Win10 upgrade and a retail purchase of Win10 Pro- not the same.

Mystere said:

There already is. When you enter a new retail windows 10 key, and activate, the hardware hash is sent to Microsoft's servers, and you can then re-activate your new full retail copy without having to re-enter it on subsequent reinstalls.

But...I don't understand...how can license misuse be so problematic then?? Are MS really that useless on enforcement??

Edit: I mean, if they can't be bothered to enforce then why bother with the EULA at all? It just doesn't make sense...

WhyMe said:

But...I don't understand...how can license misuse be so problematic then?? Are MS really that useless on enforcement??

Edit: I mean, if they can't be bothered to enforce then why bother with the EULA at all? It just doesn't make sense...

Licenses are legal documents. Suppose they find a major corporation that is pirating their software. If they stand to make millions off of suing them, they will have the license to fall back on.

Activation is one of those "keeping honest people honest" things. It's there to make it annoying enough that most people will just do the right thing, rather than waste a lot of effort on doing the wrong thing. It's in lieu of enforcement.

Tell me, how many individual people get sued over pirating a personal copy of Photoshop? I've never heard of any.

Again, this is not advocating it, not by any means. I'm just explaining why there is a license, and why most people get away with it if they choose to violate it, and why such a license is not futile.

A license is the equivalent of a "No Trespassing" sign. You might cut through a yard with a no-trespassing sign every day of your life, but if someone starts throwing a party on the property, you can bet the cops will get called.

WhyMe said:

But...I don't understand...how can license misuse be so problematic then?? Are MS really that useless on enforcement??

Edit: I mean, if they can't be bothered to enforce then why bother with the EULA at all? It just doesn't make sense...

The same retail license is activated on ten different machines in one month. It is perfectly legal for a person to do that so long as they uninstall it from the previous machine first. How is Microsoft going to prove that the user didn't uninstall it from the previous machine before installing it on the next? And don't forget, the American legal system is likely different than yours. Convictions in our legal system are based upon the presentation of lawfully obtained physical evidence.

NavyLCDR said:

The same retail license is activated on ten different machines in one month. It is perfectly legal for a person to do that so long as they uninstall it from the previous machine first. How is Microsoft going to prove that the user didn't uninstall it from the previous machine before installing it on the next? And don't forget, the American legal system is likely different than yours. Convictions in our legal system are based upon the presentation of lawfully obtained physical evidence.

See earlier posts above. Because the checksum on the license key would identify the misuse. It is up to MS whether they choose to enforce or not. I'm guessing the reason they do not, is no doubt because enforcement against each individual home user would be financially restrictive. Still makes a mockery of the whole EULA. They may as well do away with it completely for retail home users and just hammer the corporates. Then their servers wouldn't currently be so overwhelmed, with countless folks worldwide unable to activate for possibly many more weeks.

WhyMe said:

See earlier posts above. Because the checksum on the license key would identify the misuse.

But, again.....it is not a matter of Microsoft proving the same key was activated on 10 different computers. Because that is legal to do. It is a matter of Microsoft proving that it was not uninstalled on previous computers first.

NavyLCDR said:

But, again.....it is not a matter of Microsoft proving the same key was activated on 10 different computers. Because that is legal to do. It is a matter of Microsoft proving that it was not uninstalled on previous computers first.

That's what I'm saying. If a retail EULA is totally unenforceable then it may as well be done away with for retail licenses. It becomes redundant. It serves no purpose. The only people who lose out on the whole thing as it stands, are MS and their honest customers.

It would be like bringing in prohibition for alcohol and tobacco. The only people who would lose out in that scenario are honest people who happen to enjoy a drink and a smoke. The only people who would gain are those that run their operations outside the law. Again the whole thing would be and has historically been unenforceable and is the reason why prohibition, regardless of the health impacts, does not exist.

WhyMe said:

That's what I'm saying. If a retail EULA is totally unenforceable then it may as well be done away with for retail licenses. It becomes redundant. It serves no purpose. The only people who lose out on the whole thing as it stands, are MS and their honest customers.

It would be like bringing in prohibition for alcohol and tobacco. The only people who would lose out in that scenario are honest people who happen to enjoy a drink and a smoke. The only people who would gain are those that run their operations outside the law. Again the whole thing would be and has historically been unenforceable and is the reason why prohibition, regardless of the health impacts, does not exist.

Corporations are still the largest purchaser of consumer licenses. Most PC's come with a standard consumer EULA, even those sold to corporations. Only large corporations tend to use site-licensed corporate editions. I've worked in companies with 500-1000 users who still rely on standard consumer OEM licensing.

The part you aren't quite getting is that you don't really understand what a license is. If there is no license, then a user has no rights to copy or use the software. This is the default behavior of copyright. A license gives a specific user the right to do things that are otherwise illegal for them to do (use the software, copy it under specific conditions, etc..), so a license must always exist or legally people would not be able to use it.

Mystere said:

The part you aren't quite getting is that you don't really understand what a license is.

I can assure that I do. Please see this thread that I began a couple of days ago regarding licensing as evidence of my total awareness of the applicable legalities.

Mystere said:

If there is no license, then a user has no rights to copy or use the software. This is the default behavior of copyright. A license gives a specific user the right to do things that are otherwise illegal for them to do (use the software, copy it under specific conditions, etc..), so a license must always exist or legally people would not be able to use it.

You misunderstand me. I'm just saying there is no point having a retail license version available to purchase if no-one is going to enforce it and prevent the unlawful use of the software. If Microsoft don't enforce retail licenses then they may as well only sell OEM and corporate licenses. Or just go open source lol...

imho

Mystere said:

So, when you install clean on a new PC, there is no way to get the OLD OS KEY sent to the activation servers, because your old OS no longer exists on the machine. All you have is the generic key, and there is no way to map it back to your original OS>

It is very easy. They can store whatever they want along with your hardware id (the key you upgraded with).

NavyLCDR said:

The same retail license is activated on ten different machines in one month. It is perfectly legal for a person to do that so long as they uninstall it from the previous machine first. How is Microsoft going to prove that the user didn't uninstall it from the previous machine before installing it on the next?

They don't have to prove anything. They just have to invalidate the previous machine you installed it on. So when that machine talks to the activation server next time, it will no longer get status as activated.