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Microsoft Stealthily Backs Away From Free Windows 10 Promise

posted by cmn32480 on Monday June 22 2015, @01:54PM   Printer-friendly

darkfeline writes in with an article from Arstechnica:

On Friday [June 19, 2015], Microsoft described a way for anyone to get Windows 10 for free: activated, genuine, and updated forever. We wrote at the time that we expected the company to do a volte-face and back away from this promise. Lo and behold, it has come to pass.

Since Friday, the blog post describing the changes to the Windows Insider preview program has been silently updated. Previously it said that signed up members of the Insider Program running a preview version would "receive the Windows 10 final release build and remain activated." Now it says only that they will "receive the Windows 10 final release build." The activation wording has been removed. The company has also added a "clarifying" sentence: "It's important to note that only people running Genuine Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 can upgrade to Windows 10 as part of the free upgrade offer." This is in contrast to what the company said on Friday, when Microsoft's Gabe Aul confirmed that upgraded preview copies would be Genuine.

So what does this all mean? The main thing it means is that we're not expecting clear communication from Microsoft about licensing any time soon. We don't imagine that there will be any technical difference: we expect that as previously described, Windows 10 installed via the preview will activate and show as genuine. It should be fully functional (no "non-genuine" watermark on the desktop or anything like that), and essentially indistinguishable from any other Windows 10 installation.

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  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @10:57PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2015, @10:57PM (#199632)

    It cost Sterling Ball, CEO of Ernie Ball, Inc., $100,000 to figure that out (a BSA raid with armed federal marshals).

    He quickly learned that with Linux that isn't necessary.
    He told his IT guys he wanted the place switched over within 6 months.

    EULAs suck. [google.com]

    -- gewg_

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  • (Score: 2) by Marand on Tuesday June 23 2015, @07:19AM

    by Marand (1081) on Tuesday June 23 2015, @07:19AM (#199768) Journal

    It cost Sterling Ball, CEO of Ernie Ball, Inc., $100,000 to figure that out (a BSA raid with armed federal marshals).

    He quickly learned that with Linux that isn't necessary.
    He told his IT guys he wanted the place switched over within 6 months.

    I've wondered before what happened with that switch. Seemed like someone would follow up on the story and get a long-term retrospective on the change, but every time I think to search it the latest info is still early 2000s. I'd love to hear savings, costs, and challenges faced in the past 15 years. Even if it turns out it was a failed experiment and they went back to being extorted by the BSA, more info could help others succeed.