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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Steel_Wind" data-source="post: 3308716" data-attributes="member: 20741">Maybe.  Apple isn't exactly a non-DRM company. iTunes is all about DRM.Mind you, you don't see an iPod refusing to play an mp3 or downgrading its quality.So yeah - I'll admit Apple might be able to do it. I'm with ya. I do not think that Microsoft will let this happen though. They are counting on inertia, Monopoly, games and pre-installation of the Vista OS to carry the day.The problem is.... I think Microsoft has made a fundamental error. They have maintained a near Monopoly in the OS business for one simple reason: the vast majority of people see the competition as an overall inferior good.  They will pirate MS products as opposed to something else if price is a factor, such that in the end (when price is eliminated from the decision tree) - it's all about desirability of features and compatibility - not price.This simple law of rational economic choice in a market when piracy is a very significant element in the market means monopolies are inevitable.Operating systems and application software favors monopolies because of piracy.  When you cannot complete with price, you can only compete with features. And that really has not been possible to do against  Microsoft over the long haul.Corel found that out with Wordperfect. You can give it away with motherboards for free. People are still going to perceive it as an inferior good and not install it.But all of this DRM stuff changes that perception in a flash, and that's why it is a mistake. It will make Vista appear to be the inferior good among a large number of consumers.  And should that happen, the rational economic choices that have made Bill Gates the richest man in the world will threaten to bite MS on the ass.  It will breathe life into something that has not existed for MS in 15 years: real competition that people are prepared to pay for.Microsoft will blink before they let that happen; I have little doubt that for now - they think it probably won't happen. I think they are wrong. When Ars Technica refers to Vista as an "upgrade" in derisive quotation marks = you know all you need to know about how this is going to shake down amongst tech savvy users over the nest year. If the Linux advocates are against you - it is irrelevant. If the broad stream of tech geeks are against you - it will be another matter entirely.</blockquote>

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