Originally posted by garegin
View Post
Yes, hackers will most probably crack the new model, too, but one thing is "double click an exe and you're done", and another one is "solder stuff to your dvd drive to hack its firmware, and hope that MS doesn't remotely blacklist you" (see Microsoft's gaming consoles). I'm not saying that this is happening now (secure boot CAN be disabled for now, after all), but the direction we're heading is clear. Moreover, starting with Windows 8 they're (optionally for now) binding your Windows login to your Microsoft Live account - if I were a pirate, I wouldn't want to get caught by Microsoft cracking Windows when they know everything about me.
Normally, I'm happy when MS strengthens its copy protection schemes. I'll bet a lot of people in the "software is a tool" camp are actually pirates: I wouldn't otherwise understand how they shun, say, the Gimp for Adobe Photoshop, when the latter costs $700; is there somebody who actually spends that much to remove the red eyes from his holiday photos? So, having them actually pay for the software they use might make those people reconsider the actual value of "free" software.
However, binding MS' software to everybody's hardware has the unfortunate side effect of subtly forcing people NOT to use free software. Or non-MS software in general. Which is the aspect of "secure" boot that I find unacceptable.
Comment