Battleangel

There were quite a few tech sites reporting on Microsoft’s decision to limit the user interface for non-genuine Windows installations. The so called Aero interface that is. The very same fancy interface that the vast majority can’t run anyway. Especially if you’re strapped for the cash to upgrade and, say, buy Windows Vista.

Way to go. Especially since you know the scene releases are going to be stripped of any such obstacle and the only people to actually suffer will no doubt be the average user who may have to provide constant authentication whenever changing the setup. And much like, say, alcolocks in cars, the risk that something will prevent you from using your product increases dramatically.
One could speculate that MS is not so certain that this technology will work as intended that they would tie it into any deeper processes than the glossy interface. If they really followed through with the alcolock metaphor, there would be scores of people who’d get their setups effectively trashed because something triggered the integrity alert.

Then again, as has been recently pointed out again, Microsoft isn’t at a total loss when its software is infringed upon. Like Bill Gates let slip a few years back: “[...] as long as they’re going to steal it, we want them to steal ours. They’ll get sort of addicted, and then we’ll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade.”

So this is tilting at windmills. For most people, the main problem with Vista remains the implementation of media DRM (like HDCP), its almost limitless hogging of resources and the fact that product tie-ins (like Halo 2 on the software side and an entire generation of graphics hardware) will be delayed as Vista is delayed. Plus its break with backward software compatibility of course.