Re: Legality of installing XP bundled with one computer on another

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Alias wrote:
> Kerry Brown wrote:
>> Alias wrote:
>>
>>> Kerry Brown wrote:
>>>
>>> I am one of the few
>>>
>>>> people who posts here who thinks activation is a good thing. I sell
>>>> many more copies of Windows and Office because of it so it has
>>>> greatly helped my bottom line.
>>>
>>> IOW, you make money ripping people off.
>>
>>
>> Please tell me how selling them Windows and Office on a new pc is
>> ripping them off.
>
> By recommending retail versions, of course.

You assume you know how I run my business. I tell my customers how the
different versions work and let them pick which one they want to purchase.
Less than 1% pick the retail version. In the last two years I have only had
one customer say they wanted to pay more and purchase the retail version
over the OEM version. I have sold a few retail upgrades to business' who
were told by Dell sales reps that they would have no problems with XP Home
in a business. Even though an OEM version would have been cheaper to buy
they also factored in the cost of rebuilding the systems and at my
recommendation went with retail. Do make assumptions.

>
>> Previous to activation most customers didn't buy Office and some
>> didn't buy an OS. When I asked they said they were going to use a
>> friend's copy. In most cases they knew this was somehow wrong but
>> were prepared to set aside their ethics for monetary gain. If they
>> were installing software from an old pc taken out of service this
>> would be one thing but most of them were clearly running multiple
>> copies.
>>>> Activation is a tool to fight piracy.
>>>
>>> Not true. The pirates just crack away and laugh. Activation only
>>> inconveniences the paying customer.
>>
>>
>> It has almost stopped the type of casual piracy I list above.
>
> Um, no it hasn't. I went to a client the other day and told them they
> should update to XP. The wife called up her "contact" and had a
> pirated copy in a matter of minutes. Her contact was a friend who
> charged her nothing. She also had Office XP, Photoshop and I don't
> know what else on her computer that were pirated copies.
>
> Now, here's a fact for you:
>
> Before the activation scam and the WGA scam, MS had none of these
> "protections" and has become one of the richest corporations in the
> world, headed up by the richest man in the world.
>
> Again, activation only inconveniences paying customers and even leads
> paying customers to buy another copy of XP that they don't need.
>

I can only speak from personal experience. My sales of Office with new
systems has gone from virtually none to about 50% of the systems I sell. For
the OS it is much less of an increase but there was an increase. Of course
some people will still pirate software. Some are more ethical than others.
This is a fact of life.

>> It has also
>> reduced the number of shops preloading hard drives with unlicensed
>> software. Kerry
>
> This may be true but I don't think there was a significant amount of
> shops doing this.

Open your eyes to the real world. Two business' out six in my town used to
preload unlicensed software. They are now both out of business. In the
closest city (about 60 kilometres away) I can walk into many stores and find
preloaded systems. When asked they say they can load up the system with
"free" software. For price checking purposes I visit many stores on a
regular basis. Over the last two years this practice has become far less
common or they are more careful. This is due to two things. Because of
activations and now WGA many of them have irate customers at their doorstep
complaining. Also Microsoft is actively purchasing systems and suing
business' caught doing this.

Kerry



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