I didn't go to this, but I remember a number of those people and places.
Windows Refund Day (1999)
21–30 of 138 posts
Re: Windows Refund Day (1999)
#22I was there too, although I didn't make it into any of the pictures AFAICT on the site. Everex computer (which was in Fremont) also refused to refund any money for "returning" the license code.
Re: Windows Refund Day (1999)
#23> The windows EULA (End User License Agreement) clearly states that the agreement can be refused by the end user, and that windows can be returned to the manufacturer. In real life, however, manufacturers typically say that they can't refund the windows license and tell the user to contact microsoft directly. I can't say I really blame manufacturers for doing that [...] I can. If companies want to profit by being a m…
That's what Amazon does.
You buy things from their website and pay using their payment platform. The website doesn't make it obvious that you're actually buying from a third party ("sold by: X" is in small letters and gets lost between all the other details). And Amazon lump items from different vendors together in the same product page.
I literally bought like 3 items on Amazon before realizing that not all items were sold by Amazon themselves.
When it turns out that items are counterfeit, they try to offload a great part of their responsibility onto the legal system, because they see themselves as the victims of counterfeit, not as facilitators [1]. Luckily, some judges are not buying their excuse [2].
(Even if buy items "sold by Amazon", you can get a counterfeit product [3].)
[1] https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/company-news/amazon-establi...
[2] https://californiaglobe.com/section-2/amazon-liable-for-defe...
HN discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24174276
Re: Windows Refund Day (1999)
#24I’m going to get downvoted into oblivion for this, but as a teenager who remembers when this happened, this always struck me as the absolute dumbest idea and the most useless of performative actions.
First, it was sponsored by a VC-backed company (that had hired a documentary crew to capture their success, the ill-fated VA Linux Systems (which eventually became known as Geeknet) and the pretty poor propaganda documentary “Revolution OS” that managed to just sort of forget the whole dot com collapse thing)), so although I know the LUGs were part of it, this was a marketing event by a company looking to boost their IPO. I didn’t know any of that at the time, but looking back, it’s so clear this was just yet another VA Linux publicity event.
Second, to anyone who wasn’t part of the group “protesting” — that is, outsiders — all you see is a bunch of weirdos dressed up with picket signs outside a sales office (they didn’t even go to Redmond) to demand action, only to be greeted what seem to be very polite corporate people with a sign and lemonade.
Third, it fundamentally changed nothing. It took the DoJ agreements to lessen the hold Microsoft had one some OEMs, but it really took the proliferation of Chromebooks (which was predicated by the short-lived netbook era) for manufacturers to get cheaper deals on Windows licenses and to offer more customizations of OS choice at purchase. That still had zero impact on Linux on the desktop adoption rates.
And sure, most bigger OEMs if you buy direct will let you customize a machine with no OS and sometimes with Ubuntu, but the Ubuntu XPS 13 isn’t much cheaper than the Windows variant (max $50), you just get more of an assurance that there is some sort of driver support for your system (although usually not for stuff like fingerprint readers).
So like, all I remember is that 21 years ago, some angry nerds showed up to an office park parking lot, got some free lemonade, were told politely to leave, and then went home with their cardboard signs screaming victory. When they didn’t get a refund. Didn’t change OEM terms, and had zero impact on OS adoption. OS adoption changed over the years but it wasn’t because of anything any of the people in that movement did, it was because of Apple and Google.
Re: Windows Refund Day (1999)
#25> The windows EULA (End User License Agreement) clearly states that the agreement can be refused by the end user, and that windows can be returned to the manufacturer. In real life, however, manufacturers typically say that they can't refund the windows license and tell the user to contact microsoft directly. I can't say I really blame manufacturers for doing that [...] I can. If companies want to profit by being a m…
It is pretty amazing how Microsoft has gotten away with this, which probably had few comparables in the business world when OEMS first started pre-installing Windows on personal computers. Gates' entire fortune rests on the success of it.
I have always thought there is this underlying assumption that generally no person would ever purchase a computer that had no OS pre-installed. (Obviously that is not true, there are exceptions, e.g., pre-Microsoft and even today, with development boards.) If people were happy to install their own choice of OS (if there were choices), then could Microsoft have been so successful.
Computers have given rise to middleman-based businesses the likes of which have never been seen before.
What we are seeing with the internet perhaps mirrors the PC. As with the PC, where it was assumed that generally no person could do anything useful with "just a PC" without a pre-selected, pre-installed OS, there is an underlying assumption that generally no person could do anything useful with "just an internet connection" without a pre-selection of some certain "tech" companies.
It is nigh impossible to purchase computers and connect to the internet without the presence of middlemen and pre-made selections.
Re: Windows Refund Day (1999)
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wow nytimes.com looks drastically better than their current design.
That’s an archived/print-formatted design. It isn’t how the actual website looked in 1999 (CSS and the DOM weren’t advanced enough for those kinds of layouts then), unfortunately.
Regardless, I wish I could get this version of the website for current articles.
Re: Windows Refund Day (1999)
#27> The windows EULA (End User License Agreement) clearly states that the agreement can be refused by the end user, and that windows can be returned to the manufacturer. In real life, however, manufacturers typically say that they can't refund the windows license and tell the user to contact microsoft directly. I can't say I really blame manufacturers for doing that [...] I can. If companies want to profit by being a m…
That's what Amazon does. You buy things from their website and pay using their payment platform. The website doesn't make it obvious that you're actually buying from a third party ("sold by: X" is in small letters and gets lost between all the other details). And Amazon lump items from different vendors together in the same product page. I literally bought like 3 items on Amazon before realizing that not all items we…
I find Amazon’s system very confusing. I recently bought a Magic Keyboard for my iPad Pro ($100 off!) [1] on Amazon. The purchase page didn’t show a return policy, and at the top it said “visit the Apple Store”. This made it seem like the device was being sold by Apple.
But of course there’s no way Apple would take a return in store if I purchased via Amazon.
So I chatted an Amazon rep to see what the return policy would be for that item. She looked at the link and said “because this item is sold and shipped by Amazon, there’s a 30 day return period, and return shipping is covered.” I had the rep email me a chat transcript just in case her interpretation turned out to be wrong.
This system makes no sense to me. What does it mean when you see the “visit the Apple Store”? I thought this indicated that this was the seller?
I should note that I wouldn’t buy most Apple peripherals through Amazon, but I’m pretty sure no one is making knockoff Magic Keyboards just yet...
1: https://www.amazon.com/Magic-Keyboard-11-inch-iPad-Generatio...
Re: Windows Refund Day (1999)
#28> The windows EULA (End User License Agreement) clearly states that the agreement can be refused by the end user, and that windows can be returned to the manufacturer. In real life, however, manufacturers typically say that they can't refund the windows license and tell the user to contact microsoft directly. I can't say I really blame manufacturers for doing that [...] I can. If companies want to profit by being a m…
> maybe they should stop doing business deals with a company that's actively hostile to them
Microsoft was a monopoly, and was happy to abuse that position (see: United States v. Microsoft Corp.), OEMs had no choice.
Re: Windows Refund Day (1999)
#29This is the cringiest thing I’ve read in weeks.
Re: Windows Refund Day (1999)
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think it was meant in regards to refunding the Windowx tax or buying computers with Linux preinstalled universally . Some like Lenovo were giving customers very hard time in getting a refund. And only very recently they started offering Linux preinstalled on some of their models for regular users. Some things like you mentioned above are of course much better today. But Windows tax situation is still a mess.
Yea, would have to say there's a lot more options now. It kind of seems like an elephant in the room, so want to call it out.... Is windows better or worse than macs/osx with Linux hostility? To me, it seems like Microsoft is less bad than Apple in this regard.
In regards to lock-in, both MS and Apple can be quite irritating (DirectX / Metal instead of backing Vulkan are glaring examples). But Apple seems to be worse overall, they are more like MS from the '90s in their lock-in obsession.
MS did some positive things recently. Like freed up exfat for Linux to use. But when it comes to gaming for example, MS are still pretty unfriendly in their old ways.