Windows 7 Anti-Piracy Plans

Slatterz writes "Microsoft has announced that the forthcoming Windows 7 operating system will contain a number of piracy 'tweaks' it says are designed to protect the interests of customers. Under the new regime users will be expected to validate their software in a much more precise way than before. Other Microsoft operating systems and anti-piracy measures, including Windows Genuine Advantage, allowed users to delay 'activation,' but Windows 7 will make it harder to ignore repeated messages. According to Joe Williams, general manager for Worldwide Genuine Windows at Microsoft, counterfeit software 'delivers a poor experience and impacts customer satisfaction with our products, particularly if users do not know that their software is non-genuine.' Williams gave the example of one piracy exploit that caused more than a million reported system crashes on machines running non-genuine Windows Vista before Microsoft was able to resolve it."

Comments

I Hope They Get Anti-Piracy to Work This Time

[eldavojohn]

So they can halve their user-share.

Re:I Hope They Get Anti-Piracy to Work This Time

[spud603]

You have it backwards. If hacking the copy protection is harder, then that just makes the task that much more alluring.

Re:I Hope They Get Anti-Piracy to Work This Time

[Grimbleton]

My aunt is of the "Buy new computer when kids fuck up OS by downloading any random shit they come across" mentality.

I don't mind. I get a reasonably-new computer every year to cannibalize for parts out of it.

I wish she'd just let me fix it so she could buy a much nicer computer for them to really break something in every two years for better parts...

Hasn't MS learned *anything* over the years?

[Smidge207]

It's amazing that after all this time Microsoft still believe they can win the fight against piracy. As long as there is someone that builds anti-piracy measures in there will be people willing to hack around and take them out. Equal and opposite forces. Look at the iPhone for example; it took very little time for people with no previous knowledge of the device to have a working solution for jailbreaking the phone and installing pirated apps. MS needs to come up with viable solutions instead of crippling the user's experience.

Oh, shit, that's right, we're talking about Microsoft. Never mind; carry on with Ubuntu installs. ;-)

=Smidge=

Re:Hasn't MS learned *anything* over the years?

[MikeUW]

If you make the process difficult enough, people will give up!

Sounds like the first few times I tried to switch to Linux.

*ducks*

Re:What does that say about the product?

[Captain Spam]

"You see, when counterfeit software shows up in the hands of some unlucky customer, Big Louie, an associate of ours, shows up as well. After a spirited discussion of the matter with said customer, Big Louie tells us that the customer does not approve of the resulting experience counterfeit software brings and much prefers the experience of genuine software, wherein Big Louie does not intervene."

Re:but it's now WAT instead of WGA

[Amazing Quantum Man]

Soon they will rename it as "*The* Windows Activation Technologies", at which point it will be known as TWAT.