2004-09-30 - 5:16 p.m.

a warning to Windows XP users

If I ever become a communist, I will look back on last night at about 11:30 p.m. as the defining moment.

It was just a coincidence, right? I did the political compass thing, published the entry, and then...

What did I do? Please forgive me for whatever I did! Someone sent me a music (.wma) file over MSN to listen to. I double click on the file to open it, but it doesn't work, and my browser rudely pops up and takes me to this page which tells me that I must migrate some licence from the computer the music was sent with or else I face "civil and criminal prosecution". Exqueese me?

I try opening the file with Real Player. Same result. Winamp. Same again. Jukebox. Ditto. What's going on? Then it made sense.

It was the first time I had tried to use Windows Media Player since the Automatic Updates feature that I had on my computer had downloaded and installed its latet package of updates to Windows XP, which included Windows Media Player v9.0. A quick Google search confirmed the worst.

Not content with being our legislators and judiciary, multinational corporations, led by Microsoft, have now become our law enforcement agencies and correctional institutions as well. The new Windows Media Player v9.0 gives the power to block me from using my own files on my own computer to whichever company its software coders think owns the right to control what I do by myself in private at their sole discretion, as this article explains.

Stalin could never have dreamt of having such invasive powers over the lives of individuals. Surely this is illegal? Apparently not. How on earth could this be so? This article kindly informs me that when I click on the "Accept" and "Next" buttons when Microsoft decides to interrupt whatever I am doing to mess with my computer and won't let me get back to my life until I agree with its pages of legal jargon, they are in effect saying, as this article puts it, that "you can't have the fix (to the bugs in Windows XP, which is the whole point of having Automatic Updates) unless you give the company the right to control the software you use on your computer".

So no longer does Microsoft merely threaten me with prosecution, and then physically prevent me from using my own files on my own computer, but it now does so with my full legal "consent". But wait, it gets worse, if that is possible. There seems to be no way to uninstall these updates or revert to previous versions of WMP. Again, nothing I can legally or practically do about it.

The solution? If you have Windows XP and have Automatic Updates on, and want to continue using your computer on your terms, you might consider turning Automatic Updates off.

As surely as Bill Gates lives, the advent of national right governments draws ever nearer with every spirit that is broken.

previous entry - following entry

gewerq.diaryland.com - an online diary. All original content © gewerq 2003-2005. All rights reserved.