Re: Microsoft is scary.
quote: Originally posted by sangxjin
Under Microsoft, business usually license several copies of Microsoft software because it is much cheaper to license it than just buy boxed product. Under the current license, they get a few CD's and an e-mail with an authorization number allowing them to use and own however many licenses they bought. These authorization numbers are easy to track and make spotting pirates very easy, since there is no software CD to copy with a specific CD key code.
Instead, the CD is a general CD and any code will work - that is why it sells for only $22. But the authorization numbers are needed to unlock the CD and software behind the CD. Once these CD keys are entered, the software will install. So how does Microsoft know I have installed the software on all 30 of my business machines instead of buying 30 licenses?
Simple; connect to the web, update the software, register it, or hit a Microsoft web site, and they have the info. The law right now is very limited as to what companies can do to gather info on customers, but that is changing due to new legislation for software piracy, and new laws to combat it are coming.
Microsoft's new licensing program has thrown out the upgrades. No longer can you just get an upgrade - now you have to buy a full version; even end users will see this effect. Businesses have even less choices. They must purchase a full license for the software they want, and add on top of that what is called Software Assurance. This is like a 2-year subscription to any and all upgrades and version changes to that software title.
They will get it free of charge during the 2-year plan. If businesses do not buy the SA (as I call it), they will end up paying almost double or triple over 5 years for the software just to upgrade. So Microsoft has forced businesses to get into the 2 year SA program and, at the end of the 2 years, the company just has to renew the SA program which costs much less than a full license.
So businesses are getting rocked into a subscription plan for 2 years and they have to upgrade at the end of the plan before they can get renewed. But to the rest of us - what does this mean? Well, soon after, Microsoft will try to pass legislation making the tracking and monitoring of software much easier to combat piracy.
They will eventually forgo selling businesses and end users a box with a CD in it and opt out for a License number. This number, which a business, or end user buys at a store, will be used at home or in the IT office to log onto Microsoft's web site and enter the authorization number. Once entered, you will download the software right to the machines which need it and that's that - yeah, right!
What Microsoft does not make openly known is the fact that without a CD in your hand, You Do Not Own The Software Any More!
If you don't own it, your rent it, and the rules have now changed. Now the law can be bent and Microsoft can legally monitor usage, and at any time cut the use of the software remotely from the web. If after 2 years you are still using their older Windows program, Microsoft may say, "Hey, time to upgrade, you get 14 days to do so, or we are shutting your OS down until you do!" They can do that folks, it's heading into law.
more info here
This is why i might consider getting a mac os soon. But the problem is , everywhere...people are using windows....so if i type a document in macintosh...how would i use it in word ?
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