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Microsoft's Suing Over Diverted Student Software... Even As It's Encouraged Similar Diversions

from the how-about-that dept

Thu, Apr 5th 2007 2:41pm — Mike Masnick

There's been a lot of press coverage the past couple of days about Microsoft filing lawsuits and sending cease-and-desist letters over specially priced software for students being diverted to retailers. By itself, the story isn't all that interesting, but it did remind me of stories from the past few years that have suggested that Microsoft has either turned a blind eye to non-students buying student-priced software or actively trying to court non-students with the academic discounts. At the time, it seemed like Microsoft recognized that for many people, the alternative to not getting the student discount would be to either get a totally unauthorized version or move on to another platform. However, like so many other things, perhaps Microsoft's views keep changing as it grows older.

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16 Comments

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Techie Chick, 5 Apr 2007 @ 3:47pm

Still isn't cheap enough!
Who is Microsoft kidding? Starving college students who have a brain about them use OpenOffice, Abiword, Jarte, etc. Face it, you have $100-$150 extra bucks.. what are you going to buy? MS Office for students or food, clothes, etc!?
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Jazzmyn, 5 Apr 2007 @ 3:53pm

Greedy
Greedy sons of bitches.
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Apennismightier, 5 Apr 2007 @ 3:57pm

Idiots. College give it out free
If you go to any decent school, they give you Microsoft Office for free. You just have to accept it. And if not, there's always that one guy who knows a lot about computers in the dorms/frat houses. Pirated copies get around just fine in colleges if you don't want to use the labs.
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USC college student, 5 Apr 2007 @ 4:45pm

Re: Still isn't cheap enough!
While yes, there are college students who are starving, not ALL college students are starving college students. If that were the case, you would see much more :30min infomercials on college students rather than father-less African babies and Ethiopians.

College students should be referred by as "creative" or even "innovative", not "helpless" or even "starving".
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tommy trojan, 5 Apr 2007 @ 5:04pm

trojans
fight on!
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antiver, 5 Apr 2007 @ 5:06pm

student software is very cheap.
I bought XP Pro sp2 for something like $16 USD and the bloated version of MS office for about $7 USD off my campus. If that's not cheap enough, damn. Although I do complement it with AbiWord, OpenOffice and linux.
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LKS2007, 5 Apr 2007 @ 5:54pm

Re: Re: Still isn't cheap enough!
I agree!
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lks2007, 5 Apr 2007 @ 5:57pm

Re: Re: Still isn't cheap enough!
I agree with the comment comparing college students to infomercials.
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Walking Dude, 5 Apr 2007 @ 6:00pm

This is about greedy resellers
This article is about wholesalers getting the student copies and then re-selling them to Internet retailers. This isn't about M$ turning a blind eye to the whole student discount thing. I think the summary mis-represented the actual article.
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Sean, 5 Apr 2007 @ 6:09pm

Straight From The Horse's Mouth
Having worked at a retail store that had Microsoft reps come in, I can tell you that I have actually had at least one of those reps encourage me to sell the academic version of MS Office to anyone willing to buy! Kind of strange to me that company policy seems to be changing now.
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boomhauer (profile), 5 Apr 2007 @ 6:27pm

agreegree
I agree with the agreeability
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Horkenforffer, 5 Apr 2007 @ 7:33pm

Re: agreegree
I am afirming your agreeance.
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Anonymous Coward, 5 Apr 2007 @ 8:14pm

This is just proof that Microsoft makes plenty of money off of the Academic versions, and just gouges out of monopoly on the full retail. Justice department should hit them up again. Id really like to see MS get broken up
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Fat Grad, 5 Apr 2007 @ 8:24pm

I was a starving college student who was actually skinny.. until I graduated and started making good money!!!!
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DictionaryMuch?, 5 Apr 2007 @ 8:59pm

Re:
"...just gouges out of monopoly on the full retail." You can't call it 'monopoly' in the same comment section that names at least three alternatives to the product. obviously there is some sort of competetive product.
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Joe, 5 Apr 2007 @ 9:11pm

Re: student software is very cheap.
There are two possible reasons why it's so cheap:

1.) MS sells it to the colleges cheap, in order to help discourage piracy, and for brand recognition (to build up consumer loyalty or whatever it's called, so the students will continue to buy MS products after they graduate).

2.) Most or all of the cost of the software is included in your tuition costs
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