
Taiwan Forces MS To Cut Prices, Unbundle Software 477
bev_tech_rob writes "This article from ZDNet reports how Microsoft has agreed to cut prices on their software after a backlash from the country's effort to crack down on piracy. Seems the citizens were forced to obtain pirated copies due to the high cost and having to buy software they did not need to get the parts they DID need."
Robbin Hood (Score:2)
Yeah. Forced. Arm twisting and the whole deal.
Re:Robbin Hood (Score:5, Funny)
I'm proud to say that there is no such danger in XP. Windows pop up when I want to make a change, and then more pop up to ask if I'm sure I want the change. Thankfully, Windows XP looks after my computer's well-being by occasionally switching configuration settings from the way I want them to what the OS programmers think they might probably ought to be. Boy, I'm just impressed with how smart they are. Once I learned to live with whatever the default settings are on any new hardware I install, I can't say the number of hours I have saved.
I use that spare time to reboot my Windows XP machine multiple times a day. Technical support personnel recommend that I do it regularly-- kind of like brushing my teeth. To help remind me of this necessity, windows pop up to tell me to reboot whenever I make a configuration change. By now my machine is minty fresh, I figure.
There is no such useful rebooting in a Linux system. It is as reliable as the sunrise, with uptimes in weeks, months and years. Virtually no configuration change requires a reboot, to boot. Imagine all that plaque in the computer. Gross!
In XP I am prevented from making dangerous fundamental configuration changes unless I use a special "registry editor". I have found it so useful to have this separate editor that I hope in future versions they go all the way and supply a separate editor for each file on the disk-- in that way windows could pop up at every keystroke to warn me that changing any line in the file I am editing could cause the system to not run properly. If this were only the case, people would finally learn that it is best to just stick with the mouse and they would be freed of the need to constantly move their hands back to the keyboard. (If one stops to think about it, the mouse is a much better device to use than the keyboard. Ever hear of someone getting carpal tunnel syndrome from a mouse? No. It's comfortable and ergonomic. Like Morse code devices. That's how long distance communication started, after all.)
Linux, by contrast, requires no special editor to change configuration files. The fact that there is no "registry" in Linux allows the abomination of using any text editor whatsoever to do the configuration. Can you believe that configuration files are usually stored clear text? Talk about dangerous!
I am also happy to report that I have experienced no truth to the rumor that Windows disks become corrupt after improper shutdowns. Indeed, I have been forced to improperly shutdown the machine innumerable times after it locks up, and I have no apparent problems to report regarding the disk. No such claim can be made for Linux. They say something about lack of data points. Excuses are all I ever seem to hear from the Linux crowd.
By sheer size alone, Windows XP beats Linux hands down. It is so much bigger, it is _obvious_ that it is better. Why would you want a small OS with the large disks and RAM sizes we have these days? For this reason alone, I heartily recommend Windows as a way to maximize resource utilization. Your CPU and disk will constantly be pegged to the limit, the way god intended. The Linux kernel and drivers accounts for only about 750KB. Why, even the Microsoft Win16 subsystem uses more space than that.
It is no surprise that Windows XP costs $300 on the retail market and Linux doesn't cost anything. People know what they want, and they want Windows XP. Because Linux is free, that means it's basically worthless. The same goes for all the development tools, remotable GUIs, and applications, which all cost money for Windows (i.e., are worth something) and free for Linux (worthless!).
Installing software is very easy in Windows XP. I usually slip in CDs without even reading instructions or warnings, and just double click on whatever window pops up. There is no need to read anything or touch the keyboard. (Did I mention that I hate that thing?) Well, OK, I have learned the hard way the machine locks up if I don't take the time to close all other applications.
Linux, by contrast, requires typing on the keyboard to get anything to install at all. And you always have to know the NAME of program you want to install. For example, in Slackware, you have to type "pkgtool" to install a program. Linux needs to get with the 21st century!
Windows XP follows the DOS convention of putting \r\n at the end of every line of a text file. While this is only a mild concern because of the relative rarity of text files on Windows machines these days-- thank god--it helps to differentiate between the text files and the other files. Sadly, Linux makes no distinction between text and other files.
If I legitimately purchase Windows XP, I can call Microsoft customer support to get help with my problems. After a short hold time of an hour or so, they always help me. Ever since I told them that I was dual booting to Linux, they were able to flag my account and now each time I call even the entry level support personnel I am connected to say that Linux is the source of my problems. Everyone seems to agree that Linux is no good. The more I listen, the more I'm impressed with the knowledge of the support staff there.
By contrast, in Linux, all I have is stockpiles of resources and documentation that I would actually have to read in order to understand. Sure, I could obtain Linux support from a commercial organization, but they would probably just tell me I have to use a text editor to fix up my system.
In the end, I have no need for that old computer donkey Unix. I don't need to run big Unix tasks, after all. I refuse to become one of those a bug-eyed computer users, that's for sure. As soon as I can keep Windows XP from crashing for long enough, I'm going to delete my Linux partition, i.e., the equivalent of moving it to the Recycle Bin, saying that I'm sure, emptying the Recycle Bin, and again saying that I'm sure I want to empty it.
It's funny because it's true. (Score:5, Insightful)
Being able to put the CD in the CD drive, press a button a couple of times, reboot, and get what you want is VERY IMPORTANT. NOT THINKING is VERY IMPORTANT.
Users want things that work like coffee machines. You plug it in and it works. If you want a different coffee machine, you get a different coffee machine and plug it in and it works. Windows makes computers a lot more like coffee machines than Linux does. Having to turn your computer on an off to get a new feature is much less of a problem than having to know what to type to get a new feature. Linux wants you to figure stuff out. Microsoft wants your money.
For most people, giving up money is easier.
Re:It's funny because it's true. (Score:4, Insightful)
> important. Optimum configuration is not important. Control is not
> important. Not having to power toggle is not important.
> Being able to put the CD in the CD drive, press a button a couple
> of times, reboot,
> and get what you want is VERY IMPORTANT. NOT THINKING is
> VERY IMPORTANT.
> Users want things that work like coffee machines. You plug it in
> and it works. If you want a different coffee machine, you get
> a different coffee machine and plug it in and it works. Windows
> makes computers a lot more like coffee machines than Linux does.
> Having to turn your computer on an off to get a new feature is much
> less of a problem than having to know what to type to get a new
> feature. Linux wants you to figure stuff out. Microsoft wants
> your money.
I'm not sure that I can entirely agree with you. I don't think that Windows is inherently easier to deal with. I think that the fact that Windows is by far the dominant operating system means that all hardware and nearly all software developers pay specific attention to how their products work with Windows. This isn't due to any particular feature of the operating system. It's simply because they have to make it easy on the popular platform.
For most applications, installations go like this:
* In Windows 2000, I'd open up my web browser of choice. Then I'd go to one of the download sites or perhaps to google.com, and I'd search for an application online. I'd download the application (usually going through a few screens of ad-laden BS and choosing various mirror that are closest to me. I'd go to the location of the file (either through Start->Run or using a file manager like PowerDesk or simply by using Opera's excellent download manager). Then I'd double-click on the file. A "wizard" application opens and asks me a series of successive questions about where it wants me to install the program, whether I agree to a fifty-page application-specific legal document, where in the Start Menu I want this thing to go, and whether I want shortcuts placed in various locations. Then the program (sometimes) tells me that it needs to reboot, and I hit "OK". It reboots, occasionally does some further installation, and then I'm set. I would do all this every time for each program.
* In Mandrake Linux 9.0, I go to the package managing program (By clicking on "K->Configuration->Packaging->Install Software", or by hitting ALT-F2, typing "rpmdrake" and hitting ENTER). I change the little radio button group from "Mandrake choices" to "All Packages". I type a program name into the Search bar and hit the Search button (or I'd just look through the efficiently categorized list of programs). I check the checkboxes of any and all programs that I want to install, and I hit the Install button. Then I sit back as the installer automatically downloads, installs and configures all the applications I selected, grabbing any prerequisite programs from the servers automatically. In the time it took to search for, download and begin the installation of a program in Windows, I've finished installing the Linux app. Before I've finished mucking with the Next->Next->Next->Finish screen of that installation, another Linux app has finished installing (without me needing to click on anything more). By the time my computer has rebooted into Windows 2000 from that one install, the Mandrake Linux package manager has installed six or seven different apps (and I only had to click the "Install" button once). And you know what? Everything is installed into logical, well thought-out places. Instead of going into "Programs" and having to scroll down a clumsy list of company names to find the app you've installed (difficult especially if you've forgotten the company name!) like I see on Windows 2000, the Mandrake installer puts everything into intuitive, user-friendly subcategories. Stuff that uses the network is in "Networking". All my email programs are in "Networking->Mail". My news (usenet) readers (Pan for binary downloading, Mozilla Messenger for general reading) are in "Networking->News". Card games are specifically in "Amusement->Cards". Know what I have to do to find all my card games in Windows? I have to look in "Programs->Accessories->Games" and figure out which ones are card games. Then I have to look in every subgroup in Programs (the aforementioned company names) to check and see which ones have card games. I have to *memorize* this stuff in Windows. In Linux, I just go to "Amusement->Cards". Holy crap, you can't get any more obvious than that! Oh, I need to watch TV? "Multimedia->Video". I have to put this 800MB SVCD onto my 700MB CD without data loss? "Applications->Archiving->Cd Burning". I want my kid to learn stuff? "Applications->Edutainment". I'll never accidentally click on the "Hot Boobies" interactive porno game when I intended to show my female colleague my PG-rated "Hard Bodies" fitness management program. It just won't happen, because one of them would be in "Amusement->Sex" while the other would be found in
It's better than that. If I want to be lazy in windows, I can set up links on the taskbar, Office Bar (if I spend the untold hundreds for their Office product) or desktop to the programs. I could also (with a non-native third-party extension program) map programs to a Win-key combination. Currently, in Windows, I use Win-O to open Opera, Win-M to open my Mail program (Eudora), Win-X to open eXcel, Win-W to open Word, and so forth. Mandrake natively supports key combinations to open programs, and I believe you can differentiate between the two Win keys if you had the desire (LeftWin+W goes to OpenOffice Writer, RightWin+W goes to KWord, for example). I don't use it much, for the following reasons: Mandrake (and, by the way, I'm using KDE to manage my gui, so ymmv if you use other programs) allows me to put links to programs on the desktop. It also allows me to put links to programs on my taskbar. But it lets me configure these links in interesting ways (and we're not talking about difficult configuration; we're talking about Right-click-on-panel->Size->Large and similarly easy means). I can have (and I do) two levels of bars with these links. I have a big taskbar with my extra-lazy application links. These are full-sized icons, so they're easy to click on when I'm too slothful to competently use the mouse. On the bar right above it, I have (among other things) medium-sized icons for a whole bunch of programs that I tend to frequently use, like my text editor and my web browser. Incidentally, that bar also has a dictionary bar, an ascii character picker (I could paste odd characters into any program instead of having to rely on some arcane, application specific "Insert->Character" features that don't work universally), a web news scroller, an advanced clipboard manager (you know how more recent versions of Microsoft Office allow for multiple clipboard levels? Well, KDE's Klipper application does this for *every app*) and quick shortcuts to lock the computer or to logout. But I don't every really use those icons very often. Why not? Well, I have session management turned on. Whenever I turn on my computer, the system reloads active programs so that I can continue from where I left off. And most of my programs (Opera, Konsole, Konqueror, Kate, Pan) have their own internal session management, so I don't have to click on bookmarks or whatever to get to where I was before. The other thing that makes it easy to not have to move my mouse to hit those "shortcut" icons is the nature of linux pathing. Remember when I installed those programs above? Well, the executables are automatically put into a place that's in the system path. Most of the programs have pretty short filenames for the binaries. Most of the time, if I want to run the program and happen to remember the program's executable name, I hit F2, type in the program name and hit ENTER. F2,pan,ENTER. F2,mozilla,ENTER. F2,kate,ENTER. Heck, even those programs that I installed through other means than the Mandrake Package Manager (sometimes, you can install the very latest versions of programs before they get packaged) will work with this. F2,gmplayer,ENTER runs the GUI version of MPlayer, the only multimedia program that can play just about every format out there, from mpeg to avi to asf to quicktime to rm to ogg to DVDs and Mode 2 SVCDs (which I *almost* have working in windows, with some occasional bizarre inconsistencies). I have to have three or four different players installed on Windows 2000 to get that sort of compatibility, and that's ignoring the easier interface and hotkeys in MPlayer.
The hardware side is sometimes easier in Windows, though my experience doesn't exactly completely agree with that. I have a somewhat generic 5.1 sound card with no discernable markings on it. It took me *forever* to find the drivers for Windows 2000, and it was actually Linux (and its "harddrake" hardware manager) that gave me enough clues about the main chips on this soundcard to find out that it was from some C-Media company or something like that. Some time after, I found the Windows drivers and everything went swimmingly. Know how much I had to look for the Linux drivers? They were already there. They. Were. Already. There. When I installed Mandrake 9.0, the sound card was autodetected and autoconfigured. I'll give you that an earlier version of Mandrake (8.1 or 8.2) didn't properly detect the card when I first installed it, but the drivers for it were in there and it was comparatively trivial to tell the computer this (I put the name of the sound card driver module, something like cmpci.so, into some configuration startup text file) compared to the herculean effort to get it running in Win2k.
My TV card used to be an outdated Hauppauge that didn't support scaling past 640x480. I had to guess which drivers it used from Hauppauge.com, and I was eventually successful in Windows 2000. The scaling thing was annoying, but it worked, except that the video capture seemed problematic. A few months later, Win2k went crappy on me, and I had to reinstall it. For the life of me, I could not remember which drivers and in which order I needed to install, and I couldn't get the TV program to work, no matter how hard I tried. So I did it in Linux. The Mandrake 8.x install autodetected, autoinstalled, autoconfigured. And it installed a whole wad of different TV programs that could use the TV card. One of them (xawtv) could inexplicably scale the TV screen to whatever dimension I wanted. I still use that program.
Heck, this past Christmas, my parents bought me an All-in-Wonder RADEON 8500. The installs worked fine on both systems. Unfortunately, I only have a choice of one TV program on Windows, and that program makes the system crash after I try to shut it down. I still have the exact same vareity of TV programs on Linux, and if I wanted to use my brain, I could probably pretty easily figure out how to broadcast the TV image onto my local network.
The USB CD burner that I recently gave up was fun. When I installed it in Windows, the Windows Media Player tried to autoinstall a "CD Burning Plugin" which caused all my CD drives (even the CD-ROM) to disappear (until I got all technical and figured out how to remove the stupid plugin). Mandrake 9 (and 8.2, I think) just installed it. No fuss. It worked on installation.
I think that my newly installed ATAPI burner is easier to install in Windows, but that's because (as I mentioned above) Windows gets the third-party support. I did have to change two or three text files (though I didn't need any installation program) to get this burner working in Linux. I haven't really tested the burner in Win2k, primarily because process management in 2k is sloppy. If I wanted to burn at the maximum speed, I'd have to close *everything* to avoid buffer underruns in Windows. In Linux, I'm simultaneously downloading from usenet, unRARing 800MB mpegs, viewing SVCDs from my CD-ROM drive and browsing the internet. It gives me a little trouble if I -- on top of all that -- run a particularly intensive parity checking program, but I think that this is on the whole better than having to avoid *breathing* lest Windows get cranky and reduce my CD-R media to useless silvery powder.
Granted, linux does have some usability drawbacks. Moving drives around is a big no-no unless you're a learned user. My system forgot where that ATAPI burner went when I recently rearranged some devices. I fixed that in under ten minutes, but it felt like the end of the world before I figured out what was going on. I can't get my Gyration gyroscopic mouse working properly in Linux (I've gotten it to the point that it takes *some* input from this device, but said input is completely incoherent and unmouselike). That one is due to the third-party effect, but it's still tremendously annoying. Games aren't as developed, of course, but that's not really a usability issue.
Damnit, doing things that I *need* to do, system-wise, is totally trivial in Linux. My Millennium II and Marvel G200 half a decade ago could zoom in with a hotkey in Windows, but I haven't been able to do that for years now since that feature is driver-dependent in Windows. Linux does this no matter what video card you have. This is set up intuitively in Mandrake's "please select the screen sizes you want available" install. These aren't things that you should have to reconfigure every time you get a new piece of hardware.
Aaargh, I'm sorry. This has turned into just a straight rant. I know that different people have different habits, but my own personal experience is that Linux is *easier* and requires *less thinking* unless you *want* to be an advanced user, in which case it seems happy to give you the power to be advanced. I can finally do things that maximize my personal productivity. In most cases, hardware and software just works, instead of just works until the blue screen appears. That may be overly mean to Microsoft, and I readily admit that several of their programs are top notch (I've loved products from them going all the way back to Decathlon, a game that Microsoft made for non-Microsoft operating systems!). Excel is great. Access seems strong. I'm told that the "Ages of..." series is phenomenal. MS-DOS Edit was a fantastic MDI editor (and boy was I disappointed when they downgraded to Notepad and Wordpad!). Media Player (well, using the Classic skin since the more recent interfaces have been very clunky) is usually fantastic. But it's still my opinion that Windows isn't inherently easier. The thing that is easier for users is the fact that nearly every company in the universe tailors their hardware and software to work best with Windows. I mean, wouldn't Dodge look unbelievably superior if 95% of body shops only did work on Dodge vehicles?
Eh, I'm done complaining. I may have made it sound like Linux is infinitely superior to Windows, but I was mostly overreacting to what I consider an equally extremist (but opposite) viewpoint. Windows 2000 is "good enough" for me. If there were no Linux, I could probably be comfortable using Windows 2000 for the rest of my life. Unlike the nightmare that was Windows 98, I can usually get Win2k to listen to me in a reasonably reliable manner. I use Linux largely because it prevents the need for me, a poor guy, to steal computer programs from P2P networks. I use free (and Free) software on Linux, and the very knowledge that people do these things to benefit others and not just to win a buck both makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside and compels me to be similarly generous with my gradually expanding coding knowledge.
BTW, there is one area where I will be stubborn: Qt beats any OS-specific class/widget programming package ever. I love, love, LOVE being able to develop and compile applications for Windows, Linux, OS/X, various unix variants and a couple PDAs using OS-native widget sets on a single codebase. So pbbbbllllt!
Note: Hey, neat, I just discovered that I can drag
copied text to my desktop background and it'll
automatically paste it into a new text file. That's rather useful.
-JC
Seems like someone got it right (Score:4, Insightful)
The US doesn't have to (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The US doesn't have to (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:The US doesn't have to (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The US doesn't have to (Score:5, Interesting)
When I heard computers calling me back I went up to AsusTek looking for a job writing manuals. Y'know how much they offered the first time? 12,000 USD a year plus "stock options." When I let my friends know I thought that was pathetic and turned it down they were amazed. People over there live on less, and dream about working at AsusTek. They have computers and cars. No S***! They just all live with their parents (my brother in law makes a bit more as an MCSE sysadmin at Viewsonic, has a PocketPC, a color couple cell phones, a car and counts himself really darned well off)
Their final offer was 25,000, no stock options (the "options" could not be exercised until after you quit, you got a lot of 1000 after two years, and a lot every year thereafter. The "option" was not given to you, but kept in the President's safe and given to you when you quit if he liked you)
Prices used to be a lot less for hardware over there. But that was when it was 25nt to the dollar. Last time I checked prices are about the same (if it costs a 100 US here, it costs within 3% of that there).
What? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
(I fully expect to be modded down for this, but what the hell. I have karma to burn)
Re:What? (Score:2, Informative)
Of course that only works if the person is already running windows.
Re:What? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:What? (Score:3, Interesting)
No it doesn't. Whenever a client sends me a contract in Word I have to ask my roommate to print it for me, because when I print from Open Office I get a bunch of garbage half of the time. I'd pay the ~$300+ (OEM) for MS Office in a heartbeat if it weren't for the security issues.
Re:What? (Score:4, Insightful)
(I fully expect to be modded down for this, but what the hell. I have karma to burn)
Kalidasa's first law of slashdot: any poster who mentions that he expects to be modded down will invariably be modded +5 insightful.
Re:What? (Score:5, Funny)
Complain.
Re:What? (Score:2)
Re:What? (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually they get the job done, at least for me last quarter. As a small social experiment I decided to use only open source and non-MS apps for school. I study CS at an all-Microsoft campus so it's a bit more of challenge than it probably sounds.
Open Office took care of my "office" needs just fine. The doc format didn't crap out on me often and the app itself isn't bad. It could really use some nice 16-bit cutesy icons though.
Mozilla and other gecko-based browsers took care of all my web stuff. My school is heavily into making use of the web (for better or worse) and I didn't have any problems using Moz even though the sites had huge disclaimers about using non-IE web browsers. Other than pointing out the fact that they weren't sending proper MIME types I got along just fine.
The stuff works, it may not be as pretty or arguably "user-friendly" (whatever that means when you consider MS's own learning curve), but it will do the job.
You're right, open source is not the swiss army knife of software, but it is a workable and viable alternative. The biggest problem I see is that there's so little effort evangelizing open source Windows apps compared to Linux.
I'd be a lot more comfortable if I heard something like "Oh, Open Office runs on Linux too?" more often. Or ever.
Re:What? (Score:2)
Re:What? (Score:3, Funny)
Yeah, but when Word has formatting errors on its own files, those are the official formatting errors. With Open Office, the formatting errors come from some third party.
I'm sure most people want to experience errors the way they were meant to be, not some lame wannabe errors.
Re:What? (Score:3, Insightful)
It may not be fair to the monopoly to require them to adhere to extra regulations but it is less fair to punish everyone else with a stagnation in competition.
Re:What? (Score:2)
China sponsoring huge change to their own version of Linux.
Taiwan resents being part of the R.O.C.
Taiwan willing to do anything to silently jab mainland China.
Taiwan is the economic leader of the entire R.O.C. If they use Windows for everything, then the rest of the R.O.C. will have to too, if they want it all to work right.
Re:What? (Score:2)
This comment doesn't make much sense.
Taiwan is the economic leader of the entire R.O.C. If they use Windows for everything, then the rest of the R.O.C. will have to too, if they want it all to work right.
I guess if Taiwan uses it, the people on the Pescadores, Matsu, and Querny will have to as well.
Re:What? (Score:2)
http://www.flags.net/CHIN.htm
http://www.flags.net/TAIW.htm
And while mainland China claims that they are not independent it is clear to everyone involved that they are.
Re:What? (Score:2)
I'd say there are alternatives to WORD when there are no formating differences between different applications.
Re:What? (Score:2)
I used to live in India and as a student have experienced this shift first hand. Good computer books from the US always costed a fortune and quite naturally pirated books started showing up in small petty shops. Although these books were darn cheap, they were printed on horrible paper and there was almost nothing to expect of the typesetting (fonts) - which ofcourse also forms a part of the reading experience.
A year from then, the Publishers got smart. They began to authorize indian publishers to sell asian editions and almost all of us went for these books which were the books of great quality for a resonable price.
i have an indian edition of Red Hat Linux Bible
which costed me Rs499. The original US edition would have costed someone Rs.1720.
i cant see why microsoft cant start popping CDs in Asia and sell it for much cheaper that people will actually buy.
Re:What? (Score:2)
Re:What? (Score:2)
hmmm
Red Hat? are they worth that much?
yeah, right (Score:2, Insightful)
That'll surely show 'em!1!!
Re:yeah, right (Score:2, Interesting)
However, your point remains valid.
Re:yeah, right (Score:5, Informative)
Re:yeah, right (Score:2)
Re:yeah, right (Score:2, Redundant)
CIA factbook on US [sitesatlas.com]
CIA factbook on Taiwan [sitesatlas.com]
Re:yeah, right (Score:2)
Of course, it helps that the U.S. is the only country willing to stand up for Taiwan against the Chinese.
High cost of software (Score:2, Interesting)
Gee, this sounds awfully familiar. Not a problem unique to Taiwan. I wonder if (and hope) it will ultimately have implications for the US market.
Re:High cost of software (Score:4, Funny)
"In other news, Microsoft announced it will be raising the price of Office XP approximately 26.7 percent in the US."
Re:High cost of software (Score:2)
Hopefully (Score:5, Funny)
I am serious.
No really, I'm being serious.
No competition. (Score:2)
Re:No competition. (Score:2)
'bout time someone started fighting back (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:'bout time someone started fighting back (Score:4, Insightful)
Similar situation... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Similar situation... (Score:2)
But iffen youzen a talkin aboot s0ftw4r3 p1r4cy, then y0u b33s a scurvy d0g whoze a gonna b3 4ced t0 w4lk d3 pl4nk!
Aargh! (Different spelling, totally different pronunciation/meaning, for the record.)
Re:Similar situation... (Score:3, Funny)
Only in Soviet Russia.
Join The (1337) Clan If You Have What It Takes! [slashdot.org]
Possible? (Score:2, Interesting)
Assuming the software in Taiwan is a lot cheaper than in North America and Europe, what's to stop someone from buy^H^H^Hlicensing MS' software in Taiwan and using it here? Do the licenses actually have clauses against that?
Re:Possible? (Score:2)
Not just Taiwan (Score:5, Insightful)
This is a problem most people under 24 seem to have...
them and everyone else (Score:2)
No, it's a problem everyone has. Ask your IT guys how much your company pays for software. The product is greater than the sum its the parts as it is passed down through the food chain. Where do you think M$'s billions of dollars come from? Those billions of dollars represent a significant but unnecessary economic friction. The waste M$ forces onto everyone in the form of file formats and work disruption is even greater than the billions that can be counted. I don't even want to think about privacy and data security issues, but the costs of "I love you" were reported to be in the billions too.
The good people of Taiwan will be happy to pass thoses costs along and you can expect the cost of electronic components, clothes and other goods to go up by that little chunck. Or they will get smart and start using free software.
24? (Score:2, Funny)
So ... (Score:5, Funny)
Bash Mircosoft ?
Praise Taiwan ?
Hail Linux ? (oops
Seriously, I miss those days when slashdot's M$ stories were like
So easy to pick a side, now with these ambiguous stories, I don't know which side i am on.
Re:So ... (Score:2)
Politically correct! (Score:2)
Children love both nicotine and windows!
but... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:but... (Score:2)
Sounds like it ~26% off, so the OS is still hundreds of dollars. Also, they're going sell the bits of Office separately, not Windows. You can already get Office in pieces here if I recall.
Kinda pointless really.
Shae
Hooray! (Score:5, Funny)
DarklordJonnyDigital, officially surfing on Debian
Boohoo (Score:5, Funny)
Expensive bundles? (Score:5, Interesting)
Just looking up the prices for MS software on Outpost.com, Word costs $340 and Excel costs $320, but Office itself only costs $440. Office also includes Powerpoint (another $320 by itself) and Outlook ($100 by itself).
Even for just one component, you're far better off buying the bundle here in the US. How much is the bundle mark-up that they're complaining about?
Russia has MS source! (Score:5, Funny)
Russia was the first country to take advantage of the program in January. The source code--blueprints of Microsoft's dominant operating systems--is one of the world's most tightly protected corporate secrets.
Knowing russian social structure, (considering I used to live there...) that source will quicly become public.
KremlinXP anybody?
Re:KremlinXP (Score:5, Funny)
Re:KremlinXP (Score:2)
Russian Matrjoshka clippy. (Score:5, Funny)
Vertial Matrojshka clippy.
We will see more of this (Score:2)
Man I sound like a starting Linux user. But I really think people are finally aware that they are mistreated by the giant and that they have the power to do something about it.
Why doesn't Taiwan just say no? (Score:2, Insightful)
Better solution I believe!
Re:Why doesn't Taiwan just say no? (Score:3, Insightful)
Do you know what these features are that they need?
Openoffice/Koffice/et al are fine products, but don't run around saying that they're automatically the solution. That's bad karma.
Strange... (Score:5, Interesting)
So even though a federal court found MS guilty of doing the same thing here, MS got to keep their high prices and predatory practices. Amazing.
It seems as if Taiwan has succeeded in doing what John Ashcroft and Co. (and his predecessors, for that matter) could never do: control Microsoft. Strange, isn't it, that Taiwan can effectively demand concessions from a foreign company when our own DOJ can't even enforce the judgements they do have against a domestic one...
Yeah, the future's bright. I think I'm going to start a monopoly somewhere - then I can tell John Ashcroft and the DOJ where to go...
Re:Strange... (Score:3, Interesting)
One thing to consider (not saying this happened here, but it's interesting) is that Taiwan comes from a position of power in the computer world. Piss them off, and memory prices could triple. Similar situation with lots of other computer components.... MS can't sell so many new copies of windows when nobody is buying computers anymore....
Probably a quid pro quo (Score:5, Insightful)
It has a draw back .. (Score:2, Interesting)
Huge programs have localized specifications, which require a bit of more work, and cost the company money, if the company does not gain money through this country, these localizations will not be worked on anymore, and then the whole country/area would lose.
Seems MS however, in this case, have thoughtfully considered the issue and found out that reducing prices and wining the user is worth more than otherwise, but would this always be the case? I really doubt so!
Khalid
Re:It has a draw back .. (Score:3, Insightful)
Microsoft would issue an Asian version even if they knew they would never make a profit on it -PERIOD-.
Why?
Because Microsoft would hate to see competition evolve anywhere in the world. Imagine if China/Taiwan/Wherever HAD to go over to a new operating system because MS refused to support the region. All those people writing software for another OS would cut into the monopoly hold they have over the desktop. MS would NEVER RISK it. PERIOD. When countries start talking about alternative OS's, Microsoft starts discounting and giving away software.
crazy. (Score:4, Interesting)
So that explains why piracy effects nearly industry in asian countries. Its simply due to illegal monopolies and bundling useless stuff with useful stuff. Apparently people wanting to get something for nothing isn't the real reason after all.
And I thought they were using PenPoint as a club (Score:3, Funny)
(Taiwan's Ministry of Information Technology bought all rights to the PenPoint OS and UI back when Go Corp. when bankrupt (see Jerry Kaplan's book _StartUp_) and I'd always wondered if it'd been to use it as bargaining chip to get better prices.)
Another great conspiracy theory down the drain.
William
Forced (Score:5, Insightful)
Ya, and I was forced to steal cable TV and uncap my cable modem and copy videos I rented all because they're more than I can afford to pay.
Geez, just because you can't afford something doesn't give you the right to steal it (or infringe on the copyright as the case may be). There are affordable alternatives out there to most expensive things.
Re:Forced (Score:4, Insightful)
now suppose you can't get a job unless you have cable.
sounds like you would be forced to get cable, or starve.
So these people need to have Windows for survival? I see your point, but I don't think it's valid. It would have to be a very strange set of circumstances for one to say "I had to pirate Windows or I would die," wouldn't it?
Suppose for a job that a person has chosen, that person has to have Windows. What's stopping that person from looking for a different job that doesn't require them to pirate software?
Say you have a guy who grew up in the inner city and for whatever reason dropped out of high school. He's broke and can't find a job. Maybe this person should become a drug dealer. It's not ethical, and it's definitely not legal, but the guy can't seem to find a job anywhere else. Does that make it alright to sell crack to kids? No!
It's not that much different. These circumstances are no excuse for pirating software.
the hypocrisy of this claim (Score:4, Insightful)
How many people really NEED MS Office applications? Literally nobody. You can't claim on the one hand that Office applications suck and the alternatives are better and on the other that people can't stop using them. You can't claim on the one hand that nobody uses anything more than the simplest features and on the other that the file formats are a big problem, since the file formats for basic Office docs are well understood.
The truth here is that people used pirated copies because they didn't want to pay the price Microsoft asked. They're thieves.
Re:the hypocrisy of this claim (Score:3, Insightful)
everybody who would couldn't get a job/contract unless they had them.
$400, but for what?!?!? (Score:3, Interesting)
It should be obvious to most people that the price demanded by microsoft is far to high for what you get. Office is ~$400 for five or six programs.. These programs were not that complex in the first place. I know I'd much rather program a program like Word then some of the harder parts of the Windows OS ( ~$150).. Add onto this that the programs in the suite haven't been changed by much in the last 10 years.
If I was running a company, it would seem quite obvious that I could have my employees do exactly the same things with OpenOffice (free) or Corel Office (much less $$ than MS) and my company could save hundreds of dollars per employee.
I never thought it was okay to pirate, but (Score:3, Insightful)
2) My dad bought MS's Streets & Maps (yeah, I know -- dad, did you ever heard of Mapquest?) and put it on his XP machine. Then he tried to install it on my mom's XP laptop. Which it choked because it already had gotten hooked into his machine, I guess contacting the M(other) S(hip) to tell them what he was doing. I don't think my dad should have to buy TWO versions of Streets & Maps for one household.
But, these kinds of things backfire on a corporation. People eventually get sick of it, like they did in Taiwan. What goes around comes around, I guess it's Karma.
Re:WAR3Z (Score:2, Interesting)
I don't say this because i think they're evil, but it's common sense for them if what you suggest might happen did happen. Their source code is a close secret, and I dont think they would even want a government of any country to see it.
Re:WAR3Z (Score:5, Insightful)
Think about it. 50 million lines of code. If you were to read 1 line per second, 8 hours a day, 6 days a week, year-round, it would take you 5-1/2 years just to read it all!
Then you'd have to understand it.
By then it would be obsolete, anyway, because it would be 1 or 2 generations behind.
If you've ever gone through even a 5,000 page program, you know that just getting yourself oriented to that you know where to look takes TIME.
Back in the '80s Microsoft was in the habit of screwing up/obfuscating the symbol tables on the software they released - until the courts made them stop that practice.
Re:WAR3Z (Score:3, Interesting)
That wrong being righted aside, the soure is certainly not useless, and it wouldn't take a huge amount of effort to de-obfuscate and domcument the code. A sourceforge project with a handful of bright peopel could do it relatively easily.
Re:WAR3Z (Score:2)
Re:WAR3Z (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think so - there is the Shared Source initiative from Microsoft. Obuscation of the code would be unprofessional at best.
Then it would be nigh on impossible to understand how windows works.
With all of the code profilers and debuggers out there, obuscation would only be a temporary set back. (*Avoids cheap shot about the average Windows user*)
I don't say this because i think they're evil, but it's common sense for them if what you suggest might happen did happen. Their source code is a close secret, and I dont think they would even want a government of any country to see it.
I also don't think that MS is "evil", but I disagree with the rest of your statement. Along with your Shared Source agreement comes an NDA. In that NDA (AFAIK), you state that you won't use the source to make your own version of Windows, nor will you help the competition in any way, which does make perect sense from a business perspective.
However, seeing that Linux and a lot of other OSS is in direct competition with Microsoft, they've basically removed you from developing OSS. Why wouldn't they want a government to be legally bound to not develop OSS? That's part of the strategic fall out from Shared Source - stealing mindshare through NDAs.
Using a WAR3Zed copy of the Windows source code to "help" an OSS project would be even worse, since you would have used illegally obtained IP and polluted the code, giving Microsoft both legal and moral ground to kill the project you contributed to.
Please, stay away from Windows source code, unless you have no desire or need to contribute to OSS.
Soko
Re:WAR3Z (Score:3, Interesting)
You can see most of it (I think some security stuff or something like that is out), but you can't compile it to obtain again i.e. Windows XP afaik. Even if someone gets that source code, and even if its not traceable to the licensee that obtained it, for what it will be useful?
Worst than that, if you develop something barely based in a shared source licensed code, Microsoft not only will sue you, but also will own anything you did with it for their own profit. I would run away from that kind of sources, and fast.
Instead of this, you have all kind of sources in open source license, a lot with BSD if you are scared by MS anti-GPL propaganda, if you want quality (?) working sources for complex tasks.
Of course, if windows XP sources are distributed by some war3z group, we will see how a security by obscurity system stand against a bit of light on it.
Re:Taiwan - famous for...paying for software? (Score:3, Insightful)
Taiwan is famous for more than just piracy, and your comment was rude and unnecessary. Most mass-produced toys are made in Taiwan because they perfected advanced assembly line techniques and could do it cheaper than the U.S.
Join The (1337) Clan If You Have What It Takes! [slashdot.org]
Re:Visual Studio .NET (Score:5, Insightful)
I would look somewhere other than programming to spend your education dollars.
.
Re:Visual Studio .NET (Score:5, Informative)
More properly you can't find a job in the places you want to live - there are plenty if you are willing to go anywhere. Nor will you make "big bucks" - you will make more than a large portion of our population though.
Re:Visual Studio .NET (Score:2)
*> Before anybody tries to reply, check out Boost's compiler status pages. Visual C++ 7.0 has 58 failures the EDG-based Intel C++ 7.0 has 43 failures, and GCC 3.2.1, has only 16!
Re:Visual Studio .NET (Score:2, Informative)
Before you pluck down a few hundred dollars for the latest edition of Visual Studio, please be sure to stop by your computer science faculty office and see if they have discounted Microsoft licensing deals.
My school has so many alumni working at Microsoft that anyone and everyone taking CS classes at the university can obtain Windows 2000 and Visual Studio
Join The (1337) Clan If You Have What It Takes! [slashdot.org]
Re:Visual Studio .NET (Score:2, Insightful)
Besides, with the release of
VS.NET is a convenience tool and nothing more, and as such MS does deserve to be paid for it without a doubt. Go compare other professional IDE's at the street price, you'll realize that even then VS.NET is a great deal. You should be happy as a student that there IS a cheaper version provided for something that is just a tool.
Re:didnt MS say that (Score:3, Informative)
Their arguement was about taking IE out of Windows. The article talks about breaking up OfficeXP into individual packages, WordXP and ExcelXP, so you aren't forced to buy the entire Office suite.
Only making Office "modular" to Taiwan, not Window (Score:2)
Re:Why just Taiwan (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Article Text (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Forced to buy pirated copies? Come on (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Wait a minute (Score:2)
Re:Refund, (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:But, but, but (Score:2)
Hmm... usually software becomes more stable when you remove extra crud. "An engineer knows he has attained perfection when there's nothing left to take away."
However, MS software seems to work in opposite ways to normal software. No wonder they've already made a deal with Soviet Russia ;-)
Re:"forced" to pirate software? (Score:3, Insightful)
Starbucks does not conspire to, nor is it unwillingly subject to, any forces that would create artificial need for it's product. Starbucks is also not a confirmed abusive monopolist that specifically manipulates such forces.
Buying from Joe's Java Shack doesn't affect your ability to interact with Starbuck's customers, nor does it prevent you from gaining use of other similar products in the marketplace.
IOW, software is not a physical commodity. Armchair moralists should not argue as if it were.
Don't like stealing? Then try some honesty.
Re:Sharing source code (Score:3, Interesting)