[nzlug] 'MS Tax' versus Commerce Commission

[Simon]

On Thu, 2007-07-12 at 14:46 +1200, Guy K. Kloss wrote:

> When was the last time you bought a printer or screen without the proper cable 
> to hook up to the computer? That's quite a common thing, as far as I know. 
> May be different with USB printers by now, but in the past the cable was 
> NEVER included by most vendors.
> 
> So, where's the difference to the OS then?

I believe that was covered in subsequent posts.

If the cable cost you half the price of the monitor, would your
assessment be different? If you didn't need that cable anyway?

What if you didn't buy the cable, but it was leased to you, and you
couldn't onsell the monitor with that cable (the new owners had to buy a
new one) and you couldn't use the cable on another monitor even if the
old one was broken?

Then you hear that the cable manufacturers reserve the right to disable
your cable if your monitor could possibly be used for, what they
consider to be, nefarious ends? Whether you were using it for those ends
or not?

Then you learnt how to make your own cables...