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Microsoft Cuts Vista Price To $66 In China
narramissic writes "Microsoft this week cut the retail price of Windows Vista Home Basic in China by 67% — from 1,521 renminbi to 499 renminbi ($65.80). This is a steep discount compared to what users in the US and elsewhere are charged for the software. The reason for the price reduction? Battling piracy, of course. The new pricing 'narrows the price gap between original versions of Microsoft's software and pirated copies,' making it that much easier for consumers to 'do the right thing.'"
The real question is why will users allow this? And can businesses and gov. make use of this
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
At that price, assuming it is the same as other versions sold elsewhere, it is almost at a point where bulk purchasing and shipping make it worthwhile to sell on the gray market.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
I know it is the "less money is better than no money" mantra that they are trying to apply, but I still find it fascinating that a relatively non-free market is getting a better price for the same product than a supposedly free market like the US and European countries. It looks like "illegal" activities can be an artificial competitor when no direct competitor exists. The question is, will people in China buy it, even at this price? I really doubt it. I wonder what the EULA looks like...
Talking about "average wages" in the industrializing world is pretty misleading.
China is a third world country that contains a first world country. Vista, computers, and internet access is being sold to the first worlders. I've seen $300 / month quoted as the base starting salary for white collar work. Which puts a Chinese office drone at about 1/4 what a US temp staffer makes. This seems about right, given that the kind of consumer price disparities here are primarily the results of China's heavy hand in their own currency market. The government keeps the local currency artificially weak to make sure that outside investment remains dirt cheap.
Now according to basic economic theory, this shouldn't work. It doesn't cost (significantly) less to market a consumer product to the Chinese middle class than anyone elses, so how can they support comparable standards of living with such weak currency, and how does the currency not strengthen as more imports and local consumer spending occurs? The Vista pricing is a good illustration of why basic economic theory is frequently inadequate to describe the real world. Most consumer goods simply don't behave like widgets or pork bellies, advertising and IP law (among many other forces that prevent commoditization of goods) prevent market effects and allow large players like Microsoft and the Chinese Government to keep prices of goods at wildly different levels in some parts of the world rather than others.
In Capitalist America, bank robs you!
Lol no :) I'm installing it with Parallels on my new Macbook I'm getting soon in the mail. Along with Ubuntu. Mac OSX, Windows Vista Ultimate and Ubuntu 7.04 all running side by side. I've dreamed of running every mainstream OS multiboot since 9th grade. Now I'm gonna be a Freshmen in college and I can run every mainstream OS at the same time! When I was in 9th grade, you wouldn't have been even able to install OSX on a PC. Now everything is moving together :) I am so happy Mac's are now Intel based.