Microsoft is to withdraw an anti-piracy tool from Windows Vista, which disables the operating system when invoked, following customer complaints.
The so-called "kill switch" is designed to prevent users with illegal copies of Vista from using certain features.
I remember there being a lot of controversy over this, based off of the Windows Genuine Advantage program. Windows XP was similarly hit with a fairly buggy and problematic issue when it came to registering its product early on. (And, even now, if you have a legitimate copy of XP and upgrade your hardware enough or simply buy a new computer, with the intent of porting over your OS, it's going to flag you as an illegal user.)
Apparently the old registration method wasn't enough, so they decided to add a full on block to you using the software.
The tool can "lock" Vista from further use if it believes it is an unauthorised copy. But many users have complained that the system is not working because legally bought copies result in error messages.
...
Microsoft said it had pursued legal action against more than 1,000 dealers of counterfeit Microsoft products in the last year and taken down more than 50,000 "illegal and improper" online software auctions.
2 comments:
Yet another example of Microsoft not learning anything from its earlier mistakes. All this form of protection does is hurt legitimate users. People hacking the software to get free copies are going to be able to disable this lock just fine, so to the real infringers this is just a minor inconvenience. The people that get in trouble are the ones that buy the product and change some hardware later. At least MS decided to pull this stupid idea off the table pretty quickly.
BTW... anybody actually using Vista? lol.
I use Vista, and actually have been pleasantly surprised at how well it has worked. I got it on my new computer figuring I would take the "downgrade" to XP after a few days, but the UI is so much more Mac like (ie, it is nice), and I haven't run into any horrible bugs. So I kept it!
Post a Comment