[Am-info] Re: XP li(e)cense, damn li(e)cense and statistics

[Glenn T. Livezey, Ph.D.]

RE: Windows XP Shows...Fred's "Says it all..." & "Did you hear..." and 
subsequent discussions...........

I have little knowledge of M$ installs, especially XP, but I have been 
told by a colleague who builds systems for several departments at his
University that the corporate version/license does not include at
least some of the worst 'features' such as the near forced Passport
account and he has knowledge of how to remove others not documented.

Is there someone on the list that can confirm this and describe the 
actual difference(s) between a corporate install and a personal 
license install? He's offered to put together a machine for my use
on a colaborative project, and insists that XP - the way he installs
and 'customizes' it - is the way to go.

Hope lies in the fact that there will always be a minority of the more
techno-savy among us, who may either prevent or reveal such invasions 
of privacy. But I found the more practical consideraton voiced by my
colleague, as the basis for this license/install difference, to be of 
great interest. To paraphrase; he said that the corporate license &
installs were exempt from most "marketing in security's clothing" ploys 
mainly because microsoft didn't dare ask its volume/corporate licensees 
to jump through the same hoops it requires of the home/individual user.
I interpret this to mean MicroSlease gets enough up front so that more 
squeezing of the turnip is not required. This also means MicroStealth 
is only interested in the 'security' concerns of its poor individual 
users, who don't have entire IT departments to protect them from 
themselves.

But of course, it just might have more to do with the size of
the legal department at User Inc, rather than the IT department, that
insures that these installs do not compromise company data security,
from behind or in front of the company firewall.

A neighbor of mine, retired from a fine corporate citizen of our 
Military/Industrial Complex, has described the careful negotiations
for custom software licenses, with an eye to the future not often 
seen in our present disposable age. Back in the day, what User Inc 
paid for, User Inc owned, including a copy of the sourcecode held in 
trust, should the supplier choose to discontinue support (or ceased
to exist as the corporate entity responsible for support and future
development). 

This got me to thinking about how much change may have occured in 
the corporate IT culture, which was not developed either recently or
de novo, as the personal/individual user market bloomed. Individual 
users rarely considered nor expected the sort of rights of ownership
that corporations used to prudently protect. But even our military
has recently signed up for bundles of MicroSludge that have left their 
battleships dead in the water on occassion. Think they got a refund? 
Or did they just sign another contract for the XP "upgrade" that will 
now check in with the USS Gates periodically, via the Gates 'Secure'
Channel on our National Security Satelite System and tweak the dlls 
in the 'security' module whenever that guy in the UK who watched the 
all too reality show "Live from Afghanistan", receives another 
transmission via the MicroStealth digital tether our ships are on.

It would all be too funny if it weren't so scary.

Glenn
-- 

Glenn T. Livezey, Ph.D.

University of Minnesota
Neuroscience Department
Room 6-145 Jackson Hall
321 Church St. S.E.
Minneapolis, MN 55455

(612) 624-2991 FAX 6-5009 
glivezey@lenti.med.umn.edu
webmaster@nbts.org http://nbts.bsbe.umn.edu

"It is the leaders of the country who determine the policy 
and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, 
whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a 
parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, 
the people can always be brought to the bidding of the 
leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they 
are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for 
lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. 
It works the same in any country." 
--Reichsmarschall Hermann Goering