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Microsoft Invents $1.15/Hour Homework Fee For Kids
theodp writes "Microsoft's vision of your computing future is on display in its just-published patent application for the Metered Pay-As-You-Go Computing Experience. The plan, as Microsoft explains it, involves charging students $1.15 an hour to do their homework, making an Office bundle available for $1/hour, and billing gamers $1.25 for each hour of fun. In addition to your PC, Microsoft also discloses plans to bring the chargeback scheme to your cellphone and automobile — GPS, satellite radio, backseat video entertainment system. 'Both users and suppliers benefit from this new business model,' concludes Microsoft, while conceding that 'the supplier can develop a revenue stream business that may actually have higher value than the one-time purchase model currently practiced.' But don't worry kids, that's only if you do more than 52 hours of homework a year!"
'Both users and suppliers benefit from this new business model'
Only Microsoft could try to call a business model 'new', when hotels and hookers have used it for centuries.
At least its obvious what they are now
What's to prevent me from hacking the software/hardware to liberate it? Of course that is if I even buy one in the first place.
My kid has been told many times just to copy and paste from Wikipedia, I mean told by his teachers. Its most distressing.
I have brought the issue up at his school in meetings, but it seems that the tickbox teaching that the UK now relies upon is more interested in achieving teaching goals then actually educating the pupils.
Given that his IT class seems to really be 'how to use Microsoft products', I wouldn't be surprised if this service became part of the UK education provision system. Angry and disgusted yes, surprised no.
Lastly, dude, having a sig that would nuke a Linux system if applied isn't exactly friendly. On the other hand, I guess it would conform to the natural selection approach to weeding out morons, so perhaps its ok...
A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' - D. Adams
my kids get free "hand me down" PCs & printer with Linux & OpenOffice pre-installed to do homework on, (no subscription necessary)
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
> It was either buy food or rent MS Word for three hours, and I didn't want to starve.
With that line the teacher can offer you food, which leaves you with no excuse next time. What you want to say is, "We were all out of computer time, and we couldn't buy more until mom gets paid Friday." This one can be used every week (well, until the teacher hands you a Knoppix CD).
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
This whole summary is a troll. Technology businesses file many patents every year that they'll never implement. Patents are like munitions. You stockpile them in case you need to go to war, and to prevent others from attacking you. Balmer's saber rattling about Linux infringing on multiple Microsoft patents is the perfect example of this. (Though it's an example of the more sinister uses of patents).
AccountKiller
Just because someone is in college doesn't mean that they are in the know, and realize that choice even exists. The other thing is that Microsoft cleverly charges considerably less for "student" versions of their software, getting kids hooked early. A buddy of mine picked up a student copy of Office 2007 for $60, where as I think as a company we pay close to $400 per seat for a VLK.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
Of course consumers will benefit! Microsoft has just announced the first truly-effective open-source promotion policy in the history of the american computing industry. We should be saluting this, but instead, the microsoft bashers on slashdot are reflexively criticizing them.
"Seriously": Consumers will benefit because they will pay proportional to their actual use, which more efficiently distributes the costs. Thus, those who can afford to pay more will do so, and those who can't won't, which is always good if you are a bizarro-world inverse-marxist ideologue, a.k.a. "free market theorist."
Oh, also, higher profits for microsoft will drive them to innovate.
This is the same reason that coupons are good for the economy - those with enough money don't bother and just pay the higher prices. The time and energy people spend clipping coupons has zero cost - likewise, artificially restricting computer use by introducing significant marginal costs is a zero loss to the economy if you are a corporate tool.
The fact that there are economists who actually believe crap like the above tells you that economics really is the dismal science.
The good and new comes from no quarter where it is looked for, and is always something different from what is expected.
I really want them to implement this business model, because it would be a great push for greater GNU/Linux adoption.
So 20 people leave their PCs on with the screen saver before they go on a two-week vacation, don't notice they still have documents open somewhere, and they get back a bill of $1.25 X 16 days (2 weeks plus the extra weekend) X 24 hours X 20 people, or $9,600.00.
That will happen exactly ONCE before they all switch to anything else ... at that point, even vim or pico look better.
Kevin Smith on Prince
Excellent point. Unless MS isn't charging for the time in-between keystrokes. In which case their pricing scheme might be worth it. =)
Which reminds me of something. I've closed Word on my work machine before when I've had a document open on a USB stick. Then try to USB eject the stick and it won't go. Go into task manager and see that some word-ish program still has an open handle on it.
Run task manager, kill the exe, and I can eject the USB drive. No real problem but it raises a question: What if this stray process was billing me?
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
The CEO all made the decisions that were in the best interest of their company
If that was actually true, we wouldnt be here. The word you are looking for in that sentence isnt 'company' the word you are looking for is 'bond-holders'.
The free market does not exist, its a concept invented and held onto by irresponsible people who need something to point at when they fail. Because, its not THEIR fault afterall...
Since they can't see what every other CEO is doing behind closed doors, they can't factor that in.
That line of thought can certainly be called many things, but logical is not one of them. Do you really think being a CEO involves simply wearing a suit and having a good smile? There are actually numbers that get put in those 'behind closed doors' formulas. When it comes to the bottom line, EVERYTHING is a known. To think that this all just came up out of the blue and took all these people by surprise is the height of ignorance. What those idealistic CEOs actually saw when looking at the numbers was EXACTLY what was going on behind closed doors, and they thought 'hey if that place can do that and get away with it, so can we.' and so on... and so on... and so on... well you get the idea. Greed isnt a difficult concept to grasp, and I think you know that. Unfortunately, we are now 'enabling' those who got caught up in greed. As if to say 'dont worry, we know you just made some bad choices and none of this was really your fault'. If the free market existed, the idea would be to eliminate those whos choices caused a problem in which the company would fail. But thats not what we are doing, and it really is the height of irony that we are proclaiming to be supporting the free market, by taking away one of its supposed fundamental pillars. That of the best wins, is no longer true. It is now, that of the biggest wins.
Now, these CEO's who took the risks and failed, have the feeling that there is no longer any risk. They didnt feel the needed reprecussions of a bad decision, which means they didnt LEARN what the failure was. If that is to be our countries reaction to this type of situation... then we can just consider the past 18 months 'practice'. You take a little while to think about that, and I mean REALLY think about it, and come back and tell me where you think it ends.
Try Open Office for Mac which is very fast. Recently released with real Mac integration and NeoOffice will soon be dust in the wind.