Microsoft to appeal ruling in favor of reselling perpetual Windows licenses — UK Competition Court says fineprint holds no ground as judges throw out company’s

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Microsoft to appeal ruling in favor of reselling perpetual Windows licenses — UK Competition Court says fineprint holds no ground as judges throw out company's

Hassam Nasir Social Links Navigation Contributing Writer Hassam Nasir is a die-hard hardware enthusiast with years of experience as a tech editor and writer, focusing on detailed CPU comparisons and general hardware news. When he’s not working, you’ll find him bending tubes for his ever-evolving custom water-loop gaming rig or benchmarking the latest CPUs and GPUs just for fun.

Dr3ams Here in Germany… …the Federal Court of Justice (BGH) ruling: A 2000 ruling confirmed that copyright cannot be used to prevent the resale of a used OEM (or otherwise) copy of software. The ruling established the "exhaustion principle" for copyright. This means that once a copy of the software is sold and its copyright is exhausted, it can be resold, even without the original hardware. Microsft is going to lose this case in the UK. Reply

LordVile So basically resold OEM keys are legal? Maybe if they didn’t charge £220 for the full version of windows and £120 for a half baked version, both of which they still mine data on AND serve ads on, more people would purchase it legitimately. Should be illegal for a product you pay for to feature baked in ads. If anything they should sell the current version as windows standard with ads for £50 and sell the Pro version for 120 with ads removed and the option to disable telemetry properly. Reply

Armbrust11 Dr3ams said: Here in Germany… Microsft is going to lose this case in the UK. Yeah Copyright prohibits making unauthorized copies. It does not prohibit original purchases from being sold when no longer needed. The license idea was always flimsy when software was a physical product (disc in a box). Now that everything is digital we need our rights reinforced. Additionally, there's an argument to be made that only source code and UI elements can be copyrighted. Compiled code or works from generative ai lack human authorship. Reply

USAFRet The problem is not so much me selling my no longer used OEM license. That is an easy 1 for 1 deal. Rather, it is some guy selling 1,000 of them for $10 each. How were these obtained? Reply

Dr3ams USAFRet said: How were these obtained? Computer leasing companies are one huge source of unused OEM licenses. Back in the late 90s and early 2000s I worked for one of the largest ones in Europe. When leasing contracts closed we would get back thousands of PCs and laptops along with an equal amount of unused OEM licenses. After the year 2000 we started selling those licenses to schools and resellers. Reply

USAFRet Dr3ams said: Computer leasing companies are one huge source of unused OEM licenses. Back in the late 90s and early 2000s I worked for one of the largest ones in Europe. When leasing contracts closed we would get back thousands of PCs and laptops along with an equal amount of unused OEM licenses. After the year 2000 we started selling those licenses to schools and resellers. And what happened to the hardware, now with no license? Reply

vanadiel007 I always found it "interesting" you can buy an OEM version from one of those online places for a fraction of the retail price. OEM implies Original Equipment Manufacturer, and I always wondered how you could resell those licenses in the retail market, considering they are OEM. Reply

palladin9479 LordVile said: So basically resold OEM keys are legal? In Europe, they have always been legal in Asia. I'm hoping this spreads, stopping companies from selling products with a built in expiration date. Reply

palladin9479 vanadiel007 said: I always found it "interesting" you can buy an OEM version from one of those online places for a fraction of the retail price. OEM implies Original Equipment Manufacturer, and I always wondered how you could resell those licenses in the retail market, considering they are OEM. Different countries have different laws. Most OEM PCs are made by subcontractors in Asia, those subcontractors buy OEM keys from MS in 10,000 unit SKUs. Unused keys are later resold and this is legal in those countries. The only way MS could stop it would be to convince the US Government to send over a carrier battle group and make those countries the 51st, 52nd and 53rd State. This is one of the reasons, along with spying, MS is pushing for forced Secure Boot + MS Account registration. They have very little hope in convincing the US to enforce US law on countries in Asia where resellers are at, the most prolific of which also happens to have nuclear weapons and is has an antagonistic relationship with the USA. Reply

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  4. Microsoft to appeal ruling in favor of reselling perpetual Windows licenses — UK Competition Court says fineprint holds no ground as judges throw out company’s

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