A vote for fair play

THE ELECTIONS ARE over, but it's not too late to register -- at least not to register your gripes about registerware.

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My recent columns about product activation and other types of forced registration struck a nerve with many readers(see " Since you asked ... "). Overwhelmingly, they wanted "Company X" -- the unnamed software company that asked me how to get customers to accept its product activation plans -- to understand that they aren't going to take this anymore.

"As a designer and programmer with over 10,000 hours invested in an integrated knowledge management system, I can certainly appreciate someone paying for its proper use," one reader wrote. "But to tell the truth, I am more afraid of one of the big boys ripping me off than any of my customers or their employees. I'm sick of corporate giants calling us thieves, the very customers who have made them fabulously wealthy."

What many readers found most galling about registerware schemes was the pretense that it's done purely for anti-piracy purposes. "Whether I like activation or not, I am insulted when the software companies aren't honest about their reason for implementing activation," another reader wrote. "Just like politicians, there is no incentive for them to be forthcoming with an honest explanation. They assume that we will blindly keep buying their products, and for the most part we will, because there is limited choice."

Examples such as the Casio PDA that required customers to give their age to keep the device from being disabled, or the QuickBooks customers who were told they must pay a fee to re-register their old versions of the program, confirmed readers' beliefs about the real motivations behind registerware. "Never have I seen such blatant disregard for the customer, or such a belligerent and indifferent attitude by software vendors," another reader wrote. "I agree we should be outraged at any vendor that will disable a person's system or device, or otherwise cripple installed applications, or make irreversible changes of any type, regardless of the reason. It is a violation of our basic rights being masked under the guise of enforcing legitimate software ownership. Things like product activation, Palladium and Palladium-savvy applications, .Net, and smart chips being pushed by the [entertainment industry] scare my privacy rights to death. To paraphrase an old saying, The only way you can take away my Win 98/Me OSes is to pry them out of my cold, dead hands.

Although the nastiest registerware practices currently belong to others, much of the readers' anger was nonetheless focused on Microsoft. Many reported XP product activation problems they've already encountered, such as a temporarily relocated reader who couldn't get Office XP without jumping through reactivation hoops for several weeks. "When I complained to the [Microsoft] guy I talked to, he said simply moving the computer has caused some folks to have to call in to reactivate," the reader wrote. "The activation process punishes the honest, it doesn't keep the honest customer honest. I know there are far more folks using Microsoft's OS and Office illegally, via Internet downloads, than they would ever lose from someone wanting to install the OS or Office on two computers that they have at home."

So what can be done about registerware? Numerous readers offered a solution they learned while dealing with the Internet: Provide bogus information on the registration forms. That may help preserve what little remains of your privacy, but it doesn't address the bigger issues of the software vendor controlling your use of the product. And it might backfire on you at a later date when the phony information could be used as an excuse to deny you reactivation.

With DRM (digital rights management) technology spreading to all types of products, some readers think that it's just a matter of time until the vendors go too far with their registerware schemes. "I agree with you that the consumers will be ripped off more and more if we let this type of behavior go unpunished," wrote a reader who works in the public safety arena. "We have already made the decision to stay at Win2K and to investigate using Linux or any other solution available where possible. Can you imagine an EMS unit arriving at a scene and their defibulator has been deactivated because it wasn't registered, or a police officer's weapon fails to operate because the registration was incorrect on his or her electronic gun lock? I guess we will have to wait for someone to sue these vendors just like they sue car manufacturers and tobacco companies."

Others feel we must persuade our political leaders to draw the line. "I refuse to upgrade to Windows XP and Office XP because I feel that the product activation procedures are unreasonable," another reader wrote. "But what can we as consumers do to get our lawmakers to protect us from the slippery corporate giants? We should not be required to provide any marketing info to a company [to which] we've paid for a product. Many of these companies profile consumers, sell consumer information to other companies [that] might benefit financially from aggressive -- and annoying -- targeting of these people by telemarketers, etc. I know that our government encourages free trade and does not like to intervene and impose rules on free markets, but they also have a responsibility to its citizens at large, namely you and me."

OK, but I'm not going to hold my breath. I think the best answer is to be heard echoing through the comments of all these readers: Don't buy this stuff. If nothing else, hold on to the blessedly registerware-free software you've got, because it's looking more valuable all the time. It's neither too late to register your gripes, nor is it too late to vote with your feet.