systems.

In theory, yes. In practice the definition is less stringent. Under UK Law a company is a monopolist if they have over 25% of the market.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[nareshov]

Linux is NOT considered the poor-man's OS. It's mostly the elite OS used by a bunch of college-goers. There aren't any computers which come with linux in India (excepting a few acer models which I doubt anyone buys). Most windows pcs are running pirated versions and they're mostly for gaming or, as the other parallel comment says, for .NET and windows specific programming.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[JonJ]

The author is an idiot. If he uses Kubuntu or even Windows on a daily basis, he should know that 64-bit is not quite there yet when it comes to proprietary stuff.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[tabby]

I dunno, I just bought an XBox, much easier.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[muuh-gnu]

> Linux is not considered a poor man's OS.

It is. The poorer a society, the more it values products they otherwise could not buy. If you are not a professional, who can judge the value of a product by its quality, the price is the only distinction. So Windows is perceived like something that costs "hundreds of US Dollars!!" and Linux as nearly worthless, so if price is the only criterion, getting Windows for free (or for $% on a pirated CD) is a way better deal like Linux for free (or god forbid, $5 for a CD). Ten years ago, when the net was still in its infancy, I knew people who danced around when they after hours an hours of downloading with a 56k modem, managed to get photoshop & Co, because "it cost $2000". They surely wouldnt have danced around after downloading a free software like Gimp, even if they needed it only for cutting their photographs and changing brightness and contrasts. They also wouldn't have valued Photoshop or Windows so much if the $2000 was a spare change for them, but would have equally evaluated every product which comes into question for a given task.

>> "I mentioned that I use Linux and he was absolutely amazed and asked me why I would do that."

He was absolutely amazed because the GP deliberately used something that was "free" (aka worthless) instead of somethig that has a higher market value by several hundred of dollars, even when you can get the second one for free of the net. He most certainly did not know either windows or linux good enough to base his decision on product quality. He probably never tried Linux at all, because it was "so cheap" compared to windows.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[smilindog2000]

Microsoft trying to enforce copyrights in countries like India and China is not new, not even worth a /. article. However, India allowing Microsoft to impose sanctions is new. The interesting untold part of this story is India's unstoppable trajectory from being a technically backwards nation that encouraged rampant copyright violations, to being a technical powerhouse that enforces intellectual property rights. Without any sort of intellectual property protection, you can't have many indigenous companies that write software or design electronics, since there would be no local market for their products. As India's high-tech industry grows, it will convince the Indian government to protect their products. This isn't about Microsoft... it's much more about India. Microsoft will simply benefit along with the local Indian high-tech companies, once intellectual property rights are enforced.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[nschubach]

The majority of Linux games aren't commercial, but derivitives, or otherwise free open source efforts, which often produce quite good products.

...and quite unfinished or bug ridden. Usually on version 0.9.x for the remainder of their life. Never quite reaching that 1.0 state.

Since I stopped playing First Person Shooters in the year 1999 when I was completely bored with the genre no thanks to every derivative of Team Fortress, Quake and Unreal Tournament, any ID game created then or now is pretty much exempt from any gaming lists I look at. I've been a big fan of story driven RPGs and space themed RTS games, but the last titles I know of that fit either of those two styles are Battle for Wesnoth and well, I can't think of any decent galactic turn based commerce games. Although, Neverwinter Nights 2, Oblivion and Galactic Civilizations are three titles which have had my attention on the Windows partition for the last few months. Reaching the end of the entertainment value of those, I'm at another point where I'm looking for a game. I decided to look for something I can load up on my Ubuntu partition without having to check Wine for some twisted method of recompiling wine specifically to run one game. I tire of that sort of thing nowadays and I just want to pop in a game and have it work. I program for a living, and I like to keep my work out of my personal life as much as I can.

And FYI, I have an assortment of sites that I look to when I am looking for new Linux games to try on for size. Most of them have some sort of petition listing or call to developers because they see the same thing I do. Lack of variety and change (in the form of updated visuals, story lines, and bug fixes.) I even have them categorized in Firefox so I can fire them all up in tabs and see what's new. On the off chance I do hit Google up for a new listing or something I missed, I still find the same "Top 10" listing of games I don't want to play. Mah Jongg (yawn), America's Army (yay, FPS), Armageddon Advanced (Tron, again?), Cube (is that another FPS?), Pingus (Well, that was fun for a day), Neverball & Neverputt (I'll pass), Nexuiz (Hey! Another FPS!), Enemy Territory (I see a FPS pattern forming here), Frozen Bubble (Another fun for a day title), and of course Battle for Wesnoth. Battle for Wesnoth took me one day to finish one of the mission trees and I can't quite pull myself into playing it again. No character building, same bland tiles and each story is the same package in different faces.

But no worries! I have Mame/NesEmu (or whatever variation they have today). Yeah, no. When I was 15, and ogle at the latest Street Fighter variation because it has awesome graphics and the people looked so real(!) it was interesting. But there's one thing I've found over the years. Retro gaming is best left to the memory. Every game I've ever loved has been ruined by me trying to play it again today. As I stated before. Things get dated. They wear out. I will never retro game ...ever again.

Oh, and as far as killer apps are concerned. Games are the only thing keeping me in Windows. Well, that and work. Where the teams in charge of selecting the proper OS to code in decided that Windows will remain for a long time due to the fact that EVERYTHING is written in it. They spend the better part of the last 7 years getting rid of Novell and OS/2 to move to a standard platform. Since most everything was written (mostly from the ground up by internal development) on Windows 2000/NT, I'm stuck developing software on Windows for a long time the way I see it. At home, I still maintain my Linux partition, but when I get home and want to relax, sit down with a game with my friends, and waste away the night on something I enjoy... Linux is the last thing on my mind. Regrettably. I even have it set to my default OS in case the day comes when I can start it up and play something that wasn't developed over the past 10 years usi

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

one is in the act of copulation?

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[B2382F29]

Want to use Flash on a 64bit browser?

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[MarkKB]

I believe the GP was making the point that the ruling against Microsoft, which you linked, was wrong.

And, no he is not making it up, he is mearly referring to what many dictionaries define as a monopoly. For example, this Dictionary.com entry. Gosh.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

First, Microsoft is American, not British.

The same! All run by the money cartels!

Second ... I seriously doubt that Rajib is using his pirated copy of windows to make a historical or philosophical statement about their old colonial masters.

And I serious doubt your serious doubt about Rajib. But then again I must doubt my own doubt of your doubt... well, provided that I can first demonstrate the existence of free will... D'oh!

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

A typical one-year maintenance for your PC would cost around 1500 rupees and that will provide a technician who will come to your house

With BO so bad it's visible.

and fix the problem for you. Of course, the quality is not outstanding

That's Indians for you.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[heinousjay]

And you're clinging to a legal definition that suits you, even if it happens to not be true in the real world.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[freakxx]

I was talking to one of my friends (who happens to be from India) the other day about computers. I mentioned that I use Linux and he was absolutely amazed and asked me why I would do that. Linux is considered the poor-man's operating system

He was certainly an idiot. I didn't hear anyone saying like this. Instead, the problem is lying somewhere else. My brother bought one new PC by himself (without asking my recommendations)....he got a pre-installed XP. Well, anyway, when I went to India, I brought FC-6 for him (I chose FC6 because it came with 5 CDs and all the required software was already there in those CDs...other distros might have been difficult to deal with in absence of Internet)...I tried to install that on that computer but hell, although the video-card driver was recognized by FC6, it refused to display anything (even console mode couldn't be launched after pressing Ctrl+Alt+F2). Later I found that the computer he bought was something China made (the anti-virus software installed on that was "panda", very first time I heard of this anti-virus). Anyway, these are the problems...if you have a high speed Internet and a little of pre technical knowledge, you can choose linux...but if no, it is damn difficult to deal with...even if the FC6 would have worked properly, I think it was a almost impossible to play an mp3 or other patented but common formats (since, FC6 or linux distros are not shipped with support to these formats).

For ppl having a bit of technical background and also having a bit of opportunity, they certainly learn linux. In our institute from where I am having my B.Tech, we were having 400+ boxes running Redhat, around 50 boxes running Solaris and around same 50 boxes running Windows. The OS what we have been introduced to by the profs, was linux. No one taught us windows....ppl learned it by themselves because they had to do some HW which could be done on windows only (e.g. AutoCAD etc.). For those having their own PCs, most of them was having Linux also. It is not that people in India can't use Linux....they would love to use linux...only problem is opportunity and availability.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Clueless Nick]

*I'll* give you a hint - it starts with a U, and ends in SERS.

Of all computer users, Indians must be some of the most clueless. I know this having tried to solve computing problems for my fellow citizens for a whole decade.

We have (branded) desktops and laptops available with Linux preloaded. People purchase them and just install XP over it (an HP retailer told me this just 15 days back). Assemblers don't care and offer systems with XP preloaded, for 'free'.

Heck, the users are so dumb most of the time, they can't even use XP or Win 98 properly. And kiddies only want games.

Microsoft is only starting an anti-piracy campaign now because it has found a new business model with Vista - and it does not rely on the ubiquitousness of the OS for maintaining monopoly.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

Until your average user can boot up, log in, and do everything without having to open a terminal or read a paragraph to determine which file is the right one in the suppository...

You mean repository, right? A suppository may contain many things, but probably not files relevant to linux administration! ;)

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm an Indian, and I can tell you that your information is wrong.

Well, I'm from the United States, so I can speak authoritatively about what's going on here. In fact, we have a smaller population than India, so I automatically know a higher percentage of our citizens. My buddies Ralph Nader, George W. Bush, and Ted Kaczynski all pretty much agree on the Windows / Linux issue, by the way.

I'm seeing George Soros and Brett Favre for lunch, but I'm pretty sure I already know what they're going to say, too.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Da Fokka]

The author is an idiot. If he uses Kubuntu or even Windows on a daily basis, he should know that 64-bit is not quite there yet when it comes to proprietary stuff.

By your definition, 98% of all PC users are idiots. This explains quite nicely why Linux is not ready to take over Windows on the desktop and this was exactly the authors point.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[BKX]

Not to be an ass, but the only real problem your sister had with Kubuntu was the installer (ie, you) being a dumbass. You can use 32-bit binary plugins with 64-bit Firefox using using nspluginwrapper. Or, better yet, you could have stuck with 32-bit Kubuntu. Why bother going to the headaches of 64-bit Linux when you probably don't need it? Installing more software is as easy as busting out the package manager and picking the app. It's EASIER than double-clicking a setup file, as there's no need to find one. Compiling shit, Jesus, this isn't 1999; someone has already done that, packaged it, and stuck it in the repository for damn near everything you need.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[transonic_shock]

a lot of people don't even know what 32 bit and 64 bit means. The concept of different binaries compiled against different cpu architectures is pretty hard to explain to someone with just a basic knowledge of point and shoot internet browsing and email.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

Until Linux looks like Windows, works like Windows, breaks like windows, it's not an alternative to Windows.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[iserlohn]

You should be installing the 32bit version of Kubuntu if you want to give your sister the best Linux desktop experience. A lot of it is because the x86_64 version needs a lot of working around to using certain binaries, including the Flash plugin and certain binary codecs.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[ATMD]

You don't like it that there's no cure for cancer? Develop one already.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[SpiritGod21]

Just FYI, I'm pretty sure the 32bit Flash will work on a 64bit system. Give it a whirl. I know Flash is working on mine (I'm running OpenSUSE 10.2) anyways.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

read a paragraph to determine which file is the right one in the suppository

I'm pretty sure you mean “repository”. “suppository” would more accurately describe Microsoft products, not free software.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[mux2000]

I traveled for a year in India, and being the geek that I am, I had many conversations about computers with the indian people I met. In many of these talks I got the powerful sentiment from the people I talked to that Bill is quite the hero in India. There's a peculiar mindset there - I wouldn't exactly call it rabid capitalism or money-worship, but more like a strong emphasis on the significance of being rich/poor. The feeling is that rich/expensive==good, poor/cheap==bad, disregarding all else. That means that it doesn't matter if Billy acts like an ass, he must be a good person since he's rich. Windows must be a better OS than Linux simply because it costs more.

Trying to talk them out of this mindset was futile. They couldn't grok the possibility of a pricey yet crappy piece of software or a rich bad man.

Oblig. disclaimer: I can't speak of Indians in general, just the people I met and talked to, but this mindset seemed to be common there.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[somersault]

Microsoft hasn't had a monopoly for some time

Sweet! You mean Need For Speed: Carbon is out on Linux and OS X too!? Not just ALL the consoles and JUST Windows on the desktop? Sweet, that means I can finally wipe Windows!

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[BKX]

Hence the "stick with 32-bit" part of my argument. The poster I was replying knew enough about Linux to have a Kubuntu CD sitting around and install it, and he knew enough about computers to know about 64-bitness. He should have taken the thirty seconds to see whether using 64-bit Kubuntu was worth the trouble. Anyone with Google could have seen that it's not. IIRC, Kubuntu recommends the 32-bit version if you don't know any better, so why didn't he just trust the recommendation. Furthermore, he knew enough to know that the Flash plugin wouldn't work because of his browser's 64-bitness; he should have taken the ten seconds on Google to find nspluginwrapper. Completely clueless users would have stuck with 32-bit Ubuntu in the first place. Users in the know would have done the research. Less clueless, but totally lazy users are the only ones who run into the these problems.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[VoidCrow]

Mmm... YMMV. I installed Kubuntu 7.04 for my mum, and she's in her late sixties. Flash works fine under 32-bit Linux, and the big majority of the video-enabled sites work under it. It's *still* not a completely trivial install but it's a million times more sorted than used to be the case. I anticipated a glitch when my dad claimed that my nephew had managed to bone the install somehow, but it turned out that he'd fiddled with the BIOS settings (the machine was an old IBM Thinkpad T31 which previously ran a limping and usually dead Windows 95). My mum (via the Thinkpad) has email, music, chat, web access, DVD, xvid and vivx video capability, wireless (via a PC card), and should she ever require it, a word processor. Since I installed it, my dad, in his seventies, has been using it more than his own laptop (a modernish Acer with Windows XP), and my nephew regularly steals it off my mum. I passworded everything that wasn't nailed down, and since then, it's been fine. So, overall, it's actually pretty good. The only remaining *real* issue is games. I boot into Windows on my laptop to play a small collection of games, and that's pretty much it.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[debiansid]

But India is more like an emerging market than an established one.

True, but the key point is that much of the growth (almost all in fact) is centered around the US, which already has a very dominant windows presence. Hence the OS demand in India is not driven by Indians, it is driven by the people we provide services for, i.e. Americans.

Also, most computer education is centered around Windows starting from MS Office to VC++/.Net (this is changing, albeit very slowly). Due to this many grow up with the belief that Bill gates is a God.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Arterion]

...but she, like many other users, will not be too keen on the idea of having to spent hours researching a problem that pertains to a single bit of software.

This is one of the main reasons I don't recommend linux to my friends and family. I'm glad someone else actually acknowledges this is often the situation.

As for the x64 comments, yes, 32 bit would have been a better way to go, but I've use XP, 2k3, and Vista 64 bit, and all of them also have a 32 bit browser (IE7 or FF) that runs flash content just fine. You can actually open IE 32bit or IE 64bit. What's preventing a linux 64bit OS from doing the same thing?

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[narsiman]

Enforcement is a joke in India. Everything has a price and so does this one. What is the asking price of a BSA auditor - 1/4 the price of a windows license - no problem. Tell me when, where and how? Does he like a nice two wheeler or a college seat for his sister's second son? We will make him an offer he cant refuse :)

Dude name any system - we will "work" with it.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[secolactico]

which file is the right one in the suppository

Was it that much of a pain in the ass? Paging Dr. Freud...

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[d0rp]

Sadly, gamers are stuck with MS for the time being. On the contrary, I got my new computer (with dual SLI Nvidia 8800GTSes) running World of Warcraft, Ventrilo, and EVE under Ubuntu with only moderate work/tweaking, and I attribute those minor setbacks to the fact that I am running on almost-bleeding-edge hardware where the driver support isn't as stable as the older stuff (especially with my dual-core AMD64). I now have no reason to run Windows.

I'll agree that Linux is probably not quite ready for the average gamer because of driver/game support (sometimes it doesn't "just work"), but it's getting there.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

If they made games timeless (which I will argue is an impossibility)

Sir - you obviously have not played Leisure Suit Larry

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Haeleth]

As for the x64 comments, yes, 32 bit would have been a better way to go, but I've use XP, 2k3, and Vista 64 bit, and all of them also have a 32 bit browser (IE7 or FF) that runs flash content just fine. You can actually open IE 32bit or IE 64bit. What's preventing a linux 64bit OS from doing the same thing?

Absolutely nothing. Which is why I'm currently running 64-bit Linux, with the latest version of Flash working just perfectly. In my 64-bit browser, too, though I could have installed a second, 32-bit browser if I wanted an inferior solution (why does Windows force you to choose between a 32-bit browser or a 64-bit browser? I want one browser that works for everything.)

Now, you may say that the fact that this isn't obvious to you means Linux isn't ready for the desktop. As it happens, I quite agree; I love Linux for myself, but I am actively dissuading less technical people I know from trying it yet, because I know that if they try it now they will swear never to touch it again as long as they live. Maybe 2010 will finally be the year of Linux on the desktop.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Haeleth]

Just as Linux users may use OpenOffice instead of Microsoft Office, there are numerous games for Linux that are mostly equivalent to their Windows counterparts.

Like OpenOffice.org is a great advertisement for Linux. I tried to do a simple spreadsheet in it over the weekend. What little documentation I could find turned out to be utterly useless - I was completely unable to work out how to write the simplest of macros, since the only documentation of the object model is a back-to-front spaghetti nightmare that assumes you know which package or interface implements the behaviour you're after, and the lack of any form of built-in help or introspection meant I couldn't even find out what methods were supported by any object without ploughing through page after page after densely-written page of irrelevant detail.

This was incredibly frustrating. It was totally obvious that OOo had incredibly powerful macro capabilities, capabilities vastly exceeding anything Excel could manage, capabilities that could do anything I could ever want and more. But it's so badly documented that I, an experienced programmer fluent in everything from C++ to Perl to ML, could not figure out how to write a trivial macro in it. I tried recording some of the steps to see how it worked, but it seems the OOo macro recorder actually generates code in a totally different and barely human-readable language, using a totally different object model. I tried looking for alternative documentation, but all I could find was endless sample macros - useless if what you need is reference material - and adverts for some guy's book, which is apparently really good, but if I'm going to pay for proprietary material I might as well just use the proprietary software I already own instead of having to wait days for a book to be delivered. So I gave up.

Then I tried Gnumeric, which is reputed to be faster and easier to use than OOo anyway - but I had to give up on that when I discovered that it apparently had only about ten keyboard shortcuts and no obvious way to add more (in line with Gnome's standard design principle: "if it's too difficult for Grandma, it should be too difficult for everybody"). Maybe there is a way to add more keyboard shortcuts, but if they're not going to make it easy to find, I'm not going to waste my entire life searching for it, and nor am I going to waste hours giving myself RSI with endless menus.

So, having wasted half the day banging my head against free software brick walls, I just downloaded a trial copy of Crossover Office and installed Microsoft Excel - and got the damn job finished in ten painless and productive minutes.

Is that what Linux games are like, too? Twelve hours of hacking and cursing for five minutes' gameplay? I knew there was a reason I kept a Windows partition around.

Don't get me wrong; I love Linux. But I'm also a pragmatist, and that means I use proprietary software where it makes sense to do so. Linux is great for most things, and I would never go back to Windows as an OS, but nor will I be renouncing Windows software (or even Microsoft software) for a long time yet.

You may argue that my complaint boils down to "boo hoo, it's different from Excel". But that's totally missing the point. I have no trouble at all with software being different; it's software being inferior that I object to. For example, when I switched to Linux I made the effort to learn Emacs instead of insisting on finding something exactly the same as the proprietary text editor I preferred in my Windows days. But Emacs has excellent documentation built in, has well-designed reference manuals for its macro capabilities, and is more customisable than anything I've seen before or since. I could never go back to my old editor. My complaint is that there doesn't seem to be a spreadsheet equivalent; OOo doesn't have the documentation, and Gnumeric doesn't have the customisability. Hmm, I wonder if there's a spreadsheet mode for Emacs...

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[PalmerEldritch42]

By almost any definition, 98% of all PC users are idiots.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

If they made games timeless (which I will argue is an impossibility) you'd never sell any games after that. It would be like creating an automobile that never breaks, and never stops running.

Like my Honda Accord? It's closer to that standard that you realize, but there are still plenty of reasons to buy new cars - new customers, increased fuel efficiency, better safety features, navigation systems, increased horsepower, fancier stereo, etc. The same concept applies to games. Wolfenstein 3D still plays fine, and it's not as if it was filled with '90s pop culture references. Our standards for graphical quality have just gone up. If stopping that from happening is what you mean by "[making] games timeless", then yes, it's an impossibility. Time marches on.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Holi]

Why are you installing a 64bit OS on your sisters computer. You would have a lot less problems if you stuck with the 32bit version. Just because your processor supports 64bit does not mean you should use it. 64bit versions of any OS are not really ready for primetime.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Starteck81]

Well then Linux should be designed for windows compatibility. The only way Linux can take over is by providing a seamless transition to the point where it doesn't matter what application you need, your data will be accessible from both operating systems. Then, and only then Linux can excel. $$$ for windows, or $0 for linux. They both do the same thing give or take, they are compatible, the apps are cross platform, and it just comes down to money.

Duh,why do you think M$ works so hard to make them incompatible?

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Stephen Samuel]

I will say that it was far easier to get the printers at work running on my ubuntu box than it was to get it working on Windows... Actually, I used the information that was gleaned on the Linux install to figure out how to get it to work on Windows. It was actually a bit of a surprise to find that the Linux setup was far easier than the Windows setup.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Daniel Phillips]

And you're clinging to a legal definition that suits you, even if it happens to not be true in the real world Ahem. I was talking about the legal definition. It has nothing to do with what suits me and it has everything to do with what the courts of the land have determined. In spite of whatever misapprehensions it might please you to hold, the legal definition is the real world and a dictionary definition is little more than an excuse for endless content free argumentation from those too lazy to understand the legal principles involved.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[retrogameguy]

I feel the same - I see cheap PCs on sale loaded with Linux and wonder - what's the point buying it - to be able to do anything serious on it (by serious I mean play decent games) I'd have to load Windows.

Linux is the poor mans Windows.

I guess in India the nerdy cool of having Linux hasn't quite translated.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Raenex]

"exclusive control" applies. It is not enough to say you have a choice when that choice means alienating yourself from the rest of the world. These days Linux is more viable, but even now it has second-rate driver support. Back when the suit was launched, there was essentially no choice for the average consumer. Hell, even Microsoft knew it looked so bad that they had to give Apple money just to keep them afloat, so they could point to them as competition.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

By your definition, 98% of all PC users are idiots.

Well, at least they're smart enough not to try to run a bleeding-edge 64-bit OS for no good reason.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, at least they're smart enough not to try to run a bleeding-edge 64-bit OS for no good reason.

Or too dumb to know it even exists.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Grishnakh]

Who cares about all this crap?

The games for Linux are better because they're older, and this includes MAME. Older games have better gameplay than newer games, and are more fun to play. They're not as good for losers who live in their parents' basements and want a game that requires them to sit in front of it for 12 hours straight, but for those of us with jobs and real lives, who just want a little diversion now and then, an old arcade game or a game of Mahjongg is far better.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Grishnakh]

This mentality exists here in the USA as well, though it's not nearly as large because so many people had to suffer through the horrors of Windows 9x. It's mostly seen in the completely non-technical people. The most ardent, during the MS anti-trust trial, had favorite phrases like "punishing success".

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[colmore]

...or read a paragraph to determine which file is the right one in the suppository,

you might have pointed your sources.list in the wrong direction there...

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

I haven't used windows since NT3.51, but AFAIK flash for 64bits windows doesn't exist either.

It's true that the Unix concept of doing things might be harder for certain people, but actually that's because for a Desktop luser it's over featured.

That is: Doing things that are not ready out of the box, or that hasn't been thought of by the developer (read m$, apple) are also hard on other platforms.

Windows is ready to do a certain amount of things, and that feature set has been locked down. Any other thing you might want to do will most probably break your warranty, you may be violating copyrights, you may be circumventing the DMCA, and:

a) is deeply hidden into the registry
b) you need to code in order to get it done
c) you have to pay for proprietary third party solutions
d) there is no documentation, and no source code. You are on your own for a nice reverse engineering and blind testing session.
e) you may break your system for no particular reason, there will be no explanation as to why it broke, and the only solution will be reinstalling.

In the Unix world, this limitations doesn't exist. Those features that work out of the box work just as well as with any other OS, and actually better since they tend to be more flexible and robust. If you want to do something that the product wasn't intentionally designed for, it's ok!, you have the source, the tools, the docs, the forums, no legal problems, everything is pretty transparent, you can script and modify, anything you may need to download in order to get your job done is probably 100% free software, if you make a mistake, it's easy to roll back, and usually everything can be fixed. It actually needs a bad rm -rf as root or a truly horrible dependency hell to render a Unix system unusable beyond all hopes of recovery, and it's pretty hard (or you have to be pretty stupid) to get into those situations.

If you know what you are doing, go the Slackware way, if you don't, go the Ubuntu way.

Here is a metaphor that explains why your post is IMHO wrong:

"Ferraris are not as good as Fords. My sister used to drive a Ford Fiesta with automatic gear, the other day, She tried to use my Ferrari, since she wanted it to be as compact as her Fiesta, she wanted to modify the car's layout to make it easier to park, but she couldn't fully understand all this manual gear stuff. Also, when she tried to modify the layout of the car and broke some parts, and couldn't find any compatible replacements at joe's store."

If you want to make Unix just as easy as windoze or mac, you have to cripple it, froze functionality, and then make an honest comparison.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[Jeff DeMaagd]

I think that's a fanciful notion. The world is interconnected. Third party compatibility for Microsoft documents still isn't all that great.

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[nobaloney]

Some of them do... Not only in India, but in the rest of the world. When my godson married I gave him and his new bride a new computer system running Linux. He had no computer experience, she had quite a bit of Microsoft experience.

They both have made the switch very successfully. The only problem so far was that she was saving files in the OpenOffice.Org default format and sending them to her correspondents who couldn't open them. A minor education issue.

They live in California now but will move to Peru after their son is born, to start an orphanage. I like to think I've saved them a bit of money in their future, and that they'll probably need a bit.

Jeff

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[evilviper]

I tried looking for alternative documentation, but all I could find was endless sample macros - useless if what you need is reference material - and adverts for some guy's book, which is apparently really good, but if I'm going to pay for proprietary material I might as well just use the proprietary software I already own instead of having to wait days for a book to be delivered. So I gave up.

I very quickly found a tremendous amount of available documentation. The OOo macros book I presume you're talking about happens to be under a free documentation license, which means it is anything but proprietary.

http://www.pitonyak.org/oo.php
http://sourceforge.net/projects/ooomacros/

Re:If m$ is too pricey

[MarkKB]

Microsoft gave them money, sure... about a year before the suit was filed. Are you saying Bill Gates is clairvoyent?

linux

[wizardforce]

MS needs to tread carefully... aw screw it.. ironically if they make the argument that pirating is wrong it opens the door to linux. 2 billion people * even a small percentage = ALOT.

Re:linux

[romland]

Wow, insightful. Why did you post anonymous with a thing like that?

Re:linux

[Lon]

Ballmer, you crazy guy, is that you?

Re:linux

[dreamlax]

Ballmer, you crazy guy, is that you?

Can't be, or you'd have a chair-shaped bruise on your forehead by now . . .

Re:linux

[zippthorne]

Linux is voluntary. It can't fail like communism because if linux fails, millions of deaths aren't part of the failure. Nice troll though.

Sad.

[Jordan (jman)]

While I'm not the biggest fan of Microsoft or their products, this is quite blatant piracy. I work for a computer repair shop where we get customers asking us to do stuff like this all the time, but it is the same as stealing one off the shelf. Any tech in my shop would be fired instantly for doing something like this. The golden rule is, if you can't afford it then don't buy it. I would be going after them too if I was Microsoft. These are companies pretty much promoting piracy.

Re:Sad.

[Bios_Hakr]

>>but it is the same as stealing one off the shelf

No, it isn't. If your shop has 20 boxed copies of WinXP, and one of your techs installs an unlicensed copy, you still have 20 boxes on the shelf.

I'm not arguing that violating a license agreement isn't wrong, but it is definitely not stealing.

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed.

Plus I don't think anybody on slashdot would believe that putting Windows on somebody's computer is a "selfless act".

Re:Sad.

[QuantumG]

it is the same as stealing one off the shelf. It's not. You know it is not, and there are plenty of other reasons why you should advocate an alternative to your customers.

Of course, I'm sure, like most PC repair shops, you don't offer any other OS solutions than Microsoft.

Re:Sad.

[ralphdaugherty]

      I think it's appropriate for US companies to send jobs over to India and China for cheap labor and then find out that the cheap labor isn't going to buy their products, nor the Anericans whose jobs were offshored who are usually making much less.

      The more they do it, the less customers they will have.

  rd

Re:Sad.

[Zemran]

this is quite blatant piracy

They came swing in through the windows with cutlasses in their teeth did they?

The average person in India earns less in a year than you earn in a month and there is no way that they can afford to 'buy' a genuine copy of windows. In the west, we have got so used to the claptrap that surrounds overpricing cartelles that we have even adopted their propaganda (i.e. piracy). You can afford to pander to this extortion but someone else in India, Thailand, China etc. cannot. You are welcome to remain in your moral black hole and they in theirs but do not think that your cultural imperialism will make them change because they do not have that option.

You think you are right, and in your culture you may be. They think they are right, and in their culture they may be.

Re:Sad.

[Jordan (jman)]

Actually, I work for Fry's Electronics. We sell a couple flavors of linux, along with a couple of BSD... We have more than one technician that uses linux at home, and have promoted it and installed it on numerous customer's computers.

Re:Sad.

[Babbster]

The average person in India earns less in a year than you earn in a month and there is no way that they can afford to 'buy' a genuine copy of windows.

And, yet, they can afford to buy the PC on which to run the pirated (suggest another fucking word, by the way, if you don't like that one - someone says "stolen" they get jumped, someone says "pirated" and an asshat like you chimes in [/parenthetical rant]) software? Times are tough all over, aren't they?

I've pirated software before and I'll do it again (lazy+cheap) but justifying it by whining about affordability - whatever the country - is bullshit. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to take Linux, modify it to run on a specialized device and distribute it under my own copyright because I don't like the GPL and I can't afford to hire someone to write me an OS from scratch.

Re:Sad.

[QuantumG]

Customers don't get to talk to the technicians at Frys. It's company policy. If you're going to lie, at least get your facts straight first.

Re:Sad.

[teh moges]

This only partially correct. As far as the shop is concerned, its the same as stealing one off the shelf. First, read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken _window It's not a strict example of whats going on here, but its very related. If someone came in and stole a copy of windows, the net effect would be -1(profit of selling Windows) and -1(retailer cost of getting in Windows). If a tech installed a pirated copy of Windows, the net effect is still -1 (profit of selling Windows), and still -1 cost of getting in a copy of Windows, since this copy hasn't been sold, and is just now sitting there. Now, you could argue that the copy of Windows could still be sold to someone else, but the store could just get in another copy of windows, which also increases the profit for the store. And also, the point comes up, what if everyone that came into the store asked only for pirated versions? The store would loose all the money it gets from Windows sales.
I'm a Linux advocate working in a small computer shop that deals pretty much only in Windows (working for the devil, I know...). While I don't like the idea, almost all of our customers do not know how to use a computer. They need to know that they can get support for their computer when they need it. While they could get support for Linux, they don't know that, and for all I know, I could just be "selling" the idea to them if I try to convince them otherwise. What this means, ignoring even any lawsuits, if we were to loose our ability to sell Windows, we would just plain go out of business.
My point is, not only does the shop still loose the money it would of lost by having a physical copy stolen, it also potentially loses the ability to even sell Windows. Sure, the physical object is still there, but the profit line (the only reason the business is running) is at the same loss, potentially even worse off.
I don't like Microsoft, but they have put up their software (however crap that might be), and their price (however much that might be). If you don't like their rules, don't play their game.

Re:Sad.

[QuantumG]

Your logic is so retarded you might have a future at a major corporation, apply now.

For those of you who missed it: the person requested the tech to install Windows without cost, can't afford Windows. They're not just out to save a few dollars.. they never would pay for Windows because they have more important needs for which the cost of Windows could be used.

Re:Sad.

[Doctor_Jest]

They infringed on Microsoft's copyright. They did not profit from it.... nor did they make anything more than something a college student does for his pals.
In order to maintain that there is damage (hence criminal infringement), these people have to be able to buy the software if said copy-service wasn't in place.
Since the average person over there can't call ma (like the college students) to get the money for the copy, how is this a loss for Microsoft? If there wasn't a copy-service set up to put windows on their computers, there would not be any sales of Windows... period. The only thing Microsoft is doing here is preventing market penetration by not allowing what they allowed here in the dim past of their existence. Publicly decrying software "piracy", but allowing the crack to take hold and cement the brand for future revenue... If they feel the need to squeeze blood from a turnip, have at it.

And before you split hairs, I'm not talking morality here. I'm talking the definition of damages received from the copying of their software.... hence the "damages" received from someone trying to copy their OS. If these losses are so prevalent, and so concrete... write them off on their taxes. See if the IRS believes your figure. They CAN'T because it's _speculation_... or as I like to call it... a WILD ASSED GUESS about how much they _perceived_ in losses due to someone not going to the store to get their copy of Windows. Whether or not that person would do so _at all_ if there wasn't an alternative never factors into the equation. (which brought me to the first point...)

How do you know these computers aren't $50 hunks of leftovers dumped by corporations when they updated their secretarial pool to new quad xenon ultra specials?
Simply owning a PC does not automatically give them the purchasing power to go out and get Windows... We don't generally know the entire story.

And lo, for $5, you can get a professionally duplicated copy of Windows and Office in stores all over Eastern Europe and China. Is Microsoft afraid to get involved with the organized crime behind these copies? I think so... So they beat up _symbols_ of "piracy" like these shops in India and try to garner press for their actions and sympathy for their "losses." They're losing the PR war to Linux, and yet when people in India who cannot afford to buy their OS (even at their "adjusted" prices) yet desire to run their software do this, Microsoft gets their knickers in a twist and closes the door on yet another market... giving something else position to take away their position.

Way to go, MS. I applaud you. Show those Indian bastards by pulling all your call centers and support lines out of the country until they can clean up their act. That'll show them the consequences of infringing on _your_ IP, by god. ...waiting to see the call centers close up....

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

The golden rule is, if you can't afford it then don't buy it. I would be going after them too if I was Microsoft. These are companies pretty much promoting piracy

Let's see, I assume you are an american. You see, not everyone in the world makes the same as you americans do. Not all of us (myself included, I live in Argentina) can afford to spend 2 to 3 months salary on Windows. And microsoft doesn't help either. They have this flat-price policy, all over the world. You *may* begin to understand us, blatant pirates, the day Microsoft charged USD 6000 for a copy of Windows. But that isn't going to happen, as Microsoft even offers discounts to students, of course those discounts are available for USA only (and a few selected european countries).

The problem is their monopoly. Someone who tries to find any job nowadays is required to know Windows (let's not enter the Linux argument, please). Just take my word for it.

Microsoft tried to "help" the situation a little by releasing the "starter" editions: crippled versions of their software for less money. Personally, I see that as an insult. You see, I go to the movies every now and then. Last year I went to see "The Da Vinci Code", the same day it was released in my country (may 18). I paid $5 (that's 5 pesos, or USD 1,80) to watch the movie. It wasn't a pirated divx, it wasn't a crippled down, shorter, lower-quality version of the movie. It wasn't even a cheaper remake. It was the same movie that was released in the US one day later (movies are released on Thursdays in my country). It wasn't a crappy cinema either. It had air conditioning, a big screen, surround sound, nice seats, popcorn, coca cola, and everything else. So, how can the movie industry charge 1/5 to 1/10 what they charge in the US, and still profit, while Microsoft refuses to do so?

One time someone answered "because people would buy an imported copy of Windows and pay less for it". Yeah, right. I'd love to see an american with their brand-new cheap copy of Windows, in Spanish. Or some indic language even.

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

Ah, fuck. And I lost 5 minutes of my time answering to the GP.

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

"They did not profit from it.... nor did they make anything more than something a college student does for his pals."

1) Thats not true. I am from India. Most of these shops charge 1000 - 5000 Rs to assemble a computer. If an Indian buying his first computer pays 10,000 - 20,000 Rs then close to 10-25% of that is given to these guys. They make deals with hardware sellers and get things cheap and then charge their customers almost twice of everything.

2) A majority of these guys don't even know how to install Linux. Forget counseling the customer. They want easy, cheap and huge margins.

These people make a profit, run a business and don't want to pay up. They are not people who want to get an OS to use but don't have money to install one. And no, they are not running this business to help the individual who cannot afford to buy M$ Windows. They run it for profit and don't care about anything but the Rupees.

My support is not for M$ but it is directed against these vendors who cheat ignorant people by over charging for assembling computers.

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

He didn't say he was a technician, did he dipshit? In fact, he strongly implied that he has some sort of supervisory or managerial position.

Re:Sad.

[Bios_Hakr]

>>My point is, not only does the shop still loose the money it would of lost by having a physical copy stolen, it also potentially loses the ability to even sell Windows.

The shop has no financial stake in Windows. Their bread and butter comes from selling a service to the customer. That service is installing, upgrading, and fixing computers.

If the shop relies on the money they make through the sale of a copy of Windows, then that shop has a broken model. Sure, and extra $20 in the till is nice, but it shouldn't make or break the bank.

I see this problem with a lot of "mom and pop" stores. They rely on old streams of revenue without taking into account how replaceable they really are. Mom and pop can buy 100 widgets for $1 each. They sell them for $2. WalMart can buy 1,000,000 widgets for $0.80 each and sell them for $0.99. The mom and pop shops are doomed to failure if they rely on moving stock.

What they need to focus on is selling a service. Don't sell Dell or Gateway, any asshole can do that. Sell a custom-built box that fits the customer like a glove. Customer wants to surf and do email; build a low-end box. Gamer comes in; build something kick-ass. Help people fix problems and educate people on how to use a computer. Sure, it's a harder job than pushing a boxed copy of WinXP, but there is a lot more money to be made there.

As for installing software, let the customer decide. If they want Windows, try and give it to them as cheaply as possible. Sell student copies or build custom NLite auto-install DVDs that the customer can "find" in a box behind the store. Or just install Linux and teach them to use that.

But, whatever you do, don't rely on pushing someone else's product from your shelf.

Re:Sad.

[cdrudge]

If someone came in and stole a copy of windows, the net effect would be -1(profit of selling Windows)

Doesn't this make the invalid assumption that the customer would have purchased a license to begin with? You can not lose something that might not have been yours to begin with.

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed with a caveat. My neighbor, on the dole and going to school to get off welfare, depends heavily on the cheap PC she bought from Wal-Mart. Her ten year old son downloaded some stupid program to the PC, and it crashed the hard drive. The restore disks that came with the computer wouldn't work, and I had to call someone I know who has access to software. For $100, he had this family's PC back up and running in an hour. How are they supposed to be able to afford to buy a new full version of Windows XP? The computers should be sold with install disks for the operating software. Since they don't, I say fuck Microsoft and the ugly donkey that Bill Gates rode in on.

Re:Sad.

[sweetandy]

...but it is the same as stealing one off the shelf.
At least with stealing something off the shelf, you can at least pretend that you own the software. You can't even pretend if you only own the highly revocable right to use the software.

Re:Sad.

[digitalchinky]

Same deal in the Philippines. Windows XP Home (OEM) costs Php4900 ($106 US) retail. While Office 2007 off the shelf is Php8000 ($172 US) for the cheapest version. Minimum legal wage set by the government is Php8400 per month, in reality people are lucky if they make half of that though.

Linux is pretty popular over here, you can have it installed wherever you buy a PC, though many retailers charge more to install it than an original licensed copy of windows for some stupid and illogical reason.

I'm not quite sure what my point is though.

Re:Sad.

[Kittenman]

For what's its worth, I entirely agree. If you can't afford it, don't buy it.

For the slashdotter from Argentina - if using Microsoft SW is a requirement but people can't afford to buy legit copies - then eventually all MS users will be, de facto, criminals. When the MS userbase is either small or full of crooks, MS may get the message that their software is overpriced. If that's the right message.

Re:Sad.

[Billly Gates]

If they can afford a new computer then they can afford Windows.

If they are so financially restrained that a little $99 OEM edition will break their wallets well ... they are probably not in a good enough financial situation to buy a computer. At least I would not if I were that broke.

Anyway there is Linux if they do not want a copy of windows. But if you agree to use MS garbage then you need to pay them whether you like the company or not you do not use it. Plain and simple.

If you wrote software for a living I think you would be pretty angry if people were using it without paying for it. Or if your boss could not afford to pay your paycheck for 2 weeks worth of work which is a better analogy.

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

Sheesh you're dumb. Look here:

Scenario 1.
Store bought 20 copies of Windows at $200 ea., expecting to sell them for $250
Somebody *STEALS* a copy of Windows from the store. The store has 19 copies of windows. They lost $200 principle and $50 opportunity. PRINCIPLE != OPPORTUNITY. Opportunity has to be weighted by the probability that it would happen. Thus, the store lost $200 + P(Sale) * $50. That's a lot of money, it's between $200 and $250 lost, closer to $200.

Scenario 2.
Store bought 20 copies of Windows at $200 ea., expecting to sell them for $250
An employee installs windows with a fake serial# generated by a keygen
The store still has 20 copies of windows. They lost $50 in opportunity only. Thus, the store lost P(Sale) * $50. That's not much money, it's between $0 and $50 lost, closer to $0.

This is why software piracy is a COPYRIGHT issue, not a THEFT issue, despite the FUD from BSA and such.

What is the probability of selling Windows to someone who has expressed willingness to pirate it? It's one minus the probability that they would get it _anywhere_ else, taking into consideration the laziness/effort/financial_desperation the person employs in seeking other places.

Re:Sad.

[jma05]

> What they need to focus on is selling a service. Don't sell Dell or Gateway, any asshole can do that. Sell a custom-built box that fits the customer like a glove. Customer wants to surf and do email; build a low-end box. Gamer comes in; build something kick-ass. Help people fix problems and educate people on how to use a computer. Sure, it's a harder job than pushing a boxed copy of WinXP, but there is a lot more money to be made there.

This is exactly what computer shops in India did/do. You tell them what you need to do with your PC and they will order the parts, build the most cost-effective machine that does the job, install the software that caters for it - with pirated software of course. When a customer says, they need something else, they send a guy to your home with the CDs and he will install the stuff for you - for about a dollar. This was a while ago. Things might have changed a bit since.

If MS starts a crackdown, customers WILL choose Linux. $100 is OK to give away for not worrying about the transition from something familiar (assuming quality equivalence) in US but it a "not OK" amount in India. A few years ago, I actually knew some not-too-bright entry level programmers being paid $100 a MONTH (Small town. No tech education and could not find jobs elsewhere. Just built simple GUI front ends. They did it for "experience". And the prices changed since).

That is not to say all software is pirated. Nearly all India software I came across was legally purchased since it came at reasonable prices, was very customerized to their (small business) needs and good support was available.

Also, back then, network was really bad and expensive. Linux is a huge pain to install software without having a good network connection. Now things are different.

Let's say for the sake of argument that Linux needs more management like Bill Gates once said. It may be more expensive in US in TCO terms when the service time is more expensive than software. Not so in India. Techs will gladly spend a couple of hours on your machine for a dollar or two. Not gouge like Geek Squad.

Re:Sad.

[syousef]

Piracy is a crime. People should pay for a commercial product. However "It is the same as stealing one off the shelf" is about the silliest thing you could say. When the act of installing software magically makes a boxed DVD disappear I'll have to go to the police and inform them that someone's put drugs in my food or drink.

Re:Sad.

[Billly Gates]

Sure the shop has a financial incentive.
1.) Not get sued and get its MS OEM license revoked.
2.) Sell Windows installations.

They do get money and an employee willing to get around not paying for Windows is more likely to steal. Could you trust that person not to walk out with some ram dimms or cpus?

But Merchandise needs to be sold and it does cost the company money. Why would I want to pay this shop for a $99 OEM copy of Windows when I can just pay a tech to steal it?

Also if low end gaming boxes were made without legal copies of pcs then the customers could sue or report you to SPA if ms ever deactivated their pcs when running a MS update with their whole copyright drm guinine licensing craplet. Ouch

Re:Sad.

[Jordan (jman)]

Ahh, you certainly astound me with what you don't know... Obviously you've never been in a Fry's since everyone in the service department is a technician (save one shipping clerk). We don't have separate people working the counter like other stores do. Sounds like YOU need to get the facts straight before you lie.

Re:Sad.

[FreakWent]

So why not sell them Ubuntu, with an original CD, for $50, and offer support?

It's not rocket science, and you can get traction in the market by offering dual-boot for those who DO buy windows.

Re:Sad.

[FreakWent]

AM2 Sempron with firewire, ASUS motherboard and 6150 chipset, in Australian dollars:

CPU $70
Motherboard $129
RAM $40
Keyboard + mouse $10

screen free 2nd hand or use a TV.

Total: $250.

Windows XP: $250

By your logic, you can afford to pay double on anything you buy, and I don't agree that this is true.

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

speaking as someone who is dealing w/ Finnish Windows XP, and not speaking Finnish [Windows and just about anything else you can imagine costs more here in Finland than in the states]....

Microsoft does offer a way to upgrade your single region OS into a Multiple region one (MUI, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MUI). It's not as expensive as buying the whole OS, thankfully, but it is priced by your region, so it'd be a reasonable deal in the states to update a very cheap XP Pro Spanish to XP Pro w/ MUI. -- Unfortunately the same can't be said for Finland.

Re:Sad.

[kripkenstein]

One time someone answered "because people would buy an imported copy of Windows and pay less for it". Yeah, right. I'd love to see an american with their brand-new cheap copy of Windows, in Spanish. Or some indic language even.

That isn't a problem. You can customize the languages in Windows (and lots of people use English Windows in non-English-speaking countries, like my own). Now, Microsoft might prevent this sort of 'problem' (a problem only for Microsoft) by technical means, that is, somewhat like DVDs. However, DVDs have hardware suited for the task (different hardware in different regions), PCs don't, so you need to do something more complex. Which leaves the door open to circumvention, for example, telling the computer that you are in the US when you aren't. Furthermore, for Microsoft to prevent selling Windows across borders may violate free-trade laws (but IANAL).

So, there are reasons why Microsoft don't just sell the same product for cheap. It would hurt their bottom line. And as a monopolist, there is really nothing to prevent them from doing so in the harshest way possible.

Re:Sad.

[RightSaidFred99]

So wait. You bring out the "but, but I need to know it to get a job!" argument, but then go on to cry that Windows starter edition isn't good enough. And I seem to notice that Windows comes bundled with PC's and that those PC's don't cost any more than it would to build your own PC without Windows. So...what's your point again other than wanting something and not being willing to pay the price the seller has for it?

If I want to get a job as a lawyer, I have to spend $50-100k to go to school, you don't hear people whining about that. Get a different job if you can't learn from the OS that came installed on your PC or you can't deal with starter edition, or get a job in Linux even though you conveniently asked us not to mention it because it blows your "argument" (arguwhined) out of the water.

"Look, I'm levitating! Don't bring the table I'm standing on into the argument!"

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

"... this is quite blatant piracy.."

No it's not. It's how software should be.

These people are living in a software paradise, and you are trying to bring them down to your degraded and filthy position, where you steal and murder the rest of the world and pretend that you do it in the name of freedom.

The sooner your sick system of torture and slavery is broken the happier the rest of the world will be. And if that means you all starve in the gutter that's all right with us.

We can see what America does when the Middle East raises the price of oil. If you can't afford it you don't buy it. No, you steal it by force, and kill millions of innocents in the process.

Re:Sad.

[OverlordQ]

Well then get to work writing your own OS. They made it, they can price it however they want. You don't like it, write your own, pay the price, or do like you already do and pirate it and shut the hell up.

Re:Sad.

[Kjella]

One time someone answered "because people would buy an imported copy of Windows and pay less for it". Yeah, right. I'd love to see an american with their brand-new cheap copy of Windows, in Spanish. Or some indic language even.

Look up 'imperialism' sometime, and you might realize that a lot of the poor countries of the world speak the same languages (English, French, Spanish) as their rich western counterparts. Or that it is their one common written language between a dozen tribal languages. It's not exactly like American English is native American either...

Re:Sad.

[dltaylor]

The movie is regionally-priced because it requires your physical presence.

M$-Windows is NOT cheaper because it is usable elsewhere.

Examples:

Sell a French-language version cheaply in West Africa, the Caribbean, South Pacific, or Guiana and it will end up on computers in Canada, the US (Louisiana has a significant French-speaking population), and France. Why couldn't a French company with offices in Ivory Coast simply buy all of their M$ software through that office? For that matter, I use a Sun UNIX-International keyboard on my desktop, and I could certainly use the French version for all that I do with M$-Windows, which is play games.

Spanish-language versions from Central and South America would certainly work well for the people of Spain, as well as the extensive US Spanish-speaking population.

I'm not defending Microsoft. In fact, I'd like to see the company seized under the RICO act (it is a convicted felon and ongoing criminal enterprise, after all) and all of operating systems and tools source code free (or media cost) at the Library of Congress, and the rest of it sold at auction. Your pricing argument doesn't really work.

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

You *may* begin to understand us, blatant pirates, the day Microsoft charged USD 6000 for a copy of Windows.

There are many pieces of software that I would use in engineering which cost thousands of dollars (CAD, drawing, math, etc). The high cost opened up markets for "crippled" versions and open source alternatives.

The problem is their monopoly. Someone who tries to find any job nowadays is required to know Windows (let's not enter the Linux argument, please)... So, how can the movie industry charge 1/5 to 1/10 what they charge in the US, and still profit, while Microsoft refuses to do so?

That's the reason. Piracy on the low end (individual users) makes Windows the defacto standard so then MS can charge extremely high prices on the high end (businesses/government). It's how they lock in entire economies to use their software, so their market grows along with the country.

Re:Sad.

[SadGeekHermit]

Why are you mad that he said "if you can't afford it, don't buy it"? He didn't say you couldn't run ANY O/S... He just said don't buy the overpriced one.

Why shouldn't we discuss Linux? Is Linux a dirty word in your home? If so, why?

You say people need to know how to use Windows. So? What do you really think they'll be using? Most people use:

* A web browser
* A word processor and spreadsheet
* Some custom applications their company bought.

The web browser will work exactly the same on Linux.

You can get Open Office, which is very similar to Microsoft Office. The skills are almost entirely portable, unless you want to do VB scripting (unlikely).

Custom applications usually come with on the job training.

The only people who need to know Windows internals (thus need to actually work on a Windows machine at some point) are the people maintaining Windows servers. And they probably learned how to do that in some kind of technical school's lab.

My point is, Linux is a perfectly acceptable substitute and it's FREE. I know you're mad because you thought the GP sounded condescending, but I don't understand why you don't consider Linux an option.

Seriously, I'm asking.

Re:Sad.

[QuantumG]

He also refered to where he works as a "repair shop", then he said he works at Frys.. but your objection is certainly valid. In fact, it's so good, you gotta wonder why he didn't say that himself. Reason: he's lying through his teeth.

Re:Sad.

[cliffski]

oh god, do some people really make themselves believe this shit? Its like people who eat super-processed economy food, and say they can't afford to eat better, but they have satelite TV and the latest mobile phone. Unless you are literally existing on the poverty line (people buying new PCs aren't), then its not that you can't afford it, its a matter of your own priorities. I can't afford a new car, except actually, that's bullshit, I can, I just choose to spend the money some people would make on car payments on other things. The moment people think they can wave the magic "i couldnt afford it otherwise" card and get free stuff, people will dream up all kinds of shit they 'simply couldn't afford'.
If you want it, buy it. If you can't afford it, you can't have it. That's capitalism. Other governmental systems also exist, see N Korea.

Re:Sad.

[orin]

You can switch interface languages in Vista by downloading a freely available language pack - so the "Spanish" version of Vista can be made "English" in a couple of minutes. I purchased a Vista laptop in Japan in the weekend and had it running in English with just a few clicks in the control panel (the English language pack appears to always be installed - it is stuff like Russian you have to get from Windows Update). This is a free and simple operation - so your scenario about the American with the brand-new cheap copy of Spanish Windows won't work (at least not with Vista onward) as it is trivial to switch the interface to another language.

Re:Sad.

[Adeptus_Luminati]

If your company is a small shop, 1 branch office kind of deal with 5 to 15 people, that might be ok.

But mid sized companies may have dozens (not 1) application, some of them DOS based still, others strictly windows binary front end. I have seen mid sized companies with 1500 people running over 200 different applications with about 7 of them being at least partially internally developed (running on windows) and then most of rest all MS based off the shelf stuff - some $50/user apps, others $10,000/user apps - no, not all of these have Linux counterparts - most don't.

Get a job in a mid-sized company in IT industry in North America / Europe for a year, and then come back and tell me Linux is a real alternative. Unless that company's IT shop was started up on Linux, the odds of Windows stuff getting converted or replace by Linux counterparts is quite simply unrealistic. That doesn't mean that if an effort is done to begin a migration that in 10 years it would not be possible to be 100% Linux shop; however, usually assigning that much (human) resources to accomplish the task is very hard to justify.

Adeptus.

Re:Sad.

[dreamchaser]

If you cannot afford it, do not buy it. Using that as rationalization to copy software illegally is rather lame when there are excellent free alternatives.

Re:Sad.

[mdarksbane]

He's just saying that MS is fooling themselves if they think they can sell an operating system at a cost that in that country is 2-3 months salary. Heck, it is a month's salary even for the Indian programmers that all of our jobs are being outsourced to!

And for the average non-techie, there is a difference between knowing windows and knowing linux. At a job interview for a desk position, they are going to ask you if you know Word, not if you know a word processor, and if you know Windows, not if you know how to use a computer. And that's how it's going to be at 90% of the non-technical but computer using positions because average HR person has never heard of linux.

I'm not saying it's excusable - these markets should, as a whole, switch over to using linux, and companies should know that one word processor is basically the same as another. But that's not the way the world works currently, and pretending differently isn't going to change anything.

If foreign governments start cracking down on piracy in general (why would they care anyway - it's an american company) then normal people might start to realize that there are free alternatives, which will eventually filter up to Ms. HR person, since she can't afford to buy windows herself at home. Until then... if there's no real incentive for either to follow some foreign copyright law, why would they?

Re:Sad.

[SCHecklerX]

Then use the alternatives. "Piracy" is what got microsoft to its dominant position in the first place. If you can't pay for it, then use something else. If everyone would do *that* instead, then we may not have had this monopoly-abusing asshat of a company with so much power these days.

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

Please educate yourself in basic economics. There are two reasons why multinationals can have lower costs in poorer countries.

1) The total unit cost is lower. Mostly this is influenced by the lower cost of advertising and distribution.

2) The richer markets (mostly USA/Japan/some European) are paying somewhat inflated values to make up the difference.

So the next time your Prozac is only 50 pesos instead of $150 US, you can thank your buddies the American citizenry for picking up part of the check, instead of thinking that being poor entitles you to cheap entertainment. We're not exactly talking about food and shelter here, so don't play the victim

Re:Sad.

[Doctor_Jest]

No, I never inferred the business was running a charity. But charging to set up the computer and putting an illicit copy of windows on it is hard to untangle, and thus, my original point... they didn't profit from the Windows copy, but the computer itself.

The simple economics of it is this... Microsoft can't claim a loss on something they couldn't sell to begin with. That's the sticking point of copyright these days, and its something the IP holders and copyright conglomerates are working hard to criminalize... right now, at least in the US, it's still a civil matter.

Give them enough time and enough bought and paid for politicians, and it'll _all_ be criminal. Which is a crying shame and _not_ what the FF's were aiming for.

Whether or not these Indian shops are rooking the customers is another matter.

And for point 2. If they can install Windows, they can install Linux. It's not hard anymore. It hasn't been hard in years... and with the liveCDs and efficient hardware recognition, it's _easier_ than Windows. So that's not a valid excuse to simply go "windows" instead... (but that's a whole other subject...) ;)

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

Forget about the language issue. Just make it illegal to use a copy of Windows in a country other than the one it was purchased in. Sure, a company could buy a whole bunch of Windows licenses in Argentina, ship them back to the states, and change the default language to English, but they'd be breaking the law. If they're willing to do that, why wouldn't they just pirate the US-English copies to begin with?

A full-price version of Windows would still be available that you could transport to other countries, if you were worried about having to move someday.

Re:Sad.

[Shajenko42]

So why not sell them Ubuntu, with an original CD, for $50, and offer support?

Probably because support for Ubuntu, when you're dealing with people who have never even heard of Linux before, would cost a good deal more than the $50 they were charging.

Re:Sad.

[shark72]

"The average person in India earns less in a year than you earn in a month and there is no way that they can afford to 'buy' a genuine copy of windows."

I think you're being fooled by the statistics. India has a very high percentage of poor people, but in the industrial centers, wages and costs of living are comparable to those of other industrialized nations. It's easy to lie with statistics and use the average salary in India, including the countless dirt farmers who do not own computers, but it's useless in this context. In an unrelated note, a more common scenario of being fooled by statistics is the oft-quoted statistic that the average lifespan was 38 years or somesuch in the Middle Ages. People tend to think that this means that folks of the day commonly dropped dead in their 30's; the reality is that plenty of people lived to their 60s, 70s, and 80s -- just as they do now -- but there was a high infant mortality rate, much higher than today. If you survived childhood, you had a decent chance of seeing much more than 38 candles on your cake.

The important thing is that the customers of these shops are buying computers, big-screen TVs, mobile phones, and other luxury trappings. They could afford that $99 Windows license to go with their $800 computer, but they choose not to, as it's widely available for free. And, if a retailer were to buck the trend and start charging for Windows licenses and other preloaded software, his customers would simply go to one of the ten other shops on the road which would still happily continue to preload the software for free.

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

There's no way to turn Spanish windows XP into English windows XP (you can change you regional settings, but the start button will still say "Inicio")

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

Thank you very much! That was exactly my point.

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

Because I know all of that. I do use Linux from time to time. I use it in all my servers (I manage a few WISPs running where the local monopoly doesn't sell broadband). The reason I didn't want to discuss linux, is that I didn't want to fall in the advocacy argument. I do advocate for Linux too. Recently I was talking to a friend of mine, she told me she liked programming (omg!) but that she didn't like Linux. Turns out she had never used it. Next time I see her I'll give her a copy of Ubuntu or something live, so she can play with it a bit.

What I was talking about the flat pricing. If you can afford it or not, that is your problem. What I meant is that Microsoft should be more realistic: you can't go suing everyone, because you will lose your almost-customers. But if you give them the opportunity to buy your software, many of them will. The local Microsoft office would also provide jobs to the locals too. It's a situation where all parts win.

Re:Sad.

[roman_mir]

So what you are saying is that you gain a competitive advantage by knowing how to use MS Windows that will allow you to make more money, yet you are blaming the company producing the product for not letting you to aquire this advantage for free or at a severely reduced charge because you can't pay? I fail to see where you have a moral right to complain.

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

So wait. You bring out the "but, but I need to know it to get a job!" argument, but then go on to cry that Windows starter edition isn't good enough. And I seem to notice that Windows comes bundled with PC's and that those PC's don't cost any more than it would to build your own PC without Windows. So...what's your point again other than wanting something and not being willing to pay the price the seller has for it?

Down here in South America we don't use "branded" computers. Most of our computers are white boxes. The last computer I bought was an athlon 64 X2 3800, Asus M2NPV-VM motherboard, 1GB DDDR2 800Mhz and a 320GB drive. This computer costed about USD 450-500. Add to that USD 200 extra for a copy of Vista (non-OEM). That's 30% of the cost of the computer. So, it does add to the price. Also, with this computer I work at 1280x1024 resolution, and right now I have several apps open (at least 7 windows). If I was using vista starter, I couldn't have used more than 512MB of ram and 800x600 resolution.

If I want to get a job as a lawyer, I have to spend $50-100k to go to school, you don't hear people whining about that.

I don't. I go to public college.

Get a different job if you can't learn from the OS that came installed on your PC or you can't deal with starter edition, or get a job in Linux even though you conveniently asked us not to mention it because it blows your "argument" (arguwhined) out of the water.

First, I answered below why I didn't want to discuss about linux. Second, install Linux on your mother's computer and see how it works. I can deal with linux (I have been doing it for the last 9 years, mind you), Average Joe can't. Third, in a country where 14% of people don't have jobs, it's pretty hard to "just get a different job".

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

Sell a French-language version cheaply in West Africa, the Caribbean, South Pacific, or Guiana and it will end up on computers in Canada, the US (Louisiana has a significant French-speaking population), and France. Why couldn't a French company with offices in Ivory Coast simply buy all of their M$ software through that office?

Duh, because Microsoft would notice!

Spanish-language versions from Central and South America would certainly work well for the people of Spain, as well as the extensive US Spanish-speaking population.

Europe has enough protectionist laws that will prevent a copy of "Latin Windows" to enter Spain, at least without paying a substantial sum (that's what customs are for, anyway). The same could happen in the US. I mean, USA has software export laws that prevents exporting of cryptographic software. I doubt they can't add some "import" law too.

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

If this advantage will allow me to make as much money as people in the US, then no. If this advantage will be "just enough" to get a job and still get paid 1/5 what I'd be paid for in the US, then yes. It's not the company's fault that my country is poor, and it's certainly not their job to help our economy to get better. So, they don't do anything to help people who can't pay for its softare (contrary to the video game industry, video games here DO sell at a reduced price), why should people do anything to make them richer?

And to top it off, Microsoft doesn't give a shit about our countries. They don't sell the XBOX, the XBOX 360, any of its games, the Zune, whatever. That means they don't care about us. Why would I care about them?

Re:Sad.

[roman_mir]

I understand that you can always try and find justification for not paying for a product that you nevertheless decide to use to a company who built it, it doesn't even matter how poor these attempts are (I will not make as much money as people in US. Whatever, this is not a real justification anyway.) However don't be surprised when the companies in question decide to do whatever it is in their power to prevent and or stop such things from happening. Whether they succeed or not is irrelevant, they can still act in their best interests.

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

However don't be surprised when the companies in question decide to do whatever it is in their power to prevent and or stop such things from happening.

Like, say, lowering their prices in "developing markets"? God forbid! Let's just sue their asses and scare them to death. I suppose you also support the RIAA and MPAA too?

Re:Sad.

[roman_mir]

You suppose I support RIAA and MPAA in what? See, you posed an open ended question, you get an open ended answer. I think RIAA and MPAA are free to do whatever they wish as long as it does not conflict with the law. Whether this will work for them or not is irrelevant just as well.

On the topic again. Deciding a product pricing is always part of decision making for any company.

Re:Sad.

[Babbster]

Actually, by my logic you can always afford to pay nothing when you have that choice, either by pirating Windows or using a free OS such as one of the many flavors of Linux. What you shouldn't do is present Windows piracy as a moral choice just because it costs too much. That's the part that works on my last nerve.

Oh yeah, and what the hell are you going to do with that potential Windows PC you just priced out without a floppy/CD, a hard drive on which to store Windows and a monitor/TV (pretending they're always "free" is a crock). Leaving the CD, HD and screen out of your calculation is just intellectually dishonest and wouldn't change the fact that Windows is overpriced (by itself, a point with which I do not disagree).

Re:Sad.

[Shajenko42]

Just out of curiousity...

Is it the intrinsic idea of copyright infringement that you find distasteful, or the fact that these people are breaking the law?

For instance, suppose India's or China's government decides to make copying software from other countries legal, or decides not to enforce the laws against it (which basically amounts to the same thing). Do they have a right to do so, or are they being totally immoral?

And if they decide to do so, should the US really put so much effort into persuading them otherwise?

Re:Sad.

[roman_mir]

The parent is bragging about breaking the law, there is no question that he will continue to do so, however he is searching for approval of his justification here. I am not teaching anyone morality, it is left up to personal interpretation, however if the parent seems to have a moral problem with what he is doing. /. posting here is paramount to a perverted Catholic confession, it is completely out in the open but anonymous, he needs mass approval for him not to feel guilt from committing what he feels is a sinful act.

Now, I am an atheist and have no morals, I follow my own code of ethics, which tells me that it is better to treat others in a way that I would like them to treat me, I also understand how naive this approach is. Personally I do find copyright infringement to be distasteful because I would like others to respect my copyright since I respect theirs. However I also agree that the current copyright laws (especially the term length) are not justified.

From point of view of the law, if a country decides that a particular set of rules are important enough, it may request that other countries who are willing to participate in economic relationship respect some of these rules.

China or India (for example) can decide whatever they wish within their own boundaries, however other countries may decide not to continue meaningful economic relationships with China or India. I don't think this will result in wars, but the relationships may dampen.

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

It was a rhetorical question. Anyway.

Globalization works both ways: it allows you to sell your products in places you didn't even know existed, but there needs to be some reality check at some point: you can't just sell your product at the same price everywhere (McDonald's, Pepsi, Coca Cola, they all figured that out many years ago, but Microsoft still refuses to believe they should do the same thing). I'm not saying people should pirate Microsoft. Instead, I'm saying that Microsoft shouldn't go and play the victim (as they did in my country), whining that there's too much piracy of their software, when they have reached a position where they are, in practice, a monopoly, and yet they expect people to pay whatever they want "or face the consequences". Oh no, they are not the victims in this game. I don't think scaring your potential customers is a good way to make money (especially when your potential customers don't have the money you want them to pay).

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

If they are so financially restrained that a little $99 OEM edition will break their wallets well ... they are probably not in a good enough financial situation to buy a computer. At least I would not if I were that broke.

this is absurd. A decent computer (able to run either windows 2000 or a non-bloat version of linux) costs ~ $100. A Windows licence will double the cost !

and most people buy a computer because they need it - it's not some kind of bourgeois hobby. They're using it to improve their financial situation.

it's like saying to some poor farmer: if you can afford a $200 donkey to carry your stuff to the market, you're rich enough to pay a $300 donkey-tax.

Re:Sad.

[roman_mir]

Well, I don't buy that the people of those places, you have mentioned, are victims as they present themselves to be. What you see as victimization I see as opportunity. Some of those people just may decide to go in a different direction, try the Free Software, try Apple products instead, there is always some other form of Unix, Solaris for example or Free BSD.

See, the people of the USA (I am Canadian by the way,) have found a way, they created Free Software while they were facing the same questions that you are posing. What are the other people doing?

Re:Sad.

[fractoid]

If you want it, buy it. If you can't afford it, you can't have it. Couldn't have said it better myself. The same goes for music downloaders - "I couldn't afford to buy a 500-cd music library so I downloaded it." BS. If you don't want to pay for goods, then you go without those goods. Don't use the "well I couldn't afford it" as justification for downloading it.

Re:Sad.

[SadGeekHermit]

Now you're talking down to me. Tsk, tsk, tsk.

The point about custom applications was that when you're hired in a shop that uses them, THEY TRAIN YOU ON THEM. And having windows at home wouldn't let you learn them in advance anyway. So the argument that an individual needs to have Windows on his home computer so he can get a job is ridiculous.

You missed my point entirely, of course.

If you're saying "piracy is necessary because many companies in South America want to run Windows only, and can't afford it" then I have no sympathy for your position. If they can't afford it, it's worth porting their software to Java, which will let it run on Linux. Java is at least as easy to write code in as .Net, which is where the Windows world is going anyway.

Re:Sad.

[SadGeekHermit]

Of course I agree with you that their prices are ridiculous. I personally think they should price according to the local market, which would expand their clientele significantly. But, hey, they're the greediest people on Earth, after all. I don't think they're capable of taking a reasonable position. :)

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

I didn't say the people at my country were the victims. I said Microsoft comes down an whines about how much money they lose to piracy.

And Apple products are too expensive anyway (the cheapest Mac mini is USD 1031, and the cheapest iMac is USD 1773, www.macstation.com.ar)

I'm not going into the open-source-can-do-it debate, because we miss the point. So let me illustrate with another situation, parallel to the Windows situation.

WHAT ABOUT GAMES? Sure, I work, I study, whatever. But what if I want to play a video game? I myself have an XBOX, but most people can't afford one, so they play on their PC. Most people are too dumb even to install the game, I don't imagine a 12 year old kid trying to install some GTA on half-translated Cedega.

The PS2 is far more popular (although PC games retail for USD 20 to USD 40, PS2/XBOX titles retail for USD 100 or more -- bootlegged originals). That popularity is not due to Sony's aggressive marketing campaigns here in my country (hint: none), or due to their excellent pricing (USD 400 for a PS2 without games, memory card, and only one controller. That's today's price). It's because of the piracy. I don't know what Sony execs think, but they don't seem interested in selling their product here. So, all machines were bootlegs until last year when Sony "introduced" them as the latest technology. Bootleg machines still outsell "official" sales by probably an order of magnitude.

So, they don't care about the market when they see it as too small, but when they realize they underestimated people, they come and whine about being the sole victims of piracy.

Anyway, I don't care. I use PIRATED XBOX games. They don't sell them in my country anyway, so they're not really losing any money. (I'll start worrying about Gates' fortune the day he starts to be less greedy and really work for his dream of "a computer in every desktop".)

Re:Sad.

[kripkenstein]

Really? That is odd then. Over here, you can switch the language of Hebrew Windows to English, last I checked. But that was years ago, perhaps they changed it...

Re:Sad.

[shutdown -p now]

What was unclear about his reasoning? He said, "you need to know Windows to get work". That is so because most companies are likely to run pirated versions of Windows themselves. It's all the same here in Russia.

Re:Sad.

[craiglarry]

If it is so sad, why have I been laughing hilariously while reading all these naive postings. I've lived in China for 13 years and have bought four computers with windows systems. To make a long but interesting story shorter, I say that all have had illegal systems that "appeared" to be legal for the first several months. When I tried to get a legal English system all the Chinese laughed at me. But I persisted and three years ago I found a legal copy in Hangzhou and bought it. (I use Kubuntu for most of my daily work, but I still find a need to have winxp, for fun especially.) Recently I began having problems on a system in Shanghai, where I live most of the time, so I began looking for a legal/legal system, since it has things missing and has begun to behave erratically. That's not a stutter but a real life category for OS systems in China: legal/legal. It was a bit easier than in Hangzhou, but in a city of 20 million there was not even ONE winxp pro English legal system for sale. I had to wait for it to be shipped in from Beijing. About the same time my wife bought a computer for her university work with an chinese system winxp pro. I did my best to have her get a legal system. There really are advantages with some nice perks for having a legal copy. Contrary to popular opinion you cannot do everything on an illegal system. Microsoft has this thing about not letting you have some of their nice stuff at the site. We were told they didn't sell legal copies to mere end users; they only sold to the government and businesses. Who told us that? Why Microsoft of China of course. In China everyone is in collusion in this game. And the biggest abuser in my mind is Microsoft themselves. They do such a poor job of promoting their products here. You will play hell just trying to find them and will run up against a number of walls when you try to buy.

Re:Sad.

[helpfulcorn]

The problem with that is the MUI versions of Windows must be in English first so that there is an English base, then you can switch the languages. I ran into the problem when I needed to install Norwegian XP onto a computer, Microsoft said to use the MUI it had to be an English version of XP Corporate first then you use your language packs.

Re:Sad.

[roman_mir]

I understand that you don't care but it doesn't mean MS or Sony or whoever shouldn't try and prevent this from happening. It's their products, they have the right to complaint and the right to attempt and prevent you from having your pirated XBOX games, regardless of how fruitless this battle will be...

Re:Sad.

[aesdesdesdes]

With respect I am curious as to why those in the United States and other advanced economies should have to pay higher prices for their own products in order to subsidize products sold in developing economies?

I worked for a US drug manufacturer and was amazed that US drugs would sell for so much more in the US than overseas. The high prices for drugs in the US had to cover all of the research and development costs for the product, but the very same drugs would sell at a huge loss and were often given away far below cost in developing economies.

Often these drugs were the only cures for disease and providing them to the developing world to save lives was far more important than profit. What citizens of other nations don't realize is that the US customers of these companies have subsidized the creation of these products for years through very high prices. It is not profitable to sell US drugs in many developing countries but to not provide those drugs because of lack of profit would cost lives and would be very immoral.

The costs of creating these advanced products is very high and requires complex R&D, highly educated and skilled engineers and technicians. Why then should these expensive products be provided to developing nations for a price that is not economically viable? In general the first world pays the higher cost of domestic goods allowing for the subsidized sales of the very same products overseas at prices that are not realistic.

Having many export products selling in other markets for far less than the domestic retail price is an everyday reality for the US consumer.

The American people pay the highest price in the world for things like AIDS drugs while the US manufacturers make the same products available to the third world for free. This is an act of good world citizenship and compassion showing support for the development of other nations.

I see very little acknowledgement of this fact and too little understanding of how the US consumer subsidizes so much of what it exports from movies, games and software to medicines.

Since it is not life or death I frankly don't know if we need to see an increase in the price of software in the US to now cover what the market in India will bear for Windows. After all this is not medicine and there are wonderful alternatives like Linux available for free.

Re:Sad.

[hjf]

You have been severely brainwashed, man. I'm so offended by your post you fucking imperialistic american motherfucking pig. Sorry, it's not personal. Comments like yours just show how ignorant and short-minded you americans are.

You are not the only ones who research, develop, create or whatever. We, in the "third world" also work, you make it look like we live off your charity. You fuck the world with your wars, steal resources from other countries, and don't give a shit if you have to kill the locals to get more oil so you can keep your ass warm in winter and watch movies at home in your 100" TV. You also keep polluting the world to avoid "hurting your economy", while Europe (which has surpassed you in terms of IGP) has managed to stay competitive without screwing the environment.

Talking about complex R&D, you should also know that many of your "inventions" were actually designed by foreigners. The Space Race was led by Von Braun, whom you stole from Germany. And bypass surgery was first done by Rene Favaloro, a doctor graduated from the Universidad Nacional de La Plata, a university in my own country (Argentina). We also developed and built a nuclear reactor that was sold to Australia last year.

Also, I can buy food (even on McDonald's or Coca-Cola) for a fraction of the US price. Not because you're subsidizing it, but because it costs less to produce here. Life would be cheaper for you too, if you didn't live in suburbs 50 miles from work, and if you didn't spend billions of dollars in useless things.

IF Microsoft and other "Corporations" sold their products at a reduced price, we would be able to "buy" them. That way, we would be (theoretically) on even grounds (in terms of education). Ah, but that is a problem, isn't it? India has proved that. Your infinitely loving, motherly, patriotic corporations, who help cure diseases in the world, are fucking you, the ones that built and made them grow, only to give away your jobs in other countries, for lower prices.

So, first get your facts straight, and then shut the fuck up. Remember, next time you think about how nice you are to the rest of the world, compare it to how many millions you have killed in the name of "Freedom", only to steal oil from smaller countries.

Again, it's not personal. The world hates americans because of your foreign policies. I don't hate americans (people are not to blame for being stupid -- OK, uninformed, if you want to be PC). But because you're so uninformed (or misinformed), you let your government do the same thing over and over. I really, really hope people from your country will some day realize that they're not being nice to the rest of the world, and only then we'll see a change. But in the mean time, the world will continue to hate you.

Re:Sad.

[Anonymous Coward]

and since other countries have different laws regarding copyright and piracy, perhaps the fact is that american companies don't have any say in how their products are pirated/stolen in those regions? perhaps they either have to lower their prices or accept that they will never see a profit in those regions?

ps stop saying you're canadian, you're making the rest of us open-minded, intelligent canucks look like money-grubbing greedy industry-loving whores.

Re:Sad.

[roman_mir]

and since other countries have different laws regarding copyright and piracy, perhaps the fact is that american companies don't have any say in how their products are pirated/stolen in those regions? perhaps they either have to lower their prices or accept that they will never see a profit in those regions? - Perhaps. But whatever these companies decide to do it is clear that they can't just sit their idly.

ps stop saying you're canadian, you're making the rest of us open-minded, intelligent canucks look like money-grubbing greedy industry-loving whores. - you may think that it is only I, who is a 'money-grubbing greedy industry-loving whore' and every other canadian is a socialist communist tree hugging environmentalist liberal, but you would be wrong and I can say whatever I want.

Re:Sad.

[SadGeekHermit]

Yeah, but MY point was that a web browser is a web browser, and a word processor is a word processor; once you know how to use one of them, using other versions of the same tool isn't exactly rocket science. Most people use the same tools to work in an office; it's pretty boring, all the same old crap, really.

So there's nothing stopping you from using Linux at home and transferring the same skills to WIndows. As a matter of fact, if you can handle running Linux, and working with all of Linux's tools, I daresay there's almost NOTHING on a Windows box that won't be child's play for you.

There's no good, compelling reason to trap yourself in Windows outside the office. Besides, use Linux, and save hundreds of dollars.

Re:Sad.

[aesdesdesdes]

Wow, you appear to have a real anger problem, using language like that usually indicates a weak mind but I assume you just misread my post, so allow me to clarify. My references to the third world were directed to the charity and benefits to Africa and other nations to the tune of tens of billions of dollars in medical aid as well as indirect benefits of an economy like that of the US and other nations, that has nothing to do with your country, however I seem to have hit some nerve which may indicate a self-loathing that I don't really understand. Argentina is a wonderful country I love Buenos Aries but I find that lately the people have become increasingly bigoted, close minded and nationalistic which is a pity. If you are a blind nationalist bigot then you are too close minded to read the rest so just stop now and wallow in your blind hate and bigotry. I am sure you and your fellow angry compatriots will revel in your hatred and expend all that venom and energy in outrage even if it means you never actually succeed at anything else.

Otherwise if you are not a close minded bigot there are a couple points you may find interesting. Your native Rene Favaloro came to the US and was a medical resident at the Cleveland Clinic in the United States, after years of study in the USA he became a valued member of the clinic's cardiology team.

Dr. von Braun, along with thousands of others was a prisoner of war after WWII. He was given resources, personnel and freedom to continue his developmental projects and was treated as a man of science and not a dirty Nazi. Dr. von Braun adopted the US and asked for and became an American citizen in the 1950s. Dr. von Braun ran the US space program into the 1970s and because the US provided him the freedom and resources to see his dream of a manned space program come true Dr von Braun was very grateful that he was able to land in a nation that was industrious enough and forgiving enough to allow him to not only fulfill his vision but a nation that would praise and celebrate his success.

Dr. Favaloro was not kidnapped neither was he a close mined self-righteous nationalist, instead he came of his own accord to the US to study surgery where he could be trained in the most advanced medical science and technology of the day. Dr. Favaloro worked directly under the head of cardiovascular surgery in the Department of Cardiology at the Cleveland Clinic for many years. He was an open minded and bright man; he understood how hard work would lead to success. Bigoted bitching about the USA would not have led him to his triumphs. The young and poorly educated often don't understand how free thinking and educated people work outside of ignorant bias and blind nationalism and those ignorant often use base language and histrionics to shout their uninformed opinions without the ability to engage in proper discourse.

We have welcomed Favaloro and Einstein and Bohr and tens of millions of other high achievers to this country because we always welcome hard working free thinking people. Our society more than any other rejects the provincial, self-righteousness and those that bitch about how unfair the world is. Where others whine and bitch those who advance this world work and succeed.

Smart people like Favaloro and other people with good ideas and a desire to succeed are welcome here, lazy crybaby idiots can stay where they are, we don't bitch about those who succeed we celebrate and reward their success.

Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[khasim]

In fact, Microsoft BENEFITS from such "piracy".

If the customers could not afford Windows and had to go with something like Ubuntu, then more people would become familiar with Linux ... and Microsoft would LOSE those customers.

This is going to happen, eventually, anyway. Microsoft has 90%+ of the workstation market. There's not many ways they can get money out of that market anymore.

Except by re-selling Windows to those same people. Again and again and again.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft benefited from it, then why would they crackdown on it?

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Vicissidude]

In fact, Microsoft BENEFITS from such "piracy".

Regardless of whether or not that is true, Microsoft certainly does not think so by their actions.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[zxnos]

wait, i am confused, how is not paying for a product being a customer?

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Firehed]

Vendor lock-in. You know, for whenever they do get that un-pirateable version of Windows out there, and you have all those documents that just can't be opened with free software for whatever reason. Or something like that.

Well... maybe not over there, but at least in places where the BSA will come in and kick your ass. Think Photoshop here - I haven't bought a copy, but if I ever use it professionally, I will, rather than just using a copy of the GIMP or some other 'equivalent'.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[CosmeticLobotamy]

Regardless of whether or not that is true, Microsoft certainly does not think so by their actions.

"Some guys are taking our software without paying for it."
"That helps us. Network effects and stuff."
"Great! So we'll tell everyone to just go ahead and make all the copies they like."
"No, dumbass. Then we get no money."
"Okay, what if we just don't say anything?"
"We're real popular, and people will figure out pretty quick that we don't do anything if they copy it, and we'll lose a ton of money."
"How about we quietly enjoy the piracy while making a big show of going after a few of them so people still have that tiny, little bit of fear to keep them honest?"
"Sounds good to me."

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Oswald]

In fact, Microsoft BENEFITS from such "piracy".

Until I read this story, I had always assumed that MS understood this fact. Now I see that, as in so many other things, they were just lucky.

I doubt that there would even be a Microsoft monopoly today without the lock-in caused by over two decades of pirated copies of DOS and Windows* If they keep this act up, they're in for big trouble in the developing world.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Vicissidude]

Gee... let's actually quote from the article:

"... six PC dealers in Gujarat received notices from Microsoft for selling pirated copies of Windows."
"Microsoft demanding a payment of 200,000 Rupee ($4,955) and a fine of 1,600,000 Rupee ($39,638) if the vendor continued to sell pirated copies of the OS."
"Microsoft conducted the raids ..."
"... Microsoft India sees the raids as a firm, but loving hand; guiding the vendors to the world of IP ..."
"Microsoft, though its own efforts in partnership with other industry groups, is committed to increasing the understanding and appreciate for intellectual property rights and original [bought] software"
"Microsoft is committed to working with the channel to help them understand the benefits of original [bought] software."
"We expect our channel partners to support us in further spreading the message of the value of original [bought] software among the end-consumers, and we will continue to support all initiatives to do so."

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[tepples]

Microsoft India sees the raids as a firm, but loving hand; guiding the vendors to the world of IP

Guiding from where to the world of Internet Protocol? What had they been using? IPX? NetBEUI?

(The other IP is a fiction, unsupported by statute. Copyrights exist. Patents exist. "IP" does not.)

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Jason Earl]

Microsoft benefited from it, then why would they crackdown on it?

Let's just say that Microsoft now believes that it can start harvesting the investment it made in the past by not hassling system builders in the Indian market. India now has a large technology industry, much of which is based on Microsoft software. Like the original poster said this almost certainly would not be the case if Microsoft had always been strict about licensing in India, but it is certainly the case now.

Besides, like executives in any publicly traded company Microsoft's executives are concerned about providing the growth in profits that will drive the stock price up. In Microsoft's case that means opening up new markets. India's technology sector is in a position to start paying for Windows, and Microsoft wants to make sure that Indians do exactly that.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Tatsh]

Well... maybe not over there, but at least in places where the BSA will come in and kick your ass. Think Photoshop here - I haven't bought a copy, but if I ever use it professionally, I will, rather than just using a copy of the GIMP or some other 'equivalent'.

How does the BSA have anything to do with using the GIMP? The BSA would not come in and kick your ass for using the GIMP over Photoshop. They are not "use proprietary software for professional works only" police. Since I've been using the GIMP solely after a fair amount of experience with Photoshop I have no plans to try and run Photoshop again (not even Photoshop 6 under Wine). I think everyone learning Photoshop should learn GIMP as well (how can that NOT be beneficial?).

If I ever run my own business I will ONLY use free open source solutions for software, like GIMP over Photoshop, Inkscape/Sodipodi over Illustrator, OpenOffice over "Office"/WP Office, etc. If everyone started with Linux (instead of Windows, by the way Microsoft loves kids!) as young ones (the idea behind OLPC), then they would be under Linux (hopefully free software) lock-in, which I don't think is necessarily a bad thing because of the philosophy (in basic terms, the idea of sharing).

I do agree on the vendor lock-in part of your post. I find it very sad that most file formats being used around the world are almost completely closed. Luckily, .doc can open (almost entirely) with OpenOffice, which is a great start for anyone thinking about switching over.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[FreakWent]

If you have never bought something from MS, and you won't, then you're not a customer.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[sarahbau]

How does the BSA have anything to do with using the GIMP? The BSA would not come in and kick your ass for using the GIMP over Photoshop. They are not "use proprietary software for professional works only" police. That's not what he said. He said he'd buy a legal copy of Photoshop if he used it professionally, rather than using something free like the Gimp.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Vicissidude]

GP: In fact, Microsoft BENEFITS from such "piracy".
P: Until I read this story, I had always assumed that MS understood this fact. Now I see that, as in so many other things, they were just lucky.

In the 1980's, Microsoft competed with Apple, Commodore, and Amiga. I can remember computer stores at the time where all of these systems were given equal self space. Apple and Commodore had all the cool games. Amiga had all the cool stuff for nerds. And the IBM PCs (Microsoft) had all the boring business software.

Microsoft did luck out. Since IBM PCs were the business computer, everyone used them at work. Adults would buy their own to do work at home and then the kids tried it too. Apples and Commodores were considered toys, so few people took them seriously. And Amiga... well, there's the perfect example of how a well designed and well received machine doesn't do well in the marketplace because of addressing the wrong audience.

I doubt that there would even be a Microsoft monopoly today without the lock-in caused by over two decades of pirated copies of DOS and Windows

Actually, people pirated the Apple, Commodore, and Amiga software too. Vendor lock-in didn't help them. It probably didn't help Microsoft either, at least with becoming the dominant PC vendor.

ONE of those companies was bound to become dominant, sooner or later. It just happened to be Microsoft.

As for today, Microsoft no longer has a monopoly on operating systems for the x86. Linux has been out for 15 years. Apple OS X and Sun Solaris for x86 have relatively recently come out.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[1u3hr]

>>In fact, Microsoft BENEFITS from such "piracy".
>Regardless of whether or not that is true, Microsoft certainly does not think so by their actions.

Actually, MS's actions, as opposed to their words, show the opposite. MS will fulminate about software piracy, but in most Third World countries takes little action to prevent it. They know that in the long run, retaining a monopoly on OS and Office software is more valuable. When a country starts to take off economically, as India, its business and home users will naturally prefer to keep using the familiar software. Then MS can apply pressure to enforcement, and the next generation of hardware and software will be OEM-preinstalled MS, as in the USA. I've seen this happen in Hong Kong over the last decade. It used to be standard for PCs to come "fully loaded", with all the software that would fit on the hard disk. Now you get and pay for MS Windows, MS Office, and a little hologram certificate.

See also what happens in countries where alternative (Linux) OSs are seriously proposed, eg in Thailand a few years ago. Immediately MS released special editions of Windows and Office at a much lower price, and engaged in hard lobbying to kill the initiative. The almost 100% piracy rate prior to this had produced no reaction; MS had just been waiting for the economy to make people wealthy enough to be worth strongarming. Piracy does more to build marketshare for MS than any amount of advertising.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Anonymous Coward]

um..... I think he was making a point about IP as not really being property.
To the other guy, intellectual property is about the only thing IP can stand for in a discussion about Microsoft raiding vendors in India (to a reasonable person who has not been under a pile of rocks for the last few years).

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Vicissidude]

This whole line of reasoning is a load of crap. It completely neglects the history of the last 25 years.

Microsoft didn't win against Apple, Commodore, and Amiga by making their software pirated more than the rest. Microsoft became dominant because it teamed up with IBM and Intel and went for the business customer. They won because they were the software for the IBM PC, the desktop computer adopted by commercial business. If a business bought a PC, then they DID pay for a copy of DOS along with it. Businesses tend to follow the law and not pirate software.

Apple, Commodore, and Amiga went for school/home use and ended up competing amongst themselves and losing out. Commodore is long gone. Amiga is reborn, but limping. Apple barely managed to stay on during the '90s and ended up taking a huge investment from Bill Gates. All their software was pirated, but it certainly didn't help them much.

The fact is ONE of those companies was bound to become dominant sooner or later. It happened to be Microsoft because they went along with IBM and Intel and targeted the business market. Their dominance had NOTHING to do with encouraging piracy, especially since Apple, Commodore, and Amiga were all pirated as well.

Microsoft became dominant because since their primary customers were businesses, they were pirated less than the others.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Bloke down the pub]

Copyrights exist. Patents exist. "IP" does not

That's like saying that cats exist, dogs exist but animals don't.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[jez9999]

Apple OS X and Sun Solaris for x86 have relatively recently come out.

Doesn't OS X arbitrarily prevent people from running it on non-Apple hardware, though? IOW, it actually doesn't run on 'any old x86'.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Bloke down the pub]

When a country starts to take off economically, as India, its business and home users will naturally prefer to keep using the familiar software. Then MS can apply pressure to enforcement

Seems to me it's the drug pushers' tactic of giving it away for free - to start with.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[rtb61]

Technically speaking if you have ever logged onto MSN either the web site, the search or Hotmal and looked at an add, then you are a M$ customer, whether you use firefox loaded on top of Kubuntu or you use a pirate copy of windows (IE is a free download).

As for Indian resellers dumping windows onto pc's for free rather than Linux, they are retailers they will stick on what ever is the easiest and cheapest for them, they are not skilled computer admins, they have a lot more in common with your typical windrone hack system admin who can barely turn on the machine.

The big problem for M$ is they are not installing Vista, nobody really wants it even for free, and M$ still wont cough up to how many Vista upgrades have been sold nor do they want to talk about sales of the latest version of M$ office.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Has someone here actually tried buying MS products in India? My guess is a lot of so called "piracy" is because of the harrowing experience buying the product.

When I got my new laptop with official XP Home preinstalled some years back, I decided to go legal with all s/w. One of the things I wanted was Visual Studio, since I used that in office too.

Since no neighborhood computer seller had even heard this name, I call up MS toll free number in India. I am asked several identification questions, & am then pointed to a web page containing the list of resellers in Bombay.

I go over the list, & locate may be two dozen near my place. I begin calling. Nearly 3 quarter are invalid numbers! Of the remaining, most are picked up by clueless people who don't understand what is Visual Studio.

I find only two from this bunch that are willing to quote a price. Both quotes are above MS list price, & I am offered delivery in 4 weeks!!!

While fast moving versions of Windows obviously don't suffer this hassle, this must be one of the major reason behind both "piracy", & switching to rivals (I went to Eclipse UI + GNU compiler for my home PC).

This cluelessness about consumer is also characteristic of many other western software vendors in India. You get a price quote in US dollars, & no phone number in India! And wonder why paid products don't move here! Good luck.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[tepples]

Copyrights exist. Patents exist. "IP" does not That's like saying that cats exist, dogs exist but animals don't. It's like saying that "animals" is so broad that discussion of the characteristics of "animals" is counterproductive in many cases. I don't see "animal rights" organizations such as PETA campaigning for the rights of invertebrates. Copyrights, patents, trademarks, and trade secrets are more different than similar in purpose, scope, and duration.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[zero_offset]

And yet the entire western world is pissing away local talent in a rush to hire people in and from that environment. Lovely.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[shark72]

"wait, i am confused, how is not paying for a product being a customer?"

Well, you already know that when record companies catch pirates, they are "suing their customers," and when Fry's or Macy's catch people shoplifting, they are "having their customers arrested."

It seems that simply using, or even simply wanting your product makes me a customer of yours.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[drinkypoo]

Gee... let's actually quote from the article:

Are you saying that the things said by M$ PR flacks is somehow more reliable than common sense?

If so, I have a large red bridge to sell you...

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Jason Earl]

This whole line of reasoning is a load of crap. It completely neglects the history of the last 25 years.

I certainly agree that my original post is an oversimplification of the issue that basically assumes that there was only one hardware architecture. That makes sense when talking about the competition between Windows and Linux. By the time Linux came on the scene the Apple/Amiga/Commodore/PC war was done, and the PC had won decisively. That's why Linus originally wrote Linux for his Intel 386 PC and not for some other hardware architecture.

Microsoft didn't win against Apple, Commodore, and Amiga by making their software pirated more than the rest. Microsoft became dominant because it teamed up with IBM and Intel and went for the business customer. They won because they were the software for the IBM PC, the desktop computer adopted by commercial business. If a business bought a PC, then they DID pay for a copy of DOS along with it. Businesses tend to follow the law and not pirate software.

Yes, that's right. When the competition was between different hardware architectures software piracy was not a particularly important issue. Whether you purchased a PC or something else the operating system generally was included as part of the price. The reason that the PC won out over the other architectures is that PCs were "good enough" at a lower price. Businesses, especially small businesses tend to be quite price conscious.

Apple, Commodore, and Amiga went for school/home use and ended up competing amongst themselves and losing out. Commodore is long gone. Amiga is reborn, but limping. Apple barely managed to stay on during the '90s and ended up taking a huge investment from Bill Gates. All their software was pirated, but it certainly didn't help them much.

All of these computers (including the PC) were marketed similarly, although it is true that Apple, Commodore, Amiga (and Atari) all had machines that were more capable graphically. It just turns out that business customers weren't particularly interesting in fancy graphics. PCs were cheaper and "good enough" and soon they were so popular that the network effects from so many PCs made it so that any other architecture was limited to niche markets. Compaq and the clones had as much to do with the eventual PC dominance as anything else. The competition between the various clones and the IBM PC basically guaranteed that PC kit was less expensive, and DOS provided a common software platform that was ubiquitous.

The fact is ONE of those companies was bound to become dominant sooner or later. It happened to be Microsoft because they went along with IBM and Intel and targeted the business market. Their dominance had NOTHING to do with encouraging piracy, especially since Apple, Commodore, and Amiga were all pirated as well.

Agreed. However, once the competition was between Windows and Linux then software piracy did become an issue, especially in third world countries where no one had really every paid for Windows (or DOS for that matter). Microsoft's operating system prices are ridiculous in companies (like India) where the average worker earns less than $1000 a year. Historically Microsoft hasn't cared about piracy in these regions, and now, in certain cases, it does care. One of the primary issues with Linux in the first world is that it requires expensive retraining of personnel. Retraining is significantly less expensive in third world countries because labor is so much less expensive.

Microsoft became dominant because since their primary customers were businesses, they were pirated less than the others.

Microsoft beat Apple because it ran on less expensive hardware, but that battle was essentially done before Linux even existed. PCs were already dominant before the first line of Linux was written. However, it is hard to argue th

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[ctzan]

No, it's like saying that dogs exist, cats exist, but God does NOT exist.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[Bloke down the pub]

No they aren't, and no matter how much you wish or think otherwise, IP is used as a blanket term to cover all of them.

Re:Would be nice, wouldn't it?

[tepples]

Copyrights, patents, trademarks, and trade secrets are more different than similar in purpose, scope, and duration. No they aren't Your evidence please?

and no matter how much you wish or think otherwise, IP is used as a blanket term to cover all of them. No matter how much I wish otherwise, people still use tobacco. That doesn't make it right.

A solid legal argument

[carou]

Since we are are not charging anything extra for installing the software, it means that we are actually not trading in pirated software I wonder if YouTube's lawyers will use that watertight legal argument in their Viacom case...

Re:A solid legal argument

[asninn]

Copyright law isn't the same all over the world. Sure, this kind of argument probably wouldn't float in the USA, but can you really say whether there's any merit to it in India?

can we get the hahaha tag back now?

[zappepcs]

This is so illustrative of why MS' business model is wrong. It totally illustrates why F/OSS software is the way forward for the world in general. Charging for software licenses is just not right. Buying the right to use something is a rental agreement and when MS Windows and other software falls under the same laws as rental agreements... well, then I will sort of agree with them. As long as they contend that 'buying' a copy of Windows is only a right to use... well, they are open to abuse and such. Too bad for them. they chose the wrong business model... I have no sympathy.

Going further, while MS would like to enforce their monopoly, it is clear that the world's population is clearly not in alignment with their wishes. This would seem to indicate that either MS is wrong or the laws are wrong. Pick whichever you want, but the dichotomy is clear.

Personally, I hope that MS loses this one, not just because I wish them ill fortune (and I do) but because clearly in this situation they are pricing themselves out of the market. That business strategy is coming back to bite them in the ass, as it should, and will.

Re:can we get the hahaha tag back now?

[maxume]

Strangely, they aren't pricing themselves out of the market. There is some revenue that they think they aren't getting due to unlicensed copying of their software, but they are still ending up with a large portion of the market using their software.

I have to disagree with your analysis though. No matter what you think of Windows, it is a better operating system than I could write for the amount of effort I have to put forth to pay for a license to use it. It actually provides a great deal of functionality for the price. You might even say it is cheap. This is a property of any software that has broad use. The $500 price difference between Windows and Linux is essentially meaningless to someone earning Western salaries(for varying degrees of meaningless...anybody that 'needs' a computer will pay it once every three or four years without blinking).

The software market is increasingly mediated on quality, and perhaps unfortunately, perception of quality. This is why crappy Free Software generally isn't all that popular(and excellent Free Software is exceedingly popular).

Re:can we get the hahaha tag back now?

[zappepcs]

You, are a shill, and should STFU. You defend an OS that you cannot support, and you use definitively stupid and weak arguments to defend your position. You are arguing that an expensive piece of software has merit in contrast to a free piece of software because you yourself couldn't write better software, and argue that this is true of any software... you sir, are both stupid and wrong. Anyone that needs a computer is not 'needing' to pay money to use it. You are a shill for MS, admit it.

While you say that the software market is mediated on quality, you refuse to admit that there is quality in anything but MS software. You sir, Suck, and I believe you to be nothing more than a shill.

Re:can we get the hahaha tag back now?

[Maurice]

First, let me preface this by saying that I am writing this reply from my Linux desktop that I exclusively use at home, so I am not a "shill".

I agree with the GP that there is software that is worth paying for simply because there is nothing that comes close in the Free Software world. If the gain in productivity from buying simply outweighs the cost I would pay, it's simple pragmatism to buy it. There is a lot of specialized software that comes in this category including CAD, 3D modeling, and even stuff like Visual Studio, which has no viable equivalent in the free software world.

Re:can we get the hahaha tag back now?

[Anonymous Coward]

Then write the software yourself fucktard. Oh, you can't then you are obviously too fucking stupid to even exist let alone use a computer. As a result you should go find a razor, run a hot bath, and slit your fucking wrists in that hot bath fucktard.

-zappepcs

Re:can we get the hahaha tag back now?

[janrinok]

You can always tell when someone is losing an argument on /. First they switch to posting as AC, and then they use expletives and obscenities.

Re:can we get the hahaha tag back now?

[maxume]

If I'm a shill, you are a fanatic(but I'm not a shill, so you probably aren't a fanatic).

Linux is currently a better operating system than *anybody* could write in a year. So, for that matter is Windows XP. $500 for either is a fantastic bargain. There may well be a large group of people that make software choices based on price, but there is also a large group of people that care much less about price(so they probably won't pay $100 a day for software, but $0.50 a day is fine) and want what they are used to or what they think works better(there's that perception I was talking about).

I do use Windows; not because I'm convinced it's better, but because I haven't noticed it getting in my way(I may simply not know any better), and because it's what I'm used to. I've bought two oem copies of Windows in 10 years(one of which was last year, I expect it to hold me for at least 2 more years). I don't actually know what I paid, but I bet it was less than $400 total. So I got 12 years worth of software for the equivalent of 2 weeks work at the worst job I could possibly find(because I happen to be in the U.S.). That's a bargain, if you don't think so, that can be your thing.

Re:can we get the hahaha tag back now?

[Maurice]

I'd rather kick back and drink a beer than keep writing software in my free time. Whatever is left of my free time that is, after writing open source code for 80 hours a week. Thanks for insulting me, and I bet that I am a far better programmer than you will ever be.

great...

[owlnation]

MS now stands for Mystery Shopper!

Re:great...

[Spy der Mann]

MS now stands for Mystery Shopper!

OH NO, look what you've done to my mind!

Shaggy: Look like we solved another software piracy mystery, Scoobs!
Scooby: Ruff! Yeah!
Indian computer retailer: And I would have gotten away with it, if it wasn't for you meddling kids!
Bill Gates: To the Mystery machine! I'll invite some scooby snacks!

huh?

[Mazin07]

We are not against piracy but against the way Microsoft is working to stop it Are they essentially saying they promote piracy?

Re:huh?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's either a typo or translation mistake - I am sure they wanted to say they are not against *stopping* piracy..

Good.

[RealGrouchy]

If laws like this aren't enforced, how will the masses ever come to realize how stupid the laws are?

- RG>

Re:Good.

[trawg]

Laws like, "you should pay money for other people's work, if that's how they want to provide it"? What's stupid about that?

If you don't like Microsoft, fine - but saying that the laws are stupid because they want to charge for their work seems a little bit silly.

Re:Good.

[yoasif]

It only works if you are a capitalist, of course. Of course, a lot of the world's poor might rightly not be capitalists, simply because regardless of it's intellectual or pragmatic merits (if there are any), they are getting the worst part of the deal.

It's just like terrorism and war -- when countries commit terrorism, they are "acts of war", and are spun either way by the media, and government propaganda. When those who are powerless, or do not have the power of a government behind them, the actions are characterized as terrorism.

I've always found it odd that many of my peers in school had no problem with pirating music or software, but stealing their cars would likely give them a fit.

Most people seem to be just fine with some "theft", as long as it is in their best interest.

Re:Good.

[QuantumG]

Here we go again. The problem with copyright is not "I have to pay". The problem with copyright is "you have no right to copy".

If there was a law that said for every copy made of Microsoft's software you had to pay Microsoft a fair royalty, that would be acceptable.

Re:Good.

[roman_mir]

But this is BS. The distributors in question gain a competitive advantage by installing for free an OS and some other software that is normally sold by other merchants. This is not about your right to copy, this is about some merchants illegally distributing other people's work for monetary gain.

Re:Good.

[GWBasic]

Laws like, "you should pay money for other people's work, if that's how they want to provide it"? What's stupid about that? If you don't like Microsoft, fine - but saying that the laws are stupid because they want to charge for their work seems a little bit silly.

The problem is that Microsoft is charging too much for their software. What TFA demonstrates is that, in India, they are charging more then the market is willing to pay.

It's important to understand software development economics. From the standpoint of Microsoft, their development costs are the same for 100, 100,000, and 100,000,000, and 10,000,000,000 users. The distribution costs are minimal, and support can be negotiated for an additional fee. Assuming that Windows costs a billion dollars to develop, they could sell one billion unsupported liscenses for $5 and still earn four billion dollars of profit! (Well, maybe three billion, assuming that they still run Windows Update...)

Thus, expecting people in India to pay more then $100 for a Windows liscense is unreasonable.

(Of course, my numbers are open to debate.)

Re:Good.

[Grishnakh]

The problem is, it's not your software, so you have no right to say how much they "should" charge for it. It's theirs, and they can charge whatever they want.

I have crappy little chair next to me that's nothing special, and the seat is covered in cat hair. However, if you'd like to buy it from me, it'll cost you $10 million. Why so much? I don't have to justify myself to you; it's my chair, and I can sell it for whatever price I wish. What I could afford to sell it for, or what it's worth to most people, is irrelevant.

So no, expecting people in India to pay $100, or even $1 million for a software license is not unreasonable. If they can't afford it, they don't have to buy it.

However, while I do find your particular argument completely invalid, I do think there's an argument that can be made that MS is abusing their monopoly position with excessive prices. Unlike my chair analogy, where no one at all needs my stupid crappy chair, there is a certain need for Windows, due to its monopoly position and the fact that so much software only runs on it. A lot of this situation can be blamed directly on Microsoft, because it has worked its way into this convenient situation, and intentionally made it very difficult for anyone to work around it, by not using open standards (like OpenGL, ODF, etc.) and worse, actively working to destroy or hamper those standards (buying the patents to OpenGL and pushing game developers to use their proprietary ActiveX, bribing and harassing government officials in order to sabotage efforts to move to ODF).

Because of these bad-faith actions, as they would be called in a court of law, I think a valid case could be made that Microsoft's copyrights to Windows should be revoked, or some similarly harsh action should be taken. For instance, the Indian government could threaten to revoke their copyrights in India unless they adopt ODF in MS Office as the standard format, publish the source code to things like ActiveX so OSS developers can develop software to allow MS applications to work better on Linux, etc.

Of course, expecting the Indian government (can you say "corrupt"?) to come down harshly on Microsoft is probably pure folly. The EU government seems to be pushing pretty hard, though.

Re:Good.

[trawg]

The problem is that Microsoft is charging too much for their software. Maybe, but that's not what the GP was saying, and not what I was replying about.

Expecting people in Australia to pay more than $100 for a Windows license appears unreasonable too, because most people I know don't have legitimate copies of Windows.

If you don't like what people are charging for something, I don't think you can tout piracy as the solution for it. I don't really care if people DO it, but I don't think you should make a big deal out of it and use it as a soapbox cause for Windows pricing reform. Especially for operating systems when there are decent, free, open source alternatives to what most people use a PC for these days.

Imagine if Indian retailers starting shipping Ubuntu-only systems in response to this instead of trying to justify piracy. 1 billion people in India all using Linux sounds pretty awesome to me.

a-HA!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

I knew someone would not pay for Windows.

Turns out it's the evil Indians!!!

Case closed.

Another selfless act

[Mazin07]

Thank god for the saints over at The Pirate Bay committing millions of thankless acts every day!
Mother Theresa, eat your heart out.

Re:Another selfless act

[value_added]

Thank god for the saints over at The Pirate Bay committing millions of thankless acts every day! Mother Theresa, eat your heart out.

That's Mother Teresa. I don't know if it extends to that level, but we do teach our children to share, don't we? I doubt any parent or teacher has ever added or will add a "but only if it doesn't incur financial, civil or criminal penalties" qualifier.

The reason we teach our children to share is that we know it invites good will. If you extend that notion and add to it the fact good will exits on the balance sheets of many companies, it's possible to argue that "piracy" benefits Microsoft. A specious argument, perhaps, but who would question that piracy has benefited Microsoft in any number of ways, not the least of which is maintaining the desktop monopoly? I'd like to think that a cost-benefit analysis would lead to the conclusion that the cost of piracy exceeds such monopoly benfefits, but how else to explain why Microsoft themselves continually invest in money-losing ventures, the only possible benefit of which is that maintaining that monopoly?

Re:Another selfless act

[Anonymous Coward]

good will exits on the balance sheets of many companies

The accounting concept of "goodwill" doesn't mean what you think it means.

http://beginnersinvest.about.com/cs/investinglesso ns/l/blles3goodwill.htm

This has got to be the funniest of all things...

[Anonymous Coward]

... I had read in a while - Robinhood style!

Seriously though MS should understand the very practical, priceless message the traders are giving them for free - Not many people in India could a) buy a branded PC and b) Buy a locally built one AND pay for the OS - Last I checked, XP Home was Rs. 4500 which is about 1/3rd the price of the full PC.

For one it is nearly impossible for Microsoft to stop the piracy in countries like India and China - even though India has laws to deal with it, there is little there to enforce them on that scale. Secondly if it is enforced, people would just find free alternatives like Linux, or simply give up on computers - none of which is good for MSFT. XP (NOT Starter - Indians are the choosiest customers and for the most part are fool-proof!) should be priced around 300 Rs or so and drive against piracy should be stepped up enough that people know that enforcements are increasingly common if Microsoft has any chance of selling legal copies to a common man in India.

i18n, l10n issues.

[Anonymous Coward]

Most Linux software offers very poor support for the various Indic languages. The support Windows offers is slightly better.

This is one of the main areas where KDE is quite far ahead of GNOME. The major KDE applications all have excellent translations for languages widely used in India and the surrounding area, including Hindi, Bengali, and Urdu. GNOME's support is quite terrible by comparison, as is the support of many other open source software packages.

Sewa-fware

[Anonymous Coward]

Why don't they just install Linux?

In a country where nobody pays for software, Windows is still prefered.

I have a great idea: why don't the FOSSkis start sending people into these stores, ask the retailers to install Lunix, and see if they can get the same free installation deal? I'm willing to bet they won't.

So, does that apply to other software?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, so, if I take in a PC and they give me free copies (copies, not originals) of Word, Norton Antivirus, and thousands of PC games, it's not piracy as long as they don't charge me anything for installing it? Cool. I mean, they're just promoting those products. They're not trading in pirated software, because it would be given to me for free!
What about warez sites? You can download and install stuff for FREE, NO CHARGE. Or do they have to open a shop where you take in your PC to get the games and programs installed for free..? Then it's okay?

Indian retailers selling pirated copies of Window

[Anonymous Coward]

The smallest violin becomes even smaller when 1/6th of the Earth population doesn't give a shit, huh?

Nothing says love like...

[teh tw]

From the article: "Brian Campbell of Microsoft India sees the raids as a firm, but loving hand; guiding the vendors to the world of IP Shangri-La." A firm, but loving raid? Sounds more like a relationship than business.

Re:Nothing says love like...

[Timesprout]

FTA

Microsoft conducted the raids by sending a dummy customer into the stores asking for a copy of Windows be installed on their PC.

Does this sound like a raid to you? Door smashed down? No. Building stormed by agents? No. Goods Seized? No. People arrested? No. Shops closed? No. The whole article is yet more of the inaccurate drivel Slashdot like to perpetuate.

Re:Nothing says love like...

[flink]

Yeah, sounds more like a sting than a raid.

Haha

[Austaph]

We are the one who are promoting their products in the market and if they will behave in such a rash manner with us then we will stop business with them. Your dollars, which weren't even there to begin with, will not be missed.

Re:Haha

[QuantumG]

They are promoting Microsoft's products.. and, frankly, I wish they'd stop it.

This is why I've never been much opposed to "copy protection" for software. If people were required to pay for Microsoft products the prices would come down.

Re:Haha

[einhverfr]

They are promoting Microsoft's products.. and, frankly, I wish they'd stop it.

This is why I've never been much opposed to "copy protection" for software. If people were required to pay for Microsoft products the prices would come down. No. If people were required to pay for Microsoft, Adobe, etc. products, more people would use open source software.

Maybe not everyone, but it would drastically increase the reachable market.

This is going to be good and bad for Linux. Bad in the sense that people are going to confuse software that is available free of charge with piracy, and good in the sense that the truth will come out and Microsoft software will be seen as overpriced.

Re:Haha

[dodobh]

Except that there are a crapload of applications which do get paid for, which run on Windows. Keep in mind that people object to paying for Ms Office because they think it should be a part of the base OS.

Software which is directly required to run the business for which they need support is paid for, the rest is pirated.

Do the software development firms pirate?

[Anonymous Coward]

Does anyone know if the software development firms there tend to pirate software like Windows for their own business use?

I was just considering what it would mean if they did. If they were to show that sort of disrespect for Microsoft's IP, I wonder how much less respect they'd show for the IP of their customers. Take, for instance, a client who has paid a large sum of money for a custom application. If such a company would use pirated software to develop the software for their client, what's to say that they wouldn't turn around and sell the source code to that client's private software to their client's largest competitors?

Of course, that can happen in any country with any company. But it's really something to think about.

Re:Do the software development firms pirate?

[Anonymous Coward]

I work for a Fortune 100 company in America and there's a lot of pirated software here at work. It has nothing to do with the "them" or "they". I know plenty of American's who walk out the door with the company's IP. Look at all the cases in the Valley.

But keep bashing outsourcing. One day it will end... or not. The writing is on the wall folks. It has nothing to do with just cheap labor and more to do with lazy management. It's easier to point fingers and blame someone half-way around the world who can't defend themselves, then the guy in the next cubicle.

Not even worthy of Slashdot

[theophilosophilus]

I don't get what makes this story interesting; the fact that they are fighting piracy, how they are, or where they are. The fact that they are fighting piracy is fine, piracy is wrong. To illustrate, imagine how pissed all of us Slashdotters would be to discover companies blatantly using GPLd code without returning it to the community in accordance with that license (remember a copyleft is a copyright). How they have chosen to fight piracy is even less interesting. Finally, the fact that it may drive India to Linux is only moderately interesting because we all know the result of heavy handed enforcement of copyrights already.

Please do go on

[Daishiman]

The more Microsoft tightens control the sale of Windows in the third world, the more they'll promote the use and development of Free alternatives.

Not that they don't have a right to do it, of course, since anyone has the right to demand that their products not be pirated. It's just that in this case it will turn out to be quite negative for them.

Re:Please do go on

[babbling]

I think Microsoft has a moral obligation to do this now. If they were to wait until the developing world depended heavily on Windows before they slammed them down and started enforcing their copyrights, that would be quite a nasty surprise.

This way retailers know how it is going to be now and in the future.

Re:Please do go on

[muffen]

The more Microsoft tightens control the sale of Windows in the third world, the more they'll promote the use and development of Free alternatives.

Not that they don't have a right to do it, of course, since anyone has the right to demand that their products not be pirated. It's just that in this case it will turn out to be quite negative for them.

l Not just the third world.. I know quite a few people who aren't willing to dish out the extra money for a real windows license and don't have the energy to keep running the patches to keep a pirated version going, and have now swapped to ubuntu. I would personally prefer them running Windows since they can install it themselves, whereas Ubunbu requires me to work, but I see this as my contribution for the greater good in the world :) (yes installing ubuntu is easy, but getting all apps running when you dont know what the apps are called or where to find them is not easy).

Personally, my gaming system is Windows XP with the other three systems running various linux distro's, 2xUbuntu and one Debian, oh, and I have the NSLU2 running Debian Etch, coolest system ever :)

As others have said, I think it would be absolutely great if MS would enforce the copy protection since a lot of people would have to step back and ask themselves why on earth they need windows, as well as putting more pressure on gaming companies to make the games linux compatible.

Define Sad

[Nymz]

Here are a few definitions from words used in the article...

Indian Market - A place where Windows is priced too high to consider paying for, but where GNU/Linux is too (blank) to even consider installing at no cost at all.

Raid - Pretending to be a normal customer, asking for a free copy of Windows, then mailing a Cease & Desist letter a month later. Very similiar to sending dozens of men to jump out of a van, and seizing all software and hardware.

Boycott - When you declare that you will stop purchasing from a particular company. It is not important that you weren't buying from them in the first place, the point is to make a distraction and take the focus off yourself. Remember, in the news, it's not who is right or wrong, it's who can successfully portray themselves as the victim.

Thank you, come again loyal customer!

[lohphat]

Why does Microsoft hate 7/11?

This can only help the competition

[iminplaya]

As long as MS wants to shoot itself in the foot, I'll be more than happy to supply the bullets. Nobody is going to care about this copyright bull until they become victimized by it. And to help in its abolishment, the more the merrier. So, by all means they should prosecute to the full extent of the law. Bring it on, baby! Wake up that sleeping giant. Let's see what it gets ya. It just might make an election issue out of it in the states(could even work in India though I doubt copyright could ever overwhelm the myriad of really serious problems they have. They can only dream of outsourcing their wars the way the west has), and I can guarantee, MS and everybody else, including IBM, do not want that. If they know what's good for them, they'll let it go. Otherwise we just might bring them a war they won't believe...to misquote Rambo..

I'm confused

[TheWoozle]

Since when is installing a Microsoft OS an act of kindness?

Re:I'm confused

[Tribbin]

To MS:
The customer will not switch (and get used) to open software thus MS has more time to adjust their prices to India's market and retain their income.

To customer:
Does not have to ask an aquintence to burn the CD.

Re:I'm confused

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually several were installing Vista as a practical joke.

Re:I'm confused

[Tablizer]

Since when is installing a Microsoft OS an act of kindness?

Shit, first they out-program us, and now they are out-marketing us too! Our comparative advantages are all gone.

I dislike MS

[pembo13]

for multiple reasons. Yet I feel that they are fully within their right to stop people from making a profit by selling their product without passing on an agreed percentage of that profit back to MS. If you can't afford it download it of the net, but don't go selling it to others. I would personally suggest Linux, but I guess that would come out as trolling here at /.

Re:I dislike MS

[bill_mcgonigle]

I would personally suggest Linux, but I guess that would come out as trolling here at /.

Which Slashdot do you read?

Re:I dislike MS

[Tribbin]

Wow, you dared to reply that non-anonynously?

Bet you didn't check his website. Scared the shit out of me.

Re:I dislike MS

[bill_mcgonigle]

Bet you didn't check his website. Scared the shit out of me.

I hadn't, but... OK, I'll bite - what, you don't like fedora?

Re:I dislike MS

[pembo13]

What was scary about my website?

Re:I dislike MS

[Tribbin]

I was joking about the stereotypical big-muscled-black-guy-phobia.

Re:I dislike MS

[pembo13]

I'm black????????

Re:I dislike MS

[Guppy06]

Does Dad know?

In capitalist India market understands you

[AHuxley]

In Capitalist* Kerala India, mystery shopper gets MS from you.
In Soviet Russia mystery shopper gets MS to you.

*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerala

This is good for Linux

[rolfwind]

When MS enforces, people will be forced to turn elsewhere.

Otherwise, MS gets adopted wholly, until the market is 100% MS. Enforcing a MS lock-in there, also enforces it in other places of the world.

The way to freedom will be paved by MS tightening its Iron Grip in this area. It will cause short-term incovenienc, but it is good in the long run.

I see the real problem here.

[Marrshu]

Besides, the pricing of their operating systems is way too high for the Indian markets. I betcha that this has everything to do with it... and you can't really move to Linux because not every Windows app is compatible with Linux. :\

Re:I see the real problem here.

[Anonymous Coward]

In other words, "We can't afford it, so we should get it for free!"

Nice to see the western attitude of entitlement is alive and well in India.

Re:I see the real problem here.

[Dunbal]

In other words, "We can't afford it, so we should get it for free!"

Funny isn't it how no one is prepared to pay almost a year's income for an OS? Frankly I think Microsoft should wise up and start charging $40K per copy of Vista in the US; 35,000 pounds in the UK; and 300 dollars in India. Hey I know, perhaps they can introduce a region control scheme like they tried to do with DVDs, to make sure everyone coughs up the zone-specific amount. Yep, that will work...

Or are you implying that India should do away with computers (which they can get far cheaper than legitimate copies of the OS) altogether?

If you screw with the market, the market will screw with you. No one in India thinks the OS is worth what Microsoft is asking, so they won't pay. Unfortunately an OS is something easily and cheaply reproduced (funny how they ARE willing to fork out a few bucks for DVD's). Adjust your price if you want to stay in the market, or shut up. Or put all of India (and China and...) in jail, yeah, that will work too.

Re:I see the real problem here.

[cunina]

Either you believe in the free market, or you do not. Microsoft has a right to price their product as high as they want, and Indian consumers have a right not to buy it - those rights are appropriately reciprocal. If you also assert that Indian consumers who don't like MS's pricing scheme are entitled to the software for free, then Microsoft should have the reciprocal right to force customers to buy their product. And I don't think anyone outside Microsoft's board room thinks that is fair or reasonable.

Re:I see the real problem here.

[rajkiran_g]

and you can't really move to Linux because not every Windows app is compatible with Linux. :\

Not really. Microsoft just has to push harder and actually *MAKE* people pay for windows/office. That would be enough for the average Indian to give up on Microsoft software.

It is pricing that drives the Indian market. The only reason why people in India use Microsoft software is because it is effectively free. An unbranded, entry level desktop costs about 20,000 rupees (about 500 US$).

Most home computers are used for multimedia entertainment, games, programming and document preparation (by grad students) and internet. If one had to use exclusively Microsoft software (the so called genuine version of it), it would easily cost an additional 30,000 rupees (about 750 US$). That is significantly higher that the price of hardware and people would just spend *a little time* learning linux (which is pretty popular in India) rather than spending *a lot of money* buying that software.

Compatibility is a non-issue if everybody switches to linux.

I stay in Hyderabad and about 8-10 months ago, I have begun seeing large advertisements all over the city by Microsoft, urging people to insist on "Original Microsoft Software". Interestingly, I don't see them anymore these days. I guess Microsoft's toll free call centers would have been flooded with calls from Indians asking them to explain what "genuine software" is, and how it would make their life better :)

My guess is that people would consider "purchasing" software if and only if it is significantly cheaper than the hardware. Something like 2000 rupees (40 US$) or so for the OS, office applications, compilers and a couple of high-end games all put together.

Re:I see the real problem here.

[Technician]

I betcha that this has everything to do with it... and you can't really move to Linux because not every Windows app is compatible with Linux. :\

On the flip side, not every Linux app is compatible with Windows. I have 3 Linux machines and one Windows machine. Incompatibility with Windows malware is the driving force here along with price. The Windows machine is for Windows programs. The Linux machines are for web, media, and learning. Nero incompatibility with Linux is not an issue since making, burning, editing ISO's is built in the OS. For media, it is the best DVD player. Putting in a movie, plays the movie, not bombard you with adverts, warnings, and menu's some of which break basic functions such as exiting to the movie or menu. If I want special features or the menu or warnings, I can go to them after the movie thank you.

The more I use Linux, the more I find what is missing Windows.

Re:I see the real problem here.

[Dunbal]

Either you believe in the free market, or you do not

      Why - is a monopoly (oh ok linux, Mac OS, yeah yeah oligopoly then) a free market? No, it's not.

      Your argument just got refuted. It also proves my point - if there's a monopoly situation and the good is a good that is somewhat necessary then we can expect the following: 1) The price will be the one that favors the monopoly's maximum profit and will NOT be determined by the market 2) that segment of the population that can't afford to pay will simply steal this perceived necessity - because it's a necessity. Because CD's are easily duplicated, they are copying the OS. If they were NOT easily duplicated you could expect to have your house broken into and having this product stolen. Often.

      If you don't like the model then either get the hell out of the market, or change the model. You can't really blame them, however. I'm sure Microsoft would sell even more legitimate copies of Windows at $10 a disk. No one would bother pirating it then - might as well pay the extra $8 for a legit copy. But at current prices, the whole third world is pirating AND WILL GO ON DOING SO.

Re:I see the real problem here.

[cunina]

First of all, you suggest that the OS market is controlled by an oligopoly, and then proceed to discuss it as if it is a monopoly. There's a real and functional difference, but you apparently can't be bothered to be consistent.

Second , an oligopoly exists only if the suppliers/manufacturers in the oligopoly are in collusion, particularly with regards to price. Do you really think that Microsoft, Apple, and Linux are in collusion? It doesn't look like my argument is the one that has been refuted.

Re:I see the real problem here.

[Dunbal]

First of all, you suggest that the OS market is controlled by an oligopoly, and then proceed to discuss it as if it is a monopoly.

      It IS a de-facto monopoly. There are other minor players, but Windows has how much market share? 95%? 98%? The other OSes are insignificant - MacOS only works on Macs - very high priced machines which I doubt sell well in India, and linux is free. Does free stuff still obey market rules? So I treat it as a monopoly.

Because

[Anonymous Coward]

FreeBSD works better?

Re:Three things come to mind

[dosius]

Almost? I paid $328 for this crate, you insensitive clod!

-uso.

MS is on a tightrope

[petermgreen]

a user moving from pirate windows to legitimate windows is a gain for MS (obviously)
a user moving from pirate windows to linux is a loss for MS (because it helps the mindshare of linux which in turn helps it into places that DO pay for the propietry software they use)

clamping down on piracy is obviously going to do both to some degree, which is more significant in a particular case is very hard to calculate.

Retailer Backlash: No M$ Purchases for Quarter.

[twitter]

The crackdown is not nearly as interesting as the vendor reaction: a general strike against M$. They have a guild and 350 shops have boycotted a M$ training session and pledged to purchase nothing from M$ for the next quarter.

350 dealers joined in a statewide bandh (that's a general strike) initiated by Surat-based South Gujarat Information Technologists Association (SITA). ... The resellers have also planned boycotts against Microsoft. Those participating in the strike agreed to stop all purchases of Microsoft products for this quarter.

This is a real culture clash and M$ is going to lose. Compare it to Gandhi's Salt March to Dandi and you can see where this is going. If M$'s $3 "education pack" is not good enough and they won't quit making alternate software difficult by vendor and driver manipulation, the people of the world will simply take what they want. M$ can no more stop this than the British Empire could keep people from taking salt from the sea.

I'd rather they discovered free software. It would be better for them and they could more easily implement things like DVD playing and advanced video codecs than people endumbered by dumb laws like the DMCA. Using M$ leaves the user open to M$ violation down, powers the botnet and props up M$'s awefull non free formats.

Xenix was US Only

[Anonymous Coward]

It is based on a program called "xenix", which was written by Microsoft for the US government.

In the late 1970's Microsoft licensed UNIX source code from AT&T which at the time was not licensing the name UNIX. Therefore Microsoft created the name Xenix. Microsoft did not sell Xenix to end-users but instead licensed the software to software OEMs such as Intel, Tandy, Altos and SCO who then provided a finished version of their own Xenix to the end-users or other customers. SCO introduced its first version of Xenix named SCO Xenix System V for the Intel 8086 and 8088 in 1983. Today SCO Xenix is one of the more commonly used and found versions of Xenix.

Linux was based on Minix. A UnixLite OS designed to run on PCs. However, it was really only a teaching tool. Andrew Tanenbaum repeatedly refused to add the new (legitimate) features the users and even developers asked for. Linus Torvalds set out simply to add functionality to his own version of Minix (the copyright allows use to do so for your own personal use, but you cannot sell or distibute it).

Over time, in adding functionality to Minix, Linus Torvalds found that he had created an entirely new kernel. I was very similar to Minix but used none of the Minix source code. Torvalds had originally called it freax, for "`free' + `freak' + the obligatory `-x'. The operator of the FTP server where Linus' new kernel made its debut didn't like the name and simply called it Linux (Linus + Unix). People seemed to like the name so it stuck.

Re:Xenix was US Only

[Hal_Porter]

Torvalds had originally called it freax, for "`free' + `freak' + the obligatory `-x'. The operator of the FTP server where Linus' new kernel made its debut didn't like the name and simply called it Linux (Linus + Unix). People seemed to like the name so it stuck.

That's not true. Originally he uploaded it as Linux(tm) but the FTP operator renamed it to Freakz. Linus thought he was being disrespected and went round to his house and beat the piss out of him with a IBM keyboard. Now everyone calls it Linux, except for the FTP operator who can't speak because he's on life support.

Linus still has the IBM keyboard - it works perfectly, but is still covered in specs of blood. Linus uses takes great pleasure in showing it to people when the join his coding commune.

Actually, this is a good thing

[einhverfr]

For exactly this reason.

When I was in Indonesia, a similar crackdown happend (by the government). The reaction by businesses was immediate and strong: develop roadmaps for migrating all possible systems to Linux.

Full-page advertisements were seen in major newspapers advertising open source migration services.

It was really interesting. Nearly every computerized business that I came in contact with asked me about Linux and how suited it would be for their work.

Yes, a lot of them will install Linux.

Actually

[einhverfr]

I am trying to *avoid* offering too many services for Microsoft OS's. But I cant quite avoid it.

More than half my work these days is for Linux.

So does getting into Heaven/Valhalla/....

[nihilistcanada]

.....reincarnating/etc.... depend on whether you have a good upload ratio? The Seventh layer of Hell is populated by leechers.

Re:So does getting into Heaven/Valhalla/....

[Anonymous Coward]

They still have all the newest gamez and appz though.

yeah

[JustNiz]

I've often thought microsoft software is only fit for the sewas.

Re:Sad. no it isnt

[kurt555gs]

I do not agree that giving away software of music or movies IS piracy. I think selling illegitimate copies of software, music, movies, etc as if they are genuine IS piracy, but if there is no money involved, by my morals, it is not wrong.

I know the laws have been bent to treat "intellectual property" ( the term in itself is offensive to me ) as real property, but is see no harm in trading or giving it away.

I have heard the argument that it denies money to the copyright holder, but has anyone considered that some one who uses or watches something for free, may not think it is worth what is being asked by the owner?

This is not a flame post, I know there are many here that have been brainwashed, but think if all the writings of the ages were protected by permanent copyright which the Microsofts of the world want.

All knowledge owned by some one.

if this were true, farmers would still be plowing their fields with sticks.

Cheers

International Pricing

[Tablizer]

"Besides, the pricing of their operating systems is way too high for the Indian markets."

They want a cost-of-living price break for software, but we US programmers don't get a cost-of-living break when our jobs are sent to India due to our high cost-of-living. They want a double standard. (And programmers there are usually well off, often able to afford a maid.)

Re:International Pricing

[TheSlashaway]

A double standard indeed but don't blame India and Indians. Blame the US politicians that fail to reign in the corporations when we are paying $$$$ tax money to them. And don't stop at that, VOTE them out.

Re:International Pricing

[FatherBash]

There are a billion people! Anyone with any decent income there can afford a maid, take your pick of any of the starving masses and throw them your change and you have a maid. The cost of living "break" is what lines the pockets of the people who choose to send our jobs there. They're the ones you should be mad at, not the Indian who worked in a very competitive field to earn his CS degree, don't begrudge him the 3000 dollars a year a full time programmer can make in India.

Re:International Pricing

[Tablizer]

And don't stop at that, VOTE them out.

Can't because the electoral college favors rural areas, and because they bundle it with anti-abortion and gay-bashing, which is more important to those voters.

Re:International Pricing

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because maids in India are paid peanuts and don't get health care and such unlike American maids. In fact maids are probably equivalent to well-clothed beggers in India.

Re:International Pricing

[Anonymous Coward]

You just have to bring in the outsourcing, right?

"Look Mom, those Indians took our jobs away. Oh! oh! Look Mom they are taking away our windows too!!!! now how are we gonna have a BSOD or make programs no one cares about!!! and.. and .... they got a maid too ...."

I would not mind another maid, wanna take up the challange?

Re:International Pricing

[Anonymous Coward]

If the jobs are not sent to India, your chevrolets are going to cost 5 times more and your dells are going to cost 3 times more. Where as, toyotas and lenovos still costs the same.

resulting.. you can guess what.. !!

Re:International Pricing

[Tablizer]

If the jobs are not sent to India, your chevrolets are going to cost 5 times more and your dells are going to cost 3 times more.

Bull. They would just have slighter fewer goodies and cost maybe 10% to 20% more.

Microsoft Cracking Down On Indian Retailers

[Seumas]

Microsoft Cracking Down On Indian Retailers

How?

(Thanks, I'll be here all week.)

Ghandi and pirated software

[The Bungi]

Holy shit twitter, I think you just broke your own dollar sign world record in this post!

They have a guild and 350 shops

These people were not buying "M$" products to begin with, so please explain to us simple people how this "backslash" means "M$" is going to lose?

Compare it to Gandhi's Salt March to Dandi

That's ridiculous and insulting to all Indians, I'm sure.

I'd rather they discovered free software.

If "free software" means people like you taking advantage of things like these to exaggerate and draw parallels between their struggle for independence and pirated software, I'm sure they'll be gathering at your door any moment now.

Dummy Customer...

[curecollector]

sending in a dummy customer to ask for a copy of Windows to be installed on their PC.

Nothing? You're slipping Slashdot!

maam, hello ! we wanna check...

[codermaniac]

... if you use Genuine Windows.

Who ??? tom, let the dogs out.

so typical of middle class america

[timmarhy]

quickly yell about how MS is just a big faceless mega corperation and it's ok to rip them off.

pathetic people, this kind of thing doesn't hurt bill gates, it destroys the local legitimate companys.

Which games?

[tepples]

It is? Because games run on it so well? MAME, Snes9x, VisualBoyAdvance, and other emulators run just as well on GNU/Linux OS as they do on Microsoft Windows OS.

Because it's so easy to install drivers for ATI and Nvidia video cards? AMD's ATI division is rectifying this problem by introducing its own Free drivers.

Because it's easy to play HD-DVD? This is India, not the United States. Are Bollywood studios as uptight about digital restrictions management as Hollywood studios are?

Re:Which games?

[DeadChobi]

I seem to recall that last time ATI released "open source" drivers, it was just an open source wrapper around a binary driver.

And All the emulators you've named will generally require piracy to be of any use. Linux needs more developers selling Linux compatible games.

Re:Which games?

[tepples]

And All the emulators you've named will generally require piracy to be of any use. MAME can run at least Gridlee, Robby Roto, and Vantris. VisualBoyAdvance can run numerous GBA homebrew games. Besides, if you're pirating other companies' software but not Microsoft's, you won't get "friendly raided" by Microsoft.

Linux needs more developers selling Linux compatible games. That may be the case, but why necessarily "selling"? Techgage has an article about its top ten Linux native games that are free software or freeware.

Re:Which games?

[jamar0303]

"And All the emulators you've named will generally require piracy to be of any use."
This isn't the US we're talking about- if they're willing to pirate Windows, they're willing to pirate other things too.

too F' late

[Ep0xi]

we are on a "too late" discussion here. the RAIDS started TEN years ago in the house of a priest,
and he died of cancer because of so many "FAKE" Microsoft users, because no country wants to pay
for software, and even big companies used to pirate software in those times, but yeah right they started
their raids where no one could have survived of the heavy load the law put on them. it were the perfect german-american treaty
to suck with latins. i still receive some idiots at home specifically asking if i can install windows on their cheap
computers, then i ask why would you need it if you dont do computing?????
Sorry but this issue has been gradually destroying my life, and of course, all the computer industry.
and not because of the piracy, but because of the trust people had on what i was selling.

no, no, no

[Trikenstein]

it still stands for Moose and Squirrel

C=64?

[tepples]

I have a great idea: why don't the FOSSkis start sending people into these stores, ask the retailers to install Lunix, and see if they can get the same free installation deal? Because Lunix is an operating system for Commodore 64 computers. Instead, ask for "Ubuntu" or "Fedora" or other Linux based operating systems designed for a standard PC.

Re:Sad. no it isnt

[gujo-odori]

While I can agree with you that if no money changes hands it's simple copyright infringement, not piracy, what we believe is moral or immoral is really irrelevant to the case. Legal or illegal is all that matters in court. Even in cases where the law is stupid, it will be followed, except in cases of jury nullification, something judges and lawyers on both sides don't really want people to know about. Of course, this is in reference to US law. Many countries do not have a jury system and even those that do may allow jury nullification. Indian law is doubtless different on that point and may (or may not; I don't know) be different on what does or does not constitute piracy and/or copyright infringement.

The argument that it's likely not depriving MS of any actual sales is spot-on; I lived in a country poorer than India for about a year and couldn't have bought a legit copy of Windows there if I'd wanted one (I was running Linux, so I had no need for Windows,legit or otherwise). The fact on the ground was that almost no one there could afford legit Windows, so only pirated copies were available (for about a dollar) in CD shops. MS likely had near-zero legit sales there, and if they could have stamped out piracy (they weren't even trying), they still would have had near-zero legit sales, at least unless they sold real copies of XP Pro for a buck.

WRT length of copyright, I think it's totally out of hand. I'd like to see length of copyright shortened to the lifetime of the author or thirty years, whichever comes first. I realize that would see the works of many living authors pass into the public domain, but after thirty years you've had a pretty good ride out of anything you wrote. Plus, that doesn't mean people won't keep buying your published editions.

If that's too extreme, there could always be a clause that says "after thirty years, anyone can copy and publish your work, with or without permission, but they have to pay some small percentage of sales to you as a royalty." Either way, I think 30 years or life of author is a reasonable term. I could accept fifty years, but I think that's really pushing it.

Re:Retailer Backlash: No M$ Purchases for Quarter.

[dedazo]

Let me see if I get this right. Microsoft tries to prevent them from pirating their software which they are doing based on their idea that they're doing a good deed. Kinda like I could steal your car and give it away to a charity, so there's no victim, right?

Anyway, Microsoft is doing this and you're all twittery about the fact that there's a "backlash" and they're not going to "buy" their products for a whole quarter? A a whole quarter? The same people who were pirating the software to begin with are going "on strike"?

And you consider this some sort of victory?

Who mods this stuff up, anyway?

Mod parent -1 troll

[mh101]

Wow. If you found that web site scary, you'll be paralyzed with fear visiting this one!

Re:Mod parent -1 troll

[Tatsh]

Sad when nearly a whole-website is in Flash; bad for compatibility (old computers) and accessibility.

Ubuntu isn't the only Free OS

[tepples]

Yes, their customers might prefer Windows, but Ubuntu is the only legal option that they are free to install. Only? Ubuntu isn't the only Debian distro (see also the current Freespire), and Debian isn't the only GNU/Linux distro (see also Fedora), and GNU/Linux isn't the only Free operating system (see also FreeBSD). Specifically, Freespire is designed for ease of use.

Re:Ubuntu isn't the only Free OS

[babbling]

Sorry, I meant Linux (and some other free operating systems) are their only option.

A matter of physics... for every action....

[3seas]

... there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Ultimately this seems to be a no win situation for Microsoft, as their price is to high and if Windows doesn't get included then Linux or other widely supported application types of lower cost OS will be.

Microsoft for so long played thing in a manner that would insure their growth and profit. In hindsight many see some of the tactics Microsoft used as being anti-competitive breaking anti-trust laws.

Consider these former acts of Microsoft as being actions that have equal and opposite reaction which are beginning to show up in counter effects.

But the real evidence of the equal and opposite reaction is that of the reactions themselves becoming unavoidably the result of Microsofts own direct actions. Not intentional actions of Linux or other outside of MS, force.

Father Physics and Mother Nature are not forces you want to bias against as they will find a way to counter bias so to balance back out. Here is as though there is a ghost applying MSs former anti-competitive actions against MS.
The availability of Linux only allowed the ghost to be enabled.

This action equals reaction has happened before, google "trillion dollar bet" and read the transcript. Follow the money!!!

Re:A matter of physics... for every action....

[Billly Gates]

Microsoft sells WindowsXP starter editions that are affordable. They are especially affordable if you can afford a new pc.

Most entry level programmers there buy used pcs off of ebay and if I can afford a laptop making a mere $11k a year because I work a minimium wage job part time and I am a student, then so can they.

You need to pay for Windows or do not use like you mention but if its a new pc then the customer can surely afford it.

Obligatory

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft caught some Indian retailers selling pirated copies of Windows by sending in a dummy customer to ask for a copy of Windows

Of course it was a dummy customer. He asked for Windows, didn't he?

You always get it wrong.

[twitter]

Let me see if I get this right. Microsoft tries to prevent them from pirating their software which they are doing based on their idea that they're doing a good deed. Kinda like I could steal your car and give it away to a charity, so there's no victim, right?

That's a useful analogy if cars cab be coppied at the push of a button. At that rate, I'd be happy to give coppies of my car to anyone who wants them. What a wonderful and abundant world that would be. I'm not sure how can compare that to theft and murder on the high seas, aka "piracy".

there's a "backlash" and they're not going to "buy" their products for a whole quarter? A a whole quarter? The same people who were pirating the software to begin with are going "on strike"? And you consider this some sort of victory?

It's not a victory but it brings us closer to one. A victory would be all 350 retailers switching to free software. That kind of victory won't be possible until hardware has been liberated from M$ manipulation. When that happens, everyone will have choices that don't involve risk. Everything that hurts M$ brings us closer to that day and this hurts M$. It clearly demonstrates the problems M$ is going to have trying to extract money from people around the world. The so called developing world is not going to be a growth market for them. It will never be in India or any other country's best interest to actually enforce crazy US "IP" laws.

Who mods this stuff up, anyway?

Your mother. Didn't she teach you that sharing was good?

Re:You always get it wrong.

[dedazo]

That's a useful analogy if cars cab be coppied at the push of a button

The fact that you think so is the root of the problem, isn't it. BTW, why do you insist on spelling "copies" as "coppies"? You should think about switching to a free web browser, like Firefox 2.0. It has this nifty on the fly spellcheck feature (stolen from Office, of course) that puts wrigglies under misspelled words.

It's not a victory but it brings us closer to one.

Yes, if I'd followed your metrics everything brings "us" closer to wherever the hell we're going.

I agree with Bungi, BTW. I didn't quite catch it but I think it's insulting that you'd equate something Ghandi did with this.

Your mother

Well, she's 79 but she's still dating and socially active, so give it a try. I have to warn you though, she's a happy "Windoze" user, and quite a good one at that. I don't know what that would do to the relationship.

On second thought, never mind. The other day she told me she hates those annoying Adventists that knock on her door all the time and preach on about how she can save her soul from the devil. I'd hate for her to sit through four hours of your retarded "M$ Winbloze SUX and GNU/Everything ROXXORZ" propaganda, which is really no different. So it's just not going to work. Thanks for trying though.

Re:You always get it wrong.

[jmac1492]

Your mother

Well, she's 79 but she's still dating and socially active, so give it a try.

In twitter's defense (ZOMG EVERYONE MOD ME DOWN NOW) this wasn't really a your mom joke. Teaching kids to share IS something that mothers tend to do, unlike having sex with twitter. I doubt that this so-called your mom joke would piss Mr. T off.

Re:You always get it wrong.

[dedazo]

Well, maybe next time he can use his own mom =)

The perfect name for an Indian Linux distro..

[the_rajah]

Sewa Linux.

Of course it's "selfless."

[trudyscousin]

"For us this is just a sewa (selfless act) that we are offering to our customers."

Reminds me of a bartender giving free drinks to his friends. "No big deal to be generous with someone else's booze," his ex-boss said. (Paraphrased from an old Law & Order episode.)

I'm certainly no MS fanboy, but I hope those retailers get nailed for this.

Re:Of course it's "selfless."

[Rocketship Underpant]

Yeah, but the bartender giving free drinks to his friends is in the wrong because he's using up his boss's booze without making a sale.

Obviously, since the Indian retailers themselves are copying and installing Windows, nothing on Microsoft's end is getting "used up" or stolen. At best, Microsoft can complain about sales they would *like* to have made on a product that costs them nothing per copy, and they want to make those sales at a price that Indian customers could not, and would not, pay.

In the end, it's a media stunt, and perhaps a political stunt; nothing more.

Don't get me wrong, I'd like to see Linux making headway in India, but I suspect that Linux-based software localization and text processing support for Indic languages has a way to go yet; I abandoned Linux because even Japanese didn't work adequately. Hopefully projects like IndLinux keep making progress.

Why should techs be enforcing copyright law?

[Rix]

Unless they have a specific reason to believe the customer doesn't have a license for the software they've asked to be installed, why should a tech refuse their business?

MOD me whatever you want, this is the truth

[Anonymous Coward]

I am currently installing 10 editions of Windows 2003 enterprise R2 onto some VM's.

Without doing this its kind of hard to emulate a true enteprise domain.

@ X,XXX $ per copy that makes me liable for probably a million dollars worth of fines.

I could do a LOT of damage if I was unable to test out some of the more involved methods of resolving Active directories many issues.

As such I will continue to use as many copies of whatever MS products I need to maintain my skillset.

I won't be paying for it, at least in this life.

I look forward to the day I don't have to support AD for a living.

Indian givers?

[jimmux]

If they aren't selling the stuff...

Tag this "thankyoucomeagain"

[Anonymous Coward]

Apu .wav file

Easy

[Trogre]

Besides, the pricing of their operating systems is way too high for the Indian markets

Supply and demand, my friend. If they won't supply it at the right price, stop demanding it.

Obligatory...

[StikyPad]

Please pay for your purchase and get out and come again!

Re:Obligatory...

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean: "Please don't pay for your purchase!"

Wow this doesnt make any sense...

[Sammy Loo]

I mean sure, Microsoft charges alot, but is it right to justify a "Selfless act" of pirating their software for other people by saying its GOOD for the company? "Selfless act" my ass. Stealing software for yourself is one thing, stealing software for people so that they will come to your business is just downright low and senseless. How would m$ stay afloat if they let these little guys fly? Then what if dell started installing pirated m$ for free, claiming that they're doing a "Selfless act"? wtf?

and in all honesty I'm no m$ lover or user, I'm a proud user of Ubuntu since dapper (now I'm using feisty), which is probably why I dont care that M$ charges. If you dont want to pay them for their work, use linux. Dont be dumb. Business is business, no matter how much you hate a company. There are alternatives. "Too expensive for the indian market"? Tough luck, world economy you bimbo.

Re:Wow this doesnt make any sense...

[dosius]

I remember when Windows cost $79 and people still thought it was a ripoff...

-uso.

Still cheaper to bribe the judge and cops

[Sad Adam]

I don't mean to suggest that India is corrupt, but it seems more cost effective to bribe the cops to look the other way. The cop pockets an on the spot fine, the business keeps businessing, life goes on.

Poor Indian guys that got busted tho.. I guess the own brown-skinned scapegoat is required as a sacrifice for US shareholders to stay happy....

On a more interesting note, I wonder how much "I didn't see a thing" bribery goes on on in the US. Not meaning to suggest the US is open to corruption or anything...

Re:Paying for Windows

[Technician]

I knew someone would not pay for Windows.

Since I have a collection of old hardware I still use, I have problems with the one copy per machine license model. OSS has a much better model.

This is why my Wife has the single XP machine with MS office & Turbo Tax. It's also why I retired Windows 98 on a PIII machine and installed Ubuntu along with my Windows 2K laptop and a home built P4 white box (Media Center with TV tuner card and DVD burner)

The Windows license is clear, install on one machine only and do not transfer an OEM install. MS policy is why I have one XP machine and 3 Ubuntu machines.

I don't need 4 copies of XP, Office, Nero, AV, etc. As soon as the MS compatibilities go away, we can convert the XP machine also and save on the upgrade/update treadmill.

Piracy of Windows is a crime against us all

[einhverfr]

My basic theory (born out as I have seen in other countries):

Given a choice of free of charge software, people usually always pick those they perceive to be the industry leaders. When they have to pay for that software (especially when the real income equivalent, i.e. hours of labor to pay for it, is high), they have to slow down and ask what they need.

Piracy thus reduces the effective size of the total market. People aren't forced to decide whether to pay for new copies of the software, so they pick what they think is the path of least resistance. Add cost, and these people are brought back into the market and have to choose.

When I worked at Microsoft, I used to say that we had to do something about piracy because, "Piracy is anticompetitive and it hurts our competitors even more than it hurts us." I got a wide range of reactions from that statement. If there was no piracy of Windows, Microsoft *might* make a little more money. But I guarantee you, there would be a *lot* more Linux use out there too. Heck, there might even be more users of OS X...

I personally think we all need to do what we can to discourage software piracy. I think it is the greatest obstacle out there to the total dominance of open source software.

Re:Piracy of Windows is a crime against us all

[Anonymous Coward]

If there was no piracy of Windows, Microsoft *might* make a little more money. But I guarantee you, there would be a *lot* more Linux use out there too. Heck, there might even be more users of OS X...

Except that OS X is considerably easier to pirate than Windows since it has no serial number, let alone online activation process.

Similarly, Linux is free and so even easier to install. People install Windows because they want Windows, not because it's easy to pirate. Remember also that most Windows users get a copy pre-installed on their PC, so most pirates are either upgrading to a newer version, or installing it on a homebrew machine.

These are not the kind of people who would opt for OS X instead if Windows was impossible to pirate, since it can't be run on either homebrew hardware or old Dell boxes, only on a brand new Mac that costs a lot more than a copy of Windows.

If anything, the fact that it is easy to get a pirate copy of Windows may actually encourage people to switch to Mac OS, since they can install a pirate copy of XP under Parallels as a safety net, at no extra cost.

Re:Piracy of Windows is a crime against us all

[einhverfr]

You didn't read my post.

People pirate Windows because they can, and because it is the industry leader. Hence it doesn't occur to them to pirate OS X, nor does it occur to them to install Linux.

You are correct about the dynamics of piracy centering around homebrew machines and upgrades, however. And in cases where the original retail package has been lost and one has to make a decision what to do. I guess that often leaves another option, which is to stick with what you are using until the installation blows up in your face.

Shut up!

[billcopc]

The ONLY reason this is on slashdot is because it has the word "Microsoft" in it. In the USA, in Canada, in Sweden, even in that shameful tourist toilet called France, installing an illegitimate copy of Windows on a computer is illegal. Whether the pirate charges for the "service" or does it for free, makes no difference whatsoever. He/she still hasn't purchased the right to use the software. Why should things be any different in India ? There is no "Robin Hood" clause in the license agreement.

If these pirates had any brains they'd be installing something else on there, something legal. Windows too expensive ? Then don't use Windows! If you really want to do a selfless act, burn a few dozen copies of Ubuntu and hand them out for free.

Re:Shut up!

[nagora]

Why should things be any different in India ? There is no "Robin Hood" clause in the license agreement.

Well, the license agreement is basically toilet paper dressed up as a legal document, so it's irrelevant - a sale comes under sales law, not unsigned-contracts-law which doesn't exist. Secondly, some contries do have a clause in their copyright law that says pirating is only punishable if it's done for financial gain. I don't know if India has such a law but it can happen. And, since India has 1,000,000,000 people and an economy that isn't just an empty shell of debt propped up by oil trading, I reckon it can afford to ignore MS's protests if it wants to.

TWW

Re:Retailer Backlash: No M$ Purchases for Quarter.

[Vulcann]

This is a real culture clash and M$ is going to lose. Compare it to Gandhi's Salt March to Dandi and you can see where this is going....M$ can no more stop this than the British Empire could keep people from taking salt from the sea.

Oh please. The civil disobedience movements in India had a much larger more fundamental purpose. They did not want to be ruled by the British and have they're country pillaged. To compare it to a bunch of shopkeepers from allowing MS to make a little more money is stupid. Fine ... you can argue that they're "fighting for freedom" as in free software, but exactly where is freedom NOT there at present? Anyone is still "free" to install Linux and not MS. The "MS tax" is not really that binding in India where most computers are sold "assembled" and not from any particular vendor. MS isnt chasing people with a pitchfork to get them to use they're stuff. Its not like they're massacring people to prolong they're rule like the British did in India. When one company tries to force people to not pirate it might get a small following, but when you're basic human rights are threatened, a flood of people will support you. As for MS being a monopoly, most people in India don't give a rats ass.

I know this is Slashdot but lets just call things as they are. This is piracy ..period. Its a bunch of pirates who are illegally cashing in on other peoples work ..period. As for all that "seva (service to others)" bullshit I'm not buying. There are plenty of moves to Linux in India but most people still think Windows is the "standard". All the biggest companies and most of the general public us Windows. Most retailers in India sell Windows on the comp BECAUSE IT GETS THEM THE BUYERS. So indirectly they do profit from this venture since it clinches the sale, even if they dont sell Windows directly.

I'm on Ubuntu and I'm no MS fanboy : I thoroughly despise the policies MS follows to quell competition. But lets not get all jihadi about what MS is doing and see things in a proper perspective.

Noone seems to have read...

[Anonymous Coward]

what the Indonesian suppliers said. Or not really appreciated it.

Over there copyright is not an issue. The value of an O/S is jack shit. It's just something you have on your computer. It's thought of roughly the same as the packing is over here - sure, you need it if you're going to post your computer, and someone's had to pay for it, but it's essentially a zero-cost item.

These people live in a copyright-free paradise. This is what software should be like. And Micro$oft is the snake with the apple!

I wish they do it firmly.

[aaoojaaoo]

Its a real pain that these vendors install pirated copies. In fact even if you buy a branded PC (like Compaq), they install pirated copy only somehow. You take the PC to home and one fine day you connect to internet and then ..., The computer mysteriously develops snags and starts freezing/hanging . Then you take the PC to the vendor and he fixes it ( by reinstalling the pirated copy again ) and then only fine day you connect it to internet. This happens over and over again with no way out.

too pricey here too

[z_gringo]

Here in Spain, Windows XP costs €249 in any store that sells it. That is US$336. That price is just insane for Windows XP.

And Vista? €329. (US$444). No one is going to pay that for an OS that should be costing about €69 and €99 respectively.

It's no wonder that half the people in the company I work for have switched to SUSE, Debian or Fedora. Most of the ones who aren't running a linux OS are running Windows 2000. We have maybe 5 copies of XP in the whole company of about 750 people, and to the best of my knowledge, Zero of Vista.

How can they seriously expect to sell their stuff at those prices? And Spain is a booming market right now. If they are trying to charge those kinds of prices in a thirld world country like India, that just isn't going to work.

M$ would not want to do this

[tanveer1979]

This kind of piracy is so common, that most people who go to small time assemblers expect windows XP or even Vista for free. If M$ starts cracking down people are not going to pay something like 200$. Its like somebody asking for half of your months salary! Many people who are getting computers nowadays get them on installments and earn around Rs.20,000-30000/month. So asking them to pay 8000 for software means they go elsewhere. M$ got so popular in India just because windows was "free". Free as in beer.

Holy Cow

[cybereal]

While I'm reading all of these amusing comments in regards to an issue in Inida, I found it especially amusing that slashdot's current "quote" at the bottom of the page is:

Sacred cows make great hamburgers.

Linux is a very real threat in India...

[jkrise]

These 'crackdowns' are normal practice every time Microsoft releases a new Operating System. But with Vista, the dealers are now forced to innovate, and cannot afford to be lazy and pirate Windows... because:

Vista requires much more h/w resources than pirated Windows 98 / 2000 which satisfies all the needs of the Indian home user / small corporate user. Dealers simply cannot push the latest and greatest specs with 1GB RAM for the home segment. Huge unsold stocks of P4 motherboards, 256MB RAM with built-in display controllers and 8MB VRAM (shared with the main RAM)lie with these vendors. This is just not good enough for Vista, but Win2K runs blazingly fast.

Even now, brands like HP and Dell offer FreeDOS with the PCs... and actively encourage dealers to 'install' whatever the customer demands...the Indian PC market is very sensitive to price. Couple of years ago, HP was offering Mandrake Linux... but this stopped when customers complained that the bundled HP printers and scanners weren't supported in Linux!

In short, even if all the vendors called off their boycott and went in for Windows, they'll have to liquidate exisitng 'Build Your Own' stock and order fresh 'Vista-capable' inventories. Even after that, supporting Vista in the Home segment is a nightmare - beginning with the UAC... lack of support for peripherals like scanners, sound cards, video cards, etc.

For once, adopting and adapting to Linux could be less cumbersome and more profitable for these guys, thanks to Microsoft.

What India needs now

[zygwin]

is a dell offering ubuntu .

Of course they were buying software!

[twitter]

These people were not buying "M$" products to begin with, so please explain to us simple people how this "backslash" means "M$" is going to lose?

If you had read the article, you would have seen that M$ thinks the vendors are important. If things work there as they do here, they are right.

M$ is nothing without the support network everyone else provides. These 350 shops are their mainstay, for both their sales volume and their recommendations and fixes. Even here in the US, where people have enough money to buy new systems M$ would sink if it were not for the many local people who keep those virused out boxes running. The rub is that they are not making enough money from their sales to justify the $5,000 fines M$ would like to drop on them. That's not to say M$ was not making money - selling twenty five cent CDs in a plastic box for one or two hundred bucks makes enough to fund their billion dollar a month advert attack and put money in their own pockets.

Compare it to Gandhi's Salt March to Dandi
That's ridiculous and insulting to all Indians, I'm sure.

No, their banding together to fight is admirable and puts US mom and pop shops to shame. M$ has pulled the same kinds of game here in the land of the free and no one has ever stood up to them. Those people, more than Dell, HP and others, are who makes M$ rich.

Re:Of course they were buying software!

[The Bungi]

I couldn't get past your dollar sign shitstorm, so just let me parse out this article for you:

"We are not against piracy but against the way Microsoft is working to stop it," - I'm not against larceny, just that I dislike being arrested for it. More to the point, this is an acknowledgment of what they're doing.

"Moreover, if they want to do business in India then they should change their prices and policies according to the Indian market. We are the one who are promoting their products in the market and if they will behave in such a rash manner with us then we will stop business with them." - Look buddy, I don't like this bicycle I stole from you anyway. Paint it blue instead of red, change the rims and I'll do you the favor of stealing it.

"Since we are are not charging anything extra for installing the software, it means that we are actually not trading in pirated software. For us this is just a sewa (selfless act) that we are offering to our customers." - We're not trading boxed copies of Windows for hard cash, but this stuff is great for our business. Therefore, this is perfectly fine.

"Besides, the pricing of their operating systems is way too high for the Indian markets." - It's too expensive, so we have a right to steal it. This is the same argument used to pirate music and movies. It's too expensive, so I'll just download it along with half a million other people.

Any normal person would see how completely ridiculous this is. But you need to see it as some sort of heroic struggle against evil, along with hyperbolic comparisons to Mahatma effin' Ghandi.

Now, if you're done rationalizing crime in a culture you don't understand and have referred to before in racist overtones, I'd love a response to this as well. Thanks.

Re:Of course they were buying software!

[kimvette]

"Besides, the pricing of their operating systems is way too high for the Indian markets." - It's too expensive, so we have a right to steal it. This is the same argument used to pirate music and movies. It's too expensive, so I'll just download it along with half a million other people.

Stealing? Really? Did they deprive Microsoft of their master copy? Or, did they hijack a distribution semi and take possession of Microsoft-pressed CDs? If not, then how exactly is it stealing and not merely copying?

Re:Of course they were buying software!

[The Bungi]

Did they deprive Microsoft of their master copy?

By your .sig I see you'd use the same argument if we were talking about downloading music vs. just buying a CD. "Your honor, this cannot possibly be stealing since I didn't deprive anyone of any revenue". Please don't insult my intelligence.

country pillaged

[twitter]

The civil disobedience movements in India had a much larger more fundamental purpose. They did not want to be ruled by the British and have they're country pillaged. To compare it to a bunch of shopkeepers from allowing MS to make a little more money is stupid.

No, I've compared it to 350 retail shops who don't want to be shaken down by a foreign company. M$, like the RIAA, does not always get things right and I know at least one shop owner here who's fought them off in court. I like the "screw you, we don't want your software" reaction better.

You are right to think of this action as small, but it's the tip of a very large iceburg. The US government puts up with M$ games because M$ is a US company and, in theory, money M$ rips out of schools, government and other businesses never leaves the US. Indeed, the US sees M$ as a big trade positive that will grow. Other governments should and do look at that coercive monopoly rip off as their country being pillaged. Government and business interests should think very hard before trusting their data to foreign software that can't be inspected. These shopkeepers might not have thought all of that through, but they will. In the mean time, they have rightly concluded that M$ is not worth their effort. Watch their attitude spread and see what M$ can do about it. Worse still for M$, watch how the US government attitude changes when they realize that "developing countries" are not such a good market for software because the cost of enforcement is going to blow any profits that might be made and make the US look like a big dick.

lets not get all jihadi about what MS is doing and see things in a proper perspective.

It's the copyright warriors who are the offenders here. They are pushing their crap on the world but the price of their profits it to deny that world a choice and fine them when they naturally share with each other. In the US, they will take everything you own and put you in jail for longer than people who murder and rape. I don't think they will get away with it elsewhere. The push back is on the way.

please, Microsoft

[nanosquid]

Please, Microsoft, enforce your copyrights and patents in clear, unequivocal terms. Take everybody to court who violates them. We'll all be better off that way. While you're at it, please also scrap your student discounts, "philanthropic donations", and bundling deals and pick a single price for your product.

If people have to bear the full cost of Microsoft Windows from day 1, they'll start looking for alternatives. It's only that once they have invested a lot in Microsoft Windows that they stay with it.

And maybe that's what the monopoly enforcement action should focus on: force Microsoft to set a fixed, uniform price for all customers for each product.

Re:please, Microsoft

[Xuranova]

And when the price they choose is $79.99 for the OS and 79.99 for Office basically pricing it below all competitors that aren't giving it away, then what? Ask them to raise the price so others can compete?

Re:please, Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

And when the price they choose is $79.99 for the OS and 79.99 for Office basically pricing it below all competitors that aren't giving it away, then what? Ask them to raise the price so others can compete?

If they get 90% of the market through fair competition, I don't have a problem with that.

Now we defend India

[The Bungi]

Very interesting, but all just posturing and FUD bravado, considering comments like these. Like you care for a second about how "M$" is "pillaging" a culture you so obviously consider "inferior" to yours.

Oh, I get it.....

[OneSmartFellow]

In India - a land famous for its scrupulous business practices - there are some unscrupulous businessmen that are pirating Windows software. This is newsworthy why ??

Sell vouchers for support instead

[Anonymous Coward]

Let the customer fetch their own copy of windows and help them 'install' it, which according to Microsoft isn't distribution.

hehe

[xtracto]

Somehow after the "I am Indian" I started to read your post with Apu's [Simpsons] accent, I found it funny...

Now go ahead and read my post with the Bumblebee Guy voice =oP.

Peace.

Re:hehe

[Anonymous Coward]

Somehow after the "I am Indian" I started to read your post with Apu's [Simpsons] accent

You are not alone. (This is scary.)

But I bet I can do a better Apu than you since I live in Singapore (plenty of Indians here!)

I would accuse my Microsoft of being...

[Anonymous Coward]

I would accuse my Microsoft of being the biggest promoter (indirectly) of Piracy of Software.

Because of Microsoft, software Piracy is a big problem for software producers. It has instilled a culture of pirating software and being ok with it. I find it a major problem, much more worse than their monopoly.

A message for Microsoft: Please stop promoting piracy of your products!!!!

Since when could Microsoft 'conduct raids'?

[janrinok]

I am surprised that the raids were conducted by Microsoft - why not the appropriate law enforcement agency?

What gives Microsoft the legal right to 'conduct raids'? They can perhaps visit the dealers (which they did in this case by introducing a dummy customer) and threaten to take legal action if they, the dealers, do not stop their illegal activities. However, they cannot conduct raids, demand payments or issue fines. That is the function of law enforcement and the judiciary.

The language in which the OP is written suggests that it is the product of 'spin' and is not an accurate version of events. There was no 'raid'.

Huh?

[sharkey]

Microsoft caught some Indian retailers selling pirated copies of Windows [CC] by sending in a dummy customer to ask for a copy of Windows to be installed on their PC.

Sounds like a typical Windows user. What's the big deal?

Dummy?

[madmegdigital]

Isn't any customer shopping for Windows by default a "dummy" customer? I think "secret shopper" is a more descriptive term in this case.

Re:Of course it's "selfless." Mistranslation

[XchristX]

Of course it's "selfless." "Sewa" does not mean selfless. It means "Service" (typically towards one's community/family/nation) in most of the Indic languages. This was most definitely a "service", just not a selfless one.

We have a idiom for that

[junglee_iitk]

I have stated this before. The concept of "Intellectual Property" is as alien to India as is "worshiping a cow" for West. There is a fundamental philosophical difference, the one between individuality of West and the societal benefits of East. And India is a champion in its home grown social structure. Believe me when I say that people saying they were just doing "sewa" (a word originally coming from Sanskrit, and a concept common to all Dharmic religions), are not at all lying. It is a mob culture out there, where Internet is for downloading, and software is for getting a job done. It is going to take a lot if anyone wants to teach them paying for a software because it is "copyrighted". Such concept is, simply alien.

I don't know what I like more. On one hand I have bashed Microsoft for a long time for not stopping piracy to promote their monopoly in India. (Right now I am sitting with an Indian guy, coming from much "praised" OMG IITs, in Germany for internship, who laughed at my colleague's attempt to buy an anti-spyware. After trying to convince him for two weeks that piracy is bad, he has become numb, and probably will introduce me as a jerk to his friends back in India). And now that MS has taken a anti-piracy stance, my heart rejoices for the thought of seeing more people talking about OpenOffice and Linux.

On the other hand, it means stern cultural brainwash that is going to happen, that was cooked in West in the name of Individuality. How ironic that Indian guys like think of "owning" stuff - wife, pride, religious superiority etc., but don't want to think of others owing something which is good for themselves. In short, this is what happens when you mix two cultures without a reason. India is a place of confused people. It is where Afganistan and Iran have been before. Unfortunately or fortunately, India is too democratic to converge this unrest towards praising the past and hating the West. The only way out for her is to completely be westernized.

So, for those people saying this, in ANY way, will lead to greater acceptance of Linux, sorry boy, you are dreaming. Just wait and watch, when years later India will be new America. After China is no more, that is.

Re:We have a idiom for that

[KK2007]

Wow! After reading this post, I learned how to accept a silly excuse from some corrupt businessman in India as a valid premise to understand the psychology of the east and west and then go on to predict the future of incredibly unpredictable and chaotic world.

Re:We have a idiom for that

[junglee_iitk]

Clearly, you have never been to India.

Re:Sad. no it isnt

[Shajenko42]

WRT length of copyright, I think it's totally out of hand. I'd like to see length of copyright shortened to the lifetime of the author or thirty years, whichever comes first.

Think about this for a second. You've got someone who creates an incredibly lucrative movie/TV show/song/program/whathaveyou. It makes an unbelievable amount of money for some company, and starts putting competitors out of business.

Now suppose this guy has, I don't know... maybe a piano fall on him, or gets pushed down some stairs or something. Now the company no longer has this asset and competitors can copy it at will.

Do you think anyone might have some incentive to make sure the aforementioned accident happens?

Prediction

[Anonymous Coward]

I predict the following replies to this observation: ..

Reply 1:

Frink: Now, have you all taken your suppositories?
Amy: Yes! Stop asking! ..

Reply 2:

In Soviet Russia, suppositories contain you. ..

Reply 3:

Goatse/something to do with gay n-words ..

Reply 4:

I knew what he meant. You knew what he meant. Why is /. filled with bigots and sticklers? When did the humble, noble nerd community become so petty? etc. ..

Reply 5:

Actually, repositories don't contain any files... they contain references... URL... blah blah blah... apt-get... yackidyshmackidy... etc. ..

Yrs Scrly,

Nostradamus

Interesting ethical situations here

[geek2k5]

There are some interesting ethical situations here.

While the 'selfless' act helps the customer directly, it robs the producer of what is being 'selflessly' given away, whether it is Microsoft, or a small software company. The people doing the distributing may be gaining 'karma' points on one side but are losing them on the other side of the transaction.

The excuse of not being able to afford the 'real' product because of discrepancies in income between the United States and other countries has a lot of bearing here. In today's globalized world you need to keep up with current tech in order to succeed. If you can't afford it, then copying it can almost be rationalized.

The rationalization falls apart when you reach the point that you want your own products protected on the global market. It is hard to demand IP protection when you are not doing a good job of protecting other people's products.

To add another level of complexity to things, consider the fact that a lot of software businesses in the United States are creating service and research centers in places like India. While I trust that the businesses are buying legitimate copies of Windows and other software, are they keeping track of what their employees and subcontractors are doing? While these people may be making a lot more than the average citizen of India, the temptation of getting something 'free' might outweigh the ethically correct action of paying for it. (Of course there may be reduced cost programs that get hardware with legitimate software to this subgroup. But being in the United States, I don't hear of them.)

Ideally, everybody should be held to the same ethical standards, with allowances for all types of income discrepancies. Perhaps software, movies, music and other IP products should be priced based on personal income by country, with limits on what you can own based on what you earn. If you want more, you need to earn more, relative to the personal income ranges of your country.

It is something to think about that will continue to be a problem until all people world wide have similar income ranges.

Re:Interesting ethical situations here

[c0d3h4x0r]

While the 'selfless' act helps the customer directly, it robs the producer of what is being 'selflessly' given away

It doesn't rob the producer of anything, because the consumer of the pirated copy couldn't afford to buy it (which is why they are pirating it).

Repeat after me:
a pirated copy is not a lost sale
a pirated copy is not a lost sale
a pirated copy is not a lost sale

Re:Interesting ethical situations here

[geek2k5]

There are instances where people pirate things because they do not want to pay for product. After all, if it is 'free' via the Internet or friends or vendors, then why 'waste' your money paying for it. In those instances a pirated copy IS a lost sale.

You comment about 'a pirated copy is not a lost sale' doesn't always apply. Not being able to afford something can often be a euphemism for not wanting to pay.

It would be interesting to track cost of living versus income versus computer purchases in those countries that have a lot of piracy. Are the people buying computers and pirating the software evenly distributed through the income spectrum? Or is there a chance that the majority of the 'pirates' are better off than the majority of the population in their countries and could afford to buy if they weren't tempted by it being 'free'?

Re:Interesting ethical situations here

[c0d3h4x0r]

My anecdotal experience is that 95% of pirated copies do not represent lost sales.

In the vast majority of cases, people pirate simply because they can. If they couldn't, they wouldn't go out and buy it all instead -- in fact, they couldn't possibly afford to.

Of course, my experience is limited to the United States.

Priced too high for any market.

[rice_burners_suck]

It's not Windows. It's Losedows.

The reason you should NOT install pirated copies of Losedows is that by doing so, you're overpaying by one million dollars per copy.

Every product under the Losedows product family is priced much too high for any market. Losedows is an extremely defective piece of software and even if Microsloth paid each user $1,000,000.00 per copy to install it, meaning the price is essentially -$1,000,000.00 (note the negative sign), it would still be too high a price to pay to put up with this garbage.

In other words, there is NO EXCUSE: DO NOT PIRATE LOSEDOWS!!! YOU'RE BEING RIPPED OFF!!!

Re:This has got to be the funniest of all things..

[Anonymous Coward]

MS can never stop piracy in India and China. No law abiding citizen supports piracy, but certain practices by MS leads to this.

1. Proprietary file formats. Unless MS agrees to set up and adhere to industry standards, average non tech folks are at MS's mercy and are forced to use their OS. Nothing wrong here if folks resort to pirated copies.

2. MS Pricing is ridiculous. No need to write in length, but Bill Gates will do well to learn from his corporate brethren in electronics and automobile industries that have burnt their fingers in India. Many have adapted to the market and yet some have had their Indian operations going belly up. Indians do not compromise on features and quality, but are extremely cost conscious. Starter Edition is ridiculous, Billy can shove it up his a$$.

Contrary to misconceptions, the Indian middle class is extremely well and have access to Western type life style, though ironically restricted sometimes by India's infrastructures (like broadband bandwidth or modern airports). but not by their pockets or pay checks.

MS's market share is over hyped in media.

I've not seen any universities, scientific or research establishment using MS $h!t. Yeah, the university registrar or accountant might use it, but in the labs.

Movies vs Windows

[geek2k5]

So, how can the movie industry charge 1/5 to 1/10 what they charge in the US, and still profit, while Microsoft refuses to do so?

Movies don't usually require user support. But when you purchase Windows, you expect it and need it for update support. That would explain part of the difference.

As far as the cinema is concerned, I suspect that the costs of providing the building, air conditioning, seating, and other amenities may be lower in other countries. I also suspect that the number of people attending them may be proportionally higher than the US. These two factors could combine to make it possible to charge less.

Re:Movies vs Windows

[hjf]

As in movies, the cost of support is lower in other countries (that's why companies outsource support to India).

Also, the number of people attending to any given movie... well, going to the cinema on a premiere is almost the same as going on the last day. I have never been in a crowded cinema.