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Black Screens For Unauthorized Copies of Windows
arcticstoat writes "In a bid to deter people from using pirate versions of Windows XP, Microsoft is now updating its Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) tool to introduce a few uncomfortable niggles for users of pirated versions of Windows. These include replacing the desktop wallpaper with a black screen every 60 minutes, although you can still replace it with your wallpaper of choice in the intervening period. As well as this, copies of Windows deemed to not be genuine will also have a translucent watermark above the system tray, which Microsoft calls a 'persistent desktop notification.'"
Too close for comfort.
Some one I know just doesn't download the the WGA notification (tells it never to download when it shows up in system updates) I... I mean he wants to know if that will still work?
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
At least there's not some odd hidden process that the users have no visibility to running in the background using resources.
Oh wait...
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
I'm impressed with Microsoft's forbearance.
"Some sites have also suggested that this is a sneaky scheme to get more people to buy Windows Vista after disappointing sales of the new OS"
It's going to be very funny if this does more for Linux than Vista.
If you could reason with religious people, there would be no religious people
Black Screen of Death
Can someone remind me why Microsoft wants to chase people off to other platforms again?
Most people I know who run 'stolen' software don't have the funds, are not otherwise law-breakers, and are not aware of alternatives. I've had great luck giving these people an OpenCD and explaining the law, and, in the case of small businesses, the BSA's tactics.
I wonder how long it will be before somebody comes along with a registry edit file that will replace the permanent watermark text with a link to Ubuntu?
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Just another reason to pirate it since I've triggered the damn tool multiple times on Legitimately licensed product.
Oh crap, get ready for another wave of "omg where is the start button" questions on the Ubuntu message boards.
/whisper/ Thanks for the candy!
Cough, Cough.
*Continues innocent whistling*
The first thing I do after installing XP is turn the wallpaper to black.
Apparently, pirating it saves me a step after install.
WTG, MSFT!
Windows is shareware now?
AEIOU: open-source anonymous internet currency
It will still flag perfectly legal copies of Windows as being pirated. Just like it has in the past.
This is my opinion. To make sure you don't steal it, it's covered by the DMCA.
I know several people who've bought new machines in the last 6 months
and been forced to have Vista pre-installed
they didn't want it
so pirated XP
are they trying to push people away?
cause it won't take much to annoy your userbase onto trying alternative OS's
And I'll tell you what,
once your average "mere mortal" Windows user, for whatever reason, tries Linux, and likes it
his testimonial goes a long way with other mere mortals in the same boat
now microsoft has officially left it's users black and blue
Thank you Dave Raggett
Question: People who annoy you?
They need to get more creative. Here's a few ideas:
1) Cause the NIC to drop random ammounts of packets at random times.
2) Change the wallpaper from Black Screen to one with a letter ending with "... The police are on their way".
3) Every 2 minutes all keys on your keyboard get randomly swapped around.
4) Swaps the mouse buttons. Or moving the mouse left, moves it right, up, down, etc.
5) All print jobs only result in large words in upper case saying "PIRATE ALERT!"
6) Boot sequence and shutdown sequence get 5 minutes added on to them. Hey MS, don't forget to make sure you cause the hard drive light LED to flicker a lot while the users wait around so they think it's something going on. While you're at it, randomly flicker that HD LED every few minutes for 20 seconds at a time.
7) Every 10th web page visited would be redirected to goatse (is that site still around?)
You get the idea... now hurry up so that people get fed up faster and switch to Linux.
No trees were killed in the making of this post; however, many trillions of electrons were horribly inconvenienced.
i paid for windows vista ultimate edition *waits for laughter to die down* but after a few months, i discovered that the machine i installed it on had some dodgy RAM and i had to replace it. i don't know if it was because i changed the RAM or because the bad RAM corrupted something, but after that Microsoft decided that my copy of Windows was pirated, and put a permanent message in the lower-right corner of my machine telling me as much, and refused to let me use certain features, such as the Aero graphics enhancements.
personally, i suggest microsoft take a page from our founding fathers, and adopt a more "innocent until proven guilty" attitude (for example, offering a way to call them up and verify your CD Key) before implementing more draconian punishments upon the convicted!
i could live a little longer in this prison
My theory: This isn't actually an effort to get more people buying windows directly, but to maintain market dominance. M$ are squeezing the illegal XP 'market', trying to get them to use illegal Vista instead.
This is merely the first step, they'll eventually add checks for the most common cracks, followed by kill switches. This comes after service pack 1 removed the kill switch from Vista, making it less risky to pirate.
Whilst this might see a few people jumping ship to Linux or something, I'm guessing M$ decided the risks of losing a few freeloaers outweighed the importance of removing the XP-shaped-thorn from their side.
Get everyone doin' the downgrade, that way people will be used to it for when windows 7 comes out. M$ have learnt their lesson, and won't be creating any more good operating systems any time soon. It's less profitable!
mysql> SELECT * FROM `places` WHERE `place` LIKE 'home`; Empty set (0.00 sec)
Yeah, that'll turn the h4xx04z away. Want to really make it worthwhile? Force a pink-on-pink color scheme, license the theme song to "My Little Pony", and play that in an uninterruptable background loop on all available sound devices. That'll do a lot more to keep a kid honest than would making his desktop look 1337.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
The more you tighten your grip, the more systems will slip through your fingers.
It was a tossup between that quote and "Governor Tarkin, I should have expected to find you holding Vader's leash. I recognized your foul stench when I was brought on board."
More of the same. Just let go.
That's a good thing. Treat the noobs respectfully. Ultimately it's lack of respect from MS that's driving them away. If they get that same attitude from Ubuntu they'll just label you as asses and go back to MS.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
And the answer is none. None more black.
It's a tough job handling the ubuntu IRC channel. The other day some guy was asking how to maximize firefox. We told him to click the box in the upper right corner, and he didn't understand. So someone asked what version he was running, and he gave the output of firefox -v (or whatever command it is for version). It was baffling that he could use the command line but not maximize the window. I think (hope) he was joking. Or maybe it was Richard Stallman.
You can always run your own WSUS server.
This lets you control exactly what does and does not get installed, and WGA isn't even available through WSUS (although Office Genuine Advantage is). If you have more than two computers running Windows 2000 or later, WSUS is a big help for saving bandwidth and assuring you get patched up-to-date quickly.
Unfortunately, it requires Windows 2003 Server to run, but it is completely free (as in beer).
Were you a victim of Linux Genuine Advantage scheme to make millions? Linux Genuine Advantage Crack will restore free as in speech rights to what should have been in the first place. Down with the man!
It doesn't actually run in the background. It does the authenticity check at startup, and it vets your computer when you try to install an update which requires authentication, and that's it. And there are actual, honest-to-goddess important updates that won't install without such authentication.
*shrugs* but I guess I'm not what you'd consider a "smart" user, in that I choose to let it do its rigamorole on the 4 computers I have running Windows... my laptop, which dual boots with XP MCE, my HTPC which is running Vista Ultimate (both came from MSDN), and my parents' laptops, running XP Home and Vista Home Premium respectively.
Incidentally... none of those systems have ever had issues, performance or otherwise, with WGA. I'm not saying that it doesn't screw over legitimate users. But I am saying that I've never seen an issue with it, and that the ability to install security and stability updates that you couldn't otherwise install outweighs the marginal increase in boot time, which is about the only thing you actually notice when you install/activate WGA.
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
Um....I hate to break the news to you,but if you would have read the news section at Windiz after nobody came forward when they requested help coding the site they quit updating it. So the newest patch there is from 2006. Doesn't really help when the latest bug strikes. There used to be a site with a batch file which downloaded Windows Updates,but I'm afraid I no longer have the link. But going to Windiz is pretty much a waste of time and I don't know why the site is still up.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
FCKGW...?
Think about it. Microsoft could have did stuff like this. Thankfully, they didn't.
Change the homepage to Microsoft's website, perhaps a page about Windows XP and piracy.
Have Clippit pop up in the corner of Windows XP, saying, "It looks like you're using a pirated copy of Windows. Would you like to purchase one now?"
Slow one's Internet connection to 56kbps speed, except when doing Windows Updates.
Disable any and all video capabilities.
Limit the display to 800 x 600 at 8-bit colour.
Disable accessing certain file types, such as video files, music files, etc. (Jokingly, because if you pirate Windows, you might be pirating other things as well.)
"Every time you operate one of these weird black controls, labelled in black on a black background, a little black light lights up black to let you know you've done it"
"The dew has clearly fallen with a particularly sickening thud this morning"