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IT may have cost Microsoft millions of sales, but Redmond claims that Windows Genuine Advantage has forced punters to buy legitimate copies of its software.
According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Vole had tried everything from court cases, to threats, to try and counter piracy. But now that Windows Genuine Advantage has locked down its Vista product, piracy is more or less a thing of the past.
The SMH admits that Microsoft does not have any actual figures to back up its startling claim. The closest thing it has said was that Windows sales were up 20 percent while worldwide PC sales were up only 14 to 16 percent.
It claims that this was because people with counterfeit copies of Windows were having to put the real thing on their computers or the software does not work.
Lockdown software has been traditionally avoided by software companies who fear that the technology just annoys users so much that they go elsewhere.
However pirate hunters, the BSA is calling on them to follow Microsoft's lead and install more of this type of blocking gear.
Robert Holleyman, who has headed the BSA since 1990, said lock down technology was becoming more customer-friendly. This will reduce levels of piracy and make it easier for customers to interact with the product.
However what Holleyman and Vole have not pointed out is that sales of Vista, with WGA, are abysmal in comparison to what XP was doing a year after its release. Some of this is to do with a lack of drivers and bugs, but there is a huge reluctance on the part of punters to wrestle with Vole's incredibly bureaucratic, and unforgiving WGA.
More here. µ


Source:The INQUIRER - microprocessors, servers, memory, PCs, graphics, networking, storage

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