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With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

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Re: With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

#51

Post by beagle3 »

nivla wrote: post #39
beagle3 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your interest and Microsoft's interests haven't been aligned in years. Your interest is to keep an OS supported. Microsoft's interest is to release Browser and DirectX updates only for the latest-and-greatest, so that you'd updgrade. Your interest is an open ecosystem. Microsoft's interest is to have a closed garden. (They haven't been successful with that one, but they're trying). Your interest might be a usable Des…

>Your interest is an open ecosystem. Microsoft's interest is to have a closed garden. (They haven't been successful with that one, but they're trying). I might get some heat for this but I must say Windows is still the OS with the least closed garden or heck even a garden. To get even the legitimate and popular x86 applications you still have to manually browse to websites and download it. You can install whatever yo…

> I might get some heat for this but I must say Windows is still the OS with the least closed garden or heck even a garden.

The Windows App Store is as closed as Apple's, just not as successful - and I was comparing interests, not achievements.

> To get even the legitimate and popular x86 applications you still have to manually browse to websites and download it. You can install whatever you want whether it has a digital signature or not and yes it also includes the plentitude of crapwares and spywares.

It's not as open as Linux, or Android, and about as open as OSX. You can't load unsigned drivers anymore without much work. I have no idea why you'd think Windows is "least closed garden" - unless you've never used any of the others.

> Or maybe some people like a touch OS with their touchscreen laptop and its just MS thinking forward? I don't know what other OS can you recommend that is touch friendly for my Surface pro?

Stockholm syndrome? How can it be "forward looking" to force you to use a touch interface when you don't want to? You want it? fine, use it. I don't. But if I use Win8, I still have to use it. Forward looking? Bullying is the only description I can give it.

> No sure what you mean by this.

Then read skrebbel's post I was replying to. He is under the mistaken assumption that because he was paying for Windows, he had any control over the direction it went in the last 10 years.

Re: With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

#52

Post by hughdbrown »

bruce511 wrote: post #13
hughdbrown wrote: post #3

"Google offers free OSes to computer and phone makers as a way of driving the use of its search engine and countless other web services, and now, Microsoft is at least experimenting with the idea of doing much the same thing. According to the report, its free operating system is known as Windows 8.1 With Bing. As the name implies, the OS is meant to feed the use of Microsoft’s own search engine, as well as other Micr…

What you are describing here is the cost of changing from an OS you know, to one that you don't. Since this cost greatly exceeds the sticker price of windows, or Mac for that matter, it is the real reason why people tend to stick with the OS they already know how to use. It's one of the reasons why Linux never got much traction on the desktop. Sure it made a great desktop OS for the technorati but Joe Public knows ho…

Well, thanks, but I am not smug about this. I don't care if Windows lives or dies. I've moved on. We are no longer dating.

And here's how it happened: http://www.iwebthereforeiam.com/iwebthereforeiam/2009/10/int...

I was a happy Windows developer (DOS, Windows 3,1, NT, Windows 95, Windows whatever) and found that windows was too annoying to live with.

And I don't pretend this is everyone's situation or even anyone else's. It doesn't matter to me. I've moved on and I'm happy.

Re: With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

#53

Post by usaphp »

chaostheory wrote: post #42
kamaal wrote: post #34

Actually a free Windows OS would actually be great. Here in India, Pirated Windows OS are like as common as mosquitoes. No one but Microsoft was losing in all this. The price of Windows is generally prohibitively high and was by no way affordable to home and even small business users. The only option was to pirate them or use Ubuntu. People walk in to buy a laptop, check the difference in price for Laptops with Windo…

Piracy feels the the same in most of East and South East Asia as well.

Same thing in Russia and all former soviet republics, I don't know any of my friends back there who has ever purchased a licensed copy of windows.

Re: With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

#54

Post by Aaronontheweb »

aegiso wrote: post #45
skrebbel wrote: post #15

As a Microsoft customer, this alienates me from them. Paid software means that our interests are aligned: I want good software and Microsoft wants to make good software so that I buy it. Free commercial software means that I'll have to pay through other means, typically means that I'll have less control over.

End-user Windows licenses haven't been a significant source of income for Microsoft for a very long time. They make their money from their enterprise ecosystem, and end-user Windows serves only to support that ecosystem. So unfortunately, I hate to break it to you that as an end user the money you're giving Microsoft for their products never gave you control. But on the bright side, pissing off the end users that pro…

> End-user Windows licenses haven't been a significant source of income for Microsoft for a very long time.

If ~$20b in revenue last year isn't a big business... http://www.microsoft.com/investor/EarningsAndFinancials/Earn...

65% of that $20b comes from OEMs, which is 100% consumer.

edit: the exact quote from the earnings statement I linked:

"Excluding the impact of the Windows Upgrade Offer, OEM revenue decreased 15%, and was approximately 65% of total Windows Division revenue."

Windows Enterprise licenses are managed separately - even if Wells Fargo orders 12,000 new laptops from Dell, Windows licensing is not factored into the price; WF manages that separately through its enterprise relationship directly with Microsoft.

Re: With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

#55

Post by ekianjo »

kamaal wrote: post #34

Actually a free Windows OS would actually be great. Here in India, Pirated Windows OS are like as common as mosquitoes. No one but Microsoft was losing in all this. The price of Windows is generally prohibitively high and was by no way affordable to home and even small business users. The only option was to pirate them or use Ubuntu. People walk in to buy a laptop, check the difference in price for Laptops with Windo…

> If only Microsoft can make Windows affordable, they can kill all competitors instantly.

Yeah maybe for the consumers market, but that's already the case with Piracy anyway. But price is not the only issue, Windows is just horrible in so many ways that there's a number of people who will not come back to it even if it's 100% free. I keep Windows (7) as dual-boot on my desktop PC, where I run OpenSuse most of the time, and whenever I have to boot into Windows the sluggishness of it all (on the very same hardware) makes me want to pull my hair out. The very same application (Firefox) is way less reactive on Windows. And just opening a window (no pun intended) takes way more time, too... the overall experience is just deplorable. I only boot into that environment when I really HAVE to.

Re: With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

#56

Post by balladeer »

kamaal wrote: post #34

Actually a free Windows OS would actually be great. Here in India, Pirated Windows OS are like as common as mosquitoes. No one but Microsoft was losing in all this. The price of Windows is generally prohibitively high and was by no way affordable to home and even small business users. The only option was to pirate them or use Ubuntu. People walk in to buy a laptop, check the difference in price for Laptops with Windo…

Or give away the OS for free and charge for preferential support and even non-security updates on time and certainly not charge a fortune again.

Re: With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

#57

Post by csense »

beagle3 wrote: post #20
skrebbel wrote: post #15

As a Microsoft customer, this alienates me from them. Paid software means that our interests are aligned: I want good software and Microsoft wants to make good software so that I buy it. Free commercial software means that I'll have to pay through other means, typically means that I'll have less control over.

Your interest and Microsoft's interests haven't been aligned in years. Your interest is to keep an OS supported. Microsoft's interest is to release Browser and DirectX updates only for the latest-and-greatest, so that you'd updgrade. Your interest is an open ecosystem. Microsoft's interest is to have a closed garden. (They haven't been successful with that one, but they're trying). Your interest might be a usable Des…

> Microsoft's interest is to ram their touch interface down your throat so that you'd get used to it, and your next phone may possibly run Windows

    s/Microsoft/Canonical/
    s/Windows/Ubuntu/

Re: With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

#58

Post by gosukiwi »

usaphp wrote: post #53
chaostheory wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Piracy feels the the same in most of East and South East Asia as well.

Same thing in Russia and all former soviet republics, I don't know any of my friends back there who has ever purchased a licensed copy of windows.

Same thing for South America, 99% of Windows copies are pirated.

Re: With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

#59

Post by lstamour »

Why does this article fixate on Google? For the clicks?

We all know that most of Windows won't be free until they've a sure-fire way to make profits on top of that. And the answer lies in iOS and Mavericks more than Google. Give away the OS to build the ecosystem, sure Android also does that. But only Apple's making money at it.

If it goes free, it's going to look a lot more like iOS than Android -- a lot more like Xbox One, in fact, which also gets free updates. Sure, it might look like Office Starter edition, and be ad supported, but for productivity purposes, ads are the enemy and so that model has less chance at success.

Ultimately, Microsoft wants in on this "free-to-play" OS market, and when they do it, you can bet it will be in their interest, and it will exclude businesses and still offer premium add-on packs for home users. Let's not go crazy, this is, after all, Microsoft.

When would they ever release just one SKU of anything?

Re: With Free Version of Windows, Microsoft Gives In to the Google Way

#60

Post by neolefty »

cbhl wrote: post #12

My gut feeling is that this will be them porting Windows RT back onto x86_64, similar in a sense to Windows XP Starter Edition, with options to pay for a "full" license that can run Desktop (i.e. not Metro) apps. I hope to be proven wrong.

I don't think that's the plan, because if they want old XP users to upgrade, that would not be sufficient, since old XP users of course want their old XP apps to keep working.
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