Windows Vista Rules!

[cigar no baka]

For those of you who enjoy the freedom to purchase the hardware and software you want, and want the freedom to put multimedia content you buy on any number of devices, Vista is the first step towards the end. Vista implements OS technology that prevents "Copyright Infringement". In laymans terms, it prevents you from using your purchased content in any other form besides the way you bought it. Any hardware capable of copying protected content will be unable to play it. This is accomplished through the driver signing requirement Vista has. Everything from the disk drive to the monitor will have to comply. You will have to buy certified hardware and software to play Blu-Ray and other "Premium" content. You can bet that this technology will not stop there.

Stopping piracy wouldn't bother me so much if it didn't impact my ability to make MP3's and MP4/DIVX files to play on my portable devices and car stereo. Also, the software with items like the IPOD and Sony Mp3 players require you to destroy all your hard work if you change PC's. I think that's complete BS. I spent my 24 hours of work ripping my music collection to a collection of MP3's I can fit on two DVD-R's. I don't feel like doing it every couple of years to make life harder on the music swappers. I may be looking to play with Linux soon. XP appears to be the last MS product I'll be interested in.

A-MEN brother!!! I'm going to have to consider a separate PC for all things media related and use a different OS because it looks like Microsoft has kowtowed to the media conglomerates. They're going to punish everyone for the actions of the pirates!

[Kenyth]

I hope whatever compensation they're getting from the media makers will make up for the business they're going to lose. They're going to open up the door for a whole slew of other operating systems to become popular. The same goes for hardware manufacturers. Look what happened with Linux!