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Mozilla Is Investigating Why Dell Is Charging To Install Firefox
An anonymous reader writes "Dell is charging customers £16.25 ($27.18) to install Firefox on a newly purchased computer. We contacted Mozilla to find out more. The company told us it is investigating the issue and denied it has any such a deal in place. 'There is no agreement between Dell and Mozilla which allows Dell or anyone else to charge for installing Firefox using that brand name,' Mozilla's Vice President and General Counsel Denelle Dixon-Thayer told TNW. 'Our trademark policy makes clear that this is not permitted and we are investigating this specific report.' Dell has responded by saying that this practice is okay because the company is charging for the service and not the product."
I'm pretty sure it's illegal in the United States. If our law is ahead of yours, you guys are in pretty bad shape!
can't someone just install firefox themselves? It would take like 1 minute tops.....
Someone is willing to pay me 16$ to install firefox, why would the firefox terms and conditions apply to me? I'm not selling their product.
did you forget to take your meds?
And it takes time for some Dell employee to do it.
Makes sense to me.
Here's to hoping that the Mozilla Foundation forces them to remove the "Firefox" logo and brand from it like they did to Debian.
If they charge to add Firefox, will they give a refund for leaving off Windows?
Dell also charges to set up bios parameters. Big woop
this is total bs..
although there are 2 ways to look @ this
1. if the purchaser is too lazy, or unskilled enough then yes I feel the charge may be justified, esp with a large order..(perhaps the purchaser should nto be in a position to purchase or have any real esponsibility with regard to this, if they do not know what they need or how to get it with our relying on Peons)(Eyes and Teeth)
2. Has Dell become so complaisant? How difficult would it be to include it on a standard image and replicate @ no cost??
I cry BS on both sides, but as proposed in line 1, if the individual is too lazy, or not educated enough to understand, or just does not have the skillsets to know what he is doing, then Yes, if A deal with dell has been agreed on for a massdeployment of an Application which is not standard, stick it to the client/customer.
unfortunately in this day and age it seems that those in the wrong positoins try to leverage ogthers to cover up their SHORT commings..
no my spelling is ok, I am just astounded, and pissed by the stupidity of some people..
I mean
really?
Also /., please change your captcha,, "hemlock" has come up to many times
Michael's got to pay for getting his eponymous company back, and he won't be able to do that just by selling computers.
Once this crap hits the fan, Dell may well be singing a different tune when it becomes apparent it isn't worth the publicity. I may be wrong, and you can give me all the reasons why, but consider this: It bothered enough people to make Slashdot's front page. Flame on.
The real question is what does the "Thank You For Choosing Dell" software do?
First off, I dont like the idea that anyone is charging to install Firefox.
However:
A common perception about open source software is that it must have no value because it is free. This is adding perceived value, making Firefox something worth having, because it costs money. We make poor decisions as human beings, and we are swayed by our perceptions. In a strange way this is validating Firefox as a worthy browser, and there are certainly some people who will hold in a higher regard simply because there is a price tag associated with it.
just go to ninite.com and select what you want installed. Everything is installed without adware or extra toolbars.
I've got better things to do tonight than die.
Using a trademark to identify something isn't illegal, is it? I can say "Coke in my shop cost £1" without a license from Coke (or permission to sell their product) and they have no legal avenues to stop me, surely?
The price is ridiculous, but I don't see a problem with them charging to do the installation. OTOH Mozilla might have the right to limit use of their icons. But GPL is GPL, you have certain rights to redistribute. That's why IceCat (formerly Ice Weasel) exists.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
I charge everyone that wants me to install software for them, what's the big deal?
The dude who take your overpriced Dell PC out of it's box in order to install firefox on it for your lazy ass, needs to be paid.
They aren't selling the software they are selling their time to install it for you. Big difference....
Evolution: love it or leave it
Pardon? Dell is installing Firefox on a customer's machine before shipping it to them. How is that any different from my installing it on a customer's machine *after* it's shipped to them? What if the customer ships their machine to me, I install Firefox, and then ship it back?
.
Dell is desperate for revenue at this point, and when companies are desperate for revenue they do customer-antagonistic things.
Under UK law, as in most other nations, brand-name, trademark, copyright and junk shrink-wrap licenses do NOT prohibit tradespeople from offering services to their customers. It is sad, very very sad, that 'open source' morons have even less respect for well established business and consumer Rights than do traditional closed-source companies.
Far too many open source developers think they are above the law, and can place whatever terms and conditions they so wish into the licenses of their work. The situation gets far worse and far nastier when pseudo-open-source companies like Mozilla and Google start manipulating their users with in-built abusive functionality.
-Google preventing Android apps from full access to external memeory cards, and prohibiting user choice on location of user files, and associations with apps that process those files.
-Mozilla removing user control over JavaScript, in-browser ads and plug-ins.
The excuse of the vile shills is that expert users/hackers can always take products from Google and Mozilla, and somehow 'force' the desired functionality back into them. But this ignores the fact that such deplorable acts are designed to target the vast majority of ordinary users, who would never 'root' Android, or learn how to deactivate Javascript on Firefox.
None of this is a denial that Dell is ripping off naive users, BUT as Mozilla purposely cripples Firefox, and fills it full of very undesirable activity by default, ordinary users will need the (expensive) assistance of experts to configure Firefox in a way that serves the user, not the pockets of those that own Mozilla.
It would, of course, be far better to give the user a link to a shenanigan free installer for Firefox, but Mozilla has now ended that possibility. Mozilla is as bent and evil as they come, and has no intention of allowing any future user of Firefox to simply install a browser that serves their best interests.
Part of the reason Google and Mozilla update Chrome and Firefox at such a ludicrous rate is to reduce the likelihood of successful forks to as close to zero as possible. Once both are safe from the threat of successful forks, Google and Mozilla are free to introduce the most abusive practices into their browsers.
As a service, this really does make sense. It takes time and knowledge to configure a computer. A lot of people are lacking in one, or both, of those departments. The price also makes sense when it comes down to installing an individual piece of software. It takes time to do so. For businesses, time is money.
On the other hand, consumers really ought to look for better deals. You can tell someone what you need and pay them by the hour to get a system that is tailored to your needs. If you need a bunch of stuff done, it'll cost much less. It will also be done according to your requests, which is something that Dell isn't equipped to do.
You can't use trademark to prevent people from referring to your product. If you are, in fact, installing Firefox on the machine, you can say so, no matter what their policies say. This is "nominative use".
I just checked how much Microsoft Office Home and Business costs when put on a Dell computer - 179 USD, right there on the Dell site, for a desktop computer. It costs 219 USD at Big Box Mart and Microsoft itself
So uh... yeah. They're charging for free software. It's just taking advantage of the ignorant. Who might be your grandma. Or a firefighter. Or a grocery store cashier.
It is ridiculous, the charging for every little thing .
customer service has been tossed out the window. in favor of less services for more money strategies.
I know there is business bastards and spread sheet nazis who say this is the way it needs to be done and will reason that time is money and that the end user needs to pay for that time . It is the only way businesses can sustain them selves.
But i disagree with this. they should not even be wasting the time and energy in creating a model for such extra charges and services. and instead focusing that energy on bettering their product.
This goes for every company out there . instead of finding ways to nickle and dime their customer base they should be focusing on quality products followed up with quality customer service and product support .
These standards should be included with all products, other wise we end up with the same ol race to the bottom where everything is generic and there is no quality or support for the product .
Customer service is not expensive when you have a quality product .
If companies would return to creating quality products and focus on differentiating them selves from one another with options, services, and products. they wouldn't have to try and find "creative" ways to gouge money out customers for services that are of little benefit.
Now that we are in an market filled with race to the bottom products the companies have forced them selves into a postion where they can longer offer quality products with a good profit margin. They now rely on acquiring their profits from cannibalizing their product to the bone and reselling those services and components at a annual fee.
Thus why every thing is becoming so expensive and short lived.
Music the Paint dancefloor the canvas your body the brush
Perhaps that's why GP posted as AC.
Based on what, though? The trademark policy - not that this isn't a license - states:
As I understand it, the emphasized parts are where Dell possibly runs afoul; They 1. tie the distribution of FireFox to the service of installing it - but I'm not sure if 'service' is to be interpreted in that manner here, and 2. collect personal information as part of their sale - though if I'm selling Linux distribution DVDs for $2, list FireFox as one of the things as part of the distribution, and obviously collect physical mailing addresses in order to send to them and keep them around in case of a shipping mishap.. I may also be running afoul. Thanks, legalese.
But, what legal standing does the trademark policy have?
'Nominative fair use' may apply; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N...
Sounds about right. You can't say you're including FireFox without literally saying 'FireFox'.
It's just the name.
This one's more problematic. As you mention:
However, that's a matter of interpretation. When I first read the story subject I thought "Why wouldn't they be?". When I read the summary I thought "well that's ridiculously expensive (it's just an option in a dropdown, even at the back-end that instructs the builds which image to use), but surely they can charge whatever they want."
Consider if this option was for free. Would you still think that there was 'some kind of deal'? What if it actually went the other way around, and choosing FireFox dropped the price by 16 quid? (That's when I'd expect some sort of deal, similar to deals with the usual shovelware.)
Even after reading TFA.. I can see what Mozilla is getting at, and it's undeniably damaging when a user goes "it costs me 16 quid to get FireFox!?", but I'm not so sure their legal recourse is through trademark law.
IANAL, though. Should it go to court (which I suspect it won't - plenty of options to avoid that scenario), it will be interesting to see what judgment this results in.
So uh... yeah. They're charging for free software. It's just taking advantage of the ignorant. Who might be your grandma. Or a firefighter. Or a grocery store cashier.
Which is not illegal, you know. I'm perfectly within my right to sell bottles of air to anyone willing to buy - provided that I pay my taxes, and don't advertise it as anything other than what it actually is. I'm not obligated to tell my customers that they can get identical air for free elsewhere.
The only potential angle here is the use of Firefox trademark, but even that is dubious so long as they refer to it in the context of "service of installing X".
It's because Dell is shit. They used to be a good company that took care of their customers, and as a result they rocketed to the top of the PC market. Then the assholes they hired started pinching pennies instead of taking care of their customers, and suddenly they're just another shit PC company. I was hoping that Michael Dell's purchase of the company would herald a return to the days when they weren't shit, but apparently that was too much to hope for.
You may remember a few years ago advertisements did NOT say "T-Mobile is better than AT&T". Instead they compared themselves to "the leading brand". Only fairly recently was it decided that such a comparison was not trading on the good reputation of the target and not implying affiliation, and was therefore allowed.
The tests is whether the speaker is a) attempting to tie themselves to the trademark's good reputation or b) implying an affiliation where none exists.
In this case, the first thing the reporter did was contact MOZILLA to ask about the deal they had with Dell. The reporter figured the Mozilla had made a deal to sell Firefox through Dell. That sounds like an implication of affiliation, and a false one. It arguably makes Firefox look bad, as though they are doing something that many of their users and developers would object to. Almost like a false flag operation, making it look like Mozilla is involved. That's not allowed.
Mozilla gives away the code and a lot of the assets, but they keep the icons and names (Firefox is Trademarked).
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
They are not charging for the program. They are charging for the service of installing/configuring the program. What is wring with that?
If people think they are over charging then they can negotiate the charge away or buy from somebody else.
Do you think that Dell should offer the service of installing the software for free? Do you work for nothing?
MaryAnn was hotter!!!
I can think of ONE purchaser who would pay $100, and they'd buy 100,000 copies at $100 each.
I disagree with Mozilla's stance on this. Dell's charge is not for Firefox and that is clear from the product's listing (that is it's a service charge). There is no confusion here because they aren't advertising it as Mozilla's installation service or Firefox's installation service. They are advertising it as Dell's install service for a product called Firefox. There is no brand confusion. There is no attempt to call it Firefox after modification has occurred.
Also Mozilla shouldn't be adding restrictions beyond those that would cause brand confusion. It's probably in violation of its own software license. If not then it's a far cry from being free software as it is defined by the Free Software Foundation anyway. You can't restrict somebody from charging for Free Software (free as in freedom). There are legitimate restrictions on distribution of Free Software. Restrictions that don't apply to use of Free Software. However they can't add restrictions on receivers rights to re-distribute it and adding a restriction for those charging for something entirely different can't truly be called Free Software. In fact if Mozilla is going to argue that I'd argue that Mozilla is committing fraud because it's claiming that free is as in cost and then claiming it's not free (as Dell isn't allowed to charge for it despite ones right to re-sell). Getting something at no-cost doesn't automatically mean you don't have that right.
Origin pc does this exact same service for free. And with any browser.
The main thing in trademark law is likelihood of consumer confusion. The first thing the reporter did was ask MOZILLA about the deal. When Mozilla said "wtf", the reporter asked Dell. If a tech reporter thought it looked like implied affiliation, some customers probably will to. You can't use someone's trademarked name to falsely imply affiliation.
If you sell a Coke at your garage sale, nobody is going to think that Coca-Cola Inc is involved in that, so there is no problem.
It looks Mozilla made a deal with Dell to sell Firefox.
Given Mozilla is dependent on the goodwill of the free software movement, there are actual damages from that false implication of affiliation. Because "likelihood of consumer confusion" figures prominently in trademark law, that's one reasonably strong legal argument. I'm not a lawyer, I just play one in court. Actual lawyers may express better arguments too.
If Firefox is covered under the GPL (GNU General Public License), then this is perfectly ok (it even says so in the license, or at least in the preamble). I've read the license (the whole thing) hundreds of times. Unlike the never ending boilerplate chucked at you by some software companies (Microsoft for example, where they include Rumplestiltskin clauses and parts about weaving gold from your childrens hair, etc.) the GPL is short. It *SAYS* that you can charge for installing software, you *can* charge for media, you *can* charge for the act of making a copy. You can't charge for the software, its not yours. You also *have* to tell people that its GPL and give them a notice where to read their rights, and also let them know that its a permissive license (all the rights given to you to make copies, charge for it, charge for media, and pass on the right to copy to them). .... Why am I bantering: here is the GPL preamble and postamble:
Version 2, June 1991
Copyright (C) 1989, 1991 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301, USA
Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
Preamble
The licenses for most software are designed to take away your freedom to share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General Public License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free software--to make sure the software is free for all its users. This General Public License applies to most of the Free Software Foundation's software and to any other program whose authors commit to using it. (Some other Free Software Foundation software is covered by the GNU Lesser General Public License instead.) You can apply it to your programs, too.
When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not price. Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for this service if you wish), that you receive source code or can get it if you want it, that you can change the software or use pieces of it in new free programs; and that you know you can do these things.
To protect your rights, we need to make restrictions that forbid anyone to deny you these rights or to ask you to surrender the rights. These restrictions translate to certain responsibilities for you if you distribute copies of the software, or if you modify it.
For example, if you distribute copies of such a program, whether gratis or for a fee, you must give the recipients all the rights that you have. You must make sure that they, too, receive or can get the source code. And you must show them these terms so they know their rights.
We protect your rights with two steps: (1) copyright the software, and (2) offer you this license which gives you legal permission to copy, distribute and/or modify the software.
Also, for each author's protection and ours, we want to make certain that everyone understands that there is no warranty for this free software. If the software is modified by someone else and passed on, we want its recipients to know that what they have is not the original, so that any problems introduced by others will not reflect on the original authors' reputations.
Finally, any free program is threatened constantly by software patents. We wish to avoid the danger that redistributors of a free program will individually obtain patent licenses, in effect making the program proprietary. To prevent this, we have made it clear that any patent must be licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all.
The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and modification follow. ...
How to Apply These Terms to Your New Programs
If you develop a new program, and you want it to be of the greatest possible use to the public, the best way to achieve this is to make it free software which everyone can redistribute and change under these terms.
If you can't install FREE SOFTWARE that's dead easy to install, fuck - I'd charge you $100 just because you're fucking useless.
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
default search engine + default browser > $27 ROI, mozilla could pay for the install = profit
$27.16 for a Firefox install is a nice cash cow. After the initial download (the slowest part, at least it is for me) installing a new version of Firefox might take me two minutes to copy the tar archive onto a system, uncompress it, untar, and clean up. That comes to about $815/hour for that "service". Most lawyers don't charge that much. Dell ought to be a little ashamed of themselves.
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
People still buy Dells?
Dell still exists?
People who buy Dells know enough not to use IE?
We also charge the customer if we install Linux for him. If the price is reasonable is in the eye of the customer, but installing and configuring Linux has the same hourly rate as installing Windows.
..later at the dell stronghold :
.. the hardware business is in tatters .. Lets get back to old tricks" ..
.and all that changed.
"Comarades
_______________________
. I was against capital punishment . I saw a guy selling IE to some uninformed folk
It's the oPeN SoURce and freeware aspect that maybe confuses people to see a problem here.
What if Firefox was a commercial, closed source program, and Dell was selling this service? People would just think the installation as a basic consulting service and not notice anything special about it.
That sounds like a bargain. Provided they do a thorough job (e.g. by keeping Firefox updates coming, by ditching any other browsers, by keeping updates from installing other browsers.) How much money is the installation of Firefox worth to you? Question remains whether Dell's job is actually any good.
I hadn't the slightest objection to his spending his time planning massacres for the bourgeoisie... (P.G. Wodehouse)
It looks Mozilla made a deal with Dell to sell Firefox.
Where is such a deal announced? The only people who think such a deal exists are those who somehow think you need permission to sell a company's products.
If I go buy a shrink-wrapped copy of MS Windows for $100 at a local store, and post online that I'll install it on your PC for $200, there isn't anything that MS can do to stop me. Their rights to their product were exhausted when I paid $100 for it, as long as I only install it on a single PC.
If Dell downloads 1 copy of the Firefox installer and runs it on one PC, then I don't see how there is anything Mozilla can do about it. Maybe they can argue copyright issues if they deploy it via imaging of hard drives/etc, but I don't see how trademark applies unless what they install isn't actually genuine Mozilla Firefox.
Given Mozilla is dependent on the goodwill of the free software movement, there are actual damages from that false implication of affiliation. Because "likelihood of consumer confusion" figures prominently in trademark law, that's one reasonably strong legal argument.
If they're installing genuine Mozilla Firefox on the computer, then there is no confusion. The consumer thinks it comes with Mozilla Firefox, and it in fact does. The affiliation is that they can download it from Mozilla's website just like everybody else.
I work retail. If i sell a laptop and a customer wants me to install anything, it's $29.99 whether it be firefox or google chrome. $59 for a suite such as Office. Yeah you pay $120-$140 for office and you still have to pay me $60 to install it. I dont like it but I have to do it its my job.
... it is a custom build. What would firefox rather they do? Not offer it? Fork, calling it something else and erode Firefox's market presence? Or give them some free publicity. This strikes me as cutting off their nose to spite their face on the part of Mozilla.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
An OEM charging customers to deliver a custom suite of software on a mass-market retail computer - shocking!
I can't believe Dell is charging money to install a third-party application on a brand-new computer! I can't believe Dell is charging customers more if they they want something other than the standard product they offer... Where will this all end? /sarcasm
Who would even think to request Dell install a trivial third-party app like Firefox on their new computer, and who, upon making that request, would be surprised/upset that Dell wanted to be compensated for that requested additional effort?
Ken
I'd take that deal as long as they uninstalled Internet Explorer for me.
If you sell a Coke at your garage sale, nobody is going to think that Coca-Cola Inc is involved in that, so there is no problem.
If a single person thinks it looks like implied affiliation, some customers probably will too.
br. See what I did there? You don't get to claim perfectly non-stupid people in one case, but not the other.
"His name was James Damore."
TFA says when the reporter saw it, they asked Mozilla about the deal. Only after Mozilla said "what the hell... We didn't know about this" did the reporter ask Dell. So at least to the reporter, there was in fact consumer confusion, which is the primary test under trademark law.
You low how commercials and labels so often indicate "not affiliated with ..."? There is a reason for that. Had Dell labeled it "Installation of Firefox, a free browser not affiliated with Dell" that would be different.
Note that in your example, if you posted on Craigslist, "I will install Windows for $200" it is unlikely that a) anyone would think Microsoft was involved in posting your or and b) that it would do Microsoft any harm. Thus, you'd be allowed to use the Windows trademark since it wouldn't result in consumer confusion.
Ps, I do understand your point of view too, and that's a reasonable argument. I'm just saying Firefox also has a reasonable argument because it's about "likelihood of consumer confusion" and in this case we know it did in fact cause consumer confusion.
Of course they can charge for the service of installing non-standard software. That's akin to saying "I asked Dell to install MySQL on a server they bought, AND THEY CHARGED ME!" Of course they did. They had to re-tool their standard OEM image to accommodate you, you moron. Good to see the entitlement mentality is strong among even techies.
Both the reporter thought Mozilla was involved and also people posting here said they saw the headline and got mad at Mozilla. Out of our very small sample, we know more than one person thought it was Mozilla's doing, and it hurt Mozilla's reputation.
You might wonder much likelihood of confusion is allowed under the law. Google "moron in a hurry" for the answer. If you're selling cans of Coke at a garage sale, only a moron in hurry would think for a second that your sale of warm Coke was endorsed by Coca-Cola, so that would be allowed.
Uh, no, you wouldn't. Posting AC doesn't prevent you from using modpoints in a thread. Learn the fucking system.
If the UK is anything like the US, there is no case for trademark infringement merely because someone is selling a service and refers to the product they service. Nominative use of a trademark is generally considered fair use (e.g. it is generally legal for someone who is selling parts for Ford cards to say we sell Ford parts in their advertisements even if they aren't officially affiliated with Ford) provided you don't give the impression that you are officially sanctioned or affiliated with whoever owns the trademark.
If firefox is worth 30 google should be worth at least 55.
OVERcharging is more like it.
I just checked how much Microsoft Office Home and Business costs when put on a Dell computer - 179 USD, right there on the Dell site, for a desktop computer.
OK, so what evidence do you have that Dell doesn't mark that as $150 for software and $29 for installation, on their accounting system?
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
1) There is no evidence that they internally account for software as you say. It's speculation.
2) There IS evidence that they are charging for free software.
3) There IS evidence that they actually give a discount for installing software versus buying it from them separately: You can actually buy Office Home and Business directly from Dell for 219 USD. So they're actually giving a discount when they install it, as they only charge 179 USD in that scenario.
What does the evidence show? Seems clear to me.
Not quite sure how comparing the OEM price that Dell can sell something for to the retail price at "Big Box Mart" translates into Dell charging for free software.
People, please stop selecting every option when you buy a computer. And stop installing everything you can find onto your new laptop. Whenever a friend or family member brings me a newly purchased Dell computer to look at, I spend no small amount of effort removing numerous programs that Dell, by default, thinks that every computer needs. Then I spend another 30 minutes removing various things that they or their offspring have installed, because it seemed like a good idea at the time.
Them: "I just bought a new computer and installed some of my software on it. Now it's not working right. Can you take a look at it for me?"
Me: "Sure. Wait, did you just buy this computer in 2013?"
Them: "Yes."
Me: "Why does it have TurboTax 2001 installed?"
Them: "What if I need to open my 2001 tax return?"
Me: "When is the last time you opened your 2001 tax return?"
Them: "2002."
Me: "Is this Napster? Did you install Napster on this?"
Them: "Yes."
Me: "Arrrggggghhh!"
Andrew Borntreger
Champion of cinematic disasters
Some people live too far from the CMTS and DSLAM because they make their living growing the food that you eat. What should they use instead of dial-up?
Just like Best Buy will charge you $29.99 to set up your game console: http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Geek+Squad%26%23174%3B+-+In-Store+Gaming+and+Customization+Setup/8835497.p?id=1218016228965&skuId=8835497
I think they do an in-home install for $100 or more!
1) There is no evidence that they internally account for software as you say. It's speculation.
Not really. We know for a fact that they charge labor to install Firefox. There's no way around this - the numbers are what they are.
The null hypothesis should be that things are the same - the onus is on the claimant to prove a difference. Besides that, they certainly have incentive to structure their offerings to maximize their profits - giving it all to Microsoft doesn't do that.
Office Home and Business directly from Dell for 219 USD.
That's a different product. Retail (even download) is always more expensive than OEM in the Microsoft ecosystem. I'm spec'ing a Windows 7 PC and the retail price is $379 while the OEM price (from Lenovo) is $50.
Bruce used to say that HP gets Windows for $14 a copy.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
They think a persons labor should be free or something. Or is FF so advanced now it spontaneously appears on a computer?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Um cause there crooks. Duh.....
The TOS don't actually say that. They talk about "distribution" but it isn't at all clear that installing software is the same thing as distributing it. No, let me put that another way: installing software is *not* the same thing as distributing it. If the law doesn't recognize the difference, it should.
I don't think average means what you think it means (median, 50% percentile, ...)
But it does silently undo previous moderation you've done in the thread.
No one knows if this is a bug or a feature.
Some people pay a mechanic $25 to replace a burned out brake light. Nothing new here. Move along.
I don't think the reporter was at all confused, just looking for a story. YMMV.
Seriously who is stupid enough not to know how to install Firefox. ...
Spose the " I computer illiterate crowd" well being in computer support people that make that statement, is a choice that they have made and deserve to be fleeced .... I'm don't mind if someone call and asks "I want to install Firefox im not sure how can you help.? " not a problem but the people who use the computer illiterate use it to not even try.. what they are really saying is i am lazy and can't be bothered to even do a Google search.