While I personally can see the validity of having such restrictions, the problem I believe is not the specific context of the restriction (counterfeiting of cash) but the problem itself of there being a restriction there in the first place.
If you take a look at the bigger picture, software products and business it seems support digital rights management. I mean, that might sound obsurd that stopping counterfeiting can be seen as digital rights management but this actually is digital rights management, the only different is nobody has the right to view, edit or copy an original bank note.
If you couple this with the trend of disabling overall copying of music whether or not you own it and in a few short years the copying restrictions placed on virtually any file and software on a (generally) proprietry machine you can develop a bigger picture of the problem (no pun intended).
In a few years will this be a socially acceptable 'feature'? To have the censorship of certain material digitally stopped?
The next problem is if you eliminate one means of stopping this problem it wont be affective until you eliminate all means of stopping the problem. If you shy away from the money thing for a minute and think about a word processing software package this clearly seems wrong to me. Will the next Microsoft Word disallow or blank out words like "terrorist", "bomb" or "assassination"?
The reason this is inappropriate is because there are thousands of different contexts you may want to copy money that are nothing to do with counterfeiting. Just the same as there are a thousand different contexts you may have "assassinate president" in a peice of writing.
What I dont find quite surprising about this is probably going to be the beginning of a 'feature' that will for the most part will generally be ignored, as it seems in todays world Joe public plays ignorance to the eroding of his rights.
If you ask me. This is something that should be nipped in the bud before it becomes so widespread its accepted. Then again, with all the apparently ignored DRM issues arising already it may quite possibly be too late to do anything about it whatsoever.
Before even mentioning DRM issues and probable lack of good portability between music formats.
I have I must admit very much supported Microsoft hardware (you can shoot me later) because all the hardware I have ever bought with MS stuck on it has lasted a long time and is made durable and much more comfortable than competitors.
So I'd hazard a guess the thing will be pretty good at dealing with the bumps and scrapes inherent with portable players. But believe me, if the software is anything similar to the stuff they put on Windows Smartphone (Mobile phone/cellphone) it has got no chance. Straying off topic a tad but them things hang, call people without you asking, hang up calls without you asking, dont respond to cellular events too well (like someone rings and hangs up phone believes the sender is still ringing in).
So if its the same "specialized" version of WinCE they used on thier phones expect an abysmal effort at software design. But at least it wont smash when you drop it;).
Have you ever thought that the BIOS industry is trying to head down the way the mobile phone industry is?
I mean, for example (in the UK anyway) your mobile phone is probably the biggest big brother device you own. If you buy a pay-as-you-go phone or a contract phone you need to phone the vendor after your contract has ended (or never, on pay-as-you-go) to get a code that 'unlocks' your phone, allowing you to insert any sim card from a competitor they want. Imagine the potential contracts you could develop using a similar method for PC's?
Buy one of these hire purchase pc's that get paid out over 3 years (many families and people on budgets do this, probably dont need to tell anyone here its not a bargain as in 3 years that machine will be pretty worthless to other peoples standards). Then, after the 3 years is up.. you can pay another $40/40 in 'admin' charge to be sent a usb flash key or other data storage medium that unlocks your machine enabling another type of o/s?
You could massively decrease the cost of o/s and pc in a home market while locking home users into draconian contract schemes disallowing certain applications, or o/s's (covered by DRM of course), after which time when the pc is worthless you can have all the features you want.. most home users not knowing any different will probably settle for a return scheme where they pay up for another 2 years for the upgraded version of the machine and so it goes on and on and on.
I mean, if you really think about it it really doesnt seem such a crazy idea. It worked with mobile phones and an implementation like this in the future doesnt actually look that far off now.
The whole point of free software is freedom, the minute you begin adding forceful restrictions is the point it is not longer free software, like the internet freedom comes at a cost.
If the cost if people dont need to give anything back then so be it. But if you start adding a requirement to give something back you will end up with shoddy code, less chance of anyone bothering to use it at the enterprise level and probably increase the TCO quite a bit.
If you start adding more resrictions like this to free software you begin walking down the EULA road that the GPL and its siblings are supposed to be the opposite of.
When whoever survives/evolves discovers such a vault, I am sure they will find enlightenment in Grannies colonic irrigation.
The point is this is a profit driven idea for profit driven companies, although it would be interesting to see the colonels secret sauce recipe I am quite sure after nuclear holocaust I wouldnt be thinking about a family bucket meal.
I second that, theres some preliminary sandboxing features to I.E too. This doesnt mean ill switch to windows at all, and after this is been released lots of gamers will find some of their more legacy type games not working which will be a headache for the next year. Other than that the headaches versus the fixes mean it will be worth the download.
Very pleased with M$ for this.
Have to add a conspiricy theory though.. with all these new features and extra functionality (thats not like MS) there will probably be a trade in. Anyone hear the death humm of DRM calling?
Really if I wish to manage my rights on files I use public key encryption. That way I can confidently know what really I am allowing access to. I dont need nor would I want any rights management Microsoft give me.
As for Joe user never noticing. I think Joe user will. If my memory serves people really did not like the activation process that came with Windows XP. This seems to be taking it just another step further.
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While I personally can see the validity of having such restrictions, the problem I believe is not the specific context of the restriction (counterfeiting of cash) but the problem itself of there being a restriction there in the first place. If you take a look at the bigger picture, software products and business it seems support digital rights management. I mean, that might sound obsurd that stopping counterfeiting can be seen as digital rights management but this actually is digital rights management, the only different is nobody has the right to view, edit or copy an original bank note. If you couple this with the trend of disabling overall copying of music whether or not you own it and in a few short years the copying restrictions placed on virtually any file and software on a (generally) proprietry machine you can develop a bigger picture of the problem (no pun intended). In a few years will this be a socially acceptable 'feature'? To have the censorship of certain material digitally stopped? The next problem is if you eliminate one means of stopping this problem it wont be affective until you eliminate all means of stopping the problem. If you shy away from the money thing for a minute and think about a word processing software package this clearly seems wrong to me. Will the next Microsoft Word disallow or blank out words like "terrorist", "bomb" or "assassination"? The reason this is inappropriate is because there are thousands of different contexts you may want to copy money that are nothing to do with counterfeiting. Just the same as there are a thousand different contexts you may have "assassinate president" in a peice of writing. What I dont find quite surprising about this is probably going to be the beginning of a 'feature' that will for the most part will generally be ignored, as it seems in todays world Joe public plays ignorance to the eroding of his rights. If you ask me. This is something that should be nipped in the bud before it becomes so widespread its accepted. Then again, with all the apparently ignored DRM issues arising already it may quite possibly be too late to do anything about it whatsoever.
Before even mentioning DRM issues and probable lack of good portability between music formats.
;).
I have I must admit very much supported Microsoft hardware (you can shoot me later) because all the hardware I have ever bought with MS stuck on it has lasted a long time and is made durable and much more comfortable than competitors.
So I'd hazard a guess the thing will be pretty good at dealing with the bumps and scrapes inherent with portable players. But believe me, if the software is anything similar to the stuff they put on Windows Smartphone (Mobile phone/cellphone) it has got no chance. Straying off topic a tad but them things hang, call people without you asking, hang up calls without you asking, dont respond to cellular events too well (like someone rings and hangs up phone believes the sender is still ringing in).
So if its the same "specialized" version of WinCE they used on thier phones expect an abysmal effort at software design. But at least it wont smash when you drop it
Setting up an email client from uncle bob- 10 minutes
Cleaning computer of viruses and various other crap- 3 hours
Reinstalling o/s when it slows to a crawl and resetting it back up the way they like it- 4 hours
Installing linux- Priceless!
Have you ever thought that the BIOS industry is trying to head down the way the mobile phone industry is? I mean, for example (in the UK anyway) your mobile phone is probably the biggest big brother device you own. If you buy a pay-as-you-go phone or a contract phone you need to phone the vendor after your contract has ended (or never, on pay-as-you-go) to get a code that 'unlocks' your phone, allowing you to insert any sim card from a competitor they want. Imagine the potential contracts you could develop using a similar method for PC's? Buy one of these hire purchase pc's that get paid out over 3 years (many families and people on budgets do this, probably dont need to tell anyone here its not a bargain as in 3 years that machine will be pretty worthless to other peoples standards). Then, after the 3 years is up.. you can pay another $40/40 in 'admin' charge to be sent a usb flash key or other data storage medium that unlocks your machine enabling another type of o/s? You could massively decrease the cost of o/s and pc in a home market while locking home users into draconian contract schemes disallowing certain applications, or o/s's (covered by DRM of course), after which time when the pc is worthless you can have all the features you want.. most home users not knowing any different will probably settle for a return scheme where they pay up for another 2 years for the upgraded version of the machine and so it goes on and on and on. I mean, if you really think about it it really doesnt seem such a crazy idea. It worked with mobile phones and an implementation like this in the future doesnt actually look that far off now.
The whole point of free software is freedom, the minute you begin adding forceful restrictions is the point it is not longer free software, like the internet freedom comes at a cost.
If the cost if people dont need to give anything back then so be it. But if you start adding a requirement to give something back you will end up with shoddy code, less chance of anyone bothering to use it at the enterprise level and probably increase the TCO quite a bit.
If you start adding more resrictions like this to free software you begin walking down the EULA road that the GPL and its siblings are supposed to be the opposite of.
When whoever survives/evolves discovers such a vault, I am sure they will find enlightenment in Grannies colonic irrigation.
The point is this is a profit driven idea for profit driven companies, although it would be interesting to see the colonels secret sauce recipe I am quite sure after nuclear holocaust I wouldnt be thinking about a family bucket meal.
I second that, theres some preliminary sandboxing features to I.E too. This doesnt mean ill switch to windows at all, and after this is been released lots of gamers will find some of their more legacy type games not working which will be a headache for the next year. Other than that the headaches versus the fixes mean it will be worth the download. Very pleased with M$ for this. Have to add a conspiricy theory though.. with all these new features and extra functionality (thats not like MS) there will probably be a trade in. Anyone hear the death humm of DRM calling?
They might even call it Jabber.
Really if I wish to manage my rights on files I use public key encryption. That way I can confidently know what really I am allowing access to. I dont need nor would I want any rights management Microsoft give me.
As for Joe user never noticing. I think Joe user will. If my memory serves people really did not like the activation process that came with Windows XP. This seems to be taking it just another step further.