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Is Onlive Pirating Windows and Will It Cost Them?
An anonymous reader writes "When Onlive, the network gaming company, started offering not just Microsoft Windows but Microsoft Office for free on the iPad, and now on Android, it certainly seemed too good to be true. Speculation abounded on what type of license they could be using to accomplish this magical feat. From sifting through Microsoft's licenses and speaking with sources very familiar with them, the ugly truth may be that they can't."
Is it their fault that Microsoft didn't think they were literal when they wrote the planet Earth in as their location?
They are probably using the SPLA for this. That allows you to license software for your service on a monthly basis.
(i know, i know.. i will punish myself later)
i read this as being: onlive is not presently legit but microsoft is playing nice (i.e. squeezing them for every last nickel without involving more than a few lawyers) for now -- until they lose patience (or feel threatened by being beating to market by an upstart.. not once but twice) and bring the sledgehammer down on onlive's entire business model -- windows and office desktop and gaming platform (xbox and windows games, at least)
, the ugly truth may be that they can't.
Well, no, not in your crappy backwater country, and not with some locked down hardware like an ipad. But in more sensible and advanced societies like, er, China, these kinds of things are readily available, and cheaper too.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
If Amazon EC2 can license Windows, surely OnLive can. Microsoft won't turn down an opportunity to make more money.
Well, everyone is different. I can't stand OSX and Ubuntu. So what!
As a contractor, I have to work in all of them - they are all as bad (or good) as each other. Just different.
Also, the users bitch about each of them equally.
Windows desktop operating system and Microsoft Office system licenses do not permit renting, leasing, or outsourcing the software to a third party. As a result, many organizations that rent, lease, or outsource desktop PCs to third parties (such as Internet cafés, hotel and airport kiosks, business service centers, and office equipment leasing companies) are not in compliance with Microsoft license requirements. Rental Rights are a simple way for organizations to get a waiver of these licensing restrictions through a one-time license transaction valid for the term of the underlying software license or life of the PC.
Nevermind I looked it up at https://partner.microsoft.com/40104043
Anyone who needs to run Windows-exclusive apps.
In other words, most businesses and their employees.
I would argue quite the opposite, most business and employees actually only need a small subset of the features that Microsoft's products have, and most of these features have been replicated or improved upon by free software.
Especially where Office is concerned.
Hardly. There are lots of other productivity suites that are good in the baseline features, but those are almost certainly going to be MORE suitable for home than business users.
No open source software that I've seen handles docx halfway as well as Word 2007 and Word 2010. "Good enough", as in "this wordprocessing software is good enough for almost all needs" is a given, but that's not really the question. You're talking about sixteen or seventeen years of Office dominance here, coupled with Exchange. Do you understand the manpower that would be required to convert a large company from Office-Exchange to something else (assuming that something else was in fact an improvement in any real sense).
I'll concede right now that I loath Exchange. I hate it. I hate everything about. I hate how brittle aspects of it are, the bizarre dependencies with other systems like IIS which means if .NET/ASP takes a nosedive, your clients suddenly find out they've lost a whole lot of functionality. Believe me, I've had many sleepless nights over Windows because it's seemingly easy configurations are filled with pitfalls. I love the *nix world where you can got "cp worldsmostimportant.conf worldsmostimportant.conf.bak" and muck around to my hearts content with the config, knowing I can pretty much wipe out any changes by inverting the command and restarting the daemon. At heart, I'm a *nix man and have been for over two decades. I fit *nix and open source solutions in wherever I can.
But at the end of the day, my boss and my coworkers are expecting to walk in, log on to their Windows workstation, start up Outlook, work on their budget in Excel and read the latest business requirements documentation in Word. I hand them Zimbra and LibreOffice, and it's going to be nasty. Eventually I might calm the waters, but then someone is inevitably going to get some Word 2010 document with wild formatting and it's going to open up in LibreOffice like the dog just puked on the screen, and then I'm going to get demands for solutions, and the only solution is going to be "I guess we should have Word on there."
In the long term, Microsoft's dominance even in the business world will begin to wane, no doubt about it. As more tablets and smartphones make their way in, and the requirements of more open document standards and protocols become clear, things will change. But until then, and as ugly as it sometimes is, in the big world, Exchange-Office are still way ahead.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
TFA:
> The Windows 7 desktop just plain can’t be rented
I guess it's not precisely Windows 7, but I seem to be able to rent full Windows instances from EC2 for .12 / hour.
And that's not even taking into account the fact that they might want to PRINT the document.
Printing on Linux is easy if you happen to have one of the supported printers and the driver is decent.
If your printer is older and works fine in Windows or Mac, or newer, but for whatever reason there's no linux driver for it, you're pretty much SOL.
Same goes for scanners.
This space available.
Seriously with Ubuntu Linux finally showing some decent polish and usability (yes yes I am referring to Unity which I have gotten used to) and OSX also available who really shives a git about Microsoft?
Anyone who needs to run Windows-exclusive apps.
In other words, most businesses and their employees.
Don't forget anyone who wants to play recent video games.
Actually, there are several different Microsoft documents which say precisely that Office can be licensed per processor. However, I couldn't find anyone who had actually done it that way. So for the article I listed the license as a possibility, since I couldn't exclude it, but not a probability, since no one could confirm it. For example, the SPLA datasheet explicitly cites Office as being available per processor: download.microsoft.com/download/7/a/a/.../spla_datasheet.pdf. If you can prove that the datasheet is wrong, we can certainly update the article, otherwise the insults ring pretty hollow.--David Cardinal
I migrated 80 people from Exchange to Google Apps, Office to LibreOffice, etc. It can be done, you just need support from management.
Outlook? Web-based Google Apps mail. Calendar? Same thing. Office? LibreOffice. The only internal servers we have left are 2 AD servers and a fileserver; I plan on moving that to Box.net/Dropbox/Gdrive at some point.
Linux printing is easy and has been for some time. Ditto scanning. There are a few unsupported printers, but they're the real cheap pieces of shit.
Those who ignore Unix are doomed to reimplement it, poorly.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
"Legal considerations" as in major contract strictly prohibits using Google, and while .doc support is at a reasonable level, .docx support just plain sucks.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Though MM may in fact use *nix solutions as stated, I find the opening line of that post is disingenuous as worded, so I've edited it here to make it more obvious what is being said:
No open source software that I've seen handles the Microsoft proprietary format docx halfway as well as the Microsoft native applications for the format, Word 2007 and Word 2010.
Bolding mine, to point out the obvious deficiencies of that argument.
User eldorel is right, even if the pro-MS crowd doesn't like to admit it.
most business and employees actually only need a small subset of the features that Microsoft's products have, and most of these features have been replicated or improved upon by free software.
Especially where Office is concerned.
It has been widely touted that Office 07 and 10 both have support for ODF, though from what I've read in articles I understand it to be better implemented in 10. As a true cross-platform, cross-app standard, perhaps a "professional" IT person relied upon by otherwise unknowing end users might suggest that their company begin using *that* as the way in which to author and save their documents. Doing so just might create a result better than "the dog just puked on the screen" when a document happens to be opened by someone using a different brand of the same type of application. That's the whole point of the thing, really, isn't it? So why should we not support that, for the sake of our end users? In order to promote/prop up the MS hegemony? Not a good idea, from where I sit.
"...there are some things that can beat smartness and foresight. Awkwardness and stupidity can." ~ Mark Twain
The developers are all using Visual Studio through Win2k8 Remote Desktop services on their Macbooks, and we're working towards having them develop completely in browser-based IDEs. We eventually plan on having only Windows on the server side (SQL server, CruiseControl CI autobuild environment).
Mind explaining why? Serious question... because it sounds like you're deliberately setting yourselves up to ensure that you have the worst of all possible worlds. Buying employees MacBooks so they can access Windows-only software through Remote Desktop, just by itself, sounds like madness. And yet if you really don't want to have a Windows-centric environment, one would think the servers would be the first thing to go off Windows. Is there anything in your whole environment that you haven't managed to kluge, hobble, or overspend on?
Breakfast served all day!
Though MM may in fact use *nix solutions as stated, I find the opening line of that post is disingenuous as worded, so I've edited it here to make it more obvious what is being said:
No open source software that I've seen handles the Microsoft proprietary format docx halfway as well as the Microsoft native applications for the format, Word 2007 and Word 2010.
Bolding mine, to point out the obvious deficiencies of that argument.
I agree that your alteration makes his point clearer (although I'm unsure it was really necessary), but I'm not sure it's as much to the argument's detriment as you think. I'm probably going to come off as a Microsoft fanboy here, but so be it.
The reminder must be made that companies both create a legacy of existing files, and must use files by other companies. If you were to flick a magic switch, today, and have all your users understand a new suite of office applications and religiously save into an open format, you would in no way have solved your problems. Their blissful glee at being able to do what they were already doing but in a slightly different way would last until the moment they tried to open an existing file, or one from an external source, that "doesn't look right". And yes, I know I'm going over the same old points that get made, but I'd argue that 1) they're unfortunately still relevant, and 2) with respect, your own points aren't new either.
One additional aspect that usually gets skipped over is Microsoft Access. Yes yes, toy database, shouldn't be used in business etc etc, but we all know it does. I don't believe, and please correct me if I'm wrong because I haven't checked in a year or two, that any of the open source suites can attempt to open .mdb files. There are now open source Access-like systems to create databases, but again, what do you do about the legacy information? With databases, it's even more likely that these may be currently used, critical files.
As you've said, the starting point is probably to begin using the open document formats in Microsoft products, until all the documents made with older formats are simply not relevant anymore; for my part, our company has only migrated a few users to a version of Office new enough to *have* those formats, so I'm stuck with .doc whether I like it or not. In the end though, it's rather amusing to consider that if, one day, we find ourselves in a situation where the majority of files are created in an open format and switching to an open office suite is easy, it's likely because Microsoft bridged the gap this way.
There's no need for users to "understand a new suite of office applications" - simply for them to make "Save as ODF" their new default. Within a year, or at most 2-3 years, I'd doubt you would be running into any other format, even in your 'legacy' documents, because in a business most things written don't have a lifespan even that long. And you would still have the capability to open those much older formats, if the need arose. WRT databases, I agree that they would be a bigger issue.
.doc to .docx.
:)
As far as then having compatibility differences with documents from other companies, that is understandable/not unreasonable to expect. Some sort of educational campaign would come in handy to make this an eventual non-issue; like along the lines of what Firefox did with a full-page ad in the NYT back in '04. I don't know by what metric you could determine how much an effect that ad had in FFox eventually shouldering aside IE, but I am fairly certain that it did help in a major way, if only to shine a very public light for a day on FFox as an alternative to the lack of concern MS evinced with updating their browser. If a campaign of education and information were to come about so that the document compatibility issue became - for a short while at least - a topic of broad discussion, perhaps the cross-x concern would be lessened. I don't see how cross-company, cross-platform, cross-app compatibility could be viewed as a "bad thing" to implement by anyone, especially not when it is as simple as changing a single default setting in your already-existing software. Yes, there will be a transitional period, but there always is, even from
Your last point is a good one, and ironically amusing. Thanks for the civil discourse.
"...there are some things that can beat smartness and foresight. Awkwardness and stupidity can." ~ Mark Twain
Ah, so you're a Fedora man then!
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Powershell runs circles around bash.
I love this: a bald statement of opinion offering no insight whatsoever gets modded to +4 insightful.
PS and BASH are different. They share some common ground. The objects in PS make it more robust in a number of ways, but that comes at the expense of having to deal with the objects properly. What people often forget in these comparisons is that the shells are also a user interface, not just a scripting system.
SJW n. One who posts facts.
....and malware developers.
I still don't quite understand OnLive's business model, or why anyone would go for it. I know how it works, they render everything server-side and send you compressed video - fine. The roundtrip latency is probably not all that bad, as long as you have a short route to the server. I'm fine with the technical aspects, but what about the money ? It seems to me like the only way they can make a buck is via mass pirating.
Those servers can't be cheap, each one is basically a mid-range gaming rig with a hardware video encoder, and can only serve one user at a time. Each needs a copy of the OS and games. You're basically renting access to a $1000+ gaming rig, plus bandwidth. Sure, the benefit is that just about any internet-connected device can now "play" PC games, but how does OnLive turn a profit ? Do they pool the game licenses so they only need as many paid keys as there are simultaneous players ? Or is this like all those ridiculous startups from the dot-com bust, where they spend fucktons of VC money and die a horribly quick death ?
Don't get me wrong, I like the technical merits of OnLive. Even as we said "this will never work", well surprise: it works amazingly well for many people. I just can't see how they can deliver this without charging fucktons of money for the privilege.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
You mean like ANY HP printer, which is mostly what is in all offices.
HP laser printers dominate the office. and if the IT department was not ran by morons, the other wierd off brands will have a Postscript option. Like the Xerox copiers you can print to.
Only low end garbage inkjets have problems printing. I can even print to Designjet's on C size paper.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Most of the "you are not allowed to rent some software" licenses are invalid in many countries. So if they are hosting outside of US, it may be just okay.
Iterestingly ODT suport in word seems to have gone backwards, in 2007 they mostly open fine but in 2010 any document created in LibreOffice is treated as corupt (literally any, it could be blank). Although once it "repairs" it, it renders complety fine.
Saddly it will be a while before we get rid of docx, not because libreoffice writer isn't ready (with odt documents it is) but because docx is the standard format for the majority and whilst the alternatives can't support it, it is basicly imposible to transition. (Rember in buisness people will be reciving documents from other companies, government organisations, home computers, etc)
On the point of drivers with the exception of cannon network printers (which are completly unsuported) and nvidia drivers when installing updates (the drivers work fine, they just get unistall/misconfigured by upgrades very easily) I fine linux to be supperior to windows in driver support, because it dosen't speed 30mins searching and installing a flash drive driver (they just work) and you don't have to trawl the web for a wireless card driver (Something I had to do in Win 7 for a certain netgear N wirless dongle but not in ubuntu where it worked out of the box).
null
and will you swallow? YES and YES!
Not sure why parent was modded down... that's straight from a MS EULA.
I8-D
Disclaimer: I worked there for two years, though I haven't been with OnLive since early 2010 (before the OnLive Desktop). I do not hold any OnLive or Microsoft stock at this time, and therefore don't have a horse in this race. It's just amusing to watch.
Something to consider. Steve Perlman, their CEO, was also the CEO of WebTV, which was sold to Microsoft. He knows the Microsoft execs at the highest level, and has a good business relationship with them. He also isn't stupid. I know that it's trendy to be cynical and hipster-esque about these things, and that it generates page views (and revenue from advertising, hence the motivation for TFA to appear as it did) to make this sort of speculation, but common sense dictates that no company of OnLive's size would do something as blatant and as public as wholesale commercial piracy. There is far too much to lose and very little to gain. In fact, one of OnLive's messages to software publishers is "software installed on OnLive cannot be pirated, because there is no external access to the binaries". Short of a hack that allows access to the back-end servers, you can no more pirate an app from OnLive than you can pirate AutoCAD by taking a photograph of the box. In that context, does any of TFA make sense?
In fact, the entire article seems to come down to "I, random bloggy guy with zero personal access to what's actually happening, am not aware of a licensing program that fits, therefore such a licensing program does NOT exist, and CANNOT exist. I'm not smart enough or educated enough or informed enough know how it works, therefore it cannot work." Pretty thin, if you ask me.
I do not have firsthand knowledge of this, but I know the people involved, at least on the OnLive side. They're not PirateBay; they are thoughtful people who are aware of the consequences of their actions and who want good business relationships with software publishers (including Microsoft). I think it is very likely that there is a deal in place which might not be a boilerplate license. It is also possible that such a license is part of a larger framework.
Everybody gets what the majority deserves.