Rent Your Own Computer!

[jackofallgeeks]

Microsoft seems to want us to rent
our PCs, rather than actually owning them. I have nothing useful to say at
this moment.

Comments

[quix.livejournal.com]

Hmmm... handled appropiately I can see the idea of *leasing* a computer not being the worst thing. However, once big corporations self-interests and government over-regulations got done with it, I imagine it'd be pretty worthless.

[jackofallgeeks.livejournal.com]

But they aren't talking about leasing at all. They really are talking about renting, like Blockbuster or the paddle-boat guy at the beach. You pay them money for limited time use, and then give it back. From the article:

"Charging for the various bundles may be by bundle and by duration. For example, the office bundle may be $1.00 per hour, the gaming bundle may be $1.25 per hour and the browsing bundle may be $0.80 per hour. The usage charges may be abstracted to 'units/hour' to make currency conversions simpler. Alternatively, a bundle may incur a one-time charge that is operable until changed or for a fixed-usage period."

What's more, they seem to be talking about handing you a device that's capable of doing everything, but only allowing certain functionality (for a certain amount of time) based on what you pay. So the machine may have four cores and bleeding-edge graphix, but you won't know it if you're just using the office 'bundle.' And yeah, they talk about scaled pricing, so you only pay for what you use, but this means that they have very low level control of the hardware, in real time, and that bothers me.

[quix.livejournal.com]

*nods* Sorry, I guess in essence I was de-railing your post. I saw that they weren't talking about leasing, but your post made me think about leasing computers which was where my mind went.

I agree the concept for what they're proposing is awful. Even though it is essentially what we are doing with our cellphones.

[jackofallgeeks.livejournal.com]

Actually, not to be contrary (:p), I don't think it is the same as what we do with cellphones either. I buy a cellphone and the carrier knocks off a bunch of the price if I sign a service agreement with them. I pay a monthly fee to connect to their network and use their voice- and data-routing services, but I'm not paying to use the *phone* as such. I can take pictures and save contacts and the like to my heart's content without them. And when my contract ends, the phone and everything in it is still mine, whether I renew my service contract or not. This would be like if Verizon was selling computers along with it's FIOS as a package deal.

What Microsoft seems to be proposing is really a lot more like paddle boats. It doesn't cost you anything unless you want to use it, and then when you do you start the timer and begin racking up charges. when they talk about "gaming packages" and "browsing packages" and "office packages," that means you can't so much as write a word document without paying them money. This isn't even like Internet access or cellphone service, where you pay a fee and get unlimited* service for the month; it's like a taxi, where you're paying for as much as you use it.

[uhlrik.livejournal.com]

I think it's absurd, and I don't want to start ranting so I'll leave it at that.

[jackofallgeeks.livejournal.com]

Today's so dull I've been counting the pores on the back of my hand to kill time (I got up to 127, but lost track and had to start over at -1). I'd LOVE if you ranted a little bit...

[uhlrik.livejournal.com]

You started at -1? How does one have negative pores?

[jackofallgeeks.livejournal.com]

I'm... not exactly sure...

[uhlrik.livejournal.com]

Oh, darn.

Here's another happy: Someone else that has o idea how he did what he did.