www.pcworld.com/article/id,127678/article.html

If You Dislike Microsoft's Windows Antipiracy Checks, Look Out
Next up: Microsoft Office joins the software validation program.

Elizabeth Montalbano, IDG News Service
Thursday, October 26, 2006 02:00 PM PDT

If you don't like the mandatory antipiracy checks that Microsoft now enforces for Windows, brace yourself. The Microsoft Office productivity and collaboration suite is about to get a similar program.

The company's Office Genuine Advantage (OGA) program will require mandatory validation of Office software starting October 27, the software vendor quietly disclosed today. After that date, any Office Online templates downloaded from within the Office 2007 Microsoft Office System applications will require validation of legitimacy.

Similarly, starting in January, users of Office Update will have to validate the legitimacy of their Office software before they can use the service, Microsoft added.

Users absolutely hated the first iteration of the Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) program, and their protests pressured the company into revising it about a year after it launched in July 2005.

'Quick and Simple'
Microsoft said in a press statement that the validation process will be "quick and simple" for users. The OGA program, currently in the testing phase, is now available in 26 languages worldwide.

OGA is a sibling program to WGA; both automatically check a user's version of Microsoft software to ensure it is not counterfeit or pirated.

Microsoft has integrated this check directly into the next version of its OS, Windows Vista, as part of what it is calling a "Software Protection Platform." Through that automatic validation system, a Vista user must activate his or her copy of the software with a valid activation key within 30 days after purchase of the software, or see the OS enter a reduced functionality mode. In that mode, users can browse the Web for an hour but then the system will log them out, and they will have to log in again if they want to browse more.

Microsoft has increased its efforts in recent years to fight software piracy and counterfeiting of its software products. But these efforts have met with some resistance from users, especially when early bugs in the WGA checks were tagging legitimate software as counterfeit or pirated.

Microsoft also was forced to turn off a notification feature in WGA that sent information to the company from users' PCs when some users complained that the feature was acting like spyware.

www.openoffice.org

Free.  Legit.  Equivalent.  FREE.  Works with Linux when you're ready to give Windows the heave-ho.

-Jeff

Enterprise Edition

Like it wont be hacked seconds after its released...  

Just like with gun laws, this only hurts the people who are legit anyway.

+1 on OpenOffice.  

Used it from early 1.x releases on Windows.  Just waiting for the OS X native version to be finished (not crazy about the X11 version  for OS X, but it works).

Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac.

I used, built and repaired PCs for quite awhile.  Had several friends with laptops that had major issues when WGA first hit.  No pirate, they were the original owner and it was factory installed OS.  Bill wants to rule the world with blue screens.

Bunch of my friends are into IT in a big way.  Several are IT managers at large facilities, two world wide.  I know some are comsi grads.  Want to know what they are using?  Either a flavor of unix or macs.  One gave me a test drive of his MacBook Pro.  That's all it took.

I should be a Mac owner by Thanksgiving.

OpenOffice is great.  I have OpenOffice Portable on my keydrive.

Another great (free) product, for word processing, is AbiWord.  

Jim

Quoted: Bunch of my friends are into IT in a big way.  Several are IT managers at large facilities, two world wide.  I know some are comsi grads.  Want to know what they are using?  Either a flavor of unix or macs.  One gave me a test drive of his MacBook Pro.  That's all it took. I should be a Mac owner by Thanksgiving.

You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile!

Openoffice is the way to go.

Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac.

But what do you do when 99% of buisinesses that use MS office? Did you try Open Office yet?

So I bought two copies of office, one for each computer....

Quoted: Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac. But what do you do when 99% of buisinesses that use MS office? Did you try Open Office yet?

I have not tried OpenOffice. I run MS Office for Mac, which doesn't have any of that validation crap attached to it (certainly not nearly as much as described above).

I got MSOffice so I could do work stuff at home. Seeing as I am no longer really able to use my Mac at work (different company; long story), I use it strictly for home use. OpenOffice my be worth a try.

I don't mind the WGA, never had a problem.

Work in the IT section of a large corporation, none of the computers I support have ever had a problem.

My nerdy friends that I lan with?  no problem.

I have only personally seen two people who have had a problem with WGA is two people I know for a fact was using a pirated copy.

I probably won't mind the OGA.  

I support a mixture of pcs, apples and UNIX (well, the unix is what the servers are running) currently the mac guys are trying to budget replacing their Macs with pcs.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac. But what do you do when 99% of buisinesses that use MS office? Did you try Open Office yet? I have not tried OpenOffice. I run MS Office for Mac, which doesn't have any of that validation crap attached to it (certainly not nearly as much as described above). I got MSOffice so I could do work stuff at home. Seeing as I am no longer really able to use my Mac at work (different company; long story), I use it strictly for home use. OpenOffice my be worth a try.

I use OO for Windows, and have recommended it to our Mac users on campus. So far no complaints from them.

Quoted: Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac. But what do you do when 99% of buisinesses that use MS office? Did you try Open Office yet?

OpenOffice.org reads and writes in all of the Microsoft Office formats; Word, Excel, and Power Point

Quoted: I don't mind the WGA, never had a problem. Work in the IT section of a large corporation, none of the computers I support have ever had a problem. My nerdy friends that I lan with?  no problem. I have only personally seen two people who have had a problem with WGA is two people I know for a fact was using a pirated copy. I probably won't mind the OGA.   I support a mixture of pcs, apples and UNIX (well, the unix is what the servers are running) currently the mac guys are trying to budget replacing their Macs with pcs.

The WGA all up and decided one day that a machine that had functioned fine for 3 years was now using a pirated copy of XP.  I called Microsoft, they said the WGA is never wrong.  I promptly reformated and installed my Volume License copy and gave it back to the customer.  Fuck this.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac. But what do you do when 99% of buisinesses that use MS office? Did you try Open Office yet? OpenOffice.org reads and writes in all of the Microsoft Office formats; Word, Excel, and Power Point

No kiddin'?

Downloading now....

I made the switch from Windows to Linux long ago. I couldn't be happier.

Quoted: Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac. But what do you do when 99% of buisinesses that use MS office? Did you try Open Office yet?

Dude, i dont know what you are talking about!! Mac and apple are a whole whopping 1% of the PC market! Oh teh noes!!1!1! before you know it they are gonna sell more computers than gateway. (which right now they dont )
If apple was the shitznit all those Cult members say it is then Linux would've NEVER BEEN BORN! people would've just shrugged off windoze and gone back to thier beloved Mac platform right? but they didnt. Lets not forget, do you think apple is any different than MS when it comes to dickyness and proprietary stuff?? oh hell no, they even worse. At least the wintel platform has open development for its hardware. Compatability is one important word that is NOT in apples dictionary.

Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac.

Microsoft makes an even greater margin off suckers running Mac's who are happy to pay twice as much for their software because its a "Mac".

Quoted: Quoted: I don't mind the WGA, never had a problem. Work in the IT section of a large corporation, none of the computers I support have ever had a problem. My nerdy friends that I lan with?  no problem. I have only personally seen two people who have had a problem with WGA is two people I know for a fact was using a pirated copy. I probably won't mind the OGA.   I support a mixture of pcs, apples and UNIX (well, the unix is what the servers are running) currently the mac guys are trying to budget replacing their Macs with pcs. The WGA all up and decided one day that a machine that had functioned fine for 3 years was now using a pirated copy of XP.  I called Microsoft, they said the WGA is never wrong.  I promptly reformated and installed my Volume License copy and gave it back to the customer.  Fuck this.

Here's an even better example of why WGA sucks ass and should be avoided...

My computer originally used an Intel motherboard for two years.  Then strange things started happening, especially failures to boot the hard drive.  After much testing and experimenting, I found that I had to replace the motherboard.  I was already pissed before I even chose the replacement, an Asus.  Swapping motherboards is not my idea of fun!  Fortunately, I use the VLE of XP, so getting the OS functional was relatively smooth.  If I used the retail edition of XP, I'd have to pay for ANOTHER license!

OpenOffice.org reads and writes in all of the Microsoft Office formats; Word, Excel, and Power Point

Also, it will sometimes open Microsoft Office files that the new versions of Microsoft Office won't even open!  We have several customers that send us files every few weeks that we "recover" simply by opening with OpenOffice and then resaving.  It takes 30 seconds and we charge $50 each in small qty so it's a pretty good business.  We have a customer with ~40,000 Word files that were saved between 1993-1995 that the new version of Word will not open but OpenOffice can.  As soon as I figure-out a way of automating the conversion, I'll make a good bit of money since they need them for a lawsuit.

We also open Microsoft Office documents and resave them with OpenOffice in the Microsoft formats before putting them on customer web sites because even Microsoft Office has an easier time of opening files that OpenOffice saved than it does with files it saves.  It's amazing that Microsoft Office is such junk that it has so much trouble reading what it creates.z

Quoted: not crazy about the X11 version  for OS X, but it works).

Help!

X11 is telling me it can't be installed because I have newer software on my computer.

OpenOffice is telling me it can't install without X11.

WTF am I doing wrong?

Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac.

That's only because nobody wants the software enough to steal it.

I hate all the anti piracy stuff, but much like laws against murder, if the crime wasn't being commited, there would be no reason to try to fight it.

X11 is telling me it can't be installed because I have newer software on my computer.

That happened to me since I had upgraded to Tiger on several laptops that originally came with Panther installed.  The Tiger upgrade doesn't automatically upgrade X11.  I had to put the Tiger DVD back in and upgrade X11 then OpenOffice and GIMP worked fine.z

Quoted: Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac. That's only because nobody wants the software enough to steal it. I hate all the anti piracy stuff, but much like laws against murder, if the crime wasn't being commited, there would be no reason to try to fight it.

How many hacked copies of XP are you running?

Quoted: X11 is telling me it can't be installed because I have newer software on my computer. That happened to me since I had upgraded to Tiger on several laptops that originally came with Panther installed.  The Tiger upgrade doesn't automatically upgrade X11.  I had to put the Tiger DVD back in and upgrade X11 then OpenOffice and GIMP worked fine.z

Ah!

OK. I'll try that tomorrow. Thanks.

Quoted: www.openoffice.org Free.  Legit.  Equivalent.  FREE.  Works with Linux when you're ready to give Windows the heave-ho. -Jeff

It's also a big piece of crap.  I geniunely gave it a chance, and ended up uninstalling it and using Office instead.  I don't know why people put up with substandard open source garbage.  If MS had released Open Office everyone would be using it as proof that MS sucks.  

Fuck that Pinhead, Libtard Bill-The Prick-Gates

Oh by the way, MS allows you to activate several copies of XP.  After that they say to call to activate another copy. You call in, punch in your license key and they activate your new copy.  It's not as strict as people make it out to be.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac. That's only because nobody wants the software enough to steal it. I hate all the anti piracy stuff, but much like laws against murder, if the crime wasn't being commited, there would be no reason to try to fight it. How many hacked copies of XP are you running?

None.

Quoted: Fuck that Pinhead, Libtard Bill-The Prick-Gates

So the man has no right to protect his product? Downfalls of WGA aside, this stance is puzzling coming from such a pro-capitalist site as Arfcom.

Thank goodness they haven't done this shit to CD's.

Yet....

Quoted: Thank goodness they haven't done this shit to CD's. Yet....

its called a root kit. It keeps you from copying or ripping from CDs

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Reason #342,871,846 for me to stick with my beloved Mac. That's only because nobody wants the software enough to steal it. I hate all the anti piracy stuff, but much like laws against murder, if the crime wasn't being commited, there would be no reason to try to fight it. How many hacked copies of XP are you running? None.

Was it your software bundle, WGA, or loosing your hacked copy that changed that?

Quoted: Enterprise Edition

That does not always mean a trouble free OS. We have had MS telling us about their database corruptions and having to remove certain files from our Windows XP Enterprise edition softwares to re-validate before.

Quoted: <Snip>

WTF is wrong with you?

Quoted: Quoted: <Snip> WTF is wrong with you?

Nothing , Why?

Quoted: Quoted: Thank goodness they haven't done this shit to CD's. Yet.... its called a root kit. It keeps you from copying or ripping from CDs

And it was made and installed without users permission by Sony not Microsoft

Quoted: Fuck that Pinhead, Libtard Bill-The Prick-Gates

On the contrary - Bill G is far from a Liberal.  

He gives his own money to others where Liberals give YOUR money to others.

He started a very successful company that brings in Billions of dollars to the US economy from overseas.  We may import oil into the US but we export software.  Microsoft does this without spending your tax dollars like defense contractors.  Thats why Europe really hates Microsoft.

If you don't like the company or product you don't have to buy it.  On the other hand
you can buy part of it for around $28/share and you will actually receive part of the profit because unlike most tech companies, Microsoft pays dividends.

Microsoft does not have anti-gun libtard hate policies.  There is even an NRA affiliated Microsoft gun club - honorable mention here for supporting gun rights with funding:
Gun Week

The reason for the piracy checks is because in great countries like RED CHINA where there is so much law and order - 80% of software is pirated from American companies.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Thank goodness they haven't done this shit to CD's. Yet.... its called a root kit. It keeps you from copying or ripping from CDs And it was made and installed without users permission by Sony not Microsoft

Thats true, but it serves the same purpose, prevent piracy, which I believe Zaphod was refering to.

Quoted: www.openoffice.org Free.  Legit.  Equivalent.  FREE.  Works with Linux when you're ready to give Windows the heave-ho. -Jeff

+1

Have used this for years...works great

Compatible with MS office formats too

Quoted: Thats true, but it serves the same purpose, prevent piracy, which I believe Zaphod was refering to.

I was actually trying to make the point that they haven't required you to buy a new disc for each CD player you have.... yet.

I had an older computer that one day decided it would no longer run Excell.  Reinstalling and other fixes just did not work.  Someone suggested EasyOffice.  Well, that didn't work either, just did not handle Word and Excell well at all, even though it was supposed to.  

Inserted graphics were all screwed up.  Outlines on cells in forms disappeared.  Other problems.

Perhaps Open Office is better, I don't know.

So, does this effect all versions of office, or just 2007?

I think it is for all office. When I use it it checked office 2003
installs an active x and then clears you to download updates
and templates, been doing it for awhile now

Quoted: Enterprise Edition

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