Wired has a story about Microsoft’s latest copy protection scheme which includes limiting the total number of times a given piece of software can be installed.
When activating the software, the Product Activation utility examines the PC’s hardware and generates a “hash,” like an electronic fingerprint, based on all of the different pieces in the system. When the software is activated, Microsoft stores both the activation key and the hash. That way, if a user has to reinstall the software, Microsoft’s server will recognize the hardware configuration.
One or two peripherals can be swapped out of a system and the hash would be preserved, but a major overhaul or new system would require the user to call Microsoft to confirm that they have rights to the software to get it activated. If the software isn’t registered, the Microsoft operator can see how many times the software has been activated and decide based on the number of activations and the story the user tells.
Microsoft insists honest users have nothing to fear. “If it’s an honest customer, then they know what they did, they don’t have to remember a bunch of lies,” said Nieman. “If you’re pirating the product, you have to remember a bunch of lies.”
Stupid, stupid, stupid. Okay, I’m probably not the typical user but in the last four months I changed the video card in my main system twice, added an additional hard drive, swapped about 6 PCI cards in and out, and upgraded the memory. And I’m going to wait on hold for Microsoft? Are they going to help me do this at 2 a.m.?
No thanks. Unfortunately there’s no way to ditch Windows at the moment because of the lack of applications on other OSes, but I refuse to use Office anymore and am surviving just fine. Hopefully Linux will mature into a viable desktop OS or somebody else will find a way to route around the Redmond behemoth.