Microsoft Invents $1.15/Hour Homework Fee For Kids 580
theodp writes "Microsoft's vision of your computing future is on display in its just-published patent application for the Metered Pay-As-You-Go Computing Experience. The plan, as Microsoft explains it, involves charging students $1.15 an hour to do their homework, making an Office bundle available for $1/hour, and billing gamers $1.25 for each hour of fun. In addition to your PC, Microsoft also discloses plans to bring the chargeback scheme to your cellphone and automobile — GPS, satellite radio, backseat video entertainment system. 'Both users and suppliers benefit from this new business model,' concludes Microsoft, while conceding that 'the supplier can develop a revenue stream business that may actually have higher value than the one-time purchase model currently practiced.' But don't worry kids, that's only if you do more than 52 hours of homework a year!"
Re:pay to park,....... (Score:2, Informative)
Come on now, we can always pay more.
Nevermind you lost your job, you're upside-down on your mortgage and you can't get a loan. Where's that American "Can-Do" spirit?
Re:Depends on the options (Score:4, Informative)
How about using say..Wordpad? It comes with Windows, so its not an additional expense. Has decent features and is very usable. Also you don't have to re-learn it every year.
Or Open Office, perhaps?
Hell, even notepad.
I've never purchased a copy of MS Office and I don't use it at home. I use Open Office at home, and MS Office on the computers at school and work.
Office is already $60... (Score:5, Informative)
Microsoft is already offering MS Office Ultimate for a one-time cost of $60. Why in the hell would I want to rent the same damn thing per hour and turn it into a $2000+ piece of software?
I don't get it. Every time I turn around, Microsoft seems to be trying to take one step forward...into another pile of shit idea.
If this doesn't send their users screaming towards (free) alternatives like Google Docs, I don't know what will...
Pardon me will I go don my Ballmer signature-series chairproof helmet...
Re:Pretty Remarkable (Score:3, Informative)
Yeah, but the cellular companies now have quasi-monopolies because of the way the US mobile industry is (not) regulated. Tariffs or tolls are a way you exploit a monopoly position, not how you build or establish one.
Re:only one thing to say (Score:5, Informative)
Kinkos charges about $0.42 a minute to use their computers that have MS office preinstalled. I don't own a printer, but the 3 times a year I actually need something printed (like christmas card notes, for example) that I can't get away with at work, I email to myself and print at Kinkos. Office depot will go one step further you can email them the document and they'll print it at no additional charge on whatever paper you need.
/Printer free since 2000
Re:New model? (Score:3, Informative)
And they are the only one that can say the user benefits from a 'pay per use continual raping' scheme...
Besides hotels, remember the entire premise of Microsoft in the beginning was based on was to avoid the 'timesharing charges and have your own computer'...
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
I guess they also have forgot the days of 'metered internet' and how it hardly used. More revenue stream was gained by dropping 'metering'. Lots more.
Re:only one thing to say (Score:2, Informative)
Office depot will go one step further you can email them the document and they'll print it at no additional charge on whatever paper you need.
Kinkos does the same thing. https://printonline.fedexkinkos.com/ [fedexkinkos.com]
Re:The Ultimate Steal? (Score:3, Informative)
You can get it for free if you enter the Microsoft Programming Challenge and complete the first tier. ne of their games development newsgroups was giving Visual Studio 2008 out for free.
Re:8 cores, 3 Gb, 3 GHz? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The Ultimate Steal? (Score:5, Informative)
OpenOffice 3 simply feels clunky and is slow. That's enough to make me say that Office 2003's far superior. I responded to the next post down from yours with specifics, but to sum it up: Calc sucks compared to Excel (formulas act weird in comparison, poor macro support for Office files--and yes, that's a requirement), Impress sucks (while PowerPoint presentations suck in principle, it's a really good program when compared to Impress, and that should shame the Impress developers), and Draw sucks if it's supposed to be an alternative to Publisher (it's not necessarily, but it's the closest thing in the suite).
Oh, and what I forgot below--it doesn't play with SharePoint. Not their fault, but I use SharePoint because it's a very useful piece of software, and the integration with Office is very handy.
Re:The Ultimate Steal? (Score:3, Informative)