WPA: Pure Evil?
While cruising Slashdot I came across this blog post from Ed Bott about the future of Windows Product Activation. So apparently there is an ugly rumor going around that the Windows Genuine Advantage Notification update will become manditory for all Windows machines this fall. And by mandatory, I mean your computer will stop receiving critical security updates if you don’t have it installed. Check out this response sent to Ed from Microsoft after he inquired about the WPA mess:
As we have mentioned previously, as the WGA Notifications program expands in the future, customers may be required to participate. [emphasis added] Microsoft is gathering feedback in select markets to learn how it can best meet its customers’ needs and will keep customers informed of any changes to the program.
Also there are several other posts and comments talking about the “quality” of the WGA software that is being pushed out with Windows update. Several users reported crashes and/or blue screens, or that their CD-keys were flagged as already in use. Although some of these reports could be anti-Microsoft hate, there could be legitimate reasons to not install WGA on your machine..
I have several questions for Microsoft about this fiasco. First off, why is WGA pushed as a critical Windows update? Up until now participating in the WGA program has been completely optional. Most novice home users will have automatic updates turned on, and by default Windows pulls down critical security updates. How would you feel if you come home from work to find that your computer has been royally screwed by a critical update that is supposed to help you? Better yet what if this program erroneously flags your legal copy of Windows as pirated and gives you 30 days to get legal? The three hours I would spend in the MS Technical Support queue would be a great prep time for my yelling voice ;).
In the end the WPA initiative is making Micro$oft look like the big ugly green giant they truely are. I haven’t installed WPA on my machine, and I probably won’t ever. Even if the “kill switch” is pushed in September. Hell some people I know are running on XP SP1 just fine! My computer will probably be seeing a port to Suse 10.1 Linux in the near future. I’d rather go with software that is built by honest, hard working developers and not the code slaves of the Microsoft mines. So as a user, I charge you to go tell every Windows user you know about Microsoft’s plan. Raise enough ruckus and maybe Microsoft will put the breaks on this very bad idea.
Dave said,
June 29, 2006 @ 4:22 pm
Read this for a little more info on the subject: http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/75882
I am one of those users still running SP1 without a hitch. SP2 is a little borderline bloat-ware for my tastes. Looks like I’d better learn more about Linux, I’ve got Suse 9.3 dual booting, but I don’t know enough about using it to be productive. Time to get rid of my M$ Smartphone too. lol Time for a good Samsung, or maybe a Symbian Nokia.
Derek said,
June 29, 2006 @ 9:32 pm
“Code slaves of the Microsoft mines?” What, you think they don’t get paid well? Because last time I checked, developers contributing to open-source don’t get paid. But open-source and for-hire developers make their own choices.
Hey, if you wanna go Linux, more power to you. But don’t do so because you think better of the guys writing it, do so because it’ll work better for you. Some of us write software for Windows, so we don’t have much of a choice!
I don’t think the end result will be as bad as things may seem. Most users get XP with a new computer — all of those are activated, and genuine, and won’t have an issue. But you have to understand that Microsft, just like any software company, is in this to make money, and they get hammered by piracy, particularly in foreign markets where the laws on this stuff is not as strong. This is one way to get their business markets, particularly, to stay legit — if they want security updates, they have to have the real deal.
jduv said,
June 29, 2006 @ 10:39 pm
Most of my very young career has been writing software for a Windows environment. But I try to keep things as cross platform as I possibly can. Don’t get me wrong, XP is a good OS. There are several other factors that are pushing me away from it, however. One big push is based on the newest iteration of Windows. The target platform for my research project is Windows Vista. I realize that what I have is still in Beta, so bugs are to be expected. But it seems to me like Windows is dumbing it’s OS down too much.
I also believe the advantages of open source vs. closed source are too numerous to ignore. There are many reasons why, but thats another post altogether. Eric has a good post on that topic.
Sure, I believe Microsoft has a right to protect themselves against piracy. And, like I stated in my post my copy of XP pro is 100% paid for–along with all the other Microsoft software I own such as VS2005, SQL server Developer, and many others (no office though, Open Office works fine!). And a few of Microsofts products are quite possibly the best on the market. I haven’t found a better IDE than Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 for SQL/ASP/C# development, and there is obviously a reason that Windows has a +90% market share in the home user environment. But the fact that the WPA software phones home every so often is borderline malware. The logical followup question would be what’s next? How long before Office starts phoning into Microsoft servers? This isn’t a matter of who writes better software, it’s a question of ethics. Electronic privacy is a very touchy subject these days, and it seems everyone is ignoring it.
I admit, the code mine comment was a bit over the top, but sometimes I do feel like it takes forced hard labor to make the ASP.NET/C# or the Windows API do what I want ;).
Great followup Derek, and welcome to AnxAw!
Ben said,
June 30, 2006 @ 12:28 am
You’re forgetting theorem 1.1… people = stupid. So there is no way to dumb down an OS enough for stupid people. With as easy as windows is, you above all people should know that some people just aren’t cut out for it…
Derek said,
June 30, 2006 @ 1:15 pm
“…sometimes I do feel like it takes forced hard labor to make the ASP.NET/C# or the Windows API do what I want.”
I haven’t dived too much into the .NET world, but in regards to Win32 I totally relate. Especially when trying to hack around VB6 limitations with Win32… which is what I commonly have to do. We’re actually looking at using QT — it’s pretty cool. One common codebase, native Win32, Mac OSX, and Linux apps. And I like C++ a lot better anyway. I wrote and maintain a common C++ library that we share with our mac guys, and I enjoy working on that a lot more than VB stuff these days.
I’m also working right now on getting our app compatible with Vista. The betas are, by definition, buggy, and I suspect that they keep them that way to ensure people will install the full release as soon as it’s available. Still, there are many good things about Vista, not the least of which is that default permit is not a part of the OS. Even if your account is an administrator account, admin actions still require explicit permission. This closes SO many security holes, that it alone will be worth the upgrade to Vista. Of course, those of us who get MSDN subscriptions through work don’t have to worry about paying for it, anyway. But Vista will be a “good thing” for dumb computer users, and for companies that have tech support departments that have to deal with dumb computer users all the time. But alas, nothing can prevent dumb users from installing malware on their own.
Anxiously Awaiting » Windows Vista: The Best Case for Windows XP said,
February 22, 2007 @ 7:55 pm
[...] The first and second features are arguable threats to privacy, and the third and fourth are poster children for DRM. To make this concrete, imagine that I have a song that I download in iTunes. If sealing and binding were in place then it would be impossible (without cracking the keys on the chip) to transfer that song to any other electronic media that didn’t have an identical TPM chip. Since number one states that no two chips are the same, then you are hosed. Vista uses this piece of hardware in it’s hell-spawned incarnation of WGA. [...]