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Ballmer Ordered To Testify In 'Vista Capable' Case
alphadogg writes "A federal judge in Seattle has ordered Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to testify in a class action lawsuit against Microsoft that alleges the company misled consumers in a marketing campaign for its Windows Vista operating system in which computers sold with an older Microsoft OS were labeled 'Vista Capable' when in fact they could only run a basic version of Vista. Ballmer has unique personal knowledge of facts surrounding the case, therefore he must face questioning, Judge Marsha Pechman of the US District Court for the Western District of Washington at Seattle ruled, according to court documents released late Friday."
Although I agree with the justice of going after them for misleading statements, I reckon all-in-all these people are better off, having got a PC with XP rather than being forced to wrestle the leviathan.
[FUCK BETA]
Well, it DOES run Vista basic. So yeah, it's a little cheeky. But it's not exactly lying. And not TOTALLY misleading either. Although they probably ideally should have been more upfront.
Initially, the "Vista Capable" logo meant that you'd be ready to use Aero, and able to run Home Premium or better using all its features. Then, due to pressures from OEMs and Intel among others, the requirements for "Vista Capable" changed to "can have some version of Vista installed", which pretty much meant that many of those machines can barely have Vista Home Basic installed, let alone give you a usable system, and they certainly cannot use Aero.
The gist of the argument is that Microsoft changed the requirements and definition of what "Vista Capable" meant along the way, misleading customers about what it really meant.
For Microsoft, from my point of view (I've followed the computing industry for 25 years or so now), it's business as usual and nothing that surprises me. I'm used to taking any recommendations they make and double it, and used to seeing them lie, cheat, deceive, coerce, defraud and generally do anything they can get away with in order to increase their profits and enhance their control of the computing industry.
Caveat emptor I say, but a lot of people aren't interested in doing research and make informed decisions, they'd rather believe the companies selling them this stuff, or the sales drones at the local big surface shop.
If he explores all forms and substances Straight homeward to their symbol-essences; He shall not die.
Yes, but this is the first time I recall that OEMs sold machines that were seriously underpowered. The difference between XP Home and XP Pro requirements were small. In previous versions, if you upgraded an old machine, you had to double the MS requirements but most new machines met the requirements. In this case, you had a whole lot of new machines that could only run Vista Basic. Add this to whole mess of other problems Vista had at launch and it adds to the negative image of MS.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
I am really amazed at the inept of the legal department of Microsoft. People in this country sue for petty things and it is a known way to circumvent the deceptive marketing tactics with disclaimers in tiny fonts that no one could read. Why didn't Microsoft legal department came up a disclaimer that said Aero interface requires Supercomputer to run. I guess this case would have folded long time back.
That's my point- it doesn't offer benefits at all. It does offer a difference, however.
I'm arguing that the claim aero made Vista is false. Vista is different than XP in tons of other ways as well. Not better, just different. Mostly worse.
But to claim without aero, it's not vista, is just plainly false. If, without aero, the software ran better, faster, less hangups, and more compatible, I'd say that then, without Aero, it's not actually vista. Now you have an argument.
But the things that make Vista special are true in all versions:
-It's slow
It's incompatible with EVERYTHING
-It's a resource hog.
I fail to see how Aero makes any difference.
The claim is that MS changed their internal standards from AERO capable to just plain basic capable. As far as I'm concerned, Being vista capable means just that. Vista also supports tons of features that I can't take advantage of without particular hardware. I can't use the floppy disk capabilities without a floppy drive. I can't take advantage. I can't take advantage of the extras and bitlocker without upgrading to the Ultimate Edition.
So the fact that Aero was people's favorite feature does not in fact prove that it was in fact what made vista "vista." And therefore anything labeled Vista capable doesn't neccessarily need to run a particular feature to still be vista. People just liked the eye candy and didn't research before purchasing.
Only on an MS bashing site are people claiming something illegal may have happened. Unethical? Probably. Not done with customers in mind, of course. Enough to make you switch to linux or max, absolutely. I certainly don't trust them after this.
But to say their marketing tricked everyone, as opposed to the fact- people wanted to believe the cheapest gave them all the features, and decided not to inform themselves before buying? That's just stupid.
Belief? Hope? Preference?The Existential Vortex
It would be far simpler to handcuff Ballmer instead.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Another point to ponder is what Microsoft was leading people to see as "Vista" at that time. Pretty much all the advertisements and hype of Vista featured Aero (obviously it would sell better that way). Thus, the image that MS created was a Vista with Aero, which is not what people ended up getting or being able to run in the end.
Aero was /advertised as such/, which is part of the point here. The issue isn't the actual functionality of stuff in Vista Business or Ultimate; the issue is the misleading expectations Microsoft allowed.
Microsoft went, "Look! Here is our new shiny OS, Vista! Vista can play movies! Vista has shiny UI! Vista can sing and dance and make you coffee! And look, because this will be coming out soon, we've even labeled computers for you so you'll know which ones are ready for the Vista Experience!"
Consumers went, "Yay! Thank you, Microsoft! This makes my life easier! I, a non-technical consumer who do not wish to have to worry about hardware specifications but do wish to enjoy the benefits of this OS you are telling me about, have gone and bought one of your conveniently labeled computers!"
Then Vista comes out and the consumers try to run Vista Ultimate or Vista Business or whatever, and discover their computer can't. And Microsoft goes, "Oh... yeah, /that/ computer? That one is kind of a piece of junk. That has a crappy Intel chip which can only run this lower-end version. This version doesn't have shiny UI, only plays movies that are 3 years old, and the singing and dancing part only includes musical numbers from Bollywood films. And while this version of Vista can still make you coffee, the coffee can only be decaf with artificial creamer. Didn't you read all the fine print specifications on the Vista box?"
And the consumers go, "WTF BBQ I paid $2600 for this laptop! You said this would run Vista! There's a label right on the computer! I bought this because I didn't want to have to worry about figuring out what hardware my computer had and whether that was enough for various Vista stuff! I bought this computer /specifically/ since the computer says it can run Vista!"
Microsoft goes, "Well, that computer /does/ run Vista! Just not the same version of Vista we were telling you about earlier, that's all. Not our fault you got confused about that."
And the consumers go, "LAWSUIT!"
--Rachel
Microsoft should simply offer a free upgrade to Windows XP for everyone who bought a computer with Vista installed that couldn't handle it.
If Microsoft advertisements implied that anything called "Vista" would come with the Aero interface, then that's essentially a defining attribute of Vista. From that perspective, if something lacks the Aero interface, it's not what MS ads referred to as Vista.
Ballmer: Perhaps you would be interested in this "Vista Capable" computer?