I can understand why people who don’t know much about computers or people who don’t care to know much about their computer don’t switch to something like Linux. But what I really don’t get is the people who are PC-savvy enough to be professionals who are constant cheerleaders for this asshole company. Look at what nastiness is in store for users of Windows Vista Beta:
Techworld.com – Vista beta prepares for self-destruction
Unless Vista Ultimate Beta 2, Release Candidate 1 (RC1) and RC2 are upgraded to a legal copy by Friday, machines running those editions will automatically reboot every two hours. This crippled state will continue until Aug 28, at which point the operating system will refuse to boot.
Jackasses! I can understand (or at least, I can take as predictable) the desire to make people all use paid-for versions of your Operating System. But why do you have to be such an asshole company about it and go through all that crap? I mean, even an unregistered version of Windows XP will just stop working.
For you uninitiated, here’s what happens: someone decides they’re going to help Microsoft out and test-run their latest Operating System. So, they go through the time and trouble to download MS’s over-bloated pig of an OS over the Internet; we’re talking several hours of download on a high-speed connection, here.
They bug-track, report errors, deal with instable operating and constant crashes (which are all part of testing software, but still) and generally give Microsoft a free load of data critical to the development of it’s commercial software. You would think that, in exchange for such patient and loyal assistance, you could get a free version of the OS, right?
Well, not in Microsoft’s world. In fact, on the MS-Fairness platform, not only do you not get a fair exchange of free information for free software, you get treated like a recalcitrant child if you don’t cough up the cash for a new version.
Nice. Real nice.
Technorati Tags: Microsoft, Vista, Beta, Sharing, Open Source
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