First Victory for Microsoft against hard-loading reseller
Be warned, Microsoft is clamping down…
Taken from Microscope (28.05.2007) by Simon Quicke
“Microsoft’s tactics to use the small claims courts to penalise resellers found selling counterfeit product has resulted in its first victory, with further cases waiting to be resolved.
Michala Alexander, head of anti-piracy at Microsoft, said it had settled out of court for £1,800 with its first small claims target, Bargain Computers of Stoke-on-Trent, but had another eight to ten cases in the pipeline.
“There are ten to 15 computer shops in every town selling to the local business round the corner and customers will always shop around on price. If they can save £50 because the reseller is not charging for authorised software, then the consumer often has no idea.”
She added that Microsoft would continue to educate and use legal means to get resellers to comply, while changes in Vista meant that those with illegal copies would miss out on functionality after 30 days if they could not prove the copy was legal.”
Does this attitude also apply to the way Action Packs are used?
I don’t think I’ll be the first to say “about time too”.
Unfortunately, in my experience most consumers still don’t treat software (or DVD or Music) piracy as anything to worry about and therefore don’t have any compunction about receiving such items. Personally, I think there is no excuse - either pay for the software legitimately because you really want it, or if you can’t afford it but want some of the functionality, look to the many Open Source alternatives!
Many businesses I’ve come across have the same lax attitude. Only last week at a client site, I was asked to join a “newly upgraded” computer to a domain, which on inspection was running a rather crude pirated copy of Windows XP - complete with poorly printed media. Without being confrontational, I stated that it needed a legitimate license to function properly and the client left it at that. In this case it could easily have been ignorance of licensing issues, but I’ve seen many cases where it’s just accepted that pirated is “ok” - surprisingly, usually from Retail business owners, who I’m sure wouldn’t take so kindly to members of the public taking their stock without paying!
Education through advertisement goes someway to tackling this - so more of those “Piracy is theft!” adverts and the like you see on DVD’s and in the cinema!
[…] Staggering starfish! As reported by Susanne and David, it looks like Microsoft UK is turning words into action at long last, with an out-of-court settlement and more cases in the pipeline. […]