The Register: How Microsoft drove me to Linux

“It was XP product activation that broke the camel’s
back. I’d put up with steadily deteriorating software and my
steadily deteriorating control over it, all right; but the idea
that I should have to buy a separate copy of their rubbish OS for
each machine I have made me want to vomit.

I can understand MS cashing in on businesses that use their
software to earn a profit. Fair enough. But to tell me that if I
buy their software for my home I don’t actually own it, and have to
pay the Demigod Gates tithe for each installation, well, that’s
just going a bit too far.

It’s the XP ‘product activation’ slavery agreement that drove
me, finally, to Linux. And fortunately, a lot of the newer Linux
distros now install nicely on any x86 machine. I’ve been able to
install it successfully and then refer to the documentation to
tweak it properly, just as I used to do with Microsoft’s products
before the cheap bastards shrank their documentation to a mere
glossy advertisement brochure.”

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