Microsoft Offers Free Copy of Windows Vista Ultimate if you Surrender Privacy *UPDATE*

Damn me! Procrastination got the best of me once again. I saw this offer earlier, but I decided to wait to sign up. Hours later, the offer is gone -.- I hate myself.

 

I guess MS wised up and figured out the the only people willing to sign for the free gift were the ones smart enough to defeat or avoid the data collection strategy. Sorry I didn't get on board yesterday with an old dog of a laptop with a PCMCIA WiFi card.

 

WTF! I guess I'll be uninstalling this **** then if I'm not going to be compensated for my "effort".

 

Well, it did say, "while supplies last", so I just thought they reached the maximum.

 

I think (hope) if you have already picked your gift and signed up then you will get it.

Otherwise, if you try to sign up and not presented with the free gift option, don't download and install the software.

 

I tried it earlier today (4PM EST) and it gave the option of a gift.........hmm

 

I see no one doing this without the free gift, I sure am not. I registered yesterday, but unforunately didn't download the program at that time.

 

So now it's just "Microsoft wants your Privacy. Period."

=P

 

Forget that...bad Microsoft.

Yet again, angering the customers.

 

Well, it was while supplies last, so...

 

So if my local bakery puts up a sign and says

"Free sticky buns to the first hundred customers"

and gives away a hundred sticky buns, is that a bad move because it's going to anger the customers? Or was it a good move becuase it made 100 customers happy?

For a few days there was a promotion that said "Sign up for our survey and receive a free gift". Now there's a sign that says "Sign up for our survey...please". I don't see how anyone got a raw deal out of that. I doubt I'd have signed up if there was no freebie on offer but I suppose a few people might out of curiosity.

Heck, for all we know they've already had 10,000 people sign up and they don't really need any more...

 

Today's update is hilarious...thanks Andrew!

 

I signed up far enough yesterday to get an email w/ link... but only finished up today. I forget if I chose Vista during the initial signup... doh!

When did it provide the drop down box to choose the product?!?!

 

i'm assuming up until they closed down at 2pm.

 

Does anyone who got the offer in yesterday remember if the time to select the product was when you first signed up or after you got the email??

 

I agree. Microsoft is definitely not doing themselves any favors. Most people will need an incentive - especially when we are talking about Microsoft

 

I signed yesterday also and asked them immediately when they would ship free product but I got out of office reply instead. So I guess no Ultimate for me.

 

I didn't think so! I don't want them to monitor me!

 

I was thinkin to get a vista for my macbook.

I filled the survey but nothin to get vista. I read the article again and found it was over..

It was free 24hrs ago. Now I don't wanna pay for it.

I never thought this way but maybe better to get a pirate?

 

Precisely what I was thinking. This attempt by Microsoft was to monitor piracy efforts? Wouldn't someone that pirated software just pirate Ultimate instead of doing this? I'm not trying to advocate piracy, but I laughed when I originally read this...

 

well i believe i was the last last person to get in on the promotion, signed up around 1:45 got the confirmation email at 2:04 definitely remember selecting Windows Vista Ultimate..
and for my privacy? I installed their app on my media center.. which only has holiday photos on (videos are on my other media center)

 

Is anyone knowledgeable enough to see what is in the logs? The folder has file extensions I've never seen before: .loge and .eve.tmp. The data is in C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\WFP.

 

Well, considering that Microsoft ALREADY monitors your computer for illegal things (pirated software, illegal downloads, etc--as well as the feds from the open areas of your software), and at any time can take a look at the material on your hard drive, this "offer" they made is laughablely moot......there wouldn't be a snowballs' chance that I would EVER trust this company with my information, let alone look at what was going on with my computer.......

 

Uh, yeah...I'm sure the federal government regularly peaks into my computer. Yeah...right. Same with Microsoft...sure.

 

Strange...when I signed up, it told me that I had to select both options in order to recieve my free gift but I dont remember being given the option to choose my free software. Whats going on?

 

I'm not sure if anyone mentioned this, but can't you just put whatever software on a virtual machine and run it in there? It's even easier than putting it on an old computer!

 

My response to the update: get OpenBSD if you care about privacy, not Vista!
Greg, Patriot Act gives them that right. But I'm sure that they don't look into anyone's computer without some reason.

 

So how do you know if you will get anything then? I don't see any way to verify.

 

If you remeber selecting an item, id say there probably is a 75% chance of getting something, if you don't.. might as well just wait and see.

*rembers selecting windows vista, but is doubtful of ever getting it*

 

I did select a product. Last night I had a windows popup that said "your windows is genuine" in the taskbar! that was the first time I have ever seen that so this software definitely checks WGA beyond the norm.

 

I wonder, is there a way to find out your current status in the program?
I wasn't on this pc for nearly a week (let alone online), and I don't want to be disqualified. Do they inform you if you are disqualified?

 

i just got my copy of windows vista ultimate =]

 

holy s***! i thought you had to wait 3 months for them to verify?

 

also, have you answered any surveys? I haven't received any.

 

received 0 surveys. Got my copy of office half a week ago.

 

did they like, send it via mail or something ?

 

Probably via email.

 

I hope they don't send it by email, Gmail blocks executable attachments!

=]

 

they sent two vista ultimate dvds to me in the mail along with two product keys.
i answered one survey in 3 months....haha

 

Nice...I came in just under the wire, or so I am thinking. Wonder if I signed up too late...did take one survey, though.

TheCynical1

 

Yeah, silly me I must've entered your address. So one of those is actually mine. Message me for my correct address

 

couldn't have been
btw...one's 32-bit and one's 64-bit.
hopefully you'll get yours soon

 

anyone else get their copies ?

 

I haven't received mine yet. I'm wondering if the ones who already have signed up for the program several months ago rather than in early December?

 

I checked my taskmanager and the wfp program is still running but how do I know if it's still sending information? And more over how can I see if i wrote the right address when registering? I'm getting nervous.

 

it's still sending info when it's running as far as i know. for me it was easy since my firewall program would ask if i wanted to allow the program to access the internet everytime i turned on the computer.
i didn't expect the cds in the mail, they just appeared one day.

 

I have yet to see a survey and I started using it just before the cutoff. I have noticed I am getting specific advertisement to what I have done on the internet (like laptops and bags), even at e-mail addresses that are not used for general public.

 

i've had this thing on another machine since early december, about 15 min a day web browsing and the rest of the time its chugging away at 100 cpu load on the SETI project.

i haven't got one email survey though. i hope i will get my free software in late feb or sometime in march. if i don't get it by the end of april (that'll be 4 months with this feedback program) i will kill the machine.

 

I recieved an email reply from Microsoft because I wasn't recieving any surveys too.

And no worries about the lack of surveys, we simply didn’t have a need to send any out in the past month.

So no worries.

 

Anyone have a link to the software download?

I reformatted the rig this was on, but I can't find the link to redownload the software again.... I signed up when the free software offer was still valid and had it running since.