Chasing Pirates: Inside Microsoft’s War Room - From the special thread that Chinese factories counterfeit in mile-long spools that adorns software authenticity stickers, to near-perfect bootleg discs leaving microscopic evidence of their factory origins, to Mexican and Russian gangsters who are dealt with very carefully, the NYT covers Microsoft's multi-pronged, international war on piracy.
posted by Blazecock Pileon
on Nov 7, 2010 -
30 comments
Russia Uses Microsoft to Suppress Dissent - Adding to its
long-running series on corruption and abuse in post-Communist Russia, the New York Times has reported on Russian authorities using the pretext of software piracy to seize computers from journalists and political dissidents critical of current policies. In a surprising twist, lawyers representing Microsoft have been found working with Russian police, despite reporters and NGOs providing evidence of legitimate software purchases. An
official response to the NYT piece suggests impostors claim to represent Microsoft in Russia, and notes the company's offer of free software licenses to these and similar groups.
posted by Blazecock Pileon
on Sep 12, 2010 -
25 comments
What is the Darknet? Unfortunately, no one can be told what the Darknet is. Okay, actually, it's a term that some Microsoft computer scientists came up with to refer to all the different ways that internet users can swap copyrighted materials.
In a paper they authored [DOC] for a
workshop on Digital Rights Management (DRM), these engineers predict that the Darknet will grow ever stronger and more efficient while DRM technologies will make legal right holders
less able to compete with Darknet and are ultimately "doomed to failure."
posted by boltman
on Nov 24, 2002 -
38 comments
"You will not be able to save or create new documents", the
MS Office XP (Re-)Activation Wizard said to me this afternoon. You can imagine my horror, when I sat down to print off my housemate's coursework, only to discover that the floppy drive I'd reattached so that I could get to her document had spurred Office XP into an
unwelcome data embargo. Be warned, MeFites: Significant hardware changes piss Microsoft off! This is especially dangerous for those of us who... er... can't seem to
find our original store-bought fully licensed Office CDs.
Even though it's
been lurking a while, I'd never heard of it. Is this a justifiable (ha!) anti-piracy technique or another excellent reason not to hand in Uni assignments on time? ("I'm sorry sir; Microsoft ate my homework") Either way, I won't be able to check my email in Outlook for a while.
Until then, thank God for
openoffice.org.
posted by armoured-ant
on Nov 1, 2002 -
62 comments
$100 million in fake software seized .The copies of Windows Millenium and Windows 2000 Professional were indistinguishable from the real thing except for their failure to crash every 15 minutes(I made that up).Ever burn a copy for friends? Is that wrong?
posted by Mack Twain
on Nov 17, 2001 -
31 comments
MS gets an 'A' for effort. Office XP, built with the draconian 'product activation' feature to prevent piracy, has been leaked to USENET.
This version does not require an activation key, and the serial number has already been sewn into the installation.
posted by Dirjy
on Mar 14, 2001 -
14 comments
Time to short Microsoft stock. After building a behemoth though a quarter-century of tacitly encouraging piracy to increase market share, Microsoft appears to be getting ready to drink the anti-piracy kool-aid. Look for revenues to shrink accordingly.
posted by aurelian
on Jan 9, 2001 -
11 comments
