Wendy Seltzer, who is tech lawyer (she works for the EFF, which hasn’t exactly been friendly with Microsoft over the years, just so you know her own biases), tears apart the Windows Vista licensing doc. Much more on Windows Vista licensing over on Google News, I don’t see too many positive articles in there.
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Robert Scoble works at Fast Company.TV (title: Managing Director). Everything here, though, is his personal opinion and is not read or approved before it is posted. No warranties or other guarantees will be offered as to the quality of the opinions or anything else offered here.
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October 19th, 2006 at 7:33 am
So, if in my Enterprise, when I have a laptop come back to me from the field, I can’t just reinstall the OS and reissue this equipment? Ms. Selzer quotes the license agreement here: “The first user of the software may reassign the license to another device one time”.
Do I have to rely on my OEM exclusively to help me with my licensing strategy?
October 19th, 2006 at 7:44 am
Uummmmm, where did you read you can only “reinstall OS twice”?
I didn’t see that….
October 19th, 2006 at 7:51 am
Rick: hmmm, a couple of readers sent me mail and brought that up. But looking around I can’t find an article about that. So, I’m pulling that. There is controversy about transfers being limited, as well as some controversy about what this means for virtual machine installs.
October 19th, 2006 at 7:53 am
Oh, the virtualization shit is the least of the stupid in the license…
“You may not
· work around any technical limitations in the software;”
http://www.bynkii.com/archives/2006/10/fun_with_licenses.html
October 19th, 2006 at 7:54 am
Hi Robert,
I did complaint on Vista’s EULA on my blog yesterday. In fact it IS much more restrictive than XP’s counterpart, but what you’ve mentioned about reinstalling the OS is not correct. You can reinstall Vista on the same computer infinitely. The license restricts transfer to another licensed device to just once and only for the first user. Legally, this can have two effects:
1. You can only transfer Vista to a second PC only if you are the first user of Vista.
2. If you move your Vista to a second PC, your copy of Vista should stick on it.
October 19th, 2006 at 8:02 am
I’m with Rick. I didn’t see that specifically detailed anywhere, either in the article or the link to actual license from the article. Did you actually READ the whole article, including the most important link…THE LICENSE? (of course you didn’t. why am I even asking?). Can you please cite and quote the specific text that says you can only reinstall the software twice?
Thanks.
October 19th, 2006 at 8:06 am
LayZ: I already pulled that text, even before you commented. Thanks for noticing.
October 19th, 2006 at 8:28 am
“I often reinstall my OS several times a month.”
That worries me, Robert. Are you still using windows 95?
;)
October 19th, 2006 at 9:07 am
Michiel: no, but I test out a lot of things and mess up my systems with lots of alpha and beta stuff.
October 19th, 2006 at 9:23 am
Instead of pulling it, very likely while people were reading it or before their RSS reader updated, modify to clarify you were wrong instead of deleting the text. Blaming your readers for not watching closely enough while you rewrite an already posted blog entry — nice.
October 19th, 2006 at 10:33 am
Judging by my success last night getting my XP PC re-activated last night (having tried four nights in a row), I’d say Vista licensing will not only be tight, but have a stranglehold on the end-user. I love the way XP decided I needed to use an OEM license instead of the campus license I initially used to install the OS, and the four days it took for someone at Microsoft to tell me what was going on (and that they weren’t going to help me). Should any of the articles actually be optimistic? I don’t think I can be.
October 19th, 2006 at 11:13 am
“I often reinstall my OS several times a month.”
Same issue here, and I like to use DBAN to wipe the drive before I reinstall, which means reactivation each time. Wonder how that would play out under Vista.
The licencing issues have me seriously considering switching back to a Mac after ~10 years on Windows, or possibly looking at Ubuntu.
October 19th, 2006 at 11:44 am
Robert,
It is too bad you don’t still work for Microsoft, when it comes to this topic. One must add toe the malarky the fact that developers can’t install the home versions of software in Virtual PC in order to test products they are developing for these OS’s. I thought MS would want to encourage home development of software. Do they think they can only do this? Oh wait, for them to even do this common task means they don’t have to abide by their own license agreement.
October 19th, 2006 at 12:18 pm
I think I’ll stick with XP. It really is a shame Microsoft is so anticonsumer.
October 19th, 2006 at 12:23 pm
Little funny side note here. When I did a Windows Live Search on Vista Licensing, Ed Bott’s critique was the number one result. The punchline though was the top advertisement on sponsored sites. “You’ll love a Mac” with the link to Apple’s website to get a mac. Hmmm seems like Windows Live Search reflects general sentiment and not MS’s viewpoint.
October 19th, 2006 at 2:50 pm
I’m running XP under Parallels Desktop on my MacBook Pro, just so I can use Outlook, VSTS, and a database app. I won’t be able to do that with Vista.
I do have Vista RC1 running under Parallels, but I find it much slower than XP with nothing that improves productivity. It feels like a “dumbed down” Windows.
October 19th, 2006 at 3:45 pm
Does it make a difference if points 1, 2, 5 and 6 (out of 6) are incorrect, inaccurate or misleading?
#1 & 2 affect only those who haven’t activated Windows. Never in my life have I had a copy of Windows that wouldn’t have activated under the current system, and I don’t believe any significant percentage of users will be affected by this. Product activation only adversly affects those who perform constant and significant hardware upgrades, and those who pirate the OS. Not business users, no your grandma, not teenagers.
#5: You can reassign the license an unlimited amount of times, just only once at a time. You can deactivate Windows on one device, then install it on one new device, not three new devices. That is all the license says.
#6: So common, even Apple uses this one:
http://www.google.com/search?q=the+first+user+of+the+software+may+make+a+one+time+transfer+of+the+software%2C+and+this+agreement%2C+directly+to+a+third+party
Many software products say you can only transfer it once. Who has this every stopped?
October 19th, 2006 at 4:09 pm
Um, obviously you can only transfer it once. Once you’ve transferred it, you no longer have it.
October 19th, 2006 at 7:59 pm
[...] Robert Scoble also shares links to a further look into the Vista EULA that helps clear the air a lot. [...]
October 20th, 2006 at 8:31 am
What a trainwreck…notevensurewheretobegin.
Microsoft, has every right, even an obligation to make sure people using their services, have rightfully paid for the priviledge of doing so. But when you make it so complicated and headachy for End User and Corp. Enterprises…at what point does it all backfire? My documented WGA glitches on LEGIT OEM pre-installs, already caused me headaches enough.
Geepers…this is supposed to help in marketing Vista? I am not hearing the drumbeat of new Vista features, just all the cutbacks, backtracks, delays, compromises, and now legal thickets de jour. Gosh. They are gonna hafta go OSXy and pipe a Unixified core and emu out X86 legacy, painful but vital, if they are to survive as an OS company. It’s not Vista per se, it’s the OS beyond that, that could reduce the company to an ISP.
October 24th, 2006 at 8:48 am
This seriously makes me consider shelling out the extra cash for a site licence version. There is a site licence version, right? No site licence version is corporate suicide.
January 28th, 2007 at 9:02 am
Seems that Microsoft didnt learn any lesson from the past and still continues doing the same mistake according the Vista.i explain what i mean : if they would sell the Vista versions in reasonable prices starting from 30 pounds for example from the home edition i dont think would be an issue regarding license and all the rest of the headeaches which will be come.which family would pay easily 350 pounds to install vista in one only computer or even 80 for the home version which is limited.most homes they run more than one pc and i dont think would be easy to afford.Personally i have to confess that i liked vista but i will not use them because i refuse to pay that amount of money they will be asking.is not reasonable at all and im sorry if they see it differently.i will switch in Linux,use XP or whatever but not with vista.they should have learned from the past.that issue with licensing and copies and things like this starts getting very annoying.they must take also in concideration that we have to get also other programs not only the OS and then the cost is getting really high.dont think it will work and i hope they get a slam from the customers.just waiting and see.
August 15th, 2007 at 8:01 am
If you install your OS a few times a month, why activate your OS then? You got 30 days to activate it.