Another reason for not using VISTA

Microsoft promises to wow people who are upgrading from Windows XP to its new operating system, but with the joys of Windows Vista comes plenty of pain.

1. Vista Activation Cracked by Brute Force
-"The Inquirer has a story about a brute force Vista key activation crack. It's nothing fancy; it's described as a 'glorified guesser.' The danger of this approach is that sooner or later the key cracker will begin activating legitimate keys purchased by other consumers. From the article: 'The code is floating, the method is known, and there is nothing MS can do at this point other than suck it down and prepare for the problems this causes. To make matters worse, Microsoft will have to decide if it is worth it to allow people to take back legit keys that have been hijacked, or tell customers to go away, we have your money already, read your license agreement and get bent, we owe you nothing.'"

2. Vista Firewall Easily Tricked, Says Symantec
-"[The firewall] poses a great limitation for malicious code looking to backdoor a host," said Padilla in the entry. "Unfortunately, the Unblock button may be accessed with the same privilege level as a standard user. This configuration of privileges creates a point of vulnerability that undermines the effectiveness of the firewall's policy in Windows Vista."

3. Vista's user account control is not trustworthy

4. Microsoft's new Windows Vista operating system is a giant step backward for your freedoms.
-Usually software is supposed to enable you to do more with your computer. Vista, though, is designed to restrict what you can do. Vista enforces new forms of "Digital Rights Management (DRM)". DRM is more accurately called Digital Restrictions Management, because it is a technology that Big Media and computer companies try to impose on us all, in order to have control over how our computers are used.

DRM enables Microsoft and media companies to:
*Decide which programs you can and can't use on your computer
*Decide which features of your computer or software you can use at any given moment
*Force you to install new programs even when you don't want to (and, of course, pay for the privilege)
*Restrict your access to certain programs and even to your own data files

DRM is enforced by technological barriers. You try to do something, and your computer tells you that you can't. To make this effective, your computer has to be constantly monitoring what you are doing. This constant monitoring uses computing power and memory, and is a large part of the reason why Microsoft is telling you that you have to buy new and more powerful hardware in order to run Vista. They want you to buy new hardware not because you need it, but because your computer needs it in order to be more effective at restricting what you do.

Microsoft and other computer companies sometimes refer to these restrictions as "Trusted Computing." Given that they are designed to make it so that your computer stops trusting you and starts trusting Microsoft, these restrictions are more appropriately called "Treacherous Computing".

Even when you legally buy Vista, you don't own it.

Windows Vista, like previous versions of Windows, is proprietary software: leased to you under a license that severely restricts how you can use it, and without source code, so nobody but Microsoft can change it or even verify what it really does.

Microsoft says it best:

The software is licensed, not sold. This agreement only gives you some rights to use the software. Microsoft reserves all other rights. Unless applicable law gives you more rights despite this limitation, you may use the software only as expressly permitted in this agreement. In doing so, you must comply with any technical limitations in the software that only allow you to use it in certain ways.

To make it even more confusing, different versions of Vista have different licensing restrictions. You can read all of the licenses at http://www.microsoft.com/about/legal/useterms/default.aspx.

It's painful to read the licenses, and this is often why people don't object to them. But if we don't start objecting, we will lose valuable freedoms. Here are some of the ridiculous restrictions you will find in your reading:
If your copy of Vista came with the purchase of a new computer, that copy of Vista may only be legally used on that machine, forever.
If you bought Vista in a retail store and installed it on a machine you already owned, you have to completely delete it on that machine before you can install it on another machine.
You give Microsoft the right, through programs like Windows Defender, to delete programs from your system that it decides are spyware.
You consent to being spied upon by Microsoft, through the "Windows Genuine Advantage" system. This system tries to identify instances of copying that Microsoft thinks are illegitimate. Unfortunately, a recent study indicated that this system has already screwed up in over 500,000 cases.

Free software like GNU/Linux does not require you to consent to these absurd licensing terms. It is called free software because you are free to make as many copies as you want, and to share it with as many friends as you want. Nobody will be monitoring your actions or falsely calling you a thief.
What you can do to help protect your freedom

There is a battle underway between those who value freedom, and corporations such as Microsoft who wish to profit by taking that freedom away. DRM and absurd licenses are at the heart of that battle. Please join us on the side of freedom by saying NO not just to Windows Vista and other DRM-enabled products, but to proprietary software in general. Instead, use non-DRM, "free" software such as the GNU/Linux operating system. You can get your work done while ensuring that your rights and freedoms will not be restricted now and into the future.

As more and more of our lives become digital, it is vital that we protect our digital freedoms just like we have always worked to protect our freedom of expression in print and speech.