UK Retailer produces and sells 94,000 Counterfeit Windows CDs, Microsoft to sue.

Dangelus · January 04, 2012, 04:52:53 AM

This is crazy. A major UK electronics retailer has been caught producing and selling there own Windows recovery CDs.

Comet are already struggling but being sued by Microsoft may spell the end. The company is already looking for a buyer but I can't see anybody touching tem with this lawsuit over their heads....

http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/04/microsoft-uk-retailer-sold-94-000-counterfeit-copies-of-window/

Rico · January 04, 2012, 06:05:43 AM

Ouch! And here I thought all pirates just used bittorrent. ;)

turtlesrock · January 04, 2012, 07:15:41 AM

i wonder how this is going to turn out.... what will happen to the pirated disks already out there? will microsoft still allow them to be used?

Dangelus · January 04, 2012, 08:12:20 AM

I think they will try to fine them per unit of disc. 94,000 discs, if they ask for $10,000 per instance of copyright breach....

Bye bye Comet! :)

KingIsaacLinksr · January 04, 2012, 09:19:46 AM

Wow, they really thought they could get away with that many? Well...goodbye.

King

Meds · January 04, 2012, 12:28:15 PM

Update: Comet has issued the following response to Microsoft's statement which we've got for you in full, after the break.
"We note that proceedings have been issued by Microsoft Corporation against Comet relating to the creation of recovery discs by Comet on behalf of its customers.

Comet has sought and received legal advice from leading counsel to support its view that the production of recovery discs did not infringe Microsoft's intellectual property.

Comet firmly believes that it acted in the very best interests of its customers. It believes its customers had been adversely affected by the decision to stop supplying recovery discs with each new Microsoft Operating System based computer.

Accordingly Comet is satisfied that it has a good defence to the claim and will defend its position vigorously."

Feathers · January 04, 2012, 12:32:35 PM

OK, recovery CDs I can sort of understand the reason for. It's not quite as cut and dried as if they had been selling counterfeit copies of Windows itself.

Dangelus · January 04, 2012, 01:01:37 PM

Yep it was always reported to be recovery CDs but that doesn't make any difference. It's still the Windows OS and code in there, just it can only be used to restore the hard drive of a particular manufacturer.

This will be interesting as it seems from that statement they are admitting it and blame MS decision to stop supplying discs as the reason. This won't stand up legally at all.

I know they've sought advice but I can't see how it's legal. The UK doesn't even have a fair use policy for backing up copyrighted material for personal use never mind to sell to the public!

It would be like HMV selling a DVD that used to have bonus features but was discontinued and replaced with a vanilla disc to then insert a disc with a copy of those extras on a separate disc...

This is serious stuff for Comet...

Meds · January 04, 2012, 01:11:10 PM

I have a friend who works for comet, i'll have a word and see what she says or if anything has been mentioned to them.

KingIsaacLinksr · January 04, 2012, 01:29:20 PM

Yeah, they are going to get slammed in court. It doesn't matter if you were doing it for the good of the customers, piracy is pretty clear cut in the legal system.

They'll be lucky if they can settle this...

King

Feathers · January 05, 2012, 02:21:35 AM

What I'm not clear on is whether they were actually selling the CDs or simply supplying them as part of the package with the PCs they sold.

If the former then I agree with the above assessment. If not, then I think there may be a grey area they'll try and claim (assuming the user is allowed to create a recovery disk from the PCs in question).

Dangelus · January 05, 2012, 04:42:21 AM

Quote from: Feathers on January 05, 2012, 02:21:35 AM
What I'm not clear on is whether they were actually selling the CDs or simply supplying them as part of the package with the PCs they sold.

If the former then I agree with the above assessment. If not, then I think there may be a grey area they'll try and claim (assuming the user is allowed to create a recovery disk from the PCs in question).

Apparently they were offering the CDs to their PC customers for £14.99!

I can't see how they are going to defend this.

Rico · January 05, 2012, 05:17:58 AM

One of the problems with selling PC's with Window's installed already is generally these days the customer doesn't get any physical copies of Windows on backup CD's/DVD. You can make your own backup (if you think of it) but most people don't do that. So if their hard drive and OS gets trashed they are kind of out of luck. I'm not sure if they were just trying to provide their customers with backup copies or not. "OEM" Windows OS discs have been floating around the computer world for a long time. They usually have some kind of stamp that says "to be sold only with a new computer" - or something like that. Again, I'm not sure of all the details in this case, but it might not be as bad as it sounds.

Dangelus · January 05, 2012, 05:36:31 AM

Quote from: Rico on January 05, 2012, 05:17:58 AM
One of the problems with selling PC's with Window's installed already is generally these days the customer doesn't get any physical copies of Windows on backup CD's/DVD. You can make your own backup (if you think of it) but most people don't do that. So if their hard drive and OS gets trashed they are kind of out of luck. I'm not sure if they were just trying to provide their customers with backup copies or not. "OEM" Windows OS discs have been floating around the computer world for a long time. They usually have some kind of stamp that says "to be sold only with a new computer" - or something like that. Again, I'm not sure of all the details in this case, but it might not be as bad as it sounds.

Yes it seems this was their intention, or at least that's what they're saying. It all stems from like you say, Microsoft doesn't provide the OS on disc for reinstallation / restore in pre-built pcs these days and the majority of people unless they are technically minded would be stuck as soon as their PC starts behaving oddly.

While I agree that these discs should be provided, at least in the "restore" format which would only work on the specific manufacturers PCs anyway, I can't see this working as a defence.

They may have had a chance with that argument if they were producing these discs and giving them away to their PC customers but they were SELLING them to their PC customers. What were they charging for? It doesn't cost £14.99 to produce those discs so they were charging for the added value contained on the discs which doesn't belong to them.

X · January 05, 2012, 06:02:28 AM

this is a problem that this has zero to do with Microsoft. It's the people that are building the computers that are responsible for getting the license for OEM discs from Microsoft. To cut costs, they stopped doing that. The companies did put in tools for the users to make their own backup discs and that's fine. The problem is that this company seems to be selling OEM discs for a profit without giving Microsoft their cut. I think that they KNOW full well what they were doing in selling those discs because each company has their own tools on their systems for restoring them now. Most have backup programs in addition to their recovery partitions.

Ignorance isn't going to cut it on this one.