Windows 7 Leaked To Pirates By Microsoft? 236
nandemoari writes "The beta version of Windows 7 has been widely distributed through torrents and other file sharing systems. But now some commentators claim Microsoft deliberately allowed the package to get into the hands of pirates. 'I'm not being critical here, as some Microsoft Watch commenters will surely claim. It's rather smart marketing. Microsoft fills a big news void with something bloggers and journalists will write about. The suspense of stealth downloads from torrents and races to post the best screenshots first make the Windows 7 leak buzz all the more exciting. For other people, there is delight in seeing Microsoft squirm because Seven leaked early. Not that I see much squirming going on.'"
I guess thats one way to get Beta Testers (Score:3, Interesting)
The copy which is available has a built-in 30 day time limit and, unlike previous editions of Windows 7, 'enthusiasts' don't seem to have found a way around this yet. While this is pretty normal practice for test editions, it would make it possible for Microsoft to leak the software without it affecting the final product.
Anyone tried to reset the clock yet?
On another note, since virtually all of the market for MS Vista is folks who buy a new computer (that isn't a Mac), what good is it to MS to offer something like this up? Is it in the hope that developers will bite? Is this some attrition for Vista?
If authenticode is cracked this time, there will B (Score:4, Interesting)
I wouldn't touch them with a 10-foot pole, even if they were reviewed file for file for viruses and you ran a firewall that blocked outbound connections like Comodo or Zonealarm, because if they want to create a zombie machine, they'll do it using SSL for the control channel.
Windows 7 can't be patched online yet, but after release if these sites have copies that can be, then I doubt Microsoft would be so happy.
As to whether or not this is some MS developers idea of a viral marketing campaign: we give those guys in redmond too much credit. I don't think they like seeing it in the wild, esp. with the comments flowing in about how it's no better than Vista.
Happened before (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:I guess thats one way to get Beta Testers (Score:2, Interesting)
Is this some attrition for Vista?
In a sense, I think it is. It's not that Vista is a bad operating system, it is in fact a very good operating system, and will be getting much of the same praise Vista would have had it launched today with todays drivers. 7 can be likened to an OS X point release (hopefully they'll price it as such). Windows 7 will be Vista SP3, re-branded.
Re:then why (Score:5, Interesting)
Because the clever marketing people who 'leaked' the beta do not communicate with the licensing and piracy teams.
PR (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:I guess thats one way to get Beta Testers (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Well, I'm convinced. (Score:4, Interesting)
The kicker is that the baseless claim she made was that Microsoft did something to whore attention without any fundamental basis ("performance improvements"!?! Where is that new filesystem we were promised back in 2001?)
OH THE IRONING!
Re:I guess thats one way to get Beta Testers (Score:5, Interesting)
Also the fact that literally nothing was in the same place as it was in XP meaning there was a learning curve right out of the box in finding where the settings have been moved to. I know I got a bit more than frustrated when I tried to actually do anything in Vista. It wasn't because it was slow, (I didn't really notice it being "fast" either) but everything was renamed and/or moved around so much it made changing things a bit of a hunt and peck routine I haven't had since Win95.
Re:If authenticode is cracked this time, there wil (Score:1, Interesting)
I wouldn't touch them with a 10-foot pole, even if they were reviewed file for file for viruses and you ran a firewall that blocked outbound connections like Comodo or Zonealarm, because if they want to create a zombie machine, they'll do it using SSL for the control channel.
This is why (if you have any sense) you either:
A - Run Windows in a VM and only turn on networking when you need it (VMs also have the added advantage of being able to revert to snapshots, in case anything untoward happens).
or B - Only plug in the network cable when you need to.
I seriously cant imagine anyone stupid enough to run a pirated OS on a box with 24/7 Internet connection (the risks are just too high).
Re:I guess thats one way to get Beta Testers (Score:3, Interesting)
drivers and software in general. Vanilla vista ran pretty well on old or budget computers, give or take some crappy intel GPUs that made even XP lag some... But OEMs would bundle it with anti-virus softwares that had known performance issues in Vista, versions of Nero that were incompatible, same with codecs... it really trashed the performance. AVG, one of the more popular free anti-virus, had serious issues with Vista back then (not sure about now, didn't hear anything about it in a while). That really hurt it.
OEMs are supposed to provide some added value in the form of a good configuration of the machine, and they always sucked at it, but they failed HARD at Vista's launch, up to a bit after SP1 (in my experience. The OEMs still shipped crappy configs a month or so after SP1 came out...).
No, it wasn't leaked to 'pirates' (Score:1, Interesting)
I know he's a little upset with the group since it was supposed to be confidential, but with all the positive reviews he's not too peeved.
Re:I guess thats one way to get Beta Testers (Score:5, Interesting)
I've never yet had to use Vista myself, but in my limited experience helping friends who do use it, the "budget laptops" issue looks to be a serious one. A friend of mine was given a budget laptop for work, but he couldn't get wireless networking to work and asked me for help.
The first thing I noticed was that it took something ridiculous like 10 minutes to start up, and was incredibly slow even when no applications were running. So I went to the "System" control panel, and discovered the laptop had only 384MB of RAM.
So...it's a new laptop, that ships with Vista, and it falls short of Vista's minimum RAM requirements? I never did figure that one out.
I finally told him that the first thing he needed to do before I could help him was to get a laptop that met or exceeded Vista's minimum system requirements. I didn't hear anything about it after that.
Re:If authenticode is cracked this time, there wil (Score:3, Interesting)
Conspiracy theories of mythical "pirate" rootkits aside, the source of these installations that require no activation or cd key is from Microsoft themselves. They released this version to Universities who have licensed with MS to provide copies of Windows to all their students. They couldn't be bothered to make a system to issue/track cd keys so they released it without a need for any.
Re:then why (Score:4, Interesting)
1) It's Microsoft. Frequently, left hand and right hand are barely acquainted. And in this case, they've probably deliberately been kept apart.
2) Like a magician, they're making a big show to distract you, so you don't notice what they're up to with their other hand.
3) They have to be SEEN to be doing the right thing, even if they're not. And they wouldn't be alone in this, there's a lot of ot about. Can somebody remind me of the fairly well-known American band whose album got leaked before release to torrent sites last year, causing takedown notices aplenty, only for it to transpire that the person who leaked it was their manager?
Re:tag: hypocrisy? (Score:1, Interesting)
If it's given to you by the company who wrote it is it still piracy?
Re:tag: hypocrisy? (Score:4, Interesting)
There's one thing you're not quite taking into consideration: patents. MS can't release anything in any form (including beta) and then file for a patent. They need to file for the patents first, and only once the paperwork hits the US PTO can they release a beta.
They may have a claim here that they didn't really release it, so it probably won't count against them when it comes time to file patents.
Welcome to the internet (Score:4, Interesting)
I am seriously amazed this is news. This has been happening almost as long as piracy has been around. I used to release for several groups, and helped run sites. We had several people who were friends with industry people (sometimes software producers (but this was rarer), mostly movies/music/tv). This is how we got PRE's ages before the movie/album/show was released. There were instances of people stealing the property, but this was unsustainable and so those people were only able to provide us with 1 or so releases. The people who continually delivered were often from the marketing/producers/execs from the big parent companies and similar. However, there were some people who worked in development, or at cd presses, however this was a much smaller subset of releasers, as this section always got the most scrutiny on security.
I am perpetually amazed by how little people actually know about the scene. It provides us with so much awesome, yet very few people understand it.
Re:I guess thats one way to get Beta Testers (Score:5, Interesting)
More of an addendum than anything else... XP released at a time when 32-128MB of RAM on a system was fairly standard. XP required 64MB as a minimum to install, and didn't really start running very well until you had at least 256MB, which happened at large in the consumer market about 6 months after XP hit the shelves.
Vista released when 512MB-1GB was fairly standard. It runs poorly on anything less than 2GB. It's the same problem that XP had when it first released... now that new computers are generally coming with 2GB at a minimum, and 6 or 8GB is available from most major manufacturers, Vista's performance has reached acceptable levels.
I think the problem is that Microsoft has been providing its developers with very powerful workstations to design software on. Maybe for the next major releases of Office and Windows, they should replace all the workstations with '486 DX/66 with 16MB of RAM.... Hopefully then they'll learn the meaning of lean code again.
Re:If authenticode is cracked this time, there wil (Score:4, Interesting)
You're a little too paranoid.
I trust the pirates and torrents FAR more than the software companys.
One works to screw me over all the time. The other has never let me down.
Re:Windows 7 Rap (Score:4, Interesting)
Metamoderation seems to be broken. All I ever get is a bunch of unmoderated comments, with poorly-defined +- options. If the comments are not yet moderated it is hardly metamoderation.
Re:Buzz?!?!? (Score:2, Interesting)
Well to be honest, I'm looking forward to seeing what Microsoft can do with Win7. The "modular" approach they've taken with Windows Live services is a great start. There's nothing wrong with taking a little inspiration from Linux or OS X for certain features if they can turn around Vista's shortcomings. I say bring it on!
My mantra regarding betas is always: let's wait and see...