Slashdot Mirror
Is Microsoft Improving Its Image?
nk497 writes "Writer makes the case that Windows 7 is a turning point for Microsoft, and we all might start liking them soon ...
'While it's not winning everyone over, there are real signs that Microsoft has taken criticisms on board where it matters most: in the software and services that it provides. The idea of a faster, slimmer Windows is one that most Vista owners would automatically put on their wishlist, and it seems that Microsoft has genuinely done something about it. It's not just reignited interest in the Windows product line, but it's got users appreciating a fresh approach from Microsoft as well.'"
Windows XP = lean
Windows Vista = fat
Windows 7 = leaner than Vista = Windows XP
Or so people keep saying (about XP and Vista).
Back to square one?
It seems that Windows 7 is still a lot like Vista to me.
"and we all might start liking them soon..."
Hi. You must be new here...
Though, since I am using Windows 7 beta, it might take a little while...
The authors here are just having a laugh, aren't they?
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Has reviews of Windows 7 said anything other than: 'this is a prettier hog than vista, but still a hog.'? If so, I would agree, the image is improving, at least.
...of them trying to take control of their image, as opposed to letting it be defined by journalists/other people with opinions/competing companies.
The Jerry ads destroyed MSFT's already fucked up image, by making it more fucked up.
In order to get their image repaired they have to embrace Linux, and Open Source and then they can claim to be pioneers again, like when they pioneered a UI based OS by copying Apple.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
But isn't Windows 7 just a service pack for Vista? From what's been touted about it doesn't look and leaner or meaner they've just put some speed improvements into the UI to make it look faster.
The majority of the stuff under the hood is still vista so people will probably have the same problems.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Microsoft's goal is to be like cable TV.
You pay about $50 a month to use their O/S. And then you pay an extra $10 a month for Word, or get the Premium package with Word, Excel, and Access for $20.
Is this where you want to be in 5 years?
I prefer to own, not rent my own PC.
I prefer to own, not rent my applications.
I want my applications to be mine and my data to be mine so that I do not lose access to them arbitrarily.
Microsoft is a big scammy company that provides extremely easy to use products that work reasonably well.
I don't like them as a company but I can deal with that.
I do like their ease of use and will miss it but the free competition is now only a couple years behind microsoft (and gaining).
But I won't be lead to market to slaughter and end up renting their OS and applications at the rates they desire.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
we should do like the sicilians (people from Sicily) and never forget all the bad things that Microsoft has done
:0(
or
we should do like the Cylons and come back at them with a twist
or
we should do like Obama and simply ignore them and go to the next big thing: Open Source
That, my friend, is the question
Can I put a spell on those who can't spell?
Your wheels are loose and they're losing their grip, good you're there.
The author might have a point.
But it will take a hell of a lot to make me forget the last two decades of monopolistic and agressive business tactics.
And it will take an awful lot more to make me use their SW when there are free alternatives that suit my needs.
This is only being done to save their tanking reputation and sales, do not imagine for a moment MS would be doing this if Vista had performed better.
And lets be plain, they are not allowing people to play with it out of the goodness of their kindly heart - they want people to test it and find the bugs for them on one hand whilst they try and seduce corporate business with the other.
No. Next question?
Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
Perhaps. I've also heard that Cheney being wheeled around in a wheel chair makes him more likable. And somebody said that Lindsy Lohan's new hairdo made her look smarter.
I guess only time will tell if any of these pan out.
--MarkusQ
It has been awhile since I've been excited about upgrading to a new OS. Why should I go to Windows 7? I just haven't seen the feature jump with the latest windows versions that seemed to happen between earlier versions.
Wow an article on Slashdot that doesn't say Microsoft is a total failure at everything it does. For a second I thought Slashdot was the one starting to change, but then I read the replies...
For my part, Microsoft will only improve its image when they remove DRM support from the OS and its bundled applications (IE, Media Player).
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
Microsoft donates to Apache ...and of course, the "Windows 7 might actually be rather good" article in TFA.
Microsoft donates to moonlight
Microsoft supports ODF
IE to be standards compliant by default
Microsoft assist SAMBA team with interop
Maybe; just maybe, Microsoft isn't the evil machine some slashdotters make out.
throw new NoSignatureException();
WOLF! WOLF!
Maybe we should wait until, you know, Windows 7 actually comes out to find if it's the best thing since sliced bread or the worst thing since Gitmo. Vista was supposed to be the awesome super duper OS everyone would love that would make everyone want to give Ballmer hugs for, but it turned out to (from what I read) be a stinking pile of dogshit.
Frankly, given their history at Microsoft, I have no doubt to give them the benefit of. They're going to have to deliver a slim, fast, stable OS and I'll actually have to try it before I believe a word of it.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Microsoft is going to have to prove itself.
Free Martian Whores!
Being a .NET developer I am very aware of many of the inner workings of Microsoft that some outside of their technology don't see.
Over the past few years they are doing things differently. They have started to release free software for developers (Visual Studio Express) and users (Windows Live Writer and other Live services). Then if you have a look at their offerings compared to Google, you see that when Microsoft puts focus on a product it out performs.
Microsoft Maps, is better than Google Maps if you don't need the street view. Their Bird's eye view is awesome.
Microsoft Image search has a much prettier UI than Google, though the overall 'search' weakness compared to Google still hampers it.
Microsoft has started to embrace open source projects, both from internal Microsoft employee's to offering support for non-Microsoft owned projects. They have taken many of their critics in the Microsoft world and put them on payroll in key positions that has led to a much friendlier Microsoft.
Then with all of this you take the growing 'evilness' of Google and it makes Microsoft look not so bad.
People will say whatever they want- on slashdot, that will be MS bashing and MS loving. But think about this honestly, and answer honestly- I think it is helping.
I, for one, prefer windows over linux, and the thought that Windows 7 is better than vista makes me excited to try it. My main machine is still XP, but I've got Vista at work and on my laptop, and I just can't stand it. Anybody who says vista is good is somebody who only tries websurfing- not actually trying to get something done.
Now, if only they got rid of the pesky sys requirements of windows. I don't want to need 4gb of RAM minimum to get things running smoothly. I want things to run with 512 as smoothly as XP does, and allow the extra 3.5 gb of memory to give me extra performance with other programs.
Belief? Hope? Preference?The Existential Vortex
Microsoft is simply delivery more of what they originally promised with Vista, with the crap cut out. It's hardly anything to scream about. Same security (worse with the UAC slider tab, do they never learn?), just a bit leaner. It makes me think they are the same old company - Windows Me vs Win 2k anyone?
Although, compared to several years ago, I do find at more and more websites people fanboying for Microsoft. Which I find perplexing - with Linux I can understand as it's as much a movement than anything - but why shill for a corporation that doesn't give a shit about you?
The whole MS "image" thing is really only a thing with geeks. Most regular people couldn't care less.
But, it's like that with every industry. I've never seen a Slashdot article about Intuit's shitty, shitty business and programming practices, but rest assured that among small business owners, Intuit is the devil. IT geeks don't know or care because it's not their area of expertise.
2009 will be the year of Windows on the desktop?
Windows 7 really is an improvement over vista, I have a few computers running around my office I have been trying the Win 7 beta on, the best news comes from my Acer Aspire one 8.9 laptop. Win 7 not only runs faster then xp on the little devil, but still manages to play certian mmorpgs at 12 fps, that is actually the same speed xp runs it at on the laptop, but Win 7 handles it with other processes so much better. Hopefully they dont screw Win 7 up in the end game.
I love it when the scrappy little come-from-behind underdog is able to pull itself up by the bootstraps and get from a measly 89% market-share all the way back up to 95%. It renews my faith in the hope and outright tenacity of the little guy!
%
No matter how much money you spend, you can't make a racehorse out of a pig. You can, however, make an awfully fast pig.
-- An old saying about program efficiency
%
Though in this case, I think they just slowed down the rate of increasing slowness. See! we only got 20% more slow and bloated this time compared to Vista's 40% increase!
No.
When I see Windows 7 Live CDs like I see Ubuntu and other Linux live CDs then I will really think that Windows 7 is modular. That right there says to me that you can have as little or as much as you want.
~~ Behold the flying cow with a rail gun! ~~
...Microsoft has taken criticisms on board where it matters most: in the software and services that it provides.
Where it matters most? Isn't that their entire business? Software and services. Apart from the XBOX series they really don't do much else than software and services. Is TFA author trying to sound dramatic or did I miss something?
I am the lawn!
There is also a business-related issue. Microsoft is now the underdog compared to Google. Google gave away a free desktop sidebar, and now Microsoft has made that obsolete by bundling in their own with Vista and Windows 7. A decade ago, there would have been howls of monopolization, and using Windows to enter an adjacent market. Today, nothing. Today it is seen as Microsoft defending its desktop turf against Google's Internet challenge.
I'm thinking that this is just an image issue. A few people hated Vista at the start, the media grabbed that, and WHAM, worst MS OS in history (arguably).
Windows 7 has gotten some good press at the outset for whatever reason (the UAC is toned down - BIG help) and if the media grabs that, then MS will have a good OS, at least in terms of sales.
Since Windows 7 is basically Vista, I'm willing to bet that anyone that passed on Vista for technical reasons is going to pass on Windows 7. That's just my hunch...
I'm already I-L-L.
The very first thing you do is to tell everyone that it -is- a fresh approach; usually by telling them how the company is different, the changed actors, and how they have found redemption.
Then you proceed to tell them how it is a -fresh- approach, because they obviously cannot sense the freshness on their own. And, that it is "less annoying".
Then you tell them all this freshness is just a result of washing the moldy, known-to-be-stinky, product by cutting out the dead spots and covering it up with milk and floating marshmallows.
I'm sold.
Sounds great. By the time it's finished I hope it will become even slimmer with some nasty software removed ;-)
Until microsoft makes the end customer who actually uses their products their only focus (and not the RIAA and all these other distractions) and goes back to courting developers like they did when they were successful there will be no significant change. Windows 7 will be more of the same.
Not at all. Wolf in sheep's clothing
If Microsoft wants me to "like them":
1. Ballmer has to go. This guy is just offensive. Between the combat metaphors and the chair tossing, I can't respect any company run by this guy. AND, he's doing a poor job of running Microsoft.
2. The 'kinder/gentler Microsoft' has to become more open. That means opening up APIs and stop trying to manipulate standardization processes.
3. They have to improve their product quality. That will be a huge challenge given their code base, and maybe Windows 7 will be a substantial quality improvement. The record for Microsoft seems to be "every other product is OK" (Win 98 was much better than Win 95, Win XP is much better than Win 2k, hopefully Win 7 will be much better than Vista."
4. They also need to pay attention to both Apple and to their own research arm, and start -innovating-rather than blindly copying what others are doing.
5. Until 1..4 are achieved, I'm not going to like Microsoft. More importantly, I'll not even consider a car (e.g. Ford) that has Microsoft products in it, and the idea of the current Microsoft trying to "fix health care records" scares the fertilizer out of me.
Just my $.02...
Throwing arbitrary (and high) numbers out there isn't going to convince people you are right. If you want people to buy in to what you're saying, try to be more realistic or at least make it clear that your cost estimates are made up off the top of your head.
Anyway, this model really isn't all that different than what you're doing now. You don't own software now, you own licenses. And you do own licenses with today's model, but in the end is how you use them so different than your vision? You buy your license for as long as that version of Windows is useful, then buy another. In terms of net cost, they aren't going to be able to get away with the end result costing much more than it does today.
Time limited licenses are already the way of business applications. Companies don't "arbitrarily" lose access to the tools. If they allow the license to expire, they can't use it anymore. It isn't like one day they suddenly have no access anymore.
And you say you prefer to own your data? No shit? Are you implying that somehow this new version of windows is going to steal your data and give you access only when it wants? Once again, if you want people to take you seriously.. quit making shit up.
Whale
Microsoft really isn't a monopoly anymore. It's easy for a home computer user to switch to a Mac or to get a Linux PC from Dell or HP. Also, it's easy for them to download and install OpenOffice.
So how exactly is Microsoft supposed to implement their software rental fantasy?
This space left intentionally blank.
Well, the first thing that I did when I read this story was to check the URL. It was slashdot, but I couldn't believe it. How could such a story make it on SLASHDOT! Somebody must be playing a joke. If you are a slashdot admin, please verify your security. You were most likely just hacked.
If I was running a company and our flagship product came out several years late, overhyped, underspeed, underfeatured, unable to run on most computers, frustrating to use, and it sold really poorly, causing billions of dollars of shortfalls in sales, well, yes, I'd try to do better the next time. No news here. The real problem is that Windows 7 is just a service pack for Vista. Many of the issues like DRM and slow I/O have just been lightly patched over with no real attempt to roll back to the somewhat simpler, faster Windows XP code base. When you're in a hole, stop digging, don't just paint the hole walls a more pleasing color.
Buying an application has nothing to do with "owning" it. Read the EULA: you are not the owner.
It's been more than 20 years since closed-source software vendors started forcing they customers to update (read: buy a new release) their applications by constantly changing file formats.
Actually, with Vista and Visual Studio 2008 and Windows 7 will seal the deal. I've railed on about how Microsoft has abandoned native code developers, and that's tuned me into Linux quite a bit... but...
Visual Studio 2008's C++ compiler is pretty darned good. Everyone rips MFC, and deservedly, in some ways, but, all of sudden, everyone else's "slim" C++ framework is suddenly pretty darned fat. I mean, doc/view in wxwidgets? And you surely gest if you think Qt is thin. And, MFC, for all of its ugliness, comes now with those fancy Office ribbon bars that I just love. I know it sounds crazy, but I see those ribbon bars popping out of the default MFC application, and I'm like, yeah, I know its a fatter framework than WTL and everyone in the Unix world will laugh at my giant download... but look at those ribbon bars, minitabs, and all the other widgets that other frameworks simply do not have.
Microsoft does have to watch out though, because my foundness for the MFC facelift in no way diminishes the excellent work under way with the tools for wxWidgets. There's some forms editor tools for wxWidgets that have no native C++ answer in Visual Studio and that's something Microsoft really ought to worry about.
And, in Windows 7, those fancy ribbon bars are going to be shipping as part of Windows.
But all in all, compared to Ubuntu Hardy Heron, I really like Vista as a desktop. I really do. That's not to say that Vista is better than Hardy in every regard - Hardy trumps for working with ISOs and command line dvd burning is a hoot, but... the way that the task bar works, the folder search works, the file open dialogs work, and, its pretty darned stable, and feels faster than Hardy does, I must say.
The one thing that does suck about Windows 7, though, is that I think the Outlook Express -> Windows Mail in Vista is a mail client that I think Microsoft finally got right for casual pop mail, and that's going away evidently.
This is my sig.
I first want experience the WYSIWYG experience when I see and use their real finished product. Maybe they have an confusing amount of editions. Maybe people who migrate from XP find their hardware still lacking support. Are the drivers for new hardware out on time? Is SLI etc upported?
New tag: writerwillwinalaptop
Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
You pay about $50 a month to use their O/S. And then you pay an extra $10 a month for Word, or get the Premium package with Word, Excel, and Access for $20.
If Windows + Office + Visual Studio were around $50 a month, I don't think Linux would even have a shot, so long as you got a couple of games along with the ride.
I prefer to own, not rent my application
You don't own any application you use, unless you wrote it. Even under the GPL, you are permitted to modify and copy it, but the original copyright belongs to the author of that product. If you just -owned- the software you got, but could copy it freely, that would essentially be public domain and RMS himself has already written quite a bit on why public domain is bad for software. To some extent, RMS was motivated by companies in the early unix world essentially stealing software by commercializing something in the public domain and then restricting other people's right to do what they did.
This is my sig.
Microsoft's image can't get much worse without going batsh*t crazy like SCO, and look how that ended for them.
Yes, I expect a somewhat kinder and gentler Microsoft with all the governmental pressures on them, and they'll have to actually compete with the rest of the marketplace.
As for Windows 7 being the savior of Microsoft, I'm doubtful, but Microsoft still has many years of stranglehold left on the small business side, with their tight server integration, and Office format games. If Microsoft is going to win, it needs to be the same way it has in the past, keeping other products from integrating with their systems by constantly changing the interfaces. If the governments can force them to move to DOCX, and make other interoperability gains, Microsoft has no choice but to compete on quality again.
Blessed are the pessimists, for they have made backups.
"Oh, wow, maybe people won't just buy whatever crap we try to shove down their throats. This is going to take a bit of rethinking of our strategy..."
Sorry, couldn't resist. I understand that the automobile industry is going through the same realization. We can hope that a few others might get the clue...
Wake up - the future is arriving faster than you think.
My experience bears this out. Right now, I have an old G5 Mac that I dual-boot with 10.4 and 10.5 (I still have some programs that require 10.4). 10.5 is visibly faster. (Although some of the improvement might just be due to disk fragmentation on the older OS, so I don't know).
Names are important, all (reputable) marketing people will tell you that. Companies spend a fortune trying to find just the right name and slogan which will associate the customers mind to what they want. Microsoft have never included the version number in the name before. How many people knew this was the 7th incarnation of everyone's favourite virus compatible platform? I've even seen debate on whether it's the 8th or not.
The point is that 2007 / 2008 have been the years of Vista. Is the "7" going to associate people with "Windows in 2007"? It may not get it's final release until late 2009, early 2010. Are people going the be thinking it's a 2007 product which is late? Vista was 5 or so years late so they do have form. Even Vista's final release was as buggy as a beta. Wouldn't it not be a better idea to give it name?
I say this as a Linux user who enjoys a good laugh at every Microsoft own goal.
... for people to get used to something new...
how IT is changing the world - http://max.zamorsky.name
Microsoft has shown a continued interest in not enforcing subscription services. Even with the move to the Windows Live line of services that many dreaded would open up for subscription enforcements, this has not been the case.
People like you use to, almost without exception, tell that "you just wait and see" though, so I'm not sure it's worth wasting my time in countering your made up arguments.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
I suppose you've never heard of the WGA (Windows Genuine "Avantage") issues that have occured throughout XP's life? Try entire campuses de-authenticating simply because of a faulty WGA update. Couple this with Vista's well known "cripple the pirates" features, and you have a recipe for disaster. With the way corporations are moving (Microsoft in particular) I suspect this is only the beginning.
How exactly do you access your data if the OS you "Own" does not let you? (READ: http://distrowatch.com/ )
Your tinfoil hat seems to be a little tight and cutting off circulation up there. Maybe loosen it a bit.
DOS=Linuxware
Windows 3=Crawlware
Windows 95/98/ME=Crapware
Windows NT=Oldware
Windows 2000=Repeatware
Windows 2003=ThickCockware
Windows XP = Bloatware (Classic)
Windows Vista = MorbidlyObeseware
Windows 7 = Beware
All that's really changed over time is the BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH is now finally rendered in 3D. Big whoop-de-fucking-dah.
I could start to like Microsoft if I weren't compelled to run their software because I had no other choice. In the office where I work, the Exchange server will only work with Outlook, critical internal web-based applications don't work outside of IE, Visio diagrams are routinely distributed internally, and there are loads of legacy desktop applications that will never be ported to another platform. My workplace is hardly unusual in any of this. Short of quitting my job, how do I get away from this shit?
When I can recommend software based on its own merits rather than how compatible it is with a proprietary infrastructure, then I might start to like Microsoft. In the meantime, if you don't see a problem with a single company having a virtual monopoly on small to medium business IT infrastructure, I don't know what to tell you.
KTHXBYE
Ignorance is a powerful lever to be pulled.
You are right in your evaluation. In fact, MS does not design software to fit the slowest or moderate CPU at their anticipated delivery date. They want to design an OS that will be able to stick around and take full advantage of the CPU's and memory advances for several years (at least). This means that several years before the CPU's are developed, they must guess where they will be for the next 5 years and try to take advantage of that processing power to create an OS that will do more than play videos and music.
The real problem with Vista was the minimum requirements. They allowed far too many PC's around the world that were using 2003 technology run Vista. The newest CPU's and higher memory machines with better Mobo did great with it (once the drivers all became available, of course).
This was exactly where we started with XP.
jsut athnoer menagiensls ltitle psrhae for you to dcoede. Why do we wtsae our tmie dnoig tihs?
The real problem is that Windows 7 is just a service pack for Vista.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Features_new_to_Windows_7
throw new NoSignatureException();
I've been following Microsoft pretty closely the past few years, and it's been interesting to see what they've been up to. For starters, they've yanked out their mail, calendar, contacts, photo gallery, movie maker, and messenger applications from the operating system, providing them as a separate Windows Live download. While this doesn't appease the EU (who also wants IE and Windows Media Player out of the OS as well), it helps for users who don't want to be bothered with default Windows software and would rather use Thunderbird, Pidgin, Picasa, etc.
Their Entertainment and Devices division has been great with the updates to the XBox 360 and the Zune; I know people who managed to snag a Zune 30 for $80 on Black Friday clearance a year ago and have the newest firmware and games running on it. And yes, I own a Zune, because iTunes on Windows is a sadistic experiment.
They're looking to have Office applications available on the Web and are pushing forward in the cloud sector with Live Mesh (a great product) and Azure. The last piece of the puzzle, it seems, is Windows 7. They are looking to make this one be the success they were hoping Vista was partly because they NEED it. They need a central spot to tie all these other services and devices together, whether its Windows Live, XBox, Zune, Azure, or Office. Nobody gives a crap about Windows Live or Live Search on OS X or Linux.
Their recent moves including standards compliance in IE, supporting ODF, and contributing to Apache may be a PR stunt, but it's also what we've been asking for from them for a long time now. There seems to be a new culture at Microsoft these past few years, and so far, so good.
"It's a reverse vampire...they....they crave the sun!"
Isn't this the same Microsoft that was convicted on anti-trust violations, and then weaseled out of any punishment? It's all very nice if they now want to make good technology, but I don't buy even good technology from crooks if I can help it.
There is the option to uninstall or never install a lot of the little features in Windows. You can also quite easily disable many of the devices. If you can figure out how to do that with Linux, it's even easier in Windows. Bloat or not, we still have the ability to turn off or get rid of a lot of the things you don't want.
I don't care about Bloat if I still have the ability to turn off what I don't want. In that case, give me all the bloat you want. I may need features you don't, and rather than having to hunt for them online and download a virus posing as a function, I can just turn on or off the function in Windows.
jsut athnoer menagiensls ltitle psrhae for you to dcoede. Why do we wtsae our tmie dnoig tihs?
Apple is even worse for this with their DRM and Development controls. Nobody seems to look critically at them. I agree with the article when it says that Microsoft needs to really work on its PR and not look like an abusive corporate fat cat.
Hey Microsoft, want to improve your image?
1: Remove all the Vista DRM crap out of Windows 7. It's my computer, not Hollywood's.
2: Interoperate better with Open Office and support their open standard in MSWord, not your own.
3: No more per processor licensing agreements. If we want Windows at purchase time we'll ask for it ourselves.
While there's more, get started on this list now!
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
I think what he means is he doesn't want to plunk down a wad of cash for an OS, then be forced to keep paying a monthly fee or his OS stops working.
It's a preference for an ownership model vs. a subscription model and I agree with him. I'm aware that Windows today is licensed as I'm sure he was, but it's a license with a fee that you pay once. The same with Office. What MS probably dreams of is moving to a subscription model where users have no choice but to pay monthly for continued use of their OS.
The numbers were made up because they were largely irrelevant, it was the model he saw them wanting that he objected to, not the particular made up fees.
Question everything
Windows XP = lean
Windows Vista = fat
Windows 7 = leaner than Vista = Windows XP
I must say that "bloat" is about the least information-laden phrase I hear bandied about :).
What's a consensus defintion of what it means? Wasteful use of RAM? Any additional use of RAM? Does hard drive space count? What if it's for optional non-RAM loaded stuff like templates?
Is is bloat for Vista to include a lot of printer drivers in the default image? It wasn't good for Netbooks with small SSD drives, but didn't impact system performance. And I remember lots of complaints about the full install size of Office back in the day, even though that was mainly templates that didn't need to be installed.
I think it'd be useful if we all were a little more specific about that.
My video compression blog
Shut up, Twitter.
Mir tut es leid, Menschen daß Einfältigfehlersuchenbaumfolgendenaffen sind.
You don't own software now, you own licenses.
Here in The Netherlands you DO own the software; copyright law places restrictions on that ownership, but the software IS yours.
IANAL, but the situation seems to be at least not clear-cut license-not-ownership in the US as you imply it to be (see for instance wikipedia for applicable court cases).
Maybe someone like NewYorkCountryLawyer can elaborate.
Wenn ist das Nunstueck git und Slotermeyer? Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.
There's lots of behind-the-scenes work that's been done to improve performance, stability, and security.
Did NT have a software firewall?
It could have and should have, its not like ipchains took up a lot of resources.
Microsoft had more than enough money to hire the expertise to build a lean, high quality firewall into NT 3.5 . They chose not to.
Time limited licenses are already the way of business applications. Companies don't "arbitrarily" lose access to the tools. If they allow the license to expire, they can't use it anymore. It isn't like one day they suddenly have no access anymore.
If the complaints with Steam are any indication, this should be a concern for anyone who's buying the "right" to use software instead of the software itself. Now I don't really dislike the concept of "rental" that badly. I've signed up to Metaboli in the past, you pay a fixed monthly rate in exchange for being able to stream PC games over the net, you get to play the entire collection, but only as long as you're still up to date. I think that renting -games- is workable. In that it's not a big emergency when the site goes down over the weekend and they all stop working suddenly; which did happen.
And you say you prefer to own your data? No shit? Are you implying that somehow this new version of windows is going to steal your data and give you access only when it wants? Once again, if you want people to take you seriously.. quit making shit up.
If your business relies on this however, you'd probably feel differently about it.
How do you kill that which has no life?
Sorry, but this is laughable. With a marketshare that is measured in fractions of a percent, Opera isn't going to force anybody to do anything. It might have something to do with threats from the EU. And before you start: no, Opera didn't force the EU to do that either.
And you say you prefer to own your data? No shit? Are you implying that somehow this new version of windows is going to steal your data and give you access only when it wants? Once again, if you want people to take you seriously.. quit making shit up.
That is what is being implied. "Nice data, shame if anything were to ... happen to it"
And what if the EULA had in print that you should pay them more money for continued use, or not should ever buy (or license) products from competitors, or offer your firstborn?
What if the EULA says you cannot sell the product to someone else? What if the EULA says you cannot use the software on sundays?
EULA's are dodgy at least in the US: there is more info on applicable court cases here.
Wenn ist das Nunstueck git und Slotermeyer? Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.
Emaciated, thin, lean, fat, obese, who cares?
Legacy compatibility was always the key issue. This is why people stuck with MS despite frustration with classic MS weaknesses. Very few people buy Windows because they like it. Quite a few buy it because they want to preserve a pre-existing investment or to maximize their compatibility with others in the same boat.
Without the legacy support, you might as well go out and get a Mac. Until Vista, each successive version of Windows offered the user the ability to use their old apps and hardware on the new version of Windows and in most cases they ran BETTER. Starting with Vista, many things did not run AT ALL.
When enough time has gone by, people will not care so much about legacy compatibility. Upgraded software and peripherals will eventually make XP irrelevant. Question is, what happens in the mean time? How many people are left to ponder a Windows 7 migration vs. those who have jumped ship entirely?
And the biggest question of all is Microsoft's ability to sell a product on its own merits instead of legacy support. They have not done this in the OS space since MS-DOS replaced CP/M.
Honestly, I think that some people have such deep dislike of Microsoft, perhaps even hatred, even if the company gave everything they made away and open sourced all products, someone who still cry foul and claim it's part of a "master plan".
It's obvious that Microsoft cannot have another PR debacle like Vista, but also they can no longer "boil the ocean" or be to ambitious with the next release. Bill left and Ray is in-charge for a reason. Let's hope things change.
On a side note, Apple is lucky it anchored down it's UI constructs early, and has a loyal fan base that will buy, the next new shiny thing from them. Let's face it, there are fan boys out there that will accept whatever Apple gives them, and some are great products.
p.s. I enjoy the "I remember when XP..." comments. Face facts, eventually the OS will retire and we'll all have to move on.
I've used XP for years, I recently upgraded to Vista 64 bit Ultimate. While it was nice and all, the OS took up 24GB on a 30GB partition and I did not install anything. Talk about bloat, it was straight crap. I then decided to give Windows 7 32 bit a try and have not looked back. While there are a few quirks with certain programs, I have yet to have a BSOD or anything. Actually, it encountered a problem installing paint.net and gave the exact steps to fix it. I did not have to google or search arcane MS Knowledge base articles. It was a simple copy and paste to edit a registry setting and boom it fixed the problem. Vista is the equivalent of an over budget Hollywood blockbuster flop. If Windows 7 is making up for that then keep going. Please keep it lean.
I think his concern about owning the data refers to having free access to the format it is stored in. I haven't seen this to be so much of an issue with Microsoft since it seems a lot of applications can figure out how to read an Office document.
However, if Microsoft moved to a subscription and went out of business within the next 6 months, 10 years from now would you be able to find an app that would load a Powerpoint 2007 slide show?
Someone pointed a similar issue out to me when I mentioned how much iTunes music I bought. I did realize that my music was only usuable so long as I could install iTunes on my computer or had a working iPhone/iPod/etc.
So, in regards to 'owning' data, he does bring up a real concern.
...that hasn't been hating Microsoft for the past couple years?
I mean, I like having to jump through hoops to get something simple to work in linux as much as the next guy (no sarcasm, this is /. after all.. who HASN'T spent a friday night recompiling software from source and swearing at the unavailability of required source libraries?), but sometimes it's just nice to "Click-click-click-done" of windows.
Sure, it may be buggy sometimes, is a target for viruses, isn't as fast or powerful as it should be, vista's a bloated pig, but I've got XP so it works and does what I tell it to, doesn't crash, runs everything I want natively, no fuss.
Office? Yeah, it sucks, trying too hard. SQL Server? S'ok. Exchange? Simple, works. IIS? Crap. Silverlight? Pass. Their X-Boxen? They f'cked up on the RROD issue, but working at correcting (C'mon baby, don't jinx it, keep bein' green!)
Am I the only one who isn't on with the hatred?
When all else fails, use fire.
Time limited licenses are already the way of business applications. Companies don't "arbitrarily" lose access to the tools. If they allow the license to expire, they can't use it anymore. It isn't like one day they suddenly have no access anymore.
Unless the permission update fails for some reason other than non-payment. This happened at the radio station I used to work for.
The software that created the daily schedule for all on-air events (called the "log" by the on-air staff) would not update and refused to allow us to create about 2 weeks worth of logs. The vendor had to fly in and do some voodo to restore everything. Meanwhile we had to go back to creating paper logs (photocopier, liquid paper, and typewriter) for a couple of weeks.
At the next contract renewal time, we told them where they could stuff their software, and moved to another vendor who didn't have time bombs built into their software.
And you say you prefer to own your data? No shit? Are you implying that somehow this new version of windows is going to steal your data and give you access only when it wants?
If the application that is locked to that proprietary file format won't let you in, you've lost access to your data. Isn't that functionally the same as not having that data any more?
---
"I can't complain, but sometimes still do..." Joe Walsh
Fuck 'em.
I let my MSDN Pro lapse this year.
So Microsoft putting out a patch, and charging for it, because their current OS is garbage; is improving their image?
No
If someone is passing you on the right, you are an asshole for driving in the wrong lane.
Time limited licenses are already the way of business applications. Companies don't "arbitrarily" lose access to the tools. If they allow the license to expire, they can't use it anymore. It isn't like one day they suddenly have no access anymore.
Contract and license terms can change. If a business becomes dependent on a service that no longer gives them what they want, the changeover can be costly. And the service provider can always mysteriously die. Authentication might not be possible without a working network connection, which makes things a pain when the network or firewall is poorly configured. Timed licenses are easy and quick, but not always as dependable as using in-house software. I'm not saying it's a bad solution, but it has it's drawbacks.
Are you implying that somehow this new version of windows is going to steal your data and give you access only when it wants?
Well, that does tend to be something that comes with DRM. Not always the OS's fault directly, I know, but it comes with the territory.
What's the value of information that you don't know?
Microsoft will NEVER offer only time-limited (right-to-use) licenses for their Operating System and Office applications. I'm not arguing that they won't start offering it as an option, but they will always continue to offer permanent right-to-use licenses for those products.
Here's why... ... ain't gonna send the rent payment to MS) ... no way they could send the Word rent payment to MS!)
Example 1: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/08/19/MNBH12DCV7.DTL from just one of the (many) times that California state legislature impasses over new budgets have frozen CA state government spending. (if they couldn't spend money on freakin nursing homes there's no way they'd be able to send the rent payment to MS)
Example 2: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/06/nyregion/06budget.html?pagewanted=1 from when the New Jersey state legislature impasse over new budgets froze NJ state government spending. (shutdown the casinos to cost $16 million a day and put nearly 100K people out of work
Example 3: (thank goodness this hasn't happened in a while) http://www.cnn.com/US/9512/budget/12-16/index.html from when the U.S. federal government impasse over new budgets shutdown federal government spending. (shutdown the national monuments and put more than a quarter million people out of work
Neither the U.S. federal government nor any of the state governments are going to accept the risk of their PCs shutting down the next time budget arguments cause a spending freeze, so Microsoft will always have to offer a non-subscription version of their Operating System and Office.
The critical non-selling point for me with Vista was the blatant market segmentation. Vista Home, Vista Home Premium, Vista Business, Vista Ultimate, Vista IE-free, Vista Lite, Vista Media Center, Vista This, Vista That. The only version you could count on to have the features you needed was Vista Ultimate, the most expensive by far. It was just a con, and I walked away from it because of that.
If Microsoft wants to avoid insulting its users, it should stick to one version, or if its bean-counters say it must, a normal version and a cheapo crippled version.
pi = 2*|arg(God)|
I really only use Windows for a few games (Stalker, HL/Steam, WOW, Guild Wars and going to try out Trasa again now that it's $free$). I've got a MBP and Vista 64 has been just fine on it. I already have the isos for both 32 and 64bit W7 beta, so would I be doing myself harm by trying one?
Is it stable-enough to be used as a primary Windows OS, when you really don't use Windows all that much?
Microsoft is most certainly improving its image with Windows 7. They appear to be getting a lot of things right. They've improved system latency due to I/O over what was present in even XP, and the system is surprisingly stable (for a beta, of course).
Couple this with the fact that the Linux I/O scheduler appears to have moved away from a model which works well on the Linux desktop. For about the last year or so, Linux kernels have resulted in very latent desktop utility during even moderate burst-type I/O (programs/files loading, access of swap - not prologued disk writes). This may or may not be related to the bug supposedly introduced into the kernel in 2.6.18 - I don't know, I haven't personally tested it. But what I do know is that this behavior has become progressively more evident over the past 8 years: I blame the server-centric development focus in the kernel (2.2 and prior were blindingly responsive on the desktop).
With the fact that Linux desktop performance is somewhat lackluster these days giving it a perceived performance more on par with what Vista is capable of, I can see how it would sour people in preference for Windows 7, when Windows 7 appears to implement things properly - or, at least in a way which works to user expectations.
I should note that I've been personally using Linux (mostly Debian, some Ubuntu and OpenSuse) almost exclusively since around 2000. I don't make these criticisms lightly, and personally say it more as an admonishment of the Linux developers/community than I do as a proponent of W7. Whether it's a good product or not, I can not ethically approve of vendor lock in to the extent that MS software use encourages.
(Side note: has anyone noticed how W7's window effects/widgets (to the exception of the "MS-specific blurry/imperfect glass semi-transparent menus) looks shockingly like the bastard child of KDE 4 and OS X 10.5? I thought the first W7 screenshot I saw actually was KDE4 with a 'lookalike' theme.)
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
Microsoft has placed some serious burdens on users, developers and systems administrators with Windows Vista. They are completely unapologetic for it. People cling to their Windows XP CDs as they would to a life raft.
Microsoft responds with PR ads like "Mojave" completely forgetting that people are annoyed not only by the user interface, but also by the things they can't do or the fact that it takes more horsepower and/or capacity to perform at the same level they experienced with WinXP.
Windows 7 does not appear to address any of the concerns that people have with Windows Vista. If someone would be so kind, I would like to see some sort of list of changes between Windows Vista and Windows 7. Are hardware requirements lower? Are annoying UI issues addressed?
Don't get me wrong -- I really want to see Windows 7 resolve the problems of Vista because the future presently makes me a little uncomfortable. But when I see clever hackers repackaging Windows XP and Windows Vista into "lite" Windows distros that are remarkably small and remarkably fast, very compatible and capable, I have to wonder what Microsoft is most interested in? It has been demonstrated over and over again what is POSSIBLE and I am sure Microsoft is aware of it. So why aren't they?
We can speculate all day long and never arrive at the truth unless Microsoft acknowledges the truth. But terms like "defective by design" are well earned when it comes to Microsoft. They aren't doing what they could. One is forced to assume that they have motives for not making their Windows releases as fast as they could be. What those motives are, precisely, is where most of the speculation occurs. I think it is because Windows is used to prop up other activities; activities of Microsoft and of other parties such as big media interests.
I see the Redmond shill machine is in full swing now. First it gobbles up MSZD.Net. Now another publication is releasing "features" on how "performant" and "fantastic" Windows 7 is.
Bull Fraking Shit.
Windows 2000 and NT 4 was as lean as it got! Want a reminder? Load up Windows NT Server 4.0 in a virtual machine and see how much resources are being used.
20 fraking MB!
Even XP is bloated! Ever wonder why Windows Explorer sometimes takes a few seconds to create a folder on a Quad Core 3.0GHZ 4GB machine? A second on this machine has probably 1000 times more processing power than the Voyager probe and the Apollo 11 Moon lander (if you believe in all that). Yet I have to wait and twiddle my thumbs...
Its been downhill since Windows 2000. That OS ran gorgeously on my dual Pentium III 350 (250MB). XP pigged that machine in the space of time it took to install XP.
I company I worked at recently still used NT 4 to run SQL Server... and it ran like the wind... until a US company took us over and due to Sarbanes Oxley (read "license to print money" from a Redmon/corporate friendly regime) we had to upgrade to SQL Server 2099 (which sucked and was oh so .Net slow), Exchange 3059 (which sucked and was oh so .Net bloated) and a Server OS that gobbled up about 15 gig RAM just on startup.
OK. I exaggerate... but you get the picture.
I was tempted to pull out my old faithful PIII 350 (which happily runs Linux now) and install Windows 7... but why bother?
These days I console myself by liberating PCs from Windows and getting refunds for bundled Vista + Works licenses (thats £120 + vat in Blighty) on all PC purchases.
as a mea culpa, I think Mikro$oft owes all the people who bought Vista discounted if not free upgrade to Windows 7. Their product is crap, and everything I hear is that 7 is a reworking that Vista should have had before it was released in the first place.
Saying "Is Windows 7 being better than Vista really an achievement? Vista was, to be fair, crap".
Except you don't get MS fans telling you you're talking shite.
What IS different is that 10.5 has a lot more in it that 10.1 and is faster too. Even if it were crap, a service pack would just have sped it up and not introduced some new things.
(whether these new things are worth paying for is another question)
FREEDOM is the issue. This is what so many people are missing. Now some will say that freedom doesn't mean anything or is irrelevant to them, but I would beg to differ with them.
For Example, I recall an incident which cost my company over $10k. We were running an NT4 server that was spanning volume sets over a number of disks (never mind the wisdom of that, it was a supported feature and we used it as intended). One day in its typical fashion NT porked its registry and had to be reinstalled. No more access to that volume set! Oh, we talked to MS about it and their answer was flat out "sure we know what you'd have to edit into the registry to get that volume set to work again, but we just don't choose to tell you."
Vendors don't care about you. Certainly big vendors don't care about you one bit. You're an ant to them, and they won't even give you the time of day.
Had that been a Linux server in a similar situation all I'd have had to do was dig around and find out HOW to fix the problem and fix it.
So as far as I'm concerned forget proprietary software vendors. I can always hire a consultant to fix any issues I have with OSS or staff can do it. Commercial software is just too much of a risk, certainly for anything my business depends on. We ditched MS products 10 years ago and never looked back.
"Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem." -- Jefferson
http://download.live.com/
In my heart I am still a software developer, a hardcore IT guy and a Linux advocate... In 30 years I worked for 5 start ups blah blah blah. Lots of hardcore techy cred if I want to pull it.
But, now days I make most of my income as a teacher and I make most of that teaching money teaching basic computer literacy and MS Office to people on the wrong side of the digital divide. These are not stupid people, they are not old people, most are under 25 but some are as old as 65. All are high school graduates and some have college degrees. They just don't know much about how to use a computer. They never learned and they don't care about anything but getting their job done.
I dare say that they represent a fairly large percentage of todays population.
You know what? While most of them (not all) have heard of Microsoft, they have no strong opinion of the company one way or the the other. To them windows are something that you open when you want fresh air and for some weird reason is also what makes using a computer hard or easy (depends on the person). If they know the difference between XP and Vista it is because they learned a little about using a computer with XP and then bought a computer with Vista and they are pissed because the it is different from the one they learn on. (OTOH, there is a small percentage who stumbled upon Vista and love it.)
They don't buy any thing from MS. What they have from MS came on the computer. In most cases the only software they ever buy are games and mostly they buy games for their consoles. They down load games for PCs because they can, and as one student so bluntly put it "How can it be illegal when it is so easy?"
What I am trying to say is that for the people I teach Microsoft is like the road they drive to work. They only notice it when there is a problem with it. When there is a problem, they don't blame MS, if anything they blame the company who made the computer. From their point of view rebooting windows is just like driving around a chuckhole or getting stuck in traffic. It happens, shit happens, the live with it. They don't even think about the possibility that it shouldn't happen, because it has always happened.
They do not have an opinion about MS. They don't see MS. They don't buy from MS.
Microsoft has become like the air in a big city, you only complain about it when you can see it. And, Microsoft has taken great care to make sure they are not seen, they are just there, like transparent but polluted air.
Out side of IT and the small number of IT enthusiasts in the world, nobody has an opinion about MS.
Stonewolf
Trying to improve Micro$oft's image is like putting lipstick on the Iron Maiden. She looks better as she knifes you from front and back.
I'm running out of A-I-R.
The problem here is the same as before, actually: those who have XP, by and large don't have any interest in upgrading to Windows 7. Clearly, the people who are now running Vista, have a more compelling reason, but those are a small minority (10-15%)
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Clearly this time around Microsoft is taking the proper approach to Marketing and starting a Viral Marketing campaign early enough to, in the minds of the consumers, build a positive image for their new OS before the cold shower of reality start pouring down.
I especially like the part where they keep comparing Windows 7 with Windows Vista (which is crap) instead of comparing it with Windows XP (the last good OS they made) - great way to nudge the online reviews and opinions to use an absurdly low basis of comparison AND get the suckers^H^H^H^H experimentalists that bought Windows Vista to upgrade again.
To however is behind this Marketing campaign: I salute you!
Ok Folks. M$ is trying to improve the fiasco for some users or people who tried Vista and went to Linux or back to XP. Truth is unless you built a system with the proper hardware support for the operating system your results will more then likely be less then stellar and doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that out. I like Vista 64 bit. Works for me but I also run Linux. My wife uses Ubuntu and it works for her. If gaming ever got the point where any PC game could run (native not WINE) on Linux and was sold with the installer that could install on Linux I would probably ditch Windows for good. I don't see that happening any time soon. Each OS has its place for their users. Windows market share is decreasing and Linux adoption is on the rise. If this continues we could soon see more Linux applications/games being developed and more computer makers selling systems with installed Linux in the near future. I welcome that day although I build my own. But to say that Vista is a complete failure is not only incorrect but FUD. Alot of us remember windows ME. That was the last step from Win 98 to either 2000 or XP. Vista is going to be remembered by those users as an in between and hopefully M$ learned their lesson and Windows 7 will be the next XP only much better. Give em time. It is still only beta.
More than likely, charges would not be monthly.
I'd expect:
1. You can still goto the store and pay for Office for full price.
2. You'll be able to buy a college version, which will be discounted heavily and only last for 4 years.
3. You'll be able to pay per usage or page.
So, in the end, they're just giving you more options to get a legit version of Office instead. And, in all honesty, I use word 10 times, excel 5 times, and powerpoint 2 times a year at school. So maybe a pay-per-usage fee would be ok for me. 1$ per use = 17$ a year, versus 300$? Hell, Office won't last 18 years....
The only downside i see to this is that they can't pull it off with Outlook....everyone will just switch to thunderbird. Or hell, if OpenOffice made a superbowl commercial, Microsoft would die right then and there.
Not on Slashdot. Next!
does it run linux?
on a serious note, vista's not really that bad. in fact, I'd compare it to how I felt about XP when I had 2K. I absolutely loved 2K [moreso than 98/95, by leaps and bounds for the fact that I could leave it running for weeks/months without a reboot and not have memleaks abound] and thought XP was a bloated pile of crap.
however, after SP2, XP was actually a pretty decent system and definitely better than 2K in a lot of ways [not all, though]. when vista came out, it was crap. and much like others have said, windows 7 as lean as it is, will feel bloated once we get our hands on it until they patch it up and then we'll feel that windows 8 will be more bloated than 7, etc.
my favorite feature in vista [which has been in other OS's forever, but not windows] is that when the video/sound driver crashes in a game, I'm not forced to reboot. I get a stutter, get kicked back to the desktop and vista restarts the driver, and lets me alt+tab back into the game. this is rare, but I know it pissed me off when I had this happen in XP or 2K with no choice but to reboot and lose my progress [or drop the online game I was in]. there are some good things about the OS [plenty of bad, of course], but they're not advertised up-front.
I plan on dual-booting linux [most likely ubuntu] and win 7 when they come out. I want linux to do better to encourage MS to do better. ditto for mac. if I wasn't still such a gamer [and to a lesser extent, composer], I'd be running ubuntu or something exclusively [although music plugins don't necessarily translate well to linux either, even with WINE or other wrappers to help things along]. ubuntu studio's cool, but it doesn't work as nice as ableton and audiomulch do with the thousands of freeware VST's I use that don't work in linux/mac.
Retail EULA's mean absolutely nothing in the US, evidence by the fact that NO vendor has even attempted to enforce them through the courts. You buy a sealed product, and somewhere hidden inside is a slip of paper saying that you agree to something or other by virtue of having purchased the product. Well, screw that. There was a contract entered into when I bought the product, covered by UCITA, and that contract doesn't mention terms hidden in a box somewhere. You can print whatever you like on it. I'm not listening.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
Well yes every company prefers a subscription model.
But your numbers are way off. I would suspect the numbers would be closer to this.
Windows About $5.00 per month
Office Full version about $5.00 per month as well.
For them to get good acceptance they need to price their model to be more affordable then the own version. For the average estimate time line between upgrade.
That said, I want assurances that I would get the following.
Free Updates to the software as long as I am paying the fee.
Fee prices shouldn't rise beyond COLA (Cost of Living adjustment).
Ability to store/download/sync my data locally free of extra charge, and with a easy user interface in recognized standards formats
Uppon closing of my account (or forced closing(due to non-payment abuse etc...)) I should be able to still get and retrieve my data.
Notification of termination of service.
Ability to access such features on platforms of my choosing, including virtualization.
The SaaS model isn't by itself bad but you need to make sure you are playing with the correct ground rules first.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
While I realize some people may argue with my view on this, I don't consider windows 7 any more slim than vista. I mean common, it still takes over 4 gigs to install it and run it, XP took how much, maybe 1.5 gigs after the SP's were installed, this doesn't seem slim to me. And while I have to say just cause I can that I like the new interface, frankly its still a resource hog compared to XP.
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2008/jul08/07-02EquiptPR.mspx
Pricing and Availability
Microsoft Equipt is $69.99 (U.S.) estimated retail price for a one-year renewable subscription. Each subscription will be good for three home PCs, making Microsoft Equipt ideal for families and individuals with one or several computers
* Compare to Cable TV which started at $240 a year and now runs about $1000 a year. My prices might be high- but I was using current cable prices. (and I'll be moving cable providers once again to get that price back down below $400 a year).
http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=445
Under the FlexGo program, users make initial down payments on mid-range PCs and make monthly payments for software and broadband services from their local telcos, much the way customers pay cable providers for TV and Internet access. Microsoft and its partners will allow users to sign up and pay for their subscriptions in a variety of ways, ranging from ATMs and point-of-sale terminals, to the Web.
On the "own" vs. licensed you are picking a nit so I'll clarify.
I can reinstall Win2k, Linux, and my particular copy of Windows XP and it will work. Now and always. No one can stop me from installing my copies.
I can reinstall my copies of Office2000, Openoffice, Gimp, Audacity, etc. and they will work. Now and always.
My windows Vista machine can be automatically disabled by microsoft at any time.
My data stored in microsoft formats has previously become unavailable when microsoft orphaned the application and no longer made copies of it available to read older data. I was reduced to using a hex editor to extract the data.
Yes, any WMA format data can be denied to me by tools written into Microsoft operating systems now. Just like Divx, if something that I purchased which has a valid liscense stops being supported by the liscense servers, then I lose the ability to use the file. Meanwhile, ny MP3, OGG, and FLAC files will continue to work anywhere. And worst case, I can read the DVD onto another non-microsoft O/S (if they someday aggressively disable or even delete files they decide are unlicensed.
You need to open your eyes a bit wider.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
If Microsoft releases their software under a free software license I will like them as much as any other multinational corporation.
Sure, they'll take time to change their business practices, but once the source code is free as in speech, I can be patient.
For now, their proprietary code motivates them to restrict my freedom. Cost, features, and performance are secondary.
1. Start a rock band. 2. Donate all his money to Linus Torvalds 3. Become a World Series of Poker player and run with the circuit, if we saw him playing on TV, that would really get the word out about Windows 7. 4. Pose new for Playgirl. Yikes! :)
Maybe his staff should run these ideas by him and see what shakes out.
I thought Microsoft was going to lock my win7beta pc and hold my data for ransom sometime in August.
And I think it's brilliant.
The problem that Microsoft has to face is that it's no longer about More Computer Per Computer. (Detroit used to call this concept More Car Per Car.) It's about Same Computer for Less Money. The new price point for a computer is $299. That's retail; wholesale is under $200. Microsoft wants about $50 of that, which isn't going to happen. They can get maybe $10 to $15 per unit.
If Linux on the desktop didn't suck so bad, it could take over on price alone. Even purpose-built Linux systems like the Eee PC look amateurish.
For games the subscription model works because individual games are cheap, and users want to new games to become available to them, so even if they just buy games, they end up spending some amount of their money per month, paying it to the same game publishers. Subscription model does not make them pay more or exert significantly more control over users, however it provides convenience. And users usually still can get their own copies of the games that last forever.
With services subscription fees work because services usually provide something that can't be achieved by most users by merely installing and maintaining something locally. Say, Livejournal provides community aggregation and interaction that can not be easily implemented by individual users running their own blog sites. Still all "major" blogs are all hosted on their own sites because they do not need Livejournal features but benefit from the author having full control over all aspects of the site.
With OS and major applications the products are expensive (unless they are free), they don't change significantly, and OS/application vendors usually provide patches for free to all users who bought the product from them, so subscription provides no advantages and plenty of disadvantages. Support may take form of subscription, and in the case of free/open application it may be the only thing user will be willing to pay for, however it does not change the way user accesses and uses the product, only the way he obtains support for it.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Yep.
I wasn't even deleting cruft. I got stuck trying a normal upgrade, and I got mired in the roman candles of dependencies.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
I'm sure they're always spending gobs of money on fixing their image- how about fixing some software?
Regardless of the perception issues, is 10,000 people working for 5 years to produce an unsatisfactory OS a sustainable business model?
> You pay about $50 a month to use their O/S.
They will only be able to do this after they have convinced the PC manufacturers to build machines that cannot run anything other than Windows.
The claim that Vista took 5 years to write is incorrect, it took 18 months to put Vista together from Server 2003 and the remnants of a failed project to replace XP. This project was to produce an OS that ran on top of the .NET CLR. The aim was to take the XBox and produce an XPC running the new OS. This box would be locked down to only run Windows. OEMs could also install Windows on a x86 CLR but the XPC would undercut the price of any Dell or Gateway box and would have premium software.
At that point they could have monthly fees - or your machine bricked permanently.
Two things stopped their ability to do this: 1) The .NET CLR OS failed. It was slow, buggy, and completely unstable. They abandonned it and had to produce Vista in a hurry. 2) Linux had become viable and they couldn't kill it off, or buy it out, as they had done with DR-DOS, GEM, BeOS and many other possible competitors.
I've been subjected to Windows and its idiosyncrasies for over 20 years now (started with Windows/286 2.1 back in 1988), and much of my opinion of Windows has been colored by its inability to keep up with its current competition, be it PC/GEOS, MacOS, OS/2, or Linux.
If Microsoft wants to gain respect in certain circles, it needs to write good code.
It's that simple.
Mainframe/UNIX Bit Twiddler and long time Windows/Linux Hobbyist.
The Theorem Theorem: If If, Then Then.
Its Windows 9 that will really bring 'em back!
But is 10.3 and 10.4 being faster than 10.0 and 10.1 really an achievement? Early OS X releases, if we are to be fair, were crap.
They were only "crap" in the sense that not everything in the window manager (essentially) had been worked out as much. People didn't like Finder as much as the old, there was not as much software - but the core was in OK shape.
Even the earliest releases were still based on a lot of solid components, like BSD and Apache and so on.
So yes, it's impressive that the CORE system is faster overall with less bloat than the original OS X versions. Just look at what Apple did with launchd to replace a number of different processes and speed up boot as an example...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Yeah, familiar with the business model. Still think it's bullshit. See, when I buy a book or a hamburger or a house, it's mine. I'm not renting music, I'm not renting software. Especially not at those prices. Get real.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
Boy, it just burns your ass that he's right, doesn't it? See, this is the internet. Around here we typically try to argue on merit, not identity. It shouldn't matter who's on the other side of the screen. If you can refute his argument, do so. If not, STFU.
-Risen (is a real boy, not a sockpuppet)
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
That's what the software vendors tell you. The legality of this position is, to put it mildly, dubious. They want to make sure you're in a position where you can't argue it any more.
Indeed, Microsoft is improving...its image. "Oh, sure, we sold you this alpha version of Windows 7 (codename Vista) a few years ago, but trust us, the real thing is much better. You need to buy that one, too."
Windows 7 really reminds me of Coca Cola Classic after the failed debacle of New COKE.
Perhaps by flubbing Vista sooo badly, they can get Windows 7 to look great, where as if Windows 7 were compared to XP with no major screw up inbetween it would have only come off as "nice", like that girl you'll never call back, instead of amazing like that first glass of water after a week in the desert.
Microsloth is getting good press they don't deserve surrounding Windows 7. Their perceived image may be on the upswing, but their actual image isn't changing - to do that, they would have to change their behavior...
1. Micro$oft is still a corrupt organization, and getting worse.
2. Win 7 is better than Vista... It's what Vista was supposed to be the first time, they just charged their customers for the beta testing.
3. M$ will still strong-arm partners.
4. M$ will still steal other people's ideas & technology.
5. M$ will still illegally influence governments & regulators.
6. M$ will still develop code to interfere with the correct operation of competing products.
7. M$ will still bundle apps not for convenience, but in such a way as to lock out competing products.
8. M$ will still know all these things have come to light in public court records, but will pretend it's not true.
Should I go on? Nothing's changed.
Wake me up when Windows 666 is RTMed.
Vista's still the same, Microsoft's strategies and design philosophies are still the same, their products are the same, and 3rd party drivers and products will still be the same even after Windows 7 is released. The Windows experience will still be the same and that's what's keeping me off of Windows, and Windows 7 won't change anything. It's just a patched Vista, which is still missing some of the so-called fundamental pillars such as WinFS. What's supposed to be so good about Windows 7 again? Really?
how many people would point to the Mac OS and say how cool it is and all the little flashy things and swirly things that bounce and beep is where MS OS should be. MS adds some gloss to try to keep up and everyone complains that they didn't keep it simple and clean like XP.
;), but a lot of people are using it for simple stuff at home and don't need the speed. They want a cool interface dancing around the screen. Huge population around the world falling into that category.
You and I both want to have the applications taking advantage of the CPU's (like the games
jsut athnoer menagiensls ltitle psrhae for you to dcoede. Why do we wtsae our tmie dnoig tihs?
Let's see what the page lists: a bajillion bells, whistles, and gongs; some updated drivers and a few performance tweaks; also, a new boatload of DRM. That's no moon, that's a service pack!
In other news: in Windows 7, "the Windows Security Center has been renamed the Windows Action Center". Innovation at its finest! (To be fair, "a new font, 'Gabriola', is included." Now THAT's something.)
If they stopped sucking the DRM tit they could put some effort into consumer oriented development. 2009 might not truly be the year of XXXX on the desktop but if they ignore their consumers long enough by the time it is they'll be fucked trying to play catch-up after having treated their customers as second-class users for so long.
Quack, quack.
Is that like putting lipstick on a pig?
"Suppose you would normally replace your OS and office suite every 3 years"
Any home user who would do this can waste his time and money as he pleases.
Any business that would do this obviously has a lot more cash laying around than it knows what to do with.
Our company is using Windows XP (eight years old) and Office 2000 (nine years old). No plans to upgrade. We're enjoying the savings, thank you kindly.
After years of bad behavior donating a few dollars must mean they've finally changed.
While you hold your breath I'll wait to see a pattern of responsible behavior over time before I get all squishy inside.
Quack, quack.
you had transitions like going from the all-text world of MS-DOS to a whole new paradigm, found in Windows 3.x. Or again, the huge jump from that to Windows '95.
You mean that the PC evolved from being available for computer scientists to being available for everybody else?
For the most part, this evolution is hard to characterize, but I think MSFT has it backwards. They assume that each evolution changes the way the computer provides information to the user, when the real evolutionary changes are how the user provides information to the computer. Apple understands this. Nintendo understands this. Most other companies don't.
DOS? You get a keyboard. Win 3.1? You also get a mouse. Win 95? You get dial-up networking. Win98? You get broadband and USB support. Since then, the only things they've offered is prettier graphics, better stability, and incremental improvements to malware protection. I guess you could argue that they've made touchscreen Windows... but I've yet to see this implemented in a way where I'd prefer it over having a mouse. Though, the one exclusion that I'd add is that MSFT has changed the way people interact with their console gaming systems by making them network-centric.
Support the 30 Hour Work Week!!!
Hello.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blizzard_v._BnetD
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glider_(bot)
Good day to you.
I would tell Twitter to shut up, even when I agree with him.
Now, do I agree with him, or don't I? Can't tell? Then you shut up too.
Mir tut es leid, Menschen daß Einfältigfehlersuchenbaumfolgendenaffen sind.
wake me when Microsoft says that I can upgrade my Vista Home Basic to Win7 for free, since Toshiba gave me no choice but to pay MS tax for the OEM install :(
Of course it still is, ask your antitrust authorities.
Is it easy for them to buy a Linux Pre-installed PC from HP?
Is it easy for them to load up Crysis in Linux or Mac?
Is it easy for them to log into their business Active Directory Network with a Mac? (I'm not sure on this actually anymore...)
Can they install those Logitech G15 keyboard drivers in Linux?
Can I go out and order the latest nVidia graphics card and be able to go home, install it and be up and running with a Mac or Linux?
Can you pick up a cheap wifi USB dongle and guarantee that it will work on your non-Windows laptop when you get home?
It's NOT "easy enough" yet. It might be for the tech savvy, but for someone who shops at Wal-Mart for computers... it's not. There's still too much reliance on Windows to the point where people think Microsoft Windows when they say PC (Personal Computer) and they think Word when they want to edit a resume.
Every time I start to have faith in humanity, I ruin it by driving to work between 7 and 8 am.
Those who have XP probably shouldn't. They should wait until they buy new hardware, then get whatever Windows is out at that point in time. There is no joy to be had from trying to run the newest OS on a platform three or four generations in the past.
"That which does not kill us makes us stranger." -Trevor Goodchild
After a Virus got by Firefox and about four security programs, my sister is going on Ubuntu next weekend.
Pug
An Invisible Entity of Vast Power whose existence must be taken on faith alone: Liberal Media
Yes, Linux is gaining some amount of traction with the techno-hipster crowd, but that's still a relatively small slice of the sum total of all computer users across history capable of forming opinions. There are people that have walked into an Apple store and played with one of the locked away, overheating iMacs with mushy keyboards and single-button mice for a few minutes without getting a feel for how the system is actually used. Students that used old Unix shell accounts and IT guys that work overtime fighting the server over a serial terminal with sh. People that remember DOS or their old SGI Irix workstations. People bitten badly by the BeOS and OS/2 generation and people that spend their days working with the arcana of the AS/400 and its legacy.
And then, there are people that have never done any of this and have no perspective by which to judge in the first place.
I suspect that a great many of people that are purpourted to "like" Windows fall into this latter category. (I suspect also that a lot of people will consider commenting at this point with a, "Well, I..."-type response before realizing that, as readers of slashdot, they are not even remotely to whom I refer :).
There are undoubtedly people that like Windows more than any other platform for various reasons ("Games" seems the most-often cited, to be sure), but that crucial set of statistics that outline how many have ever heard of, seen, or used another platform with any amount of rigour is sadly not accounted for in any of what I have seen. Until that point, we can only look at it with mass generalizations: there are likewise a lot of people that commonly use Linux or MacOS on their desktops and laptops and a lot that say they would switch from Windows to something else were it not for some piece of third-party software (engineers give me this often. A lot of the high-powered CAD stuff is shockingly platform restricted and doesn't run in Wine at all).
RTFM
It's already happened. My wife was collaborating with someone on a Powerpoint presentation for a class. When she got the PowerPoint file, PowerPoint gave some utterly cryptic message about the registry when trying to open it. To make a long story short, and no thanks to Microsoft, I found out it was a PowerPoint 95 file, which Microsoft no longer supports, and as is typical of their utter laziness and contempt for users their piece of crap software doesn't tell you this, but rather gives you a completely meaningless error message, leading you to believe the file might be corrupt (it wasn't), or the software was messed up (it wasn't, at least according to Microsoft's abysmal standards of "correct").
It turns out I had to find an archived version of the PowerPoint 97 viewer in order to let my wife load the file. So Microsoft already doesn't support their own formats, and this is using their software, paid for. With this level of complete incompetence and disdain for customers, naturally they want a subscription model. They haven't done anything to Office in more than 10 years that 95% of their users want or need, so how else are they going to keep making money while shovelling out the same half-working barely-usable garbageware. And don't get me started on Word which is definitely the second, and maybe the third or more most compatible software for its own format.
Similar thing with Windows XP. It worked. Its worst deficiencies had all been corrected or at least improved. There was no possible way Vista could complete with a product that people were happy with, so they shoved out Vista while it was still half-baked and then will simply hit everyone up for another upgrade when Vista is finally finished (er, Windows 7). Microsoft simply cannot make money any more by providing good products and adding improvements and new features over time, so they need some other way to extort the cash they couldn't earn in a truly free market.
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
Here in The Netherlands you DO own the software; copyright law places restrictions on that ownership, but the software IS yours.
So, what, you can legally make copies and sell them ?
The memory manager used in the Windows NT series was designed back in 1989 for very different systems than we use now. With Windows 7 they have ripped out that old memory manager and replaced it with something designed for modern computers. One of the reasons why it takes less memory than Vista.
Microsoft, Apple, Google, Amazon what's the difference? All steal money from devs and control with walled gardens.
Microsoft is improving their image greatly with OEMs and consumers. They just aren't improving their image with Slashdot readers, because until they they announce that Windows 8 will be base on Linux, they will still be hated. Remember when Microsoft was constantly releasing new studies showing that Windows was "better" than Linux? Did you notice that they (more or less) quit doing that? It's because they realized that Linux users aren't now and will never be a part of their consumer base. So, yes, Microsoft's image is better, but you will just never notice it because Microsoft won't ever be, in a million years, the company you want it to be.
This is not Microsoft changing anything, its just their astroturfing campaign taking never before seen proportions. They still want to kill any and all competition, still doesnt care one bit about the customers and still have no interest whatsoever to deliver good products.
This is a dangerous game to play since if it succeds people will have overblown expectations that wont be met, just like with Vista. Have anyone forgotten how god the Vista betas was (according to the astroturfers) and how it would be the best os ever? This is just the same marketing but with even more money spent on astroturfers and paid bloggers. Ive still to come accross a respected blogger that sings the Windows 7 praise. Just your normal netgear kind of bloggers....
HTTP/1.1 400
Um... That's your prerogative, I guess. It does make you sound like a douchebag, though.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
After numerous delays, msft finally releases their half-baked, stink-bomb Vista. It was such a disaster that msft had to desperately scramble to get it half-way fixed, and change the name Win7. And this considered praise worthy?
Moonlight is just another msft scam to force msft standards on everybody. Please, we have all seen this before. Does moonlight even work on windows firefox?
I don't see msft's image as being changed at all.
"It turns out I had to find an archived version of the PowerPoint 97 viewer in order to let my wife load the file. So Microsoft already doesn't support their own formats, and this is using their software, paid for."
I hear you. This very example seems to be a good reason to have an OpenOffice.org install on a Windows machine.
My wife refuses to give up XP+MS Office, and frequently runs into this very problem. (she works for, and with a lot of non-profit organizations who frequently upgrade software at low priority due to budgets)
The first time this happened to her, we were both puzzled. I finally tracked it down: the document was written in Office '97- she was using Office XP==not compatible! WTF?!?!?
Hmmm...let me try OpenOffice.org.....
The document opened and rendered fine with OO.0rg. I then installed OO.org on her PC, and she loves it! (but only for this purpose *sigh*)
I have only used MS Office (Word) once, gave up on it after a very frustrating half hour, then went back to OO.org to 'Just Get It Done!'
(been using OO.org/Star Office since 1996)
Hell, I'd rather use Lotus Notes than MS Office, but that's me.
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
"We need some revenue. Come up with a new OS plan..."
"We'll use the model that worked last time... Customers actually liked Windows 98SE, so we dropped Windows ME on them. Everyone hated it, and when we released XP, it was a relief!"
"Do it again."
"Ok, we need a forward looking name - hey! Let's use Vista! Sounds good, and everyone will hate it. Then, we give the next one a boring name, because we expect it to be around a long time. Never know if fashions change..."
"How about XP+?"
"Naw, can't be related to XP in any way... How about 5?"
"That's it! But make it 7. Windows 7! Everyone knows 7's the charm. And, it'll go over in the boardrooms too."
Just another "Cubible(sic) Joe" 2 17 3061
I consider Bloat to be that which directly affects performance of the OS. I see comments on here about Outlook Express and such. These are not bloat as they take up minimal space and do not cause any performance hit to the PC to sit there on a hard drive. They don't even cause fragmentation if you don't use them. EVERY OS you put on a PC today for a common desktop comes with a basic e-mail client, browser, a firewall, etc. With today's TB drives, I could care less if the OS takes 3 GB or even 10 GB.
Others bits however do cause bloat when they are loaded/launched by default when I never asked for them to be, like Messenger, Offline Folders, etc. Services that I neither want, nor can I easily remove as they are constantly put back on with every service pack. In Vista, Offline Folders (MOBSYNC) thrashes the hard drive and takes anywhere from 30-60 percent of the cpu cycles, even though I've never even used it. I can't remove it. I was forced to remove permissions to the executable. How sick is that?
When MS disables these software/services by default, then I will consider it less bloated. Much like they did for Server 2003 when it came with most options disabled or not even installed by default. It was a step in the right direction.
So Windows 7 drive letters start with a floppy disk on drive Z:\? That's cooool.
The last time I tried to use Microsoft Word (2003 version) it crashed and destroyed my document. I literally cannot imagine how bad something has to be in order to do that. I was also told that OOo probably could have retrieved the corrupted document, but I restarted with reStructured Text. It took a third of the time to redo the document and get something that looked good.
I'm convinced that Word processing as a concept has totally failed. I'm not talking desktop publishing, but simply writing a simple document. Microsoft Word has become so grotesquely overburdened with features, many of which are, for all intents and purposes, completely nondeterministic in their behavior, at least to a non-expert user. OOo Write is substantially better, and I found it to be quite usable, and certainly spent an order of magnitude less time struggling to get a fairly simple document with some nice formatting and simple tables than it did when I tried to do the same thing in Word. Frankly, I think the only kind of "word processing" that anyone should use is markup. Anything with a GUI that I have every used (except Wordpad... I like Wordpad, it does one simple thing well, like good software is supposed to) is a wholly inefficient to create documents.
If I hired a company and they delivered Microsoft Word, I would consider their work not just unacceptable but criminally negligent. I literally cannot understand how people can tolerate to use it, and it is a tribute to the incredible power that Microsoft wields as a monopoly that something this horrible and poorly designed is the most popular word processor.
However, despite my superlative rhetoric, I consider Lotus Notes even worse.
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
No, they're not. Mostly because their business practices haven't changed much, even if their code was any good.
C|N>K
A lot of buisnesses who care about security updates will be interested in moving direct from XP to 7 (most buisnesses have skipped vista afaict).
Most will probablly do it by reimaging anyway though.
note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
Hear! Hear!
A worthy rant, IMO.
I agree with you.
As for Lotus Notes, I truly despise that evil mess. I would still rather use it than MS Office, even though it is:
Slow
Butt Ugly(tm)
Bug infested
Chaotic, horrendous UI
Did I mention slow?
ad nauseum
For me, it is still easier for me to use than MS Office.
Down With Slashdot BETA!!! I've been around the corner and seen the oliphant; you can only abuse me from your perspecti
Of course goncept knows this, but attacking someone's valid argument by attacking used hyperbole within that argument is a good way to try to discredit the entire argument itself, without actually having to counter the argument with own real arguments. After that attention is further diverted away from the original argument by stating that it's all not that much different than we already have.
Nihil in publicum sputa.
So since Microsoft is basically saying that since vista was a mistake because it was too clunky and big. Does that mean they're going to make it better and give me Windows 7 for free? Don't I deserve to have it on my PC that's been running slow for the past 2 years? Haven't I suffered enough, or do I need to shell out some more cash?
http://www.hanselman.com/blog/DellMini9PracticalDevelopersReview.aspx
or maybe you are just lazy, ignorant, irrational.
Before you spout - try it.
You are right! I just uninstalled IE and everything is just fi
No sig for now.
No, that is why I wrote "copyright law places restrictions on that ownership". One can resell a copyrighted work, burn it, cut it into pieces, add stuff to it, send it to the moon, modify it, do all sorts of stuff one can do with non-copyrighted stuff, except for selling copies.
Wenn ist das Nunstueck git und Slotermeyer? Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput.
Copying Xerox?
[head asplode]
I wanna get me a drink of what the summary writer has! It must be awesome to live in a surreal dimension where Microsoft is motivated by quality and customer feedback. Alas, in mine they are an out-of-touch monolithic megacorp trying to sell the same turd over and over with different looking buttons. Their "swallow our cock whole and like it" philosophy never changes, really.
I'm a regular slashdot lurker, though admittedly I can't muster the hatred for microsoft that most people have.
This leads to the question, are we pro open-source, or anti-microsoft. I ask because the biggest competitor for MS right now seems to be OSX, which is yet another commercial OS.
I'm definitely in favor of open-source, but if we're worried about a microsoft monopoly, wouldn't other commercial software serve the same end.
Not suggesting we replace one dictator with another, but I can't deny, as an end user, that OSX and Windows are easier to use.
I think it is too late, and Oracle has beat them in the long term strategy by far just because of this.
We are Turing O-Machines. The Oracle is out there.
Are they breaking the law?
Are they using open formats instead of bribing people to promote their own?
There are many questions you can ask to know if MS deserves to have a better image. Releasing a product that may or may not be technically better is no reason for a change about how this company is perceived, since lack of quality of their products is one of the least important things in the great scheme of things.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Thanks for the plug, I'd never heard of LXDE before, but it looks interesting. I've got an old iBook G4 that runs Tiger, but at a speed that's just barely usable. I was considering putting Xubuntu on it (Ubuntu with XFCE), but I think I'll put on a CLI-only Ubuntu install to start and try LXDE instead out of curiosity (quite easy to do now since they've apparently added LXDE to the Intrepid repos). :)
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
Hello.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blizzard_v._BnetD
Appellants failed to establish a genuine issue of material fact as to the applicability of the interoperability exception [of the DMCA].
The courts ruled on DMCA bullstuff, not EULA bullstuff
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glider_(bot)
Good day to you.
I can't read the order, but..
In July 2008, the court entered summary judgment holding Glider's creators liable for tortious interference and copyright infringement, based, in part, upon the legal premise that users of the World of Warcraft client software are licensees rather than owners of their copy of software.
being a licensee vs an owner of an artifact is orthogonal to copyright infringement, which is covered by UCITA. I may or may not be the owner of the artifact which I'm illegal distributing. It is still illegal to copy and distribute someone else's work without permission. Either way, this is a recent decision that is (supposedly) to be appealed. It is one to watch, though. It could be the case that finally gives some legal teeth to hidden EULAs, or exposes them for the frauds they are.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba