Microsoft experimenting with free version of Windows 8.1

Okay, so what does that tell one about 8.1? Trying to boost numbers anyway they can? But really, what is Microsoft doing that is new? I received my 8.1 for free because I had 8 and took the free update to 8.1.

ainteinstein said:

Okay, so what does that tell one about 8.1? Trying to boost numbers anyway they can? But really, what is Microsoft doing that is new? I received my 8.1 for free because I had 8 and took the free update to 8.1.

Click to expand...

I don't think they meant upgrade from W8 to 8.1 but from W7 to 8.1.
For the first part of your statement, yes, that's what they implied, That may be MS goal for long time now. Long time ago, when Billy was in complete charge, somebody asked if he was concerned of so many windows users running illegal copies he replied something in the order of : "We can live of revenues from what copies we sell, and more people runs Windows, the better". Indeed MS is not very active in persecuting illegal users (at lest nowhere close to entertainment industry). Also they gave free licenses to many a school in third world (and not so third) countries, also cheap, general use licenses to many universities , their students and also NGOs (I have one of the licenses given to them to distribute).
So yes, they are trying to get windows in as many computers they can, it's a good policy and many should be grateful for that. It keeps the base of programs large and programs, their number and quality, are the ones that do the work, OS is just a go-between. Any pure OS, without software would not last a day.
1995 while in Toronto, I waited in a store 'till 2 o'clock in the morning for them to start selling Win95 and I was running beta version for over a year. That beta was usable for long time after official release and was "richer" than release version because of some flap with Norton which was resolved short time later.

From the article: "It’s not clear how committed Microsoft is to these plans, but the experiment is part of a number of initiatives designed to push and monetize Microsoft’s cloud services and apps."

Me fix:

"It’s not clear how committed Microsoft is to these plans, but the experiment is part of a number of initiatives designed to push and monetize YOU."

MasterChief said:

From the article: "It’s not clear how committed Microsoft is to these plans, but the experiment is part of a number of initiatives designed to push and monetize Microsoft’s cloud services and apps."

Me fix:

"It’s not clear how committed Microsoft is to these plans, but the experiment is part of a number of initiatives designed to push and monetize YOU."

Click to expand...

I hope, you are not hoping beyond the hope they are doing stuff from goodness of their harts, specially when CEO is a merchant not computer enthusiast too, like Billy used to be.

I use Bing already. Just got an extra 100gb of Onedrive for 100 credits by simply searching with Bing.

I'll take free stuff any day of the week for doing nothing.

LOL Anemic market share.

Windows 8 has always been about monetising the consumer. That is what it is for. A lot of people are smart enough not to want to buy it, so give it away. Probably seems like a reasonable idea to MS. Desperate times call for desperate measures.


Microsoft is considering a free version of Windows 8.1, to increase its anemic market share | ExtremeTech

From SIW2 posted article: "Microsoft hopes to offset the massive loss of income by pushing more users towards services like Bing, OneDrive, and Office."

It's boils down to another way to say: "We really do understand we've created some crap and you are onto our jig. (for desktop, tablet ok) But, we really want you to use it anyway so perhaps you will spend money on services tied into it. Since we know you aren't going to buy it, here - take it for free."

Gee, Bing was the first thing I took off my computer. And why would I store my info in a Microsoft Cloud? Can't trust them to keep IE safe, think I would trust their cloud?