This is unbelievable.  If a friend told me this, I would laugh it off.
But it was in the Wall Street Journal today and I'm not laughing.  Get
ready for the adult version of Mother May I?  Microsoft is going to be
our parent, babysitter, and policeman.  Soon, Microsoft may be running
our lives, or at least for those using XP.

Kelly

The Wall Street Journal
July 5, 2001

Personal Technology

Microsoft Cracks Down
On Sharing Windows XP

By WALTER S. MOSSBERG

If you're one of the millions of consumers with multiple PCs in your
household, and you plan on upgrading them to Microsoft's forthcoming
Windows XP operating
system, you're in for a rude surprise. For the first time, Microsoft
plans to force families to buy a separate, full-price copy of Windows for
each PC
they upgrade. Each copy is expected to cost around $100.

Not only that, but the company's method for enforcing this rule, a system
called "product activation," requires you to let Microsoft create and
store a
profile of the configuration of every PC on which you install Windows
XP -- even if only a single machine is involved. This profile allows
Microsoft to
"lock" each copy of Windows XP to one specific PC.

If you don't allow Microsoft to collect this information, your copy of
Windows XP will simply stop working in 30 days. And even if you comply,
your copy
of Windows XP might still stop working at some point if you make a lot of
changes to your PC's hardware.

I am not making this up. A similar activation system already exists in
the latest version of Microsoft Office, called Office XP, which went on
sale in May,
though it allows you to install Office on two computers, not just one.

Here's how windows activation will work. When you install Windows XP, the
software will notify you that you must "activate" the product within 30
days.
You can perform this activation almost instantly over the Internet, or
call a toll-free number. In either case, the company will create a record
of your
machine and link it to the serial number of the copy of Windows you
installed.
[Personal Technology]

If you don't activate Windows within the specified period, it will cease
functioning -- except to remind you to activate. (On a new PC, with
Windows XP
preinstalled, the PC maker may activate each machine at the factory.)

If you try to install the same copy of Windows on a different PC, you'll
be asked to activate again -- only this time activation will fail, and
you'll be
advised that it's illegal to install one copy of Windows on multiple
machines and told to buy another copy. The second installation of Windows
will stop
working.

What if your PC malfunctions, and you have to reinstall Windows XP? Well,
you'll have to explain the situation to Microsoft, and beg the company to
allow
you to activate it again.

What's more, Windows will keep monitoring your setup to check that it's
still running on the same machine. If you make major hardware changes,
the system
could disable Windows and force you to check in with Microsoft in the
mistaken belief the program has been transferred to another computer. One
journalist
reported that his copy of Office XP suddenly went into "reduced
functionality mode" and insisted he activate again while he was using it
on an airplane.

Of course, Microsoft has a right to sell its software with whatever
restrictions it likes. And the rule requiring a separate copy of Windows
for each PC
has long been buried in the product's license agreement -- that lengthy
expanse of tiny type that appears during installation. So, in a sense,
product
activation is no big deal -- merely a new method to enforce a policy
Microsoft has long asserted.

But there are three big problems with Microsoft's sudden decision to
start enforcing this policy, especially in this draconian fashion.

If you have a question you want answered, or any other comment or
suggestion about Walter S. Mossberg's column, please send e-mail to
[log in to unmask]
1

First, the company has never really educated home users about the one-PC
policy for Windows. Sure, it's in the fine print, but few people read
that. Microsoft
has extensive programs to educate corporations about the policy, but in
10 years of reviewing Windows, I can't remember a single major Microsoft
consumer
ad campaign devoted to the topic. As I write this, I'm holding in my hand
a colorful cardboard sleeve containing a copy of Windows 98. Nowhere does
it
say "for use only on a single PC." Even now, Microsoft isn't preparing
the public for the coming crackdown.

I'm sure that the majority of multiple-PC families have been buying a
single copy of each version of Windows and installing it on all their
PCs. I'm equally
confident that few of them did so to cheat Microsoft. Microsoft calls
this behavior "casual piracy," but I call it the natural practice of
people who don't
know better.

Second, Microsoft is discriminating against home users in favor of
corporate customers, as it often does. The company offers large customers
bulk purchases
of Windows at volume prices. In many cases, these corporate bulk
purchasers won't even be subjected to activation.

But Microsoft has no plans to offer home users a special two or three
pack of Windows XP for, say, $50 or $75 more than the single-copy price.
In fact,
the company doesn't even plan to allow a person who mistakenly tries to
activate a second PC to buy another license over the phone or Internet.

Finally, Microsoft has chosen a method of enforcing its policy that
smacks of an invasion of privacy. The company says its database of PC
configurations
won't contain any personal information, and will be encrypted so that
nobody can misuse it. But Microsoft's bully-boy behavior in the
marketplace hardly
inspires confidence that it won't somehow exploit this information.

So, bear all this in mind when you consider whether to upgrade your home
PC to Windows XP, especially if you have more than one computer. The
upgrade may
cost more than you expected, both in dollars and in lost privacy.
For answers to questions about cordless keyboards and upgrading Windows
95 to Windows XP, check out my
Mossberg's Mailbox
2 column in Tech Center.
URL for this Article:
http://interactive.wsj.com/archive/retrieve.cgi?id=SB994210620680803497.d
jm

Hyperlinks in this Article:
(1)
mailto:[log in to unmask]
(2)
http://interactive.wsj.com/archive/retrieve.cgi?id=SB994279414641577216.d
jm


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