“Wine is a better Windows than Vista”

--David Gerard

Despite attempts to control public perception, Vista 7 turned out to be a dud and it's already exploitable. According to some sources, Microsoft has begun leaking its not-yet-a-reality product, just as Microsoft's evangelism tactics instruct where they state [PDF]: "In the face of strong competition, Evangelism's focus may shift immediately to the next version of the same technology, however. Indeed, Phase 1 (Evangelism Starts) for version x+1 may start as soon as this Final Release of version X."

Did Microsoft push out Vista 7 to give people the illusion that it's already "out there"? Some people sure think so.

Report Accuses Microsoft of Purposefully Leaking Windows 7 Beta

Microsoft's Windows 7 beta 1 was not officially intended for release until January. However, the release somehow hit torrent sites this week. Many, including commenters here at DailyTech, suspected the "leak" was really a clever ruse by Microsoft to drum up tech community excitement for its upcoming release.

Elsewhere, in Slashdot to be precise, it turns out that Windows comes with a few more lemons and the arrest of Microsoft's former 'partners' may be a prelude to it.

"According to Microsoft, 'No information is collected during the [Genuine Advantage Program] validation process that can be used to identify or contact a user.' That's little comfort to the software counterfeiters who were just handed jail sentences ranging from 1.5-6.5 years by the Futian People's Court in China, especially since Microsoft contends that much of the estimated $2B in bogus software was detected by its Windows Genuine Advantage program. 'Software piracy negatively impacts local economic growth,' explained Microsoft VP Fengming Liu in a celebratory New Year's Eve press release. But then again, so does transferring $16B of assets and $9B in annual profit to an Irish tax haven, doesn't it?"

Tax evasion in its own right is a subject we explored here before. It's a small problem compared to some others.

According to The Register, there may be increased enforcement urging people to pay for non-Free software, which is good news to Free software.

Chilean lawyer Guillermo Frêne is having a bit of a bad hair day after it was revealed that draft legislation aimed at cutting the internet connections of illegal downloading ne'er-do-wells was presented in .doc format written on pirated software.

This ought to be push more Chilean to Free software [1] and steer them clear of Microsoft's abuses [2, 3, 4]. ⬆

___ [1] ElMostrador.cl: Chilean Public Pension System (INP) Switches to Linux

The institution will save more than 67,000 USD per year in license fees.

Two of every three Chileans either pay or get paid by this state-owned institution, which has 63 offices and ten corporate buildings all over the country, using more than 1500 computers.

[2] Microsoft will turn Chile abstention into a Yes?

Despite the 217 comments tabled by Chile in September, the Microsoft puppets are well active in the Committee and will vote this Tuesday to turn the vote of the country from an abstention to a Yes. You can expect more of those things happening until the end of March.

[3] The day Chile was Bought by Microsoft

Just today, a secret agreement between MS and the Chilean Government came to light. In it, every citizen was sold as a potential user of a Windows Live Spaces model where every SSN is linked to, overbypassing any privacy term and cashing Bill some bucks. It wouldn't be so awful to all if that agreement wasn't aprooved yet (Spanish follows).

[4] Chilean Mapuches in language row with Microsoft

Mapuche Indians in Chile are trying to take global software giant Microsoft to court in a legal battle which raises the question of whether anyone can ever "own" the language they speak.