Microsoft CEO Sees Less Piracy With Vista

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Microsoft Corp. expects software piracy, which costs the company billions of dollars every year, to ease with the introduction of its new Windows Vista operating system and Office 2007 software suite, Chief Executive Steve Ballmer said Thursday. Microsoft launched Windows Vista to businesses Thursday, releasing the first major upgrade in five years of its dominant operating system that sits on more than 90 percent the world's computers.

In an interview, Ballmer said that more than 20 percent of its software running around the world is pirated and the company aims to lower that figure with a new authentication program to run in Windows Vista and Office 2007. Last quarter, the Microsoft division dominated by Windows desktop sales accounted for $3.3 billion of $10.8 billion in total revenue.

"We're trying to make it easier for people who somehow have received improperly licensed versions to get legal, and we also put more roadblocks in," said Ballmer, declining to specify how much it can reduce the piracy rate. "It will help," he said.

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News source: CRN

(4 replies) #1 Daninku on 01 Dec 2006 - 16:48

reduce the price .

#1.1 +guylaroche on 01 Dec 2006 - 19:04

Don't break the law and steal software? People will pirate anything that costs money...

#1.2 plastikaa on 01 Dec 2006 - 23:38

And similarly on the same theory.... Ferrari/Aston Martin etc. should reduce the price of its cars so that people don't steal them?

#1.3 Daninku on 02 Dec 2006 - 06:06

Yes, people will still pirate software, but it will help for sure. For example I'm not going, and I'm never going to buy an OS at this price; but because we have a special price for students I'm getting it legally. It still costs money, but cheaper. That's the point, at least this will reduce piracy for sure... imo.

#1.4 plastikaa on 03 Dec 2006 - 11:17

If it was £300 or £100 people will still pirate... usually those who pirate everything don't care if its cheaper... and even if they did - in a few years they would want it cheaper again. The only way they would stop piracy if they sold it for like £30, and seriously thats never going to happen.

(1 reply) #2 gph58 on 01 Dec 2006 - 16:57

Make reliable secure software instead of garbage. But Ballmer is decieved if this moron can think he can stop piracy. This damn ****ing windows activation crap is the #1 reason that pirates will even pirate more. Why? Because ****ing M$ did not ever make a way to backup it up and there is ABSOLUTELY NO WAY YOU CAN BACK UP THE ACTIVATION AS SOME MOTHER ****ERS CLAIM!

I am sick and tired of pay $$$$$$$ for worthless software. No wonder people pirate this garbage.

#2.1 jordanspringer on 06 Dec 2006 - 16:34

calm...down...

#3 adversedeviant on 01 Dec 2006 - 17:27

less piracy? rtm has been out in the wild for weeks and the official release isn't for 2 months

(3 replies) #4 Mekun on 01 Dec 2006 - 17:47

There no proper crack for rtm, so .......

#4.1 tommytom02 on 01 Dec 2006 - 19:44

Define proper...there is a crack that uses RC2 files to patch the RTM and make it genuine, then you can get updates, etc. seems proper enough to me.

#4.2 RAINMAN on 01 Dec 2006 - 20:26

Quote - Mekun said @ #4

Proper until when? It expires?

Defiantly proper

#4.3 adversedeviant on 02 Dec 2006 - 01:40

you still can download vista, and a crack will come out sooner or later.

(1 reply) #5 Avenger 2.0 on 01 Dec 2006 - 17:59

Prices for Europe (and rest of the world) leaked today. Vista is 55% more expensive there.
Buying Vista Ultimate in America is cheaper then buying Vista Home Basic in Europe.
Vista Ultimate will cost like €680 in Europe ( ~$900 ).
And then MS is surprised people start running illegal versions or won't upgrade from XP...

#5.1 XerXis on 01 Dec 2006 - 18:31

where did you get that? i find it hard to believe

(1 reply) #6 Mekun on 01 Dec 2006 - 18:08

Europe sue MS and you think they should get a break?

#6.1 Radium on 07 Dec 2006 - 18:28

Quote - Mekun said @ #6

Europe didn't sue MS. Europe is a continent, not a federation or union. There are countries in Europe who are not members of the European Union.
The EU Comission sued them, people who are democratically elected by the members of the EU (by the EU parliament, who are all elected by the people from their home country).

(1 reply) #7 PermaSt0ne on 01 Dec 2006 - 19:04

there'll be less piracy because there's no reason to update from xp to vista

most of the big projects everyone heard about publicly got dropped and will come out later. not to say there's not new stuff in vista, but most people don't know about them. you can get the same vista look and experience on xp with tweaks

#7.1 ThaCrip on 01 Dec 2006 - 23:20

"there'll be less piracy because there's no reason to update from xp to vista" ...

that pretty much sums up what i think to

... cause for me this is the first time i never really cared much about a new version of windows.

cause xp pretty much has it all now... stability is the main thing older mainsteam OS's lacked. (not counting windows 2k since that was not really made for the general public in mind)

#8 toadeater on 01 Dec 2006 - 19:56

#9 Ruciz on 01 Dec 2006 - 20:46

lol, Why bother wasting the time pirating a piece of crap like this MS? if it was decent it would be pirated.

#10 Aero Ultimate on 01 Dec 2006 - 21:02

Yeah right MS... just go on with your wishful thinking

#11 zivan56 on 01 Dec 2006 - 23:11

No need to pirate it, as Microsoft is giving thousands of copies away for free or through reduced price programs. I will stick to XP though, as a bunch of development programs I use need raw I/O access which Vista seems to block.

#12 NinjaGinger on 02 Dec 2006 - 00:02

Released to soon and full of bugs, yea, it will be pirated less as most move back to XP. At least it works, sort of. Maybe after a couple of service packs it will be what it should be now and yes, I have tried it.

#13 xpablo on 02 Dec 2006 - 01:59

Well if you look at Canadian rpices it would be cheaper for Canadians to buy the US version in US Dollars with the currency conversion, but then of course nothing is worse than having Canada Customs enforce Duties & Taxes on mail orders of this.

But for me I work & live in the USA and Canada split my times between both sides of the border, so it's usually cheaper for me to buy stuff in the USA. especially with the GST etc...

Here's a price comparison of Vista on vboth sides of the border, considering that the exchange rate is an average of 15%, so 1 US dollar =$1.15. Canadian.

USA Prices in US Dollars:

Windows Vista Home Basic: $199 ($99.95 to upgrade)

Windows Vista Home Premium: $239 ($159 to upgrade)

Windows Vista Business: $299 ($199 to upgrade)

Windows Vista Ultimate: $399 ($259 to upgrade)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Canadian Prices in Canadian Dollars:

Windows Vista Home Basic: $259 ($129 to upgrade)

Windows Vista Home Premium: $299 ($199 to upgrade)

Windows Vista Business: $379 ($249 to upgrade)

Windows Vista Ultimate: $499 ($299 to upgrade)

#14 TheRock316 on 02 Dec 2006 - 03:59

I don't understand how a company like Microsoft can claim they lose millions of dollars to piracy. The fact remains that just because someone is pirating windows doesn't mean they are likely to pay for it if they couldn't pirate it. If they couldn't pirate Windows maybe they wouldn't have it.

Kind of off topic but I thought it had to be said.

#15 rIaHc3 on 02 Dec 2006 - 11:06

If it was made by man, it can be unmade by man. Simple rule.

It will get cracked. End of story.

#16 nihilistphx on 03 Dec 2006 - 01:47

Most of their anti-piracy measures are meant to stop the casual pirate, which is generally the largest demographic of pirates. They know full well they will never stop the people who really, really wanna beat their systems; but that isn't their goal. John Q. Public is their target.

#17 mel00 on 03 Dec 2006 - 06:08

"We're trying to make it easier for people who somehow have received improperly licensed versions to get legal"

how is it making easier for the cheap ****** like my self to buy your dawn expensive ass software? don't get your hope up Microsoft your product always get cracked even if you hire super duper cracker/hacker out there, there always smarter cracker/hacker to beat your protections or what bs you could come up with.

#18 electic102 on 03 Dec 2006 - 23:49

To be honest, all MS did was make it harder for people who ACTUALLY BUY the software to use it. They have to jump thru hoops just to use it. THe people who do not have to jump thru hoops are the pirates. Who will niceley crack it and dump it on IRC for all the world to download for free.

But the only solution is to use OS X

#19 naap51stang on 04 Dec 2006 - 20:52

What happens if you do this......Some of us at work were thinking of this idea.
Not that a-n-y-o-n-e uses a patch so that they can get WGA to work on the MS site, but
what if you buy an upgrade of Vista, legit, and upgrade your illegal copy of XP, that the
MS servers think is legit?
I remember there were ways to switch a couple of files on the CD, to make the upgrade
disk work as a full clean install back in XP or 98 or something...

#20 PricklyPoo on 04 Dec 2006 - 23:48

Lol...This is funny, if pretty much everyone in the world uses windows I dont think that they are going to have it last more than a week until it is cracked. When there is a will there is a way. It will be just like the genuine advantage that was cracked in 24 hours

(1 reply) #21 macstorm on 04 Dec 2006 - 23:53

"We're trying to make it easier for people who somehow have received improperly licensed versions to get legal, and we also put more roadblocks in," said Ballmer, declining to specify how much it can reduce the piracy rate. "It will help," he said.
Words words words...

#21.1 Radium on 07 Dec 2006 - 18:39

Quote - macstorm said @ #21

hehe =)
If they spent less money on bloat, piracy protection and sold it for less then more people would buy it.
People pirate software because it's a challenge, not because they are evil.
Some even buy it AND crack it, for the challenge.

The more piracy protection you have, the more prone to errors it is. There are people with licenses who can't use their software because MS has taken the protection too far. Not many are effected when it comes to XP, but we'll see about Vista.

Too bad that the free alternatives are a bit too complicated to average Joe.
If 3rd party software developers started writing cross-platform software instead, then MS would be forced to make their OS more attractive.

I'm using OpenOffice now, because my parents own a legit version of MS Office but I don't, nor am I planning on buying MS Office.

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