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FYI, Bill Gates has explicitly stated he prefers pirated MS Windows use to unencumbered Linux converts:

"[A]s long as they're going to steal it, we want them to steal ours. They'll get sort of addicted, and then we'll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade."

https://web.archive.org/web/20060411095315/https://www.latim...



I don't see what point you're trying to make? Microsoft continues to protect all their commercial products with DRM. They clearly see value in doing that.


Not exactly. They've basically accepted that a huge portion of the world will never pay for Windows: https://time.com/3749434/microsoft-windows-10-pirates-free/


That the hypothetical case of OS piracy was false, explicitly acknowledged by the creator of the OS in question.

Microsoft's DRM on their own software is quite intentionally weak. Enforcement via audits (through its proxy arm, the BSA, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSA_(The_Software_Alliance)), has been the preferred method.


I hope you realize that "more" vs "less" DRM, is not the same as DRM vs no-DRM. In any case, I don't see anything I can respond to.. so.. thanks for the comment.


Again: not the point I'm addressing.


That's probably why they don't put up much fuss anymore if you never register windows 10.


That and it has ads.




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