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Microsoft Giving Away Vista Ultimate, With a Catch
Opinari writes "In case you haven't heard, Microsoft is giving away copies of Windows Vista Ultimate (32-bit or 64-bit DVD), Microsoft Office Ultimate 2007, Microsoft Money Plus Premium, Microsoft Student with Encarta Premium 2008, or Microsoft Streets and Trips 2008 — you can choose any one. The caveat is that you have to let them monitor your use of the program."
Free as in Linux? No, free as in Microsoft!
Funnypics
"Flag on the moon. How did it get there?"
They want to monitor whatever you are currently using today, XP or Vista, and won't give the goods until after three months of watching your stuff.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
The caveat is that you have to let them monitor your use of the program.
This is how I would go about this. I would get a free copy of vista. Then, I would set web cam up outside on the driveway. I would grab a wood maul and just go to town on the disc, and do my best to savor the thought of MS technicians staring on in horror.
I got a catholic block.
At least not the free gift part. From an email received from Microsoft posted to hardwareanalysis.com forums:
"What happened to the free product option?
Thank you for your interest in the feedback program. Due to overwhelming response, the supply of gifts have been exhausted so we have closed our free product offer on 12/11/2007 at 2pm. Thanks to everyone that participated!"
From the FAQ: If I decide to stop participating, how do I opt out? Your participation is entirely voluntary, so you may withdraw from the program at any time, with no consequence. If you decide to withdraw from the program, send us an e-mail at winpanel@microsoft.com with the word "remove" in the subject line, and we will take care of it. You should also uninstall our software. It then gives instructions to uninstall the software. And also, you don't get the software until you have participated for a certain amount of time.
"All the sex you want! But you're not going to like the catch."
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
I should set up a honeypot with their products. Hopefully when they are watching, they will get a virus or infected by a bot net.
Instead of letting them see every single thing you do on your computer for a whole 3 months (or longer... who knows what stays on your computer after installing the software), why not install Windows XP in a VM, install their crap, run it once or twice a week to "check your email" or whatever, and then after three months, collect your software? They only see what goes on in the VM, you get your free Vista and everyone's happy. Well, if using Vista can be considered as something that would make you happy.
Just to show how bad their monitoring actually is:
They're basically looking at everything you do. Here's my favorite bit from the whole thing:
This sounds like spyware? Yeah, I'll say. But noooooooo, it's not at all harmful for your computer. Rigghhhtttt....
They want us to let them monitor use of their program?? Don't they do that already???
I don't see the issue here. No question of privacy really, people can choose to do this or not, and it's openly the catch. Microsoft probably wants to watch people's use of it to see what people have trouble with and what they can improve..
FYI: I don't know what you guys are talking about half the time.
Does the software impact the performance of my computer? "We have gone to great lengths to design the Windows Feedback Program software to limit the amount of computer resources it uses to collect data. You may see a minor change in performance when you first log in to Windows; however, this typically only occurs during the first few minutes after login while we are collecting basic configuration information." In my opinion, that translate to... "The print out of the code is so lengthy the printer ran out of ink, twice. The software will not severely hamper the performance of the computer (as compare to Vista that already used up ~500mb of RAM on idle, there isn't all that much performance left to hamper anyway). After you first log in, we are going to collect some basic information and make sure you have an authentic Windows OS. We might decide to sue you or disable your OS if we found it to be pirated."
I would setup a dedicated box with XP on it that would just sit their with their spy software installed and 2girls1cup running on replay. Stuff it in the basement and forget about it for three months :D
Aikon-
They're still going to count it as another person "using" Vista. I'm guessing they'd be pretty happy. I can see the marketing spin now. "Even a skeptic like Jared found that the Vista user experience was extremely satisfying."
Something FREE! That's good!
...
Vista Ultimate? That's bad!
Monitoring? That's bad!
Can I downgrade it to Windows XP Pro and get a free Windows XP Pro license that's legit? That'd be good!
Just seems you can't even give Vista away.
This is my footer. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
At least it's completely voluntary and you make ~$400 off of it. Why are people getting upset that Microsoft is paying you for providing them with information? It's not like it's mandatory for Windows users.
Why not install this on a couple VMs (or actual machines sitting around) and then install all kinds of free software on it? Let them chew on the fact that so many people, straight away after installing, go get Firefox and Open Office and GIMP and VLC and Thunderbird and Pidgin.. and never bother using IE or Office or whatever else. Make sure they also see all the useless services you disable and how quickly you can shut off UAC.
mirrorshades radio -- darkwave, industrial, futurepop, ebm.
I tried to sign up so that I could run my free XP in a virtual machine with this spy software of theirs and see exactly what kind of stuff it reports. I didn't realize they were out of "gifts" and completed their survey before realizing this. I went through the survey and answered their questions honestly, saying that I use Linux and never use Windows anymore. 5 minutes later, I wanted to remove myself from their database for this so that I don't get e-mails in the future related to it when I have no involvement with it whatsoever... being that they had no more software to give out and all.
I looked on their FAQ page and found conflicting information. Two separate sections saying to send a blank e-mail to two different e-mail addresses with 'remove' in the subject. I e-mailed both, and what did I get in return?
I did that. What did I get back? Two NDRs for separate reasons:
: host maila.microsoft.com[131.107.115.212] said: 550
5.7.1 (in reply to end of DATA command)
-- and --
: host maila.microsoft.com[131.107.115.212] said: 550
5.1.1 User unknown (in reply to RCPT TO command)
Good one MS, you never cease to amaze me!
Glad to see that you guys don't let facts get in the way of a good MS bash.
Anyways, just in the in case there's anyone actually curious about this and not just interested in kneejerk reactions about poorly-written, inflammatory summary.
I've actually RTFA (and a page linked off of it) and here's something the summary completely neglects to mention:
The automated data collection is one of two different options you can pick; the other is to be asked to fill out a survey not more often than once every two weeks. It sounds like you can pick either option.
Now, that all said, there's also one more big thing: They're giving away FREE copies of EXPENSIVE software* which many people NEED** or WANT with a perfectly reasonable caveat. They're being open and honest, and they're providing both a manual and an automatic method of data collection. The latter is particularly appealing to many, because it basically means they can just forget about it. Those who are worried about their privacy can take the surveys.
Disclaimer: I am a fanboy of many things, including Xbox 360, but not Microsoft in general. I like Windows XP and hate most everything that MS has put out which isn't an OS (i.e. office, internet explorer, etc). I'll definitely not be participating simply because I'm not interested in any of the offerings.
*Expensive for a typical end user, I don't care how much your company paid for its graphics design software
**Again, typical end user who doesn't know what OpenOffice is and just wants to be able to open their files at work without thinking about converting file types.
I can't believe all the cynical responses from Slashdot readers. Why would you doubt the sincerity and generosity of the company found by the man who will donate $100 to an orphanage each time I forward his email to someone?
EvilCON - Made Famous by
"The caveat is that you have to let them monitor your use of the program"
So they'll monitor my activities when I sell it on eBay?
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
Out of morbid curiosity I had to know, and it installed just fine. Thankfully it uninstalled just fine too.
I wonder what kind of "useful" data Wine reports...
i read about it in a blog once
...Satan is giving away free money. The caveat is that you have to give him your soul.
I'd use it to read http://annoyances.org/. I'd go around editing the registry and fixing common annoyances. Hopefully, Microsoft would realize what they need to fix.
That way I would have known it was a MS shill trying to get people to go through the setup tool and not realizing that MS stopped giving anything away 6.5 hours BEFORE this was posted.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It's not a tactic to gain ground. It is a strategy commonly used to gain survey information. It is exactly like how you will often see a survey that says, "Get a chance at winning an ipod after completing this survey" kind of deals.
Why would Microsoft need to conduct a survey that requires generating statistics on how you use your computer? Simple, it is to determine usability statistics. That type of data can then be used to influence the design of the user interface.
For example if the data shows that for a particular window in say the control panel, the most user's mouse movement is dramatically higher than with some other window, that means that the window with high mouse movement is a candidate for reorganization. That is because the longer you take to move your mouse, the less efficient you are.
You can also see what functions your users are using the most and what functions they rarely use. So say you have a toolbar with 10 buttons and out of those 10 buttons only 2 are used by almost everyone while the other 8 are rarely touched. This suggests that you may want to make those 2 functions that are used always to be more accessible either with a hotkey or by making those specific buttons bigger so they are easier to click and you may want to evaluate if the other 8 buttons are even worth having there. Likewise if you see people always using the menu functions rather than using the toolbar buttns you may want to investigate why this is or consider labeling the buttons.
Big software companies including Microsoft typically conduct in-person usability tests. But these types of tests can only go so far. That's probably why they are turning to these larger usability tests so they can get more general data about the greater population rather than a small set of people they can get into their labs.
For the uninformed in-person usability tests work as follows: You have a piece of software that you want to evaluate the usability of. To test how usable it is, you come up with a list of tasks for the user to do, like say open their email software and write a hello email to their buddy, or say deleting files named "a", "b", and "c". After you have the tasks you want your user to perform, you people unrelated to the project with varying degrees of knowledge about computers and your software to perform each task. As they attemp the task, your objective is to observer--that is you don't tell them anything even if they are obviously having issues getting the task completed or even if they ask you a question about how to do it. You simply tell them what they're supposed to do and watch, and if they look at you and give up, you say "that's fine" and just note that they were not able to complete the task.
The results of usability testing are pretty amazing for first time usability observers even for some very simple tasks with common software and gadgets. You will also recognize that there are lots of moments where people just sit there and do nothing, times when they keep repeating actions, and times when they keep clicking on something because they think it does something but it doesn't. Some really simple tasks also will show many users all with different ways of accomplishing it. For example if you delete a file how many ways are there to delete it? Well one way is to drag the file to the recycle bin. Another way is to click on it and hit the delete key. Another way is to right-click it and use the context menu delete option. And yet another way is to first open your trash bin and then drag the file to the opened trash bin. All of these ways are valid and I'm willing to bet there will be even a few more ways of deleting files that you'd never have thought of (besides the rm command).
The nice thing about in-person usability testing (as I just described) is that you can ask questions and probe for information about what the person is thinking while they're doing the task. Normally you ask them to think out loud so you can get an idea of what's going on in their mind.
I'll freak MS out by doing nothing with ULTIMATE Office except try to open OpenOffice documents all day long.
Surprise surprise microsoft is being misleading. Also, the FAQ says that in order to opt-out you just send a message to winsurv@microsoft.com but when you do the message bounces with
So you cannot ever get out of the programme after you find out that microsoft was screwed you.
From the privacy statement fineprint, they say what information they are collecting.
"This information includes, but is not limited to:"
Then they give a list of "harmless" things such as driver types, hardware, errors encountered. But where is the "not limited to" list? Can't find it on the site. They really don't want you to know what they are collecting.
And, of course, Office has its own set of things, which you helpfully have to look for yourself:
To display the privacy statement for Office 2003, please search for "Privacy Statement" in Office 2003 online help.
Plus, the Windows Customer Experience Improvement Program has its own set of things it collects.
Very Big Brother. Then again, most of my information is already out there floating around... Might be nice to have a free copy of Vista.....
Buses stop at a bus station
Trains stop at a train station
On my desk there's a workstation....
This will give Microsoft valuable information that will help them develop better software in the future. The quesiton is how many users are prepared to trust them enough to allow this. But as it is comleatly volentary I see no problem in doing so, other than that they may get some biased results as people that value privacy and security most likely will not participate. However, personally, I wourld like to be paid a little more than just with some free software to do this kind of testing for Microsoft.
I would actually like to see open source projects such as Gnome and KDE to do a similar thing (As long as it is volentary). Knowing how the users use their is essential to create good usable systems, and very few usability tests are performed on software in the FOSS world, so something like this would probably be even more beneficial to these kind of projects. I would also think that more people would be prepared to volontear this kind information to e.g. the KDE or Gnome team than they would to big evil Microsoft. After all very few Gnome or KDE users would worry about that a big evil company might discover unlicenced software on their systems.
God is REAL! Unless explicitly declared INTEGER
From an email just received (2:05AM 12/12/07):
What happened to the free product option?
Thank you for your interest in the feedback program. Due to overwhelming response, the supply of gifts has been exhausted so we have closed our free product offer on 12/11/2007 at 2pm Pacific Time. Thanks to everyone that participated!
"We'll need 2000 crickets, 4 cans of Easy Cheese, and the fluid from 18 glowsticks for this plan to work...." - ph0n1c
As someone who cares not one bit about my "privacy", I'd love to see more of these types of deals. The only thing that makes me wary when dealing with "privacy" is I prefer not to be spammed for the rest of my life. I could, however, give a flyin' f*&k if anyone is monitoring what I do on my computer. If you are monitoring me, be prepared to be bored to tears.