I'm pretty sure they never said they'd never make another operating system... They are primarily an OS company. What they said was that they weren't ever going to screw up on the development process of an OS again like they did Vista. They'll use different strategies to build the next OS (hopefully a shorter release cycle, less feature creep, fewer features dropped, fewer unrealistic promises, etc...). Hopefully it really does turn out different.
Although this news sounds horrible. At one point Bill Gates talked about how eventually hardware would be free or nearly free, subsidized by the software. With Vista, and now this, they don't care at all about being friendly to low-power hardware (aka cheap or portable hardware) with their desktop OS. Linux looks more and more "ready for the desktop" all the time.
That's what I thought of when I saw this... but then I read:
The effort will elevate "simple flash storage to a whole new level of customer benefit," said Will Poole, corporate VP for Microsoft's Market Expansion Group.
So apparently it's a whole new, totally different thing that's just like how some current things work. Now that's innovation at work.
As a side note, and as someone already mentioned, I love how these innovative "whole new level" technologies rely on a "trusted" product. It may be trusted by MS, but I don't trust it, and my Damn Small Linux and Portable Apps don't need it!
So Apple by NOT using any DRM, is circumventing the DMCA?
Let me be the first to call BULLSHIT on that. DMCA only applies AFTER you've applied DRM to the material involved.
2 thoughts I would like to add:
1) Isn't the requirement of DRM or no DRM left up to the content provider? If the content provider isn't satisfied with FairPlay or PlaysForSure, they can make the choice not to sell through that DRM platform.
2) Apple and MS have their own DRM that they have developed themselves (or maybe bought?), and that DRM has been about as effective as any DRM can really hope to be (meaning someone will always find their way around it, but it manages to keep the honest people from exercising their fair use rights).
Is there anything to this lawsuit other than publicity? How in the world could they hope to force companies that already use DRM (MS hasn't even realeased any real plans to abandon DRM, and I don't think Apple has even starting seeling the DRM-free EMI tracks through iTunes yet) to use their own DRM, which has not been proven to be able to integrate smoothly into Apple and MS's platforms?
Media Rights Technologies (MRT) and BlueBeat.com have issued cease and desist letters to both companies [MS & Apple] and to Adobe Systems Inc (nasdaq: ADBE - news - people ) and Real Networks
Shouldn't they be sending out Commence and Continue letters?
By the way, I'm going to start suing random people for not buying products that I'm going to invent, because those products would be really good and would help them a lot. You've all been warned!
I couldn't understand the summary... there is too much text there in one big block. Could someone please explain it to me... maybe reformat it so it's easier to read?
Isn't most of the point of running Vista (as opposed to XP) that you'd have DirectX 10, Media Center, and Aero? Given the hardware requirements of Vista, I seriously doubt you'd be getting any good gaming or media experiences in a Virtual Machine.
The DOCSIS 2.0 standard maxes at 43MB in the US and 57MB Europe (NTSC vs PAL channel allocations). DOCSIS 3.0 (spec was ratified in 2006) allows multiple channels to be bonded together for even higher bandwidths (hence the demo).
I'm glad you posted the maximum capabilities of DOCSIS 2.0, because I didn't know what they were, and frankly, I'm now a little depressed. TFA got me all hopeful I'd have my 150Mbps connection sometime relatively soon, but now that I now that the current standard is already 7 times faster "than today's standard cable modems", what's the point of having a modem that goes 150 times that? If we're getting service that's a small fraction of the capability of the current standard, why brag about the new modem? Why not let us have service that actually uses our current hardware somewhere close to it's potential? Or even half of it's potential? Why do they have to start selling us new modems alre...
oh, I see. They want us to buy new modems. OK, my questions are answered.
Analog channels are about to die at least out here in Southern California they have been in preparing to open those spectrum for bandwidth, HDTV and VOD, although OTA will still be available it seems like you are now gonna have to get a box for each television for digital.
Actually, as I understand it, the cable companies will continue to provide the analog channels they do now... at least, the same ones that are currently broadcast Over the Air. If you get TV programming from your cable company, you're not supposed to need a digital tuner box for the broadcast channels. It's the OTA transmissions that are going to stop broadcasting the analog channels. This is a national thing, not specific to California, as the FCC is going to be selling off the frequencies currently used by OTA analog transmissions. It doesn't make sense for the FCC to care about the frequencies used on a cable connection, since that doesn't affect anything that's not hooked up to cable.
The cable companies might shift some of their analog channels around to make more room for Internet bandwidth, but I think they're required to keep the regular broadcast channels in analog, and will probably only move things like the Travel Channel and the History Channel over to exclusively digital. Even then, I don't think this newfangled cable modem technology is any big reason for them to start creating more Internet bandwidth to each home. As someone above posted, the current DOCSIS standard (2.0) in the US is capable of 43Mbps, but most of our cable Internet connections max out at 6 Mbps. So just because a new standard promises a way to get more bandwidth, I'm pretty sure Comcast isn't going to be giving us connections that can use anywhere near the amount that DOCSIS 2.0 can provide for a long time.
And maybe I'm not understanding, but I only have 1 cable line running into my house. So how does this help me? Does this require them to lay more lines?
Dude, just go to Radio Shack and get a few cable splitters. Problem solved.
Spoken like someone who works for Radio Shack.
(I know it was a joke, and I'm joking too... sort of.)
If you'd read the article, you'd see that Apple has already taken a lot of steps others haven't:
They've been reducing PVC usage for 12 years (not planning to, but actually reducing). They've been reducing BFRs since 2001. And according to the article, they are closing to eliminating PVC and BFRs completely. They were RoHS compliant "years before" RoHS took effect. They completely stopped selling CRTs last year. The average CRT uses 3 pounds of lead. The last CRT-based iMac had 484 grams of lead (about 1 pound). Those are now gone. As of the posting of Jobs' article, they are planning on eliminating flourescent backlights on their LCD displays, which would eliminate mercury, and that rollout begins this year. Their first arsenic-free glass for LCDs will roll out this year.
Obviously, they have been implementing solutions for quite some time. Other plans they have are well underway, not just plans on someone's whiteboard or in their PR statements. In your analogy, it's more like Apple has 75% of their homework done with %30 percent of the time left, and plan to be done before the deadline, while the others are saying "We'll get around to it on the last day."
He did make a good point- who cares if it is recognizable if it only has 3% of the market?
I think it's funny how he claims that MS is the giant in this arena, and Apple will just be small potatoes, for three reasons:
A) Someone else posted the actual market share of Windows Mobile phones, compared to Symbian, Linux, etc., and MS only had about 4%. So I don't know where he's getting his 3% for Apple and 50/60/70% for MS numbers, but that's not consistent with reality. For crying out loud, Linux, his sworn cancerous enemy, has like 4x the market share MS has (*according to those numbers).
B) He talks as if Apple is stupid for entering this market because they won't be able to grab a huge market share, but look at what MS just released a few months ago, that really didn't have a hope of gaining a large share of the market: the Zune. Going up against Apple no less.
C) Mac OSX has a similiar share of the market for PCs, and it's doing just fine, and it's very recognizable. Of course, in movies, they seem to have 95% of the market share, which serves to make them even more recognizable.
Sure, at $500/$600 sans subsidies, it's more of a premium phone (for now), and premium items aren't intended to get the largest market share, they're intended to have the cream of the crop image. But as someone else pointed out, the iPod was priced similarly when it launched, and look where it is now. Really, market share isn't everything. I think Apple has proven that by hanging in there, and in recent years flourishing in spite of not being the market leader for PCs.
We looked at buying some CFL bulbs the other day. My wife is a little paranoid about some things, including mercury, so she isn't too sure about using the CFL's. But I thought it's interesting how on the boxes they say that they contain mercury, and to dispose of them properly. How do you dispose of mercury properly? I once had a mercury thermometer that broke open and made a mess, so I called around to a few places, not wanting to just drop it in the trash. No one could tell me how to dispose of it. The best answer I got was to take it to my local waste transfer station where I left a bag of contaminated items, including carpet, with a pile of what looked like chemical cleaners and stuff. I think I even had to pay a small fee.
A few months later, my kids fried our microwave oven. Again, I tried to find out what the best way to dispose of a microwave is. Noone would give me a straight answer. I don't even know what exactly is in a microwave, but I'm sure there's some stuff that shouldn't be in the groundwater supply. I ended up tossing it in a dumpster, because I couldn't get any answers.
I think it's great that Wal-mart and others are pushing CFL's, but I wish there was more information available about how to get rid of old bulbs like this. And batteries. Global Warming is important, but I think that slowly poisoning our soil and water isn't a good thing, either. But the manufacturers wash their hands of it all by saying "Dispose of Properly". So how do I dispose of it?
Axonix does not produce, sell, ship or induce the use of any means to load media onto its products including DVD CSS decrypting software or any other software that may violate copyright regulations... In no event, whether you agree to this disclaimer or not, shall Axonix Corporation be liable for any losses dues to illegal use of this product or any incidental, exemplary, special, or consequential damages regardless of whether Axonix Corporation was advised of the possibility of such damages."
They then give a list of links to articles about Fair Use, so that everything they advertise their product can do will be in harmony with these legal disclaimers. I can assure you, DeCSS is exactly what they point their users to. At least, they did a few months ago.
This one is a little clearer about the use of libdvdcss (without calling it by name):
MIRV systems are presently not capable of uploading encrypted DVDs. When and if the legal environment changes, owners of MIRV systems are able to download open-source code software (a DVD decryption utility) from the web that enables the MIRV system to be used for storing commercial DVD content. MIRV systems have a utility that permits customers to integrate a decryption utility This utility is primarily used by corporate customers who have proprietary encryption algorithms, but can also be used by the customer for integrating a decryption utility that works for commercial DVDs. Instructions for installation of decryption software are provided in the MIRV installation guide. Users are free to download DVD decryption utility software at such time as they feel the legal environment in their jurisdiction permits such activity. Nothing in this FAQ provided by Xperinet should be considered legal advice.
Plastic Discs belong in the 1900s - content should be digital,
My big pet peeve lately is anyone who refers to downloaded music/movies as digital... as opposed to CDs and DVDs?
For anyone that forgot, DVDs and CDs are quite digital on their own, there's nothing about the ripping or downloading process that makes them more digital.
It would be nice to believe that since Kaleidescape won their lawsuit, that iTunes, Windows Media Player, and all the other media products out there will be able to let the users rip their own DVDs. But I don't think that'll be the case anytime soon (no matter how badly I want it to be that way). Kaleidescape won their lawsuit because they had previously licensed CSS decryption, probably before the DVDCCA really caught on to what they were planning on doing with it. Had the DVDCCA known what the Kaleidescape system would be, they never would have granted the license.
Which is funny, because it's probably one of the most locked down, secured DVD movie servers out there. Other similar servers use DeCSS (they just tell the end users where to download it, so the manufacturer isn't doing anything *illegal*), and they have their movies stored in Windows folders that can easily be accessed and shared with anyone on the network. That's right, they went after the company that had the most MPAA/DVDCCA friendly product possible, and let the other guys with lesser products get by on "illegal" software.
Add remove programs in Vista and the package manager Ubuntu work in simila ways
Not even that. I mean, in Ubuntu I can install applications with it, in Windows I just can uninstall them. I think I find Ubuntu's solution much more useful then:)
Not to mention that Synaptic in Ubuntu allows you to find lots of new apps to begin with, and keep everything up to date.
What Options are average Windows users messing with in Device Manager? Except for a very few cases, I use the Device Manager just to reinstall drivers, disable a driver, or see if a device hasn't gotten installed correctly. I think the only option I've ever set in there is the COM port for various USB-RS232 adapters... and sometimes that gets set in a separate, custom application, or in a separate Control Panel app. For situations like that, you usually have to find out from the manufacturer, or hunt around for yourself where to find those options anyhow, so there's no advantage to the Windows side there.
Believe it or not, little things like the lack of centralized device management DO bug the living starch out of your average user.
And, this may come as a shock to you, but the average Windows user does not even know the Device Manager exists. For those that have taken the time to learn enough about their Windows computer to know where to find the Device Manager, they could take the same amount of time to learn how to deal with devices in Linux. It's not done in exactly the Windows way, but it's not rocket science either, people who want to can learn how to do it without much more effort.
By the way, if you want to see detailed information on the hardware in an Ubuntu machine, go to Administration -> Preferences -> Hardware Information. The window that comes up is even labeled as "Device Manager".
I understand that Linux still has some growing up to do, but once people understand that things are done differently, not necessarily worse, that can help a lot with people being able to pick it up. And for all of mega-hyped releases with all of the new features... I really think Windows has just as much growing up to do. I certainly have as many annoyances with it as I do Linux, if not more.
Now, if you want to talk about getting creamed, let's talk about the PS3...
Yes, lets talk about the large pallet of PS3s sitting in the isle of the local Best Buy for several weeks while I have yet to make it to the store in time to get a Wii. Hmmm... Seems like a case of creaming to me.
I can't believe I'm replying to this, but that's exactly what he was saying... you see, he turned the tense and the subject around. Instead of saying the Wii is creaming its competition, he said the PS3 is getting creamed by its own competition. His point was that the PS3 is getting creamed by XBox/Wii more than Wii is creaming XBox/PS3.
Huh? How do you think the injunction came into existence in the first place? Verizon has already taken the argument to court.
We are still in the deliberation stage. Verizon and Vonage can still reach an agreement that is mutually beneficial (at least better then one that may be arbitrary assigned by a judge).
Actually, no, we're in the appeals stage. The deliberation ended a couple weeks ago when the jury decided that Vonage infringed on 3 out of 5 of Verizon's patents. Then Verizon sought an injunction against Vonage. I think it's safe to say that either Verizon, Vonage, or both are not interested in a licensing agreement. Vonage's entire defense was that the patents are junk and are too broad to be valid. Of course they'd rather pay licensing fees than close up shop, but if that possibility ever comes up, it will happen after the appeals process has been exhausted.
And when you say it's more profitable to Verizon to license the patents' use, I think that's complete speculation. We don't know how much business Verizon can hope to reclaim by stomping out Vonage (and then the other VoIP providers that could also be infringing), and we don't know how much they'd be able to charge for licensing fees (or how much Vonage would be able to pay).
The catches - and there are two - is that (1) these OEM versions are generally not upgradeable. You have to buy another full copy of the next release of the OS (although according to their definitions, I see nothing from stopping you from getting another OEM version since you did build the machine yourself.. and I guess "refurbishing" could be defined as an OS upgrade). And (2) you get no technical support from Microsoft - none whatsoever - since the system builder / OEM (that's you now) is supposed to provide technical support.
Don't forget the 3rd catch -- Once you install and activate that OEM copy, you can't transfer it to another computer (but I believe you can convince the phone activation people that you've upgraded the motherboard, without mentioning that you also upgraded the CPU, RAM, HDD, Video card, keyboard and mouse, and they may let you reactivate).
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I'm pretty sure they never said they'd never make another operating system... They are primarily an OS company. What they said was that they weren't ever going to screw up on the development process of an OS again like they did Vista. They'll use different strategies to build the next OS (hopefully a shorter release cycle, less feature creep, fewer features dropped, fewer unrealistic promises, etc...). Hopefully it really does turn out different.
Although this news sounds horrible. At one point Bill Gates talked about how eventually hardware would be free or nearly free, subsidized by the software. With Vista, and now this, they don't care at all about being friendly to low-power hardware (aka cheap or portable hardware) with their desktop OS. Linux looks more and more "ready for the desktop" all the time.
So apparently it's a whole new, totally different thing that's just like how some current things work. Now that's innovation at work.
As a side note, and as someone already mentioned, I love how these innovative "whole new level" technologies rely on a "trusted" product. It may be trusted by MS, but I don't trust it, and my Damn Small Linux and Portable Apps don't need it!
2 thoughts I would like to add:
1) Isn't the requirement of DRM or no DRM left up to the content provider? If the content provider isn't satisfied with FairPlay or PlaysForSure, they can make the choice not to sell through that DRM platform.
2) Apple and MS have their own DRM that they have developed themselves (or maybe bought?), and that DRM has been about as effective as any DRM can really hope to be (meaning someone will always find their way around it, but it manages to keep the honest people from exercising their fair use rights).
Is there anything to this lawsuit other than publicity? How in the world could they hope to force companies that already use DRM (MS hasn't even realeased any real plans to abandon DRM, and I don't think Apple has even starting seeling the DRM-free EMI tracks through iTunes yet) to use their own DRM, which has not been proven to be able to integrate smoothly into Apple and MS's platforms?
Shouldn't they be sending out Commence and Continue letters?
By the way, I'm going to start suing random people for not buying products that I'm going to invent, because those products would be really good and would help them a lot. You've all been warned!
I couldn't understand the summary... there is too much text there in one big block. Could someone please explain it to me... maybe reformat it so it's easier to read?
Buy em out, boys!
Isn't most of the point of running Vista (as opposed to XP) that you'd have DirectX 10, Media Center, and Aero? Given the hardware requirements of Vista, I seriously doubt you'd be getting any good gaming or media experiences in a Virtual Machine.
oh, I see. They want us to buy new modems. OK, my questions are answered.
Actually, as I understand it, the cable companies will continue to provide the analog channels they do now... at least, the same ones that are currently broadcast Over the Air. If you get TV programming from your cable company, you're not supposed to need a digital tuner box for the broadcast channels. It's the OTA transmissions that are going to stop broadcasting the analog channels. This is a national thing, not specific to California, as the FCC is going to be selling off the frequencies currently used by OTA analog transmissions. It doesn't make sense for the FCC to care about the frequencies used on a cable connection, since that doesn't affect anything that's not hooked up to cable.
The cable companies might shift some of their analog channels around to make more room for Internet bandwidth, but I think they're required to keep the regular broadcast channels in analog, and will probably only move things like the Travel Channel and the History Channel over to exclusively digital. Even then, I don't think this newfangled cable modem technology is any big reason for them to start creating more Internet bandwidth to each home. As someone above posted, the current DOCSIS standard (2.0) in the US is capable of 43Mbps, but most of our cable Internet connections max out at 6 Mbps. So just because a new standard promises a way to get more bandwidth, I'm pretty sure Comcast isn't going to be giving us connections that can use anywhere near the amount that DOCSIS 2.0 can provide for a long time.
(I know it was a joke, and I'm joking too... sort of.)
If you'd read the article, you'd see that Apple has already taken a lot of steps others haven't:
They've been reducing PVC usage for 12 years (not planning to, but actually reducing).
They've been reducing BFRs since 2001. And according to the article, they are closing to eliminating PVC and BFRs completely.
They were RoHS compliant "years before" RoHS took effect.
They completely stopped selling CRTs last year. The average CRT uses 3 pounds of lead. The last CRT-based iMac had 484 grams of lead (about 1 pound). Those are now gone.
As of the posting of Jobs' article, they are planning on eliminating flourescent backlights on their LCD displays, which would eliminate mercury, and that rollout begins this year.
Their first arsenic-free glass for LCDs will roll out this year.
Obviously, they have been implementing solutions for quite some time. Other plans they have are well underway, not just plans on someone's whiteboard or in their PR statements. In your analogy, it's more like Apple has 75% of their homework done with %30 percent of the time left, and plan to be done before the deadline, while the others are saying "We'll get around to it on the last day."
And the summary has to say "Title says it All"
Why is that modded Interesting?
Funny? Yes.
Informative? For all who needed to get a copy of that HD-DVD key, yes.
But Insightful? Come on...
I think it's funny how he claims that MS is the giant in this arena, and Apple will just be small potatoes, for three reasons:
A) Someone else posted the actual market share of Windows Mobile phones, compared to Symbian, Linux, etc., and MS only had about 4%. So I don't know where he's getting his 3% for Apple and 50/60/70% for MS numbers, but that's not consistent with reality. For crying out loud, Linux, his sworn cancerous enemy, has like 4x the market share MS has (*according to those numbers).
B) He talks as if Apple is stupid for entering this market because they won't be able to grab a huge market share, but look at what MS just released a few months ago, that really didn't have a hope of gaining a large share of the market: the Zune. Going up against Apple no less.
C) Mac OSX has a similiar share of the market for PCs, and it's doing just fine, and it's very recognizable. Of course, in movies, they seem to have 95% of the market share, which serves to make them even more recognizable.
Sure, at $500/$600 sans subsidies, it's more of a premium phone (for now), and premium items aren't intended to get the largest market share, they're intended to have the cream of the crop image. But as someone else pointed out, the iPod was priced similarly when it launched, and look where it is now. Really, market share isn't everything. I think Apple has proven that by hanging in there, and in recent years flourishing in spite of not being the market leader for PCs.
We looked at buying some CFL bulbs the other day. My wife is a little paranoid about some things, including mercury, so she isn't too sure about using the CFL's. But I thought it's interesting how on the boxes they say that they contain mercury, and to dispose of them properly. How do you dispose of mercury properly? I once had a mercury thermometer that broke open and made a mess, so I called around to a few places, not wanting to just drop it in the trash. No one could tell me how to dispose of it. The best answer I got was to take it to my local waste transfer station where I left a bag of contaminated items, including carpet, with a pile of what looked like chemical cleaners and stuff. I think I even had to pay a small fee.
A few months later, my kids fried our microwave oven. Again, I tried to find out what the best way to dispose of a microwave is. Noone would give me a straight answer. I don't even know what exactly is in a microwave, but I'm sure there's some stuff that shouldn't be in the groundwater supply. I ended up tossing it in a dumpster, because I couldn't get any answers.
I think it's great that Wal-mart and others are pushing CFL's, but I wish there was more information available about how to get rid of old bulbs like this. And batteries. Global Warming is important, but I think that slowly poisoning our soil and water isn't a good thing, either. But the manufacturers wash their hands of it all by saying "Dispose of Properly". So how do I dispose of it?
Actually, the story was posted exactly one month previously. They didn't use the name Kaleidescape in the headline at the time, though.
They then give a list of links to articles about Fair Use, so that everything they advertise their product can do will be in harmony with these legal disclaimers. I can assure you, DeCSS is exactly what they point their users to. At least, they did a few months ago.
This one is a little clearer about the use of libdvdcss (without calling it by name):
My big pet peeve lately is anyone who refers to downloaded music/movies as digital... as opposed to CDs and DVDs?
For anyone that forgot, DVDs and CDs are quite digital on their own, there's nothing about the ripping or downloading process that makes them more digital.
It would be nice to believe that since Kaleidescape won their lawsuit, that iTunes, Windows Media Player, and all the other media products out there will be able to let the users rip their own DVDs. But I don't think that'll be the case anytime soon (no matter how badly I want it to be that way). Kaleidescape won their lawsuit because they had previously licensed CSS decryption, probably before the DVDCCA really caught on to what they were planning on doing with it. Had the DVDCCA known what the Kaleidescape system would be, they never would have granted the license.
Which is funny, because it's probably one of the most locked down, secured DVD movie servers out there. Other similar servers use DeCSS (they just tell the end users where to download it, so the manufacturer isn't doing anything *illegal*), and they have their movies stored in Windows folders that can easily be accessed and shared with anyone on the network. That's right, they went after the company that had the most MPAA/DVDCCA friendly product possible, and let the other guys with lesser products get by on "illegal" software.
Not to mention that Synaptic in Ubuntu allows you to find lots of new apps to begin with, and keep everything up to date.
And, this may come as a shock to you, but the average Windows user does not even know the Device Manager exists. For those that have taken the time to learn enough about their Windows computer to know where to find the Device Manager, they could take the same amount of time to learn how to deal with devices in Linux. It's not done in exactly the Windows way, but it's not rocket science either, people who want to can learn how to do it without much more effort.
By the way, if you want to see detailed information on the hardware in an Ubuntu machine, go to Administration -> Preferences -> Hardware Information. The window that comes up is even labeled as "Device Manager".
I understand that Linux still has some growing up to do, but once people understand that things are done differently, not necessarily worse, that can help a lot with people being able to pick it up. And for all of mega-hyped releases with all of the new features... I really think Windows has just as much growing up to do. I certainly have as many annoyances with it as I do Linux, if not more.
I can't believe I'm replying to this, but that's exactly what he was saying... you see, he turned the tense and the subject around. Instead of saying the Wii is creaming its competition, he said the PS3 is getting creamed by its own competition. His point was that the PS3 is getting creamed by XBox/Wii more than Wii is creaming XBox/PS3.
At least, that's how I read it.
Actually, no, we're in the appeals stage. The deliberation ended a couple weeks ago when the jury decided that Vonage infringed on 3 out of 5 of Verizon's patents. Then Verizon sought an injunction against Vonage. I think it's safe to say that either Verizon, Vonage, or both are not interested in a licensing agreement. Vonage's entire defense was that the patents are junk and are too broad to be valid. Of course they'd rather pay licensing fees than close up shop, but if that possibility ever comes up, it will happen after the appeals process has been exhausted.
And when you say it's more profitable to Verizon to license the patents' use, I think that's complete speculation. We don't know how much business Verizon can hope to reclaim by stomping out Vonage (and then the other VoIP providers that could also be infringing), and we don't know how much they'd be able to charge for licensing fees (or how much Vonage would be able to pay).
Here's to hoping everything goes well throughout the rest of the appeals process.
Don't forget the 3rd catch -- Once you install and activate that OEM copy, you can't transfer it to another computer (but I believe you can convince the phone activation people that you've upgraded the motherboard, without mentioning that you also upgraded the CPU, RAM, HDD, Video card, keyboard and mouse, and they may let you reactivate).