The disingenuity of Microsoft's Windows Genuine Advantage program

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At the same time as it is baking into Vista more Genuine-Advantage-required features, Microsoft is stepping up elements of its Genuine Advantage program aimed at the reseller channel.

"We expect to do much more as a Windows business to help our partners to sell products based on Genuine Windows to compete with pirates. This is a major opportunity both for Microsoft and our partners, " Windows Client Marketing Chief Sievert told channel partners in July.

Platforms and Services Co-President Johnson had the same message for financial analysts later that month.

"There's a higher level of genuine Windows attached to PC shipments in developed markets than emerging markets, which means, if we want to continue to drive growth of Windows client OEM units faster than PC shipments, we've got to have a great compelling value proposition for the user for genuine Windows software and for the channel," Johnson said.

One element of Microsoft's OEM-focused Genuine Advantage strategy could be increasing the number of copies of Microsoft Office that are preloaded on new PCs. Under an internal Microsoft program known as the Unlicensed PC Initiative, the company is working to reduce piracy by curbing the number of new PCs sold without Windows ? and, increasingly, Office -- preloaded on them.

Hmmmm.... smells like antitrust to me.

Also one of the things that the courts dinged Microsoft on was that before the pathetic consent decree MS got paid for a copy of every CPU shipped if the OEM didn't want to be cut off or pay more than their competitor. This was part of the "No Naked PC" program that MS had going on. In other words it was impossible to not pay for a license for Windows if you bought a PC from a major OEM.

Posted by: Edward Meyers   Posted on: 08/10/06 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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