It appears that Microsoft wants to make sure that its customers feel as if they are being treated with contempt - just in case they didn't already feel that way. Customers who pay up to US$400 for a copy of Vista Ultimate will for their investment be able to transfer their software to another machine just once instead of as many times as they like as is the case with XP.

If your machine packs it in, Microsoft in its benevolence will allow you to transfer the software to another machine. However, if after a year or so you decide to upgrade and pass your old machine on to another family member who only needs a copy of Vista Home Edition, it's just too bad because you'll have to fork out another US$400 because your license is no longer transferrable. This is not piracy prevention. This is pure greed.

Microsoft claims that it is has a huge piracy problem. It has to tighten its rules with measures such as the Software Protection Program that has the power to disable computers deemed to house pirated software. It has to restrict users to the number of times they can re-install their software.

However, one has to ask then how was Microsoft able to build a global monopoly where Windows is installed on 90% or more of desktops despite this so-called piracy? Are they really implying that 50% of these people are priates? Given the numbers it would seem that the 2 + billion people of china and india which could buy microsoft software, why then does the price of the product not drop as the numbers go up. Production of any other material goods are expected to drop as the numbers rise. But at MS they have a sweet deal already by them maintaining high prices throughout the life cycle of a product. One which they define the life cycle as 5 years from day one.

In spite of piracy, how was Microsoft able to achieve revenues of nearly $25 billion and a profit of almost $18.5 billion on its Windows and Office products alone in the fiscal year ended 2006? Already forums are abuzz with outraged users advising to install one of the popular free Linux distributions on their computers. users are advising each other to buy Macs - anything to get away from the restrictions Microsoft intends to impose on the use of its software.