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Microsoft To Try Works As Adware

Posted by kdawson on Thu Aug 02, 2007 11:51 AM
from the penny-for-your-eyeballs dept.
Microsoft Software
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.
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  • Switch! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 02 2007, @11:54AM (#20088253)
    [...]Microsoft has announced plans to pre-install an ad-laden version of Works on some manufacturers' PCs in coming months. [...]

    Can't think of a better reason to try Linux or Mac.
    Thanks, Microsoft!

    • Re:Switch! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by nine-times (778537) <nine.times@gmail.com> on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:18PM (#20088811) Homepage
      Or OpenOffice, for christ's sake. I mean, come on, MS Works doesn't even read MS Office documents. It doesn't have the features of a full office suite. There is absolutely no good reason to continue using this crap, even if it's free.
      [ Parent ]

      • Re:Switch! (Score:4, Funny)

        by jellomizer (103300) * on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:24PM (#20088931) Homepage
        I am usually an opponent for the use of OpenOffice stating it is a sub-par replacement for office... But as a replacement for MS Works. I would say use OpenOffice even without the Adds over Works. The only advantage I found with Works in College was a lot of Girls who wrote their paper in works needed it converted to a Doc or even .TXT format went to us geeks.
        [ Parent ]

    • Re:Switch! (Score:5, Funny)

      by Kpau (621891) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:24PM (#20088927)
      I've heard tell legends of small cults of people who actually use Works but during my decades of travels as an IT wizard, I've only encountered one who actually *used* it. Typically people only use it until they figure out it is mostly incompatible with the rest of the freaking world... even within Microsoft's world.
      [ Parent ]

    • Re:Switch! (Score:5, Interesting)

      by catbutt (469582) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:30PM (#20089029)
      I don't like defending Microsoft, but in this case....that's a reason to switch platforms, because you don't like an application that you don't have to use?

      Is it the ads that bother you? Slashdot is adware, you know.

      Personally, I'm happy to see Microsoft finding separate revenue streams for their apps, rather than just bundling them with Windows and claiming they are free. That would have been typical Microsoft....kill Google Docs by bundling something with the OS and covering its cost with the price of the OS.
      [ Parent ]

  • Why would anyone want Works anyway? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Sh00tingstar (872530) on Thursday August 02 2007, @11:55AM (#20088283) Homepage
    given that it's not a particularly functional package, and Open office is mature enough to offer most of what you need anyway. I think the adware-laden 'free' trials are one of the most irritating things about buying a new PC!

    • Re:Why would anyone want Works anyway? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Tom9729 (1134127) <tom9729 AT gmail DOT com> on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:01PM (#20088399) Homepage
      A lot of people just don't know about OpenOffice. People will use this because they don't feel like paying for the full thing (MS Office). Sure, they'll mumble and groan about the ads and etcetera, but they'll use it.

      This is a great time for OpenOffice to get out there and let the common person know about them. Firefox had ads in the newspaper, why couldn't OOo?

      My only question is how long before we see ads in Windows.
      [ Parent ]

      • Re:Why would anyone want Works anyway? (Score:5, Interesting)

        by misleb (129952) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:53PM (#20089523)

        A lot of people just don't know about OpenOffice. People will use this because they don't feel like paying for the full thing (MS Office). Sure, they'll mumble and groan about the ads and etcetera, but they'll use it.


        They'll use it until they find out (the hard way) that they can't share the resulting files with others. WEll, technically there is a Works to Word converter, but Microsoft, for some "strange" reason didn't see fit to include it in Office by default. I don't think Microsoft really wants people to use Works at all. They just want to get people using some Microsoft product and annoy them (with ads and document incompatibility) into "upgrading" to Office. Works is a gateway application.

        -matthew
        [ Parent ]

        • Re:Why would anyone want Works anyway? (Score:4, Funny)

          by bilabrin (1127623) on Thursday August 02 2007, @01:31PM (#20090263)
          IMHO Works is garbage. Here's a list of progams I'd use as a text editor before I'd consider using Works again.

          Wordpad
          Notepad
          Paintbrush
          Pencil and paper.
          A sandy beach, a stick and a camera!

          Seriously, Works is a puchline!
          [ Parent ]

  • Works sells for 40$? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by 140Mandak262Jamuna (970587) on Thursday August 02 2007, @11:57AM (#20088337) Journal
    Has any one actually shelled out money to buy works? It is installed as crapware by the vendors. How out of touch with reality is MSFT really?

    • Re:Works sells for 40$? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Zarhan (415465) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:12PM (#20088689)
      Actually...Back in old days, when it was MS Works 2.0 (DOS version!). Early 90's. I really liked the darn thing.

      The target segment for Works, I suppose, is to use it for "home accounting". For that purpose the 2.0 worked very well due to one nice fact:

      It came with it's own teaching program! No annoying clippy. No gazillion menus, and indexed helps where you cannot find anything. Basically a self-running tutorial for elementary word processing and doing some spreadsheets - some basic formulas (doing sums, etc). And it worked. Even my somewhat-of-a-luddite parents changed their home accounting from pen&paper to Works. It would nicely show off some examples, allow you to try it yourself, checked your input, and really taught how to do things.

      These days they are using Openoffice. So am I.

      What went wrong?

      Well, basically, at around version 4.0 Works became bloatware. So, might as well go for Excel/OOO. And the teaching functionality is no longer there in the basic package so it's no longer even useful as a "my first spreadsheet". (Ok, I don't know about the absolute latest versions).

      [ Parent ]

  • who wants this? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by huckda (398277) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:03PM (#20088445) Journal

    The manufacturers involved were not disclosed.
    So as not to hurt the sale of said systems...

  • Just guessing (Score:5, Interesting)

    by OpenSourced (323149) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:04PM (#20088489) Journal
    Microsoft has announced plans to pre-install an ad-laden version of Works on some manufacturers' PCs

    Lemme guess... Perhaps that offer will be done to the manufacturers that were "thinking about/already intalling" Open Office for free in their naked PCs ?

  • Do they censor the ads? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:11PM (#20088653)
    Excellent. Now how do we purchase adspace for Open Office and KOffice in this wonderful program?

  • OpenOffice needs to step up (Score:4, Interesting)

    by computerman413 (1122419) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:11PM (#20088659)
    Maybe OpenOffice should try and arrange to have their products put on Windows computers. It won't cost manufacturers anything, and it won't have annoying ads.

  • Ad-Laden? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Shadow Wrought (586631) * on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:27PM (#20088987) Homepage Journal
    Isn't he the number three Al Queda guy these days?

  • Brilliant... (Score:5, Funny)

    by msimm (580077) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:31PM (#20089049) Homepage
    but only so long as they use Clippy to present the ads. It would be like life in hell in a great cuddly way.

  • Oxymoron! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Archangel Michael (180766) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:35PM (#20089099) Journal
    Microsoft Works

  • Wait...what? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Control Group (105494) * on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:44PM (#20089315) Homepage
    Microsoft still makes Works? And they charge money for it? Is it still one of the best document-encryption tools around?

    I haven't even seen a Microsoft Works installation since the days when I'd carry around a floppy with Norton Utilities on it - and use it often.

  • Oxymorons!!!! (Score:4, Funny)

    by Pojut (1027544) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:47PM (#20089381) Homepage
    #974: Airline Food

    #632: Civil War

    #232: Microsoft Works

    • Re:Have they ever managed to sell works? (Score:5, Funny)

      by NickFortune (613926) on Thursday August 02 2007, @12:07PM (#20088547) Homepage

      Exactly. Now instead of just bundling office software that no one wants and no one uses with new PCs, they're going to bundle sotware that no one wants, no one uses, and that advertises at you.

      Of course, this being MS, they're going to try and sell this as an added value proposition: "seventy five percent of all the sock puppets that responded to our market research all said that they felt the lack of advertising was a serious lack in Microsoft Works"

      [ Parent ]
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