Slashdot Mirror
Windows 7 To Sell In UK For Half the US Price
An anonymous reader writes "In the UK, a full version of Windows 7 Home Premium is going to cost less than half the price Americans will have to pay, and in fact less than Americans have to pay just for the upgrade-only edition. Full details and prices were published in an article on CNet, in which it was concluded that, at least for the time being, Microsoft is honoring the prices it set for the now-discontinued European version of Win7, which did not contain Internet Explorer 8 and was only available as a full-install edition."
Do Yanks start ordering from amazon.co.uk?
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
I guess they're pricing it for their target market? Surely nobody would ship a copy from the UK over to North America!
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
...most will just DL it anyhow...does it really matter? ;)
This will lead to people indulging in arbitrage.
Unless, of course, Microsoft has somehow put in a mechanism that disables a UK-bought Windows 7 when someone attempts to install it on a computer located in the US.
This reminds me of a story once told by Nicholas Wirth:
When he was in Europe - they called him 'Nicholas Wirth', the correct pronunciation.
When he was in USA - they called him 'Nickles Worth', the incorrect pronunciation.
He inferred this was because whilst in Europe they called him by name, when in USA they called him by value.
Well Microsoft seems to have definitely reversed that with this decision.
EMail: 0110001101100010010000000110001101110010 0110000101111010011011100110000101110010 0010111001100011011011110110
$29 for Snow Leopard!?
Congratulations Steve, I'm installing OSX in a VM soon.
"Sorrow is better than laughter, for by sadness of face the heart is made glad." [Ecclesiastes 7:3]
We've got region coding on DVDs that does the same thing -- different prices for different markets because we all know that "one market" just isn't right. We must have several markets because different markets will bear different amounts. It would definitely be counter-productive to not take advantage of markets that will pay more or those that will only pay less.
It also makes sense that markets that are more likely to switch to Linux or Mac OS X should pay less and that markets that are less likely to switch should pay more. I have pondered the notion of how a national switch to Linux could work out for any nation and I have to say, it's really hard to imagine. But with that said, the entire globe managed to switch to the metric system, including the U.K. Oh wait, not the entire world... the U.S. is a hold-out... is the U.S. the *last* hold-out? (I dunno) So while the world might switch away from Windows, the U.S. is probably the least likely to make that change.
Is it illegal to fix prices like this? It is in the U.S. It is in other countries. But is it illegal to fix prices for specific countries so long as the whole country is included in that fixed price? I guess so since no one is charging Microsoft with any crimes... yet...
Y'all know that £20 isn't really half as much spending power as $40, right?
Better known as 318230.
Dear Microsoft,
I read recently that you have decided to cut Windows 7's price in the UK to about half of what it is here in the US. I don't feel that it does justice to us here in the States, as we're actually getting less value than your UK market.
Take, for example, all the U's that have been dropped from words. My color is not colour, but yet, I have to pay more for the lack of the U. This is unfair. Has the cost of cutting U's from words taken a sharp climb?
Perhaps the letter Z is charging too much these days, and I know how that can be. It only makes sparse appearances in words such as localize and marginalize, but despite its rare occurrence, it, much like a has-been movie star, has the gall to demand top billing. Perhaps your royalties payable to this (not)under-appreciated letter raise the costs here in the US.
Whatever the reasoning, I still find it unfair, and being such a large and powerful corporation, the fact that you can be taken advantage of like this is not only sad, but reprehensible. Use those lawyers of yours and get back at them! Hey, you can even be on the winning end of an anti-trust suit... think of the headlines now: "'Z' Loses Anti-Trust Judgement Thanks to Microsoft". Won't that be good press?
Sincerely,
A Concerned Citizen
PS - This message has been brought to you by the letter 5.
The price for my country was going to be twice that in the US, let alone the UK. I dont remember any outrage about that.
Yea, it sucks, but other people most probably have it worse off than you do. Or they use linux.
$29 is for an upgrade from Leopard. Apparently you cannot upgrade straight from Tiger, and it's unlikely to work standalone if that's your idea.
MS, like many American companies, are fleecing the country. We are regularly charged top prices for drugs, Windows software, Iron, Labor, etc. Heck, the neo-cons passed a drug policy that has the US gov paying the TOP dollar for the drugs, rather than the bottom, even though we are the largest customer. Absolutely ridiculous.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
According to amazon.co.uk, since I am running XP, I could get a vista home premium upgrade for £60, and they will throw in a full windows 7 home premium free..
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/feature.html/ref=amb_link_84366313_1?ie=UTF8&docId=1000321063&pf_rd_m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_s=special-product-offers-3&pf_rd_r=1N0XDYG13SRJD90788PR&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_p=470374053&pf_rd_i=B0013O54P8
Come as you are, do what you must, be who you will.
It won't cost you anything if you don't buy it. There are alternatives.
I prefer rogues to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.
Win7 is selling for half the price over 'ome? Does this mean UK residents are twice as smart as their American counterparts?
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
MS, like many American companies, are fleecing the country.
GB prices for tech are usually close to the same number of pounds as dollars things have eased a bit recently, here are two random examples:
* New Apple iPod Touch 8GB 2nd Generation (amazon UK), £152 = $250
* ditto (amazon US), $215 -> UK one is only 16% more
* Dell M17X laptop (UK), £1699 = $2815
* ditto (US), $1799 -> saving $1000 by purchasing in the US vs in the UK where it is 56% more expensive
Last year it was about $2 = £1; http://www.google.co.uk/finance?q=GBPUSD
You were saying ...? This would make it even more extraordinary for Win 7 to be cheaper here, but when I look ...
* Win 7 ultimate (amazon UK), £170 = $280
* ditto (amazon US), $220 -> so only $60 / 27% more and the UK price is a "discounted" one from an RRP (recommended price) of £230
Um?
so you might as well just download yourself a copy since you'll be in "violation" of said license either way.
Violation of an EULA is not even the remote equivalent of violation of copyright law.
My pics.
"There are alternatives."
Arrrr, that thar be matey!
Now that the Philippines has switched, I think it is just Liberia and Burma left. And England still uses miles sometime, where appropriate.
For the record, Celsius sucks for the "how warm is it today?" question (the scale based on 0-100% is better), Meters suck for "how big is this object I hold?" question, and using a drill size 1/64th bigger than the O.D. of the bolt to make the hole just the right size is an inelegant hack in metric sizing.
None the less, the inefficiency the US carries around with it must have some huge long term detriment to the economy, and it's completely wrong on so many levels that NASA refuses to convert to metric.
~.~
I'm a peripheral visionary.
All crimes against Profit are equally serious, comrade citizen...
another example: when working with a (foot long) wrench or spanner, with the Foot-pound you can simply & intuitively feel how much force to apply. With the Newton-Meter you need a special gauge to know.
~.~
I'm a peripheral visionary.
It's cheaper and you don't have to manually eradicate Internet Explorer?
Where do I sign up?!
[Metric system -] is the U.S. the *last* hold-out?
Nope, you're in good company with Myanmar (Burma) and Liberia.
(less facetiously, the UK still uses miles for distances and miles per hour for speed, and fair number of people still use feet & inches for human height)
Man who leaps off cliff jumps to conclusion.
Don't matter a lot. It is still several times its cost, and thousands of times its value.
He never said the VM wouldn't be on an Apple machine...
so about the same as us oem price?
You need a new hobby. You managed to nail every Microsoft/Win 7 slashdot talking point in one post. What are the rest of us supposed to talk about now?
moox. for a new generation.
Alternatives? Really? What other, non-Microsoft OSes can I get that will run my existing Windows software?
Modern copyright is theft of culture from everyone and it retards the progress of the useful arts and sciences.
The funniest thing about that post is that you didn't even manage to spell his name properly!
It's all simple and intuitive when it's the system you've been taught and used since childhood. Trust me, for someone who's been using metric for all his life, meters and kilograms and degrees Celsius are perfectly easy to use and intuitive, while your pounds, feet, and Fahrenheit are totally weird and incomprehensible. Especially conversions between them.
12 inches in a foot, but 3 feet in a yard - why? And 1760 yards in a mile - gosh, how convenient that must be. Even better when you get to area and volume units - I mean, 1728 cubic inch in a cubic foot sure roll from the tongue, and is easy to remember as well. And 1 acre being 43560 square inch is so obvious! If that wasn't enough, you have separate units of volume, which follow their own, mixed 2/4-based progression (unlike mixed 3/4-based for length) - gallon/quart/pint. I also love how there's 16 ounces in a pound, but then 2000 pounds in a short ton - hey, it's almost metric - yay for consistency!
All the claims about Imperial being more "natural" or easier to use are pure bullshit. The only difference between the systems is that one is decimal-friendly and consistent, and another is not.
it's also Not A Viable Option. Really, they should call it "WINAVO"
Americans pay double; to recover the cost of IE development
lots of alternatives.
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
it's pretty much the same thing since a EULA is an agreement with the copyright holder
Wrong.
My pics.
And 1 acre being 43560 square inch is so obvious!
No, it's 43560 square feet in an acre, not square inches though I guess you sort of proved your point as you confused the units while describing how much harder it is to remember conversions in english units versus metric units.
12 inches in a foot, but 3 feet in a yard - why?
We prefer to ask "Why not?" ;)
The only difference between the systems is that one is decimal-friendly and consistent, and another is not.
That's not true. One was designed by the French and the other was not. That's all most Americans need to hear. I've often thought we should invent our own base ten measurement system and impose it on the rest of the world out of sheer spite ;) If they do make us switch to metric then the least we can do is come up with new names for the measurements. Millifreedom, centifreedom, freedom and kilofreedom sounds like a good replacement for millimeters, centimeters, meters and kilometers. Celsius could be replaced with "Jefferson's" and kilograms with "Franklin's". Still trying to come up with a good wholesome name for liters -- any suggestions?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Oh, I see your all getting your panties in a bunch when someone else is getting it cheaper!
What about Australia where I recall reading that Win7 is going to be substantially more expensive than the US (not sure about double, can't recall, but it was significantly more).
Didn't here boo from you cunts then did we? Except maybe the lame droll about convicts, living upside down etc.
dickheads...
Federal Law != Terms of a Contract
Artificially enforcing price discrimination should be illegal. Countries have used tariffs for many years to try to balance the value of a cheaper import good with that which is produced locally to make their own products more competitive.
One example of the end result is a huge glut of corn syrup usage in american foods, whereas if there were no tariffs on cane sugar importation, sugar would once again be the primary sweetener used in food industry instead of corn syrup. This is market inefficiency at its finest.
Perfect discrimination is the antithesis of a free market, where the populace collectively determines the value of a product based on what the populace is willing to pay. Imagine instead if Microsoft really had to compete for it's operating system market share-a huge chunk of their marketing budget, which is formidable, would be reallocated to development. The end result would be a better OS.
A sure indicator of the absence of free market ideals in Microsoft is their absurd profit and the proportions of money they spend on lobbying, marketing and PR versus what they spend on development. In a free market, companies compete on value, price, quality, etc. MS' only real competition is legislators and government actions.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.
$29 is for an upgrade from Leopard. Apparently you cannot upgrade straight from Tiger, and it's unlikely to work standalone if that's your idea.
There's a straight upgrade from Tiger if you have intel machine
And it will cost $169 (the same price as previous Box Sets). A great deal, but it's not the $29 OS-only option that Leopard users get.
From Apple's OS X specs page:
If your Intel-based Mac is running Mac OS X v10.4 Tiger, purchase the Mac Box Set (when available), which is a single, affordable package that includes Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard; iLife '09, with the latest versions of iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand, iWeb, and iDVD; and iWork '09,
TO START
PRESS ANY KEY
Where's the 'ANY' key? I see Esk, Kitarl, and Pig-Up...
There's one more difference. One system of measure has a group of people so convinced it's the best thing ever that they think the law should prohibit people from using any other.
If the metric system is so great, why is it necessary to try to force people to use it? Let people use whatever measuring system they find most useful and if the metric system is better, it'll become dominant.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
He never said the VM wouldn't be on an Apple machine...
Funny, but I find it flabbergasting that Apple still does not allow non-server versions of OS X to run in a virtual machine, even on an Apple machine:
TO START
PRESS ANY KEY
Where's the 'ANY' key? I see Esk, Kitarl, and Pig-Up...
You're asking the wrong question. You should ask yourself what tasks you are trying to accomplish. If it then turns out the only software available to accomplish those tasks runs on Windows, bad luck. But if you're focusing on applications instead of tasks, yeah, you'll never find an alternative.
Mart
"I know I will be modded down for this": where's the option '-1, Asking for it'?
So like the TFA says, for once the British aren't going to be screwed over by having to pay Yank prices in Sterling. At a time before the recession hit and the exchange rate was sitting nicely at US$2 for 1GBP this was sadly never translated into the Interenets SUper-Combobulating-Exchange-Calculator that all multi-nationals selling software or hardware in the UK and US seemed to use that seemed to be closer to a US$1 to GBP1 mapping. iTunes store and most Apple products being notable offenders. I for one am sick of being shafted for my lunch money by greedy companies.
Yes. I am British.
Let me rephrase it. Can you "feel" what 20 kg weighs like? Most people can. Would you feel comfortable to apply approximately 20 kg of force at the end of a socket wrench? Most people would, it's intuitive and you have experience in how much force* that is. That's how easy a foot-pound is. It's a pound of force at the end of a foot long tool. Now, could you - off the street with no training - trust yourself to apply 60 Newton-meters of force on a socket wrench? No idea how much that is? Exactly my point.
First of all, newton-meters do not measure force. Newtons measure force. Newton-meters measure torque.
Also, given that newton is ~1/10 (not exactly, but good enough for the situation you describe) of "kg of force", and given that you admit that it's not a problem to "feel" and intuitively apply force in kg, why would I have a problem in applying them? I just divide by 10.
As for "how hot is it today?", surely a scale based roughly on 0-100% of full scale is more natural to the answer than one based on the boiling point of a common liquid.
On whose full scale? Los Angeles? Toronto? Vilnius? Norilsk?
By the way, defining 0 as a freezing point is actually pretty damn convenient when speaking of weather specifically, since you know immediately whether to expect snow (and ice on roads) or rain.
$29 is for an upgrade from Leopard. Apparently you cannot upgrade straight from Tiger, and it's unlikely to work standalone if that's your idea.
Only to an insane person would that sentence make a modicum of sense. Or a mac owner. :D
Or just plain "WHINE".
A good education is a bit like a STD - it makes you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and gives you a desire to spread it.
Except, according to the Oxford dictionary, realize is more correct (because of its Greek origins). The use of -ise instead of -ize is a recent British innovation (recent in the sense of the last century or so) ... mainly so people don't misspell analyse the way we do (which is not of Greek origin). -ize is one of the rare cases where the North American spelling is actually closer to traditional, "correct" English than the UK -ise ... in stark contrast to almost every other difference between the two ("tire" vs. "tyre", "color" vs. "colour", "jewelry" vs. "jewellery") where the UK spelling is more correct and often more nuanced.
Not that it matters ... I can't spell on either side of the pond.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
For just about every other piece of software on the planet, the UK pays much more and often twice as much as the US does. Adobe are one of the worst in this respect but previous MS operating systems have been *far* cheaper in the US than here.
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
That's decimal v duodecimal (base 10 v base 12), not imperial v metric. Egg packing doesn't have much to do with either measurement system. They still sell eggs in boxes of 6 or 12 in the UK. Sometimes they sell 10, or 4, or 9.
You could use metric in base 12 (e.g. 2a88 m) if it's useful enough to you.
(PS, it's "honey, I have eleven left". We have a base-12 language up to 12, eleven and twelve have their own words, thirteen doesn't, it means three-ten. It's more obvious in something like German: zehn (10), elf, zwolf, dreizehn, vierzehn.)
You know MS make more money out of Europe than they do out of the US? I say Windows should default to damn UK English on UK keyboards, but it ain't gonna happen. And the reason "nobody buys it" is circular with the reason it's been removed in the first place - nobody buys things like Windows "N" because, basically, you can't from any of the retailers that sell OS pre-installed computers, because Microsoft basically make it prohibitive on a business basis. It's virtually impossible to find - I don't know of a single retailer (even Dell, etc.) that offer it. And because of that, that's why they are under investigation STILL for monopolistic practices.
If you're THAT reliant on a single *application*, you have bigger problems anyway. What if the application breaks, or its creator goes out of business, or become vulnerable to a serious security flaw that doesn't get updated for years, etc.?
If your data is THAT important, you'd at least secure something - whether that be the application (e.g. by bringing it in-house and doing it yourself) or the data (by using more standardised formats, etc.)
"Switching applications", "Switching OS", etc. should be TRANSPARENT to any business that relies on its data that badly. Otherwise the disappearance or modification of those things will break the business, not just the computer system, and permanently, not just for a day or two.
You should ask yourself what tasks you are trying to accomplish.
Develop Windows software.
Don't be intentionally dense and dramatic. Every corporation desires perfect discrimination, where each customer is given the opportunity to pay the largest sum they think it is worth. I don't blame companies for seeking discrimination because that's what they do-make money. Microsoft hasn't suffered any downward pressure in pricing from the free market on it's OS products in 15 years due to their illegal monopoly.
No, I don't want to "interfere" with the consensual purchase of any MS product. What I would like to see is that any person, anywhere can buy any MS product they want without licensing restrictions forbidding it. So if a Mandarin speaking customer in the US wants to buy the Chinese version from a Chinese vendor for a fraction of what everyone else pays, the EULA can't deny you a license to use based on your location.
It's a global marketplace, but Microsoft, and more so the MPAA, view each country as a little isolated retail island. MS uses EULA terms to enforce this, and the MPAA has DMCA-backed region coding.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.