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Microsoft Calls Today Global Anti-Piracy Day

Posted by timothy on from the pirates-live-for-live-cd-distros dept.

arcticstoat points out an article at Custom PC, according to which: "Microsoft has announced that today is Global Anti-Piracy Day. Launching several global initiatives, the aim is to raise awareness of the damage to software innovation that Microsoft says is caused by piracy. ... As well as educating people about piracy, Microsoft has also initiated a huge list of legal proceedings that it's taking out against pirates. Microsoft isn't messing about when it says 'global' either. The list of 49 countries that Microsoft is targeting spans six continents, and ranges from the UK and the US all the way through to Chile, Egypt, Kuwait, Indonesia and China." Interestingly enough, unauthorized copies of Vista might not be harming the company all that much: reader twitter was among several to contribute links to a related story at Computer World which highlights Microsoft attorney Bonnie MacNaughton's acknowledgement that pirates prefer Windows XP over Vista and Office 2003 over 2007.

37 of 500 comments (clear)

  1. Minor correction... by ivan256 · · Score: 4, Funny

    [almost everybody prefers] Windows XP over Vista and Office 2003 over 2007

    Fixed that for you...

    1. Re:Minor correction... by xoundmind · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The jokes/reality just write themselves when it comes to M$:
      Their newest product line is so sucky that no one wants to pirate it.
      Now that's an innovative strategy!

    2. Re:Minor correction... by SatanicPuppy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      2007 isn't that bad. The effing "x" formats are a P.I.T.A but as per usual, the next Office version is a decent incremental upgrade, which will, in due course, be adopted by the business community at large.

      If they followed the same sort of incremental, professional design philosophy with Windows, they wouldn't spend so much time having their user base frothing in hatred and rage.

      --
      ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
    3. Re:Minor correction... by g253 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      That's true. It feels strange to say this sort of things about Microsoft, especially on Slashdot, but Office 2007 is pretty decent software, and the ribbon is -dare I say it?- a clever and even innovative UI approach. (bye bye karma...)

    4. Re:Minor correction... by JCSoRocks · · Score: 4, Informative

      The ribbon appears to be the "next big thing" in Windows UI design. The Windows 7 screens I've seen have even included redesigned Paint and Notepad with the ribbon. This is a pretty big step considering the last time Notepad and Paint were updated was... ummm... yeah, I can't even remember. I'm not saying Paint / Notepad are going to magically make Windows good again, just that they're really pushing the ribbon.

      --
      You are using English. Please learn the difference between loose and lose; they're, there, and their; your and you're.
    5. Re:Minor correction... by TheLinuxSRC · · Score: 5, Funny

      (Unless you are utterly stupid) Office 2007 is much easyer and you can learn it in less than 5 minutes (I teached it myself).

      Oh, the irony.

    6. Re:Minor correction... by CastrTroy · · Score: 5, Informative

      My major problems with office 2007 are found within outlook 2007. Firstly they took the IE HTML engine out, and replaced it with the Word HTML rendering engine, which means the HTML support is now extremely crippled. Also, when you want to print an email, the only way to bring up the print dialog is with CTRL+P. Which is fine, once you figure it out, but completely annoying before you do. The only other way to print, is to find the ultra-tiny drop down arrow where the print button is hidden, but that only prints immediately to the default printer, and doesn't let you configure any other options.

      --

      Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
    7. Re:Minor correction... by Trevin · · Score: 5, Interesting

      and the ribbon is -dare I say it?- a clever and even innovative UI approachand the ribbon is -dare I say it?- a clever and even innovative UI approach.

      Would this be a good place to mention that it took me at least ten minutes to figure out what they did with the File menu so that I could convert an OOXML document someone sent me into a different file format?

    8. Re:Minor correction... by Txiasaeia · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It took me a few minutes to get used to a mouse back in the 80s, too; now that I know how to use one, it's intuitive.

      --
      Condemnant quod non intellegunt.
    9. Re:Minor correction... by Cinnaman · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The problem with the ribbon is that it assumes that menus and toolbars are not a quick and easy way of finding what you want.

    10. Re:Minor correction... by plague3106 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Well, hopefully they are going to replace Paint with Paint.Net. That alone would be a huge step in the right direction.

    11. Re:Minor correction... by JasterBobaMereel · · Score: 4, Interesting

      As in I work in IT and it took me 10 minutes to find the Save As option the first time I used the beribboned Office ...

      I use OpenOffice because I can find things on the Menus ....

      --
      Puteulanus fenestra mortis
    12. Re:Minor correction... by Blakey+Rat · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The story behind the ribbon:

      After each version of Office ships, Microsoft asks a selection of users which features they would like to see in the next version of Office. When they did this after Office 2000, a large percentage of the features users suggested were already-implemented. When they did this for Office 2003, even more already-implemented features were suggested. The conclusion was that Office isn't lacking features, but the UI is so arcane that nobody could find which features it had, or how to use them.

      That's the problem the Ribbon is intended to solve. In actuality, it removed a few features from Office (dealing with custom macro toolbars, IIRC.) I think that it's definitely a move in the right direction. It might not be right for every application, but for programs like Word and Excel that:
      1) Are used by myriads of untrained people
      2) Have craploads of features
      I think it's the right move. For something like Photoshop, point 1 doesn't apply, and for something like Notepad point 2 doesn't apply, so it's not right for every application.

      --
      Comment of the year
  2. If it weren't for piracy by BPPG · · Score: 4, Funny

    If it weren't for piracy, there'd be a sizable amount of people that would never even try Vista.

    --
    What's the value of information that you don't know?
    1. Re:If it weren't for piracy by Goldberg's+Pants · · Score: 5, Funny

      I find it funny that Microsoft feel they have to educate people about piracy. I'm already well aware of the many benefits thank you, Microsoft.

    2. Re:If it weren't for piracy by Ngarrang · · Score: 5, Funny

      I find it funny that Microsoft feel they have to educate people about piracy. I'm already well aware of the many benefits thank you, Microsoft.

      Maybe this Microsoft's way of fighting global warming? By educating more pirates, we insure a healthy planet for our children's children.

      --
      Bearded Dragon
    3. Re:If it weren't for piracy by betterunixthanunix · · Score: 5, Informative

      I'm not sure who modded you funny, or why, because you make a very good point. Actually, in the absence of piracy, Windows would have a substantially smaller market share, especially in emerging economies. Microsoft has actually admitted this in the past, and made a pathetic attempt at releasing a shareware version of Windows that could run 3 processes at a time in order to compete with the pirates. Microsoft has to tread very carefully when they try to combat piracy, because the fewer pirated copies of Windows and Office people use, the more copies of Linux/BSD and OpenOffice.org/Google Docs people will use. On the other hand, if Microsoft does not make sufficient efforts to protect its trademarks (and to some degree, copyrights), it could lose them, and that would spell trouble for them too.

      --
      Palm trees and 8
  3. RRRRrraaaaa by sxltrex · · Score: 4, Funny

    Does that make it "Talk Like an Anti-Pirate Day?"

    1. Re:RRRRrraaaaa by basscomm · · Score: 5, Funny

      If you knew who he was, he wouldn't be much of a ninja.

      --
      http://crummysocks.com
  4. For once I agree with MS by mcgrew · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Pirates seize Indian vessel with 13 crew members off Somalia

    An Indian cargo ship with 13 sailors on board heading towards Africa was hijacked by armed pirates off the northern coast of Somalia, even as suspense persisted over the fate of Indian crew members of the Hong Kong vessel MV Stolt Valor.

    Somali pirates boarded the ship which was heading to Somalia and hijacked it south of Socotra island over the weekend, an official of the International Maritime Bureau said in Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday.

    The whereabouts of the ship and the fate of the crew members was not known as the maritime bureau received the distress report from a third party on Monday.

    "We are still verifying the time and date of attack," the official said.

    The hijack pushed the number of attacks by pirates this year in Somali coast to 74. A total of 30 ships have been hijacked and 10 remain in the hands of the pirates along with nearly 200 crew members.

    A concerned Indian Government has dispatched a powerful stealth warship to the area as momentum has been growing for coordinated international response to the spate of hijacking being unleashed by Somali pirates using speed boats.

    So I agree, piracy is a terrible problem. Our hearts go out to the families of the missing sailors.

    However, I would think that Microsoft would be more concerned with copyright infringement that piracy. Are they planning an anti-copyright infringement day? September 19th might be appropriate.

    --
    Free Martian Whores!
  5. and... by Dzimas · · Score: 5, Funny

    I'm declaring today "Anti Microsoft Day." There. We're even.

    1. Re:and... by houghi · · Score: 5, Funny

      Anti-anti-piracy-day-day

      That'll teach-em

      --
      Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
  6. Well, I'm glad to see Microsoft... by AKAImBatman · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ...invest heavily in warships to help protect our shipping lanes. Nothing could be a better use of their money than helping stop the violence inherent in piracy on the high-seas. Already, many American warships are in stand-off confrontations with merchies taken over by pirates. I--

    Sorry, what? This is about software? How Microsoft is concerned about companies who are missing one or two licenses out of 5,000 or 12 year old kids bragging that they got XP off of I13|<p1R4Cy.com? Pfff. In that case, screw 'em.

    --
    Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
  7. Working so far (for me). by Piranhaa · · Score: 4, Funny

    I pledge I will not pirate anything... today

    1. Re:Working so far (for me). by Lobster+Quadrille · · Score: 5, Funny

      I pledge to pirate 3 times as much, to make up for you slackers.

      --
      "The cup is in turn designed for holding hot or cold liquids, and has an open rim and closed base." --US Patent #5425497
  8. sweet by nomadic · · Score: 5, Funny

    Know my favorite part of Anti-Piracy Days? The parades. I mean, the parties are nice, and seeing the kids put out the Anti-Piracy decorations, but the parades are what are really great.

    1. Re:sweet by deniable · · Score: 4, Funny

      Hey, I hear the '30s are coming back into fashion. There's a buzz on Wall Street.

  9. Fighting software piracy? Excellent idea! by 2muchcoffeeman · · Score: 5, Funny

    Prevent Windows piracy: Use Linux instead!

    --
    Prevent Windows piracy. Use Linux instead.
  10. Jumping on the Bandwagon by PinkyDead · · Score: 4, Funny

    After the success of last month's "Talk Like A Pirate Day", this is just Microsoft just trying to cash in on the whole pirate thing.

    Parents can't be expected to shell out for every single pirate related holiday. Enough is enough.

    Anyway, don't Microsoft already have April 1st.

    --
    Genesis 1:32 And God typed :wq!
  11. I pledge... by neowolf · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...that I will not pirate Vista. Ever.

  12. FTFAFY by Hognoxious · · Score: 4, Funny
    TFA

    reader twitter was among several to contribute links to a related story

    Should read:

    several readers, all of whom were twitter, contributed links to a related story.

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  13. Re:Can they do that? by cosmocain · · Score: 5, Funny

    Why not? You can do that, too. Just stroll around and tell everybody you meet that today's...

    - "Think of the children"-day,
    - "Bad car analogy"-day,
    - "Robotic overlord"-day,
    - "Natalie Portman"-day,
    - "In Soviet russia"-day,
    - "Insensitive clod"-day,
    - "Goatse"-day,
    etc...

    The fact that nobody'll listen to you will just make you feel like MS today. But if they don't care - why should you?

  14. Damage to software innovation caused by Microsoft. by TractorBarry · · Score: 5, Insightful

    > raise awareness of the damage to software innovation that Microsoft says is caused by piracy.

    Which fades into insignificance when compared to the damage to software innovation caused by Microsoft !

    --
    Sky subscribers are morons. They pay to be advertised at !
  15. Bill Gate's Pirate Name by capnkr · · Score: 5, Funny

    Putting "Bill Gates" in the name field here returns "Smugglin' Hubert Cutler" as the result, appropriately enough... :) Even better, though, "Steve Ballmer" becomes "Sea Monkey Baird"!
     
    Sea Monkey! lol
     
    Hey! Is that a flying chai.. OOF...
     
    ;)

    --
    "...there are some things that can beat smartness and foresight. Awkwardness and stupidity can." ~ Mark Twain
  16. Even pirates don't want Vista by elfguy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You know you have problems when even pirates don't want your software!

    1. Re:Even pirates don't want Vista by ivan256 · · Score: 5, Funny

      You've got that wrong.

      Clearly what's happening is that they made the DRM so good that it's reducing piracy. Right?

  17. Only one day? by Mr_Icon · · Score: 4, Funny

    In contrast, the rest of the world celebrates the remaining 364 piracy days.

    --
    If you open yourself to the foo, You and foo become one.