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Free Netbook From Microsoft, Then Things Got Weird

Posted by samzenpus on from the you-get-what-you-pay-for dept.

paiute writes "Matt Karolian, a Marketing Communications major at Emerson College in Boston 'won' a netbook in a Microsoft re-tweet competition (whatever that is). Then the prize arrived, and it was not exactly the high-quality major award he had expected from Microsoft."

17 comments

  1. Who cares? by dsavi · · Score: 1

    Really, who cares? I'd just do a few virus/rootkit scans (Or whatever it is you do with Windows) and use it. I mean, it's a netbook, and you got it for free.

    1. Re:Who cares? by Yvan256 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Forget virus/rootkit scans. Nuke it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure.

      (in this case, replace "nuke it from orbit" with "install Linux on it")

    2. Re:Who cares? by antdude · · Score: 1

      What if the hardwares are rootkitted? :P

      --
      Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
  2. Licenses. by baldusi · · Score: 2, Informative

    Unless he uses Linux, FreeBSD or any other OSS, he's exposing himself to infringing on Microsoft copyright (how can that be penalized more heavily than physical robbery, is beyond me).
    And he has just make a very public questioning of the legality of his software ownership.
    I do think he should press to get proper licensing. How does he knows that it was properly activated and it's not a crack? WPA itself has lots of false negatives as it is.

    1. Re:Licenses. by Penguinoflight · · Score: 2, Informative

      While it's clear that publishing something like this could raise some flags I have to disagree. If he wants to keep the system as-is then documenting the received condition should serve to protect him.

      Lack of a COA is not lack of proper licensing. There's nothing that requires Microsoft to provide a COA with a promotional item, and should there be a case brought against the new owner it's still the copyright holder's responsibility to prove the lack of license and the presence of use.

      --
      "And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World"
      1 John 4:14
  3. Whatever by jamesccostello · · Score: 1

    Wipe hard drive. Start over. Don't worry about how you got the computer, just enjoy. end of story.

  4. Gifted horse? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Ever heard a saying "do not look a gifted horse in the mouth"? You got a free laptop, shut up and enjoy it. I hope this will be a warning for any other company to never give you anything else for free.

    1. Re:Gifted horse? by dollar99 · · Score: 1

      Microsoft should have hired an 'A' list actress to ride to his house in a limousine, hand deliver the prize, and punch that crybaby in the face!

    2. Re:Gifted horse? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I looked in Mr. Eds mouth once, looked like a normal horse (although I was told he could talk). Don't know what all the hubbub is about these gifted horses...I mean, my horse is gifted too.

      No horse left behind!

  5. Re:Free lappy and you complain? by Nadaka · · Score: 1

    honestly? I would uninstall office 2007 and replace it with anything that doesn't have that horrific abomination of a ribbon. Ok, so some people like it. But would it have been that hard to give the option to use a classic menu based interface?

  6. Ribbon isn't that bad by tepples · · Score: 1

    For one thing, I'm not so sure that the tabbed toolbar that Microsoft calls "ribbon" is such a "horrific abomination" as you call it. Sure, it takes some of the limited vertical screen space away from the document, but that can be changed. Double-click one of the tab titles to minimize the ribbon, and it will act a lot like traditional menus, just across instead of down.

    For another, Office 2007 applications started faster on my work PC than recent OpenOffice.org did when I tried both a couple years ago.

    1. Re:Ribbon isn't that bad by Nadaka · · Score: 1

      I have a perfectly good copy of office 2003 I use regularly with standard menu's and keyboard shortcuts.

      And open office recently had a major boost in performance in its latest release. Comparing vs a few years ago may be doing yourself a disservice.

      Unless you use spreadsheets a lot, Oo still has a long way to go there.

    2. Re:Ribbon isn't that bad by tepples · · Score: 1

      Unless you use spreadsheets a lot

      That I do. Also, I'm trying to transition my employer from an off-the-shelf inventory and order management solution based on Access+VBA to an in-house web-based one that runs on LAMP.

  7. He should know better by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    > ..it was not exactly the high-quality major award he had expected from Microsoft."

    Expecting anything high quality from Microsoft is a mistake.

  8. Test PC? by tafkadasoh · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This looks like a test PC. Hardware vendors ship their newest products to big software companies so they can play around with it, check performance, etc. I'm guessing some product manager got one, used it for a couple of weeks to test Win7+Office. Then he/she got a newer model, so he/she gave the old one away in this contest and forgot to wipe the hard drive. So keep the Key. Maybe it's an internal debug key you can use forever on any machine...

  9. boxxxxxx by screamphilling · · Score: 1

    Like the other guy said, might've been a test device. Sounds like _______ department within Microsoft allowed the dude to run his own contest or something. I'm sure microsoft employees have access to as many copies of Windows as they could possibly want... maybe the upgrade was a courtesy? and boxes are wonderful for re-using. Alot of geeks aren't known for aesthetiics... so the dude takes the initiative to ship a laptop. *cry* also I worked at UPS and I saw boxes take some damage