Slashdot Log In
Is Microsoft Office Adware?
Posted by
Soulskill
on Sun Feb 10, 2008 01:07 PM
from the somebody-tell-lavasoft dept.
from the somebody-tell-lavasoft dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Office may fall under Microsoft's own definition of adware. It links to third-party commercial add-ons, includes up-selling promos, requires cookies for certain functions, and collects technical information. While this is like a normal day on the web, should the commercial office suite be held to a different standard and possibly be considered adware? The article also notes that clicking advertising links in Office will bring up Internet Explorer, regardless of whether or not it is the default browser. We discussed Microsoft's decision to turn Works into adware a few months ago.
Related Stories
[+]
Microsoft To Try Works As Adware 246 comments
Several readers noted that Microsoft has announced plans to pre-install an ad-laden version of Works on some manufacturers' PCs in coming months. Works is Microsoft's lightweight docs-and-spreadsheets software. The manufacturers involved were not disclosed. The adware Works will come with a pre-installed cache of ads that will be refreshed when the machine is online. Microsoft will decide by mid-2008 whether it can afford to forgo the $40 normally charged for Works.
Submission: Is Microsoft Office Adware? by Anonymous Coward
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Full
Abbreviated
Hidden
Loading... please wait.
No but this post is (Score:5, Funny)
OOo (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:OOo (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re:OOo (Score:4, Interesting)
Then their were the wizards to facilitate your Internet connection that would only work with ISP who had paid an advertising fee to M$.
So really it is nothing new, same old M$ just screwing over the customer at every opportunity ;).
Parent
Re:OOo (Score:4, Insightful)
Trusted Computing support in Vista, which brings nothing to the public, but causes their computer to cease to be under their control, allowing such things as:
Remote censorship after the fact
Unbreakable vendor lock-in
Draconian digital rights management
Inability to use custom software on your own hardware
Who demanded this? The US Department of Defense and the large media corporations.
Does it serve the public or the end user? No.
Aside from the dangers of what it does when it works right, does it inconvenience the user in unrelated ways? Yes, it consumes resources with no return and causes general bugginess in such a large variety of software that Vista is being refused by the general public despite their ignorance of these larger issues, simply because of the side effects.
Does it tie into a larger agenda to control the worlds information, tax every creative work, rewrite history, and create a system of control that would give would be despots wet dreams? You're fucking right it does.
If you were to take a random sample of a hundred people out of your typical mall and explain the technology and what it does, do you think anyone would ask for it? Anyone at all?
Yet they spent billions of dollars over many years conspiring to bring this technology to our homes. Why do you suppose they did that?
Because they were motivated by interests who wish to control the population at large without regard for what is legal.
They think of their customer base as cows, to be owned, controlled and sold to private interests.
That example about selling ad space in IE is so benign compared to what's going on these days that it actually makes a person wistfully think of how nice Microsoft used to be, relatively speaking.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
The fact that it upsets MS fanbois is a bonus.
Re: What MS wants to own (Score:5, Funny)
And you had better have a passport, because on entrance you and your computer become subjects of El Presidente Señor Lanzero de Sillónes Ballmero.
Parent
Re: What MS wants to own (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re: What MS wants to own (Score:5, Insightful)
they hate their licensees
There, fixed it for ya. The term "customer" leaves me with the impression that you've actually bought something and you can do want you want with it. I don't think this is how M$ sees it. Bill lets you use his s/w for a while if you behave and follow the rules.
Parent
Don't think so (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Don't think so (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
but you can bet there is one). You throw in the fact that calls home with usage/tracking data, and you know what?
We're technically talking about something very similar to adware.
Of course, most joe-sixpack people don't care. This suggests that there's some convergence of advertising and
application functionality in our future (see also: Google Apps)
Re:Don't think so (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I remember buying MathType in 1997 or so because I found it in Word. I was grateful as I wouldn't have known about MathType otherwise (then).
I guess my point is that it was helpful (for both me and the third party) since it led me to find a program I used a lot from a small 3rd party.
It is no less adware just because the ads may be useful.
I hated having to find programs ($20 or $30 for something I needed to use once so I didn't do it) though that did what Office should have been able to do (I really can't remember what now but I remember being really angry because they were simple things).
And these ads, if they are indeed useful and not annoying (and remember, all ads in any kind of adware are useful to somebody; if nobody ever clicked them, they wouldn't exist in the first place or would die out soon), only make it easier to find that kind of functionality elsewhere, for if it were built in into Office, there would be no need for the ads.
Re:Don't think so (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Of *course* not! (Score:4, Funny)
Of course not - If so, Windows Defender would block it. Which it doesn't. So no problem, right?
Sounds OK to me (Score:5, Interesting)
I would have been glad to get a free shrink wrap Works a few years ago. My mom was sending me documents in Works Word Processor format and I had to go buy Works to read them. Trust me, teaching "Save As . . . scroll down to Word... " wasn't practical with her at the time. It was a lot less painful to just go buy Works.
Finally, I hate to tell you, but the Works 7 Word Processor isn't actually that bad. It looks exactly like Word did a few years ago, and has all the features most people use.
Re:Sounds OK to me (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, and there are a lot of people that wish Word still looked like it did a few years ago.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Let the market decide (Score:3, Insightful)
Perhaps the manufacture should just give a genuine itemized invoice rather than bundling and let the market decide.
Windows? (Score:4, Funny)
On a side note, when I click on an email address in my Windows Mail, it opens Office Outlook. No, it is not set as my default mailer
Re: (Score:2)
This is how Microsoft was BORN. I suggest you revise the company's history a little.
I read it as... (Score:5, Funny)
I guess we need to consider... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I guess we need to consider... (Score:5, Insightful)
So any software which contains links to its creator's webpage (or its own, if one has been created) is adware?
You're right: based on the summary and Microsoft's description Leopard and office would fall under the category, but then again, so would nearly every piece of software I use to some degree. Who voted for this article to be featured, anyway? Just another excuse for pointless debate...
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
If you really don't want adware, just unplug that RJ45 ethernet cable on the back.
Instant...no adware!
Sliverlight Prompts (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe Microsoft should come up with a new logo program: "Microsoft adware Aware"
Search the internet (Score:3)
It drives me nuts because my boss *always* uses that instead of clicking the FF icon which is hindering my attempts to improve the workflow.
Re: (Score:2)
1. Get a copy of the ubiquitous "Hello World" program, in any language for which you have a compiler.
2. Compile it.
3. Rename the resulting file "iexplore.exe".
4. Copy it to the directory where the real iexplore.exe resides, thus nullifying any calls to Internut Exploder from anywhere.
5. Copy the file to your boss's computer, thereby forcing him to use Firefox.
Re: (Score:2)
Don't laugh, I saw this kind of thing happen.
--jeffk++
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe Desparationware (Score:3)
Warren Buffett saw it back in the early 90s when he said he wouldn't invest in Microsoft, because he didn't see a profitable business model (long term...Buffett's method).
Desperation is driving MS to use everything they can to continue the profit line, including using acquisitions to get what they couldn't create.
I don't have anything bad to say about MS, and use some of their products, but given their CEO's reputation and his lack of experience in any other large company, & changing FOSS world, I have this gut feel that says MS is going to have a REAL HARD time expanding its yearly sales and profits.
The Year of Office 2007 (Score:4, Informative)
Desperation is driving MS to use everything they can to continue the profit line
I have this gut feel that says MS is going to have a REAL HARD time expanding its yearly sales and profits.
67 cents of every new retail dollar spent on PC software goes to MS Office.
Through end of November, U.S. retail PC software sales are up 10.3 percent year over year as measured in dollar volume, according to NPD. By comparison, Office sales are up 50.7 percent, by the same measure and in the same time frame. Office sales are so big, they make calculating broader PC software retail sales difficult. The "magnitude of Office sales relative to the rest of the PC software market is phenomenal. It's the massively huge tail wagging the dog." Retail Black Friday sales of Mac Office were up 215.8 percent year over year. While Mac Office generated blowout sales on Black Friday, Office 2007 sales growth was exceptionally good, too. Year-over-year U.S. retail Black Friday sales of Office were up 65.8 percent, as measured in dollars. The Year of Office 2007 [microsoft-watch.com]
Microsoft's profits are up 79%:
For the quarter that ended Dec. 31, profit rose to $4.71 billion, or 50 cents per share, from $2.63 billion, or 26 cents per share the previous year. Analysts polled by Thomson Financial had forecast a profit of 46 cents per share. Revenue rose 31 percent to $16.37 billion from $12.5 billion in the year-ago quarter, ahead of the analysts' prediction of $15.95 billion in sales.
{and, in what must be the understatement of the year]
"It looks like a very nice report," said Sarah Friar, an analyst for Goldman Sachs. Microsoft Corp. earnings leap 79 percent [statesman.com]
I was sorely tempted to give my response a flamebait title like "The Geek Turns Delusional."
I won't disguise my opinion here that the Geek's increasingly frantic retreat from reality has been the Slashdot story since the posting of Microsoft's second quarter results.
The CDW poll points to a softening of enterprise IT negative attitudes toward Vista. Familiarity, it seems, has bred content: IT departments are happier with Vista's features, particularly in the area of security, and less concerned about the hardware costs of Vista than they were a year ago. Another year will bring further declines in the relative cost of PC hardware -- and make a lot of corporate desktop hardware look even more antique. Only a major economic downturn would be likely to derail current estimates of another strong year for PC sales, so even if Vista remains tied to hardware sales it would do well, and corporate upgrades could finally kick in as old hardware is upgraded. This has been a year when Vista has had its rough edges knocked off, and the marketplace has adjusted its expectations. By Vista's next birthday it should be more differentiated and acceptable for both its consumer and business marketplaces. Assessing Windows Vista On Its First Anniversary [informationweek.com]
Parent
Give me a break. (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course if this were a Microsoft Office advocacy site talking shit about OpenOffice we would have the FUD-Nazis screaming at the top of their lungs.
But honestly, I can't make myself care about the hypocrisy anymore; I am tired and bored of it even more than I am tired and bored of the whole Roger Clemens thing.
Back on-topic for a second, "adware" is not really a useful term as it encompasses a number of different things, some of which are not malicious and others which are. As long as Microsoft discloses what the software is doing then there really isn't any malicious intent.
trolls gone wild (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
I wonder if Soulskill is Zonk's sock-puppet.
It's been a trend for years. Worse then even MS.. (Score:4, Interesting)
A bit biased, perhaps? (Score:5, Informative)
The article states, "it is unusual to require cookies or to use them in a desktop application", yet Office Online is the only part of Office that requires cookies. This doesn't seem that strange to me: no local features require them.
I wasn't able to find any ads in Office 2007, but because I'm running the latest version, none will probably show up until the next version of Office is released. Showing a couple of ad links at the bottom of the help text, and only after the user goes into help, stretches the definition of Adware a bit.
Java does it... (Score:2)
All I know is... (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
EMACS forever
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Use Open Office (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re: (Score:2)
Your bias opinion that attempts to reinforce the view that OO.org is shit on the other hand might be classed as FUD. If you had said, "Is OO.org shitty?" I might have taken a different point of view when writing this comment.
Re:I am shocked and apalled! (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
But is the article really flawed? Tell us, did you check what the info published was about, "clicking advertising links in Office will bring up Internet Explorer"?
This