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How does that work exactly? Will they require a subscription? I have a hard time believing most Windows users who right now think they are getting "Windows for

How does that work exactly? Will they require a subscription? I have a hard time believing most Windows users who right now think they are getting "Windows for free" with their laptop and never have to worry about it again, would agree to pay Microsoft even $1 a month for it. If there is no subscription then how will they charge users - per "major update"? Like some sort of Windows 10.1? What would happened to the Windows 10 users who don't want to pay for that update then? Do they still get security fixes?

giaour 11y ago
Microsoft has already softened their pricing strategy by offering Windows for free on small tablets and by not charging for the upgrades from Windows 8 to 8.1 or to 10. Perhaps they don't see Windows as the cash cow that it once was and will make all upgrades free.
- Karunamon 11y ago
  It wouldn't surprise me to see them make the base OS for home users free, and then only charge for enterprise specific features. Think of 7 Home Premium as free, and Ultimate/Enterprise now the paid versions.
- dordoka 11y ago
  Actually, they even include Windows 7, not only 8 or 8.1 [0]. I guess that "for the first year" will probably be extended as well... Edit: if this [1] reuters article is true (I couldn't find a reference on Microsoft's site), they are also including pirated versions... [0] http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/about http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/about [1] http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/18/us-microsoft-china-idUSKBN0ME06A20150318 http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/18/us-microsoft-china...
  - bad_user 11y ago
    This is because 8 and 8.1 are a downgrade compared to 7 and weren't received well. Consider that Windows XP has a bigger market share than 8 and 8.1 combined.
mreiland 11y ago
They're trying to make Windows a platform instead of a cash cow. They've finally realized they have the advantage and google will never beat them unless they wait too long.
frevd 11y ago
WindOwS X Snowelephant then Mountainelephant. There will most certainly be some kind of internal sub versioning for the kernel part. Let's see which animals they will take for that, cats are already taken by OS X.
cm2187 11y ago
How will they enforce it? Will your laptop become a brick if you stop paying?
- anon4 11y ago
  Like WinRAR
csense 11y ago
My guess is they'll lock licenses to a hardware fingerprint numbers in some way (as they already do), so a new machine or radical hardware upgrades would require a new license [1]. OEM's would likely get bulk discounts on licenses and be able to pre-install the license themselves. Basically they'd be betting the Windows franchise on enough people upgrading their hardware every year that fees from upgraders' new licenses could support all the free riders who didn't upgrade that year. [1] Arguably the first sale doctrine means that this might not be a restriction Microsoft can impose at the legal layer. But they'd certainly to get around any such restriction by trying to implement it at the technology layer with DRM -- refusing to provide any supported way to move their license from one machine to another. Of course any technological restriction will always boil down to a conditional jump instruction that can be patched out, which leads to a kind of "arms race" between the pirates and the DRM. Recently there was an HN article about a (rather old) piece of software which contained multiple piracy checks to sabotage the long-term user experience of pirated versions in a way that wouldn't be immediately obvious (so users would be punished for using illegal versions, but the long-term checks would be subtle enough to slip past crackers' QA and they'd likely ship partially cracked versions that didn't patch all the checks that needed to be patched). Including deliberately deleting user data after prolonged use: http://starmen.net/mother2/gameinfo/antipiracy/ http://starmen.net/mother2/gameinfo/antipiracy/

giaour 11y ago

Microsoft has already softened their pricing strategy by offering Windows for free on small tablets and by not charging for the upgrades from Windows 8 to 8.1 or to 10. Perhaps they don't see Windows as the cash cow that it once was and will make all upgrades free.

Karunamon 11y ago
It wouldn't surprise me to see them make the base OS for home users free, and then only charge for enterprise specific features. Think of 7 Home Premium as free, and Ultimate/Enterprise now the paid versions.
dordoka 11y ago
Actually, they even include Windows 7, not only 8 or 8.1 [0]. I guess that "for the first year" will probably be extended as well... Edit: if this [1] reuters article is true (I couldn't find a reference on Microsoft's site), they are also including pirated versions... [0] http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/about http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/about [1] http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/18/us-microsoft-china-idUSKBN0ME06A20150318 http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/03/18/us-microsoft-china...
- bad_user 11y ago
  This is because 8 and 8.1 are a downgrade compared to 7 and weren't received well. Consider that Windows XP has a bigger market share than 8 and 8.1 combined.

mreiland 11y ago

They're trying to make Windows a platform instead of a cash cow. They've finally realized they have the advantage and google will never beat them unless they wait too long.

frevd 11y ago

WindOwS X Snowelephant then Mountainelephant. There will most certainly be some kind of internal sub versioning for the kernel part. Let's see which animals they will take for that, cats are already taken by OS X.

cm2187 11y ago

How will they enforce it? Will your laptop become a brick if you stop paying?

anon4 11y ago
Like WinRAR

csense 11y ago

My guess is they'll lock licenses to a hardware fingerprint numbers in some way (as they already do), so a new machine or radical hardware upgrades would require a new license [1]. OEM's would likely get bulk discounts on licenses and be able to pre-install the license themselves. Basically they'd be betting the Windows franchise on enough people upgrading their hardware every year that fees from upgraders' new licenses could support all the free riders who didn't upgrade that year. [1] Arguably the first sale doctrine means that this might not be a restriction Microsoft can impose at the legal layer. But they'd certainly to get around any such restriction by trying to implement it at the technology layer with DRM -- refusing to provide any supported way to move their license from one machine to another. Of course any technological restriction will always boil down to a conditional jump instruction that can be patched out, which leads to a kind of "arms race" between the pirates and the DRM. Recently there was an HN article about a (rather old) piece of software which contained multiple piracy checks to sabotage the long-term user experience of pirated versions in a way that wouldn't be immediately obvious (so users would be punished for using illegal versions, but the long-term checks would be subtle enough to slip past crackers' QA and they'd likely ship partially cracked versions that didn't patch all the checks that needed to be patched). Including deliberately deleting user data after prolonged use: http://starmen.net/mother2/gameinfo/antipiracy/ http://starmen.net/mother2/gameinfo/antipiracy/