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."
Not accurate. (Score:5, Informative)
No longer available (Score:5, Informative)
"What happened to the free product option?
Thank you for your interest in the feedback program. Due to overwhelming response, the supply of gifts have been exhausted so we have closed our free product offer on 12/11/2007 at 2pm. Thanks to everyone that participated!"
Re:What happens if you STOP participating? (Score:5, Informative)
Simple, you don't qualify... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Which is the catch? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Upon further digging (Score:3, Informative)
$ ps -uxaww | grep firefox
steve 1719 29.4 -25.8 1521604 542080 ?? Ss 3Dec07 4099:18.16
I've only had this instance of Firefox running a little more than a week - see the 3-December start date and it's taking 1.5GB of virtual memory. So sorry, but Firefox eating up system resources is not a valid criticism of Microsoft Windows Vista.
Re:Free... (Score:5, Informative)
To quote from the second page towards registration:
"Choose the program(s) you would like to join
Automated feedback program (Windows Vista and Windows XP only)"
and further on in the uninstallation instructions.....
"Windows XP Instructions:
1. Click Start, click Control Panel, click Add or Remove Programs, and then click Change or Remove Programs.
2. Select Windows Feedback Panel, and then click Remove.
"
I wish I noticed who posted this story (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Tactic to gain more ground? (Score:5, Informative)
It's not a tactic to gain ground. It is a strategy commonly used to gain survey information. It is exactly like how you will often see a survey that says, "Get a chance at winning an ipod after completing this survey" kind of deals.
Why would Microsoft need to conduct a survey that requires generating statistics on how you use your computer? Simple, it is to determine usability statistics. That type of data can then be used to influence the design of the user interface.
For example if the data shows that for a particular window in say the control panel, the most user's mouse movement is dramatically higher than with some other window, that means that the window with high mouse movement is a candidate for reorganization. That is because the longer you take to move your mouse, the less efficient you are.
You can also see what functions your users are using the most and what functions they rarely use. So say you have a toolbar with 10 buttons and out of those 10 buttons only 2 are used by almost everyone while the other 8 are rarely touched. This suggests that you may want to make those 2 functions that are used always to be more accessible either with a hotkey or by making those specific buttons bigger so they are easier to click and you may want to evaluate if the other 8 buttons are even worth having there. Likewise if you see people always using the menu functions rather than using the toolbar buttns you may want to investigate why this is or consider labeling the buttons.
Big software companies including Microsoft typically conduct in-person usability tests. But these types of tests can only go so far. That's probably why they are turning to these larger usability tests so they can get more general data about the greater population rather than a small set of people they can get into their labs.
For the uninformed in-person usability tests work as follows: You have a piece of software that you want to evaluate the usability of. To test how usable it is, you come up with a list of tasks for the user to do, like say open their email software and write a hello email to their buddy, or say deleting files named "a", "b", and "c". After you have the tasks you want your user to perform, you people unrelated to the project with varying degrees of knowledge about computers and your software to perform each task. As they attemp the task, your objective is to observer--that is you don't tell them anything even if they are obviously having issues getting the task completed or even if they ask you a question about how to do it. You simply tell them what they're supposed to do and watch, and if they look at you and give up, you say "that's fine" and just note that they were not able to complete the task.
The results of usability testing are pretty amazing for first time usability observers even for some very simple tasks with common software and gadgets. You will also recognize that there are lots of moments where people just sit there and do nothing, times when they keep repeating actions, and times when they keep clicking on something because they think it does something but it doesn't. Some really simple tasks also will show many users all with different ways of accomplishing it. For example if you delete a file how many ways are there to delete it? Well one way is to drag the file to the recycle bin. Another way is to click on it and hit the delete key. Another way is to right-click it and use the context menu delete option. And yet another way is to first open your trash bin and then drag the file to the opened trash bin. All of these ways are valid and I'm willing to bet there will be even a few more ways of deleting files that you'd never have thought of (besides the rm command).
The nice thing about in-person usability testing (as I just described) is that you can ask questions and probe for information about what the person is thinking while they're doing the task. Normally you ask them to think out loud so you can get an idea of what's going on in their mind.
No free software (Score:4, Informative)
Surprise surprise microsoft is being misleading. Also, the FAQ says that in order to opt-out you just send a message to winsurv@microsoft.com but when you do the message bounces with
So you cannot ever get out of the programme after you find out that microsoft was screwed you.
This information includes, but is not limited to (Score:4, Informative)
From the privacy statement fineprint, they say what information they are collecting.
"This information includes, but is not limited to:"
Then they give a list of "harmless" things such as driver types, hardware, errors encountered. But where is the "not limited to" list? Can't find it on the site. They really don't want you to know what they are collecting.
And, of course, Office has its own set of things, which you helpfully have to look for yourself:
To display the privacy statement for Office 2003, please search for "Privacy Statement" in Office 2003 online help.
Plus, the Windows Customer Experience Improvement Program has its own set of things it collects.
Very Big Brother. Then again, most of my information is already out there floating around... Might be nice to have a free copy of Vista.....
Microsoft is no longer giving Vista away... (Score:4, Informative)
What happened to the free product option?
Thank you for your interest in the feedback program. Due to overwhelming response, the supply of gifts has been exhausted so we have closed our free product offer on 12/11/2007 at 2pm Pacific Time. Thanks to everyone that participated!
Re:Hide your own habits... use a VM! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Free... (Score:5, Informative)
Right here [microsoft.com] shows what must be done. You can sign up for either, or both, of the programs (for those to lazy to read the page, the two programs available are the "spyware" and the surveys -- I opted just for the surveys).
Here is the text about the survey feedback program:
When you join the survey feedback program, you'll be invited to take a survey on a regular schedule. If the survey arrives at a time where you are busy, you can skip that one and take the next one instead. You will not receive more than one survey every two weeks.
Hell, I signed up for it. I have access to a computer I can install it on for 3 months that can just sit in a corner idle (whether I decide to use the "feedback program" or not).
And yes, they will be the first against the wall when the revolution starts (apology mr adams).
Expired (Score:2, Informative)
"What happened to the free product option?
Thank you for your interest in the feedback program. Due to overwhelming response, the supply of gifts has been exhausted so we have closed our free product offer on 12/11/2007 at 2pm Pacific Time. Thanks to everyone that participated!"
Source: Spoofee.com
Re:Bzzt!! Wrong! (Score:3, Informative)