Microsoft Giving Away Vista Ultimate, With a Catch 495
Opinari writes "In case you haven't heard, Microsoft is giving away copies of Windows Vista Ultimate (32-bit or 64-bit DVD), Microsoft Office Ultimate 2007, Microsoft Money Plus Premium, Microsoft Student with Encarta Premium 2008, or Microsoft Streets and Trips 2008 — you can choose any one. The caveat is that you have to let them monitor your use of the program."
Hide your own habits... use a VM! (Score:5, Insightful)
Instead of letting them see every single thing you do on your computer for a whole 3 months (or longer... who knows what stays on your computer after installing the software), why not install Windows XP in a VM, install their crap, run it once or twice a week to "check your email" or whatever, and then after three months, collect your software? They only see what goes on in the VM, you get your free Vista and everyone's happy. Well, if using Vista can be considered as something that would make you happy.
Just to show how bad their monitoring actually is:
They're basically looking at everything you do. Here's my favorite bit from the whole thing:
This sounds like spyware? Yeah, I'll say. But noooooooo, it's not at all harmful for your computer. Rigghhhtttt....
Prior Art (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hide your own habits... use a VM! (Score:5, Insightful)
i don't see the issue (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Upon further digging (Score:5, Insightful)
There are legitimate reasons for disliking Vista, there's so many in fact that you don't need to be using this false one to pad your list of complaints. When you do, it weakens your argument and makes it look like you don't have any idea what you're talking about.
Beta Tester anyone? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:No longer available (Score:5, Insightful)
Alright, so they're watching you. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Which is the catch? (Score:1, Insightful)
This gives the false impression that Microsoft somehow does not monitor the use of Vista for non-participants! Every single Vista user is monitored... actually every single Windows user AND Office user is continuously monitored for Genuine Disadvantage from Windows 2000 onwards, if not earlier.
Will Microsoft add these freeloaders / testers while reporting Vista sales? Why not simply admit failure; accept that Vista was a crappy effort; and actually write a new OS capable of running on existing hardware; and existing software apps? The entire PC ecosystem has been broken by Vista; and the customer (even clueless home users) has revolted; taking his business elsewhere (Apple / Linux) and ditching Windows altogether.
Everybody from the hardware OEMs to software developers has lost out because of Vista... so they're going cross-platform (Java) or Linux (the EEE PC from Asus). If Microsoft does not abandon Vista immediately and cut its losses; pretty soon it will have to abandon Windows AND Office entirely.
Hide your own definitions...use exclamation points (Score:1, Insightful)
Only if you redefine "everything" for moderation purposes.
A fair look from a Microsoft-neutral observer (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyways, just in the in case there's anyone actually curious about this and not just interested in kneejerk reactions about poorly-written, inflammatory summary.
I've actually RTFA (and a page linked off of it) and here's something the summary completely neglects to mention:
The automated data collection is one of two different options you can pick; the other is to be asked to fill out a survey not more often than once every two weeks. It sounds like you can pick either option.
Now, that all said, there's also one more big thing: They're giving away FREE copies of EXPENSIVE software* which many people NEED** or WANT with a perfectly reasonable caveat. They're being open and honest, and they're providing both a manual and an automatic method of data collection. The latter is particularly appealing to many, because it basically means they can just forget about it. Those who are worried about their privacy can take the surveys.
Disclaimer: I am a fanboy of many things, including Xbox 360, but not Microsoft in general. I like Windows XP and hate most everything that MS has put out which isn't an OS (i.e. office, internet explorer, etc). I'll definitely not be participating simply because I'm not interested in any of the offerings.
*Expensive for a typical end user, I don't care how much your company paid for its graphics design software
**Again, typical end user who doesn't know what OpenOffice is and just wants to be able to open their files at work without thinking about converting file types.
Re:Hide your own habits... use a VM! (Score:3, Insightful)
And, if they're checking your hardware, they can probably tell very easily if it's running in a VM.
Interesting how you define "everything". I doubt they really care what I have in my Word files, what I have in my Excel spreadsheets, etc. They're looking for general usage patterns to identify how people are really using their software. In my opinion, this is a GOOD THING. Instead of making, for example, the assumption that everyone just loves the new Control Panel layout, they're actually "polling" users via this method.
Chalk one up for MS on this one.
Re:Which is the catch? (Score:5, Insightful)
I would love to trumpet the impending arrival of Linux dominance but there is the reality that people and companies stick with what they know -- even if it's a PITA. MS would have to give them a major kick in the ass for them to see the hassle of moving from Windows as worth it. And I don't see even Vista doing that. At worst, companies and people will stick with XP.
Which from Microsoft's financial perspective isn't that bad.
Re:Which is the catch? (Score:2, Insightful)
On so-called low end hardware... which is very high end for Windows 2000 (remember Win2K can do everything a home user or office user needs, TODAY )Microsoft does not have any software to offer today, that customers can buy with confidence. No doubt XP is being offered on the OLPC, the XO laptop and the EEE PC... but it's a very dicey prospect bcos July 2008 will be the last chance for OEMs to bundle XP.
Microsoft has to create an INCENTIVE for people to use Vista; the reality today is that almost everyone removes even pre-installed Vista and loads XP. So a year from now.... 2 years after Vista has been launched; there will be hardly anyone using Vista; bcos XP is much better at getting things done and needs much lesser hardware.
If Microsoft withdraws XP from the market in July 2008 and makes fresh sales of XP illegal; then non-corporate-licensed users looking for additional PCs will be forced to choose Vista or Mac or Linux. I doubt they will go in for Vista, because the effort to change from XP to Vista is about the same as XP to Linux or Mac.
there is the reality that people and companies stick with what they know -- even if it's a PITA. MS would have to give them a major kick in the ass for them to see the hassle of moving from Windows as worth it. And I don't see even Vista doing that. At worst, companies and people will stick with XP.
I think you are underestimating the power of the marketplace, word-of-mouth marketing etc. The success of gmail and Google is testimony to the fact that open source software can build world-class software solutions; that work equally well on non-MS platforms. Many companies have decided to move away from
Hardware OEMs will hesitate to bundle a dying OS like XP onto their latest offerings - they risk the prospective customer looking for new, flashy things... so if Vista is no good, they'd go to Ubuntu or Xandros instead. And once thousands of customers get comfy with Linux and understand its power and potential; they will never again switch back to Windows.
In short, Microsoft has to release a new OS (not Vista... Vista has to be abandoned) before XP goes out of sale. In fact I think it's already too late... it takes atleast 2 years for the market to warm up to anything new.
Actually not too bad of a deal... (Score:1, Insightful)
Ummm... NO (Score:3, Insightful)
A) MS will make some drastic changes to boost Vista. Like remove DRM
or
B) MS will go back to XP and continue selling that until they try yet again at a new OS.
The failure Of Bob and ME didn't exactly stop them, and neither will the failure of Vista.
Consider how much money MS has sunk on Office for Vista, there may be a chance they just Give Vista away in order to maintain there desktop office monopoly. I don't have high hopes.
Now, I run Win2K because XP brings me exactly nothing. I just can't see paying 100 bucks for nothing..for an OS. I have dropped 100 bucks at craps. Hell, nearly took me 60 seconds!
Now, Vista Ultimate does have some davatages for me..but not enough. It would need to be 100 bucks or less, and have no DRM.
Re:Simple, you don't qualify... (Score:3, Insightful)
I'll give you 300 bucks, and in exchange I'll sit in the living room to see how you use furniture, and oh, btw I'll leave anytime you ask me, and you accept the offer. They aren't SPYING. Monitoring, but not spying. Now if you ask them to leave, and the sneak into a closet and monitor you from there, then it's SPYING.
And considering Spying is unauthorized monitoring, You would be hard pressed to find any case where MS spies on you. Granted, thats a technicality, since they know perfectly well most people won't read the Eula, and if they did manage to stay awake in the attempt, wouldn't understand it to begin with.
Your Rights Online? (Score:3, Insightful)
Help me out here guys, I'm trying to see what right is involved.
Re:Hide your own habits... use a VM! (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe they can anonymize the logs so that a real person wouldn't know the identity of the person being monitored. But that seems like destruction of evidence to me. I'm not sure. But there was a case where a judge ordered a torrent site to turn over a list of IP addresses. They said that they only kept them in Ram, and they were ordered to log them to disk.
E.g. here
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/08/28/1912247 [slashdot.org]
So it seems like not only are you obligated to turn over evidence of criminal activity, you can actually be forced to record it permanently if you weren't already. I guess if you refuse, that would be destruction of evidence or contempt of court or something which would have serious penalties. All of which makes collecting data from people a bit of a minefield. It seems like if it is anonymous enough for them to sign up it will be too anonymous for a court if there is a possibility that any of the people you are collecting from are bittorrent users.
Re:This information includes, but is not limited t (Score:3, Insightful)
Good idea (Score:4, Insightful)
I would actually like to see open source projects such as Gnome and KDE to do a similar thing (As long as it is volentary). Knowing how the users use their is essential to create good usable systems, and very few usability tests are performed on software in the FOSS world, so something like this would probably be even more beneficial to these kind of projects. I would also think that more people would be prepared to volontear this kind information to e.g. the KDE or Gnome team than they would to big evil Microsoft. After all very few Gnome or KDE users would worry about that a big evil company might discover unlicenced software on their systems.
Re:Free... (Score:3, Insightful)
defectivebydesign.
Re:Free... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Free... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Free... (Score:2, Insightful)