Comments on: Week in review: Battening down Microsoft's hatches

The rate of piracy on Windows Vista is lower than its predecessor, and Congress moves to ramp up copyright infringement penalties. Also: Peeling Apple.

[jstorch]

Mike is a dumb ass...

Vista might be a little harder to pirate but really Vista sucks so bad nobody wants to take the TIME to pirate it...

[fred dunn]

Agree, why spend time hacking Vista?

When it is such a small audience? That includes hacking the copy protection DRM. Despite Microsoft's spin on their sales, Vista is at most 10% of the systems out there. All the rest got rolled back to XP or Ubuntu.

[slewisma]

Other reasons

Why is Vista's piracy rate lower than XP?

If you can't afford Vista, you can't afford enough hardware to run it anyway. Or, if you bought enough hardware to run Vista, Vista came with it and there's no need to crack it. Anti-piracy through obsoleting existing hardware.

Why pirate Vista if XP works fine and you already know how it works?

If you are capable of cracking Vista wouldn't you rather hack on something cool like Linux or try to make Mac OS X run on a non-Apple x86 machine? Even freeing an iPhone from AT&T's grip is cooler than cracking Vista.

[jimmyquick1]

Customer service what?

I think a lot of piracy exists because people are dissatisfied with
the major Software companies. I know a lot of people who don't
understand why they have to pay hundreds of dollars for an OS
only to find out it doesn't work and customer service is
essentially non-existent.

Here's one example: I own two licenses for XP Home. When the
install disks broke in a move 2 years ago the mighty MS wanted
$100 a piece to replace them. Needless to say they currently
reside at the landfill.

There's been this attitude that because it Windows there's
nothing you can do. "There on 98% of the world computer" is a
common mantra. I think now is a good time for open source
software (Linux) to step up and fill the gap.

You can only treat consumers like this for so long before they
retaliate. Piracy, I think, is one outlet for that.

[Seaspray0]

Contact your OEM

I can purchase the restore disk from my OEM for about $10. However, owning the disk is not equal to owning the license. Your license is tied to the certificate of authenticity, not the disks. As long as you have the certificates of authenticity with the product ID number, you still own those two licenses whether you have the disks or not.

[wolivere]

This has been the cry since 96

And 11-12 years later its still where?

Thats an abnormaly high amount, when mine got destroyed in a move also it was closer to $20.

[TheDudeandHis360]

No Buys an iPod just to watch NBC

Really both companies loose. But NBC is still losing more than
Apple. People will still buy iPods and iPhones. Those same
people just won't bother downloading and paying for TV shows.
They'll do without or they'll get it off of Bit Torrent or another
P2P service.

For instance, I missed the Strike "Finale" of HEROES because I
found the Pats/Ravens game way more interesting. I would've
spent the $2 and downloaded it from iTunes. But I couldn't. So I
just grabbed it for free off of a Torrent.

You can't deny customers what they want in terms or content,
and you can't force them into something they don't want
(otherwise Napster 2.0 and all those rent-a-song services
would be blowing iTunes away) just to watch a TV show.

[fokwp]

50% vs. 5%

So they're getting 50% less piracy on Vista, but for all of Windows they're getting a growth of just 5%?

This should start to confirm MS's decades-old theory: if we ever keep people from pirating our stuff, they'll stop buying it, too.

Maybe they'll finally stop their ultimate monopolistic technique - giving software away under the guise of loose policing against piracy. This should start creating a big opening for Apple and open source.

[wolivere]

Think of it this way

Vista penetration into the market is = Mac, and all Linux distro's combined.

Not sure who is crying in there cookies here.

[Jim Harmon]

Offering a WiFi

[i]The U.S. House of Representatives also overwhelmingly approved a bill saying that anyone offering an open Wi-Fi connection to the public must report illegal images, including "obscene" cartoons and drawings--or face fines of up to $300,000.[/i]

I hope that the bill itself includes laguage to the effect "knowingly and willingly offering an open Wi-Fi connection." If not, potentially tens of thousands of people who haven't properly secured their wireless routers will instantly become criminals.

[wbenton]

Best way to Batten Down Microsoft's hatches

Step 1) Perform a Low Level format of the hard disk in question.

Step 2) Install Linux.

Problem Solved.

Walt

[hpew]

NBC's decision is based on pure greed

The iTunes downloads are commercial free, the NBC downloads are
NOT. You figure it out.

[wtortorici]

Pirates only pirate things they can make money

from. If there is no market for an item, what's the point of making copies and distributing them. That cost money.
We already know that the WGA in Vista has already been compromised, so making copies is no big deal.
Vista is a bust, just hope it fades away and more effort is spent on improving XP.