Financial News
- 5 January 2012, 20:18
Microsoft Sues Comet Over Windows 'Piracy'
Microsoft is suing struggling retailer Comet over claims its shops sold "fake" Windows CDs to customers.
The electronics chain allegedly pirated 94,000 copies of Vista and XP recovery discs in a factory in Hampshire.
It is then said to have sold the media to people purchasing Windows-loaded PCs and laptops from its retail outlets across the UK.
Microsoft's worldwide anti-piracy and anti-counterfeiting associate general counsel David Finn said: "As detailed in the complaint filed, Comet produced and sold thousands of counterfeit Windows CDs to unsuspecting customers in the United Kingdom.
"Comet's actions were unfair to customers. We expect better from retailers of Microsoft products - and our customers deserve better, too."
In a statement, Comet said it had received legal advice but held the view that the production of recovery discs did not infringe Microsoft's intellectual property.
It said: "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."
Shares in Kesa Electricals, the French retail company which owns Comet, fell 5% following the news.
Kesa has been trying to sell the troubled retailer since last summer after it made a loss of £8.9m in the year to April 30, 2011.
In November it reportedly agreed to sell the loss-making chain, which has 248 stores and 10,000 employees in the UK, for just £2.
The buyer is a group of companies under the name Hailey Holdings Ltd, advised by retail turnaround firm, OpCapita LLP.
Microsoft added in a statement that it "seeks to protect its customers from counterfeiting and piracy - and ensure people get what they pay for".
It urged customers to report suspicious software on its "How To Tell" website.
what do you think?
the massons
Didn't know Comet was French owned, another to add to my avoid list!
Windows Live User
Wonder if it's the same Frenchie company that made the breast implants? I wont touch them LOL
Kelly Curtis
i think Orange is french owned ! wanadoo used to be
the massons
I changed from Wanadoo to o2 few years ago because of that, just use Orange for home page :-)
pfmartin
What's so wrong with the French, that we do better. Not much. At least they have a republic, we can only dream.
Colin Hollywood
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Name witheld
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eqinox187
Well with your coment you have just showen that you have no idea how the software bussiness works. The facts are software evolves becomse more secure and more user freindly so no software can be perfect at all times as its constantly evolving. Even mac release atleast 2 new operating systems each year so atleast microsoft stick with it for aslong as they do
Gavin Nellis
eqinox does your p.c have a spell check?
pfmartin
Windows has never been right. That's why it constantly needs changing. It never works right in any guise. Apple change, to add more features. Their software actually works, and improvements are to increase customer enjoyment , unlike microsoft who are always changing to beat bugs in their rubbish software.
eqinox187
@pfmartin Acualy if you bother to go online and do alittle digging there are plenty of independent places that mesure crash statistics and on many official sites show little to no diforance between the 2 so yes apple OS crash just as much as windows OS do. Yes windows is constanlty changeing to fix bugs but the main reason it changes so often is becuse of the people that try to find the smallest crack and exploit it for criminal profit and the very same happens on apple just on a smaller scale as there are less mac out there in use
pfmartin
@ equinox. Actually, Microsoft is far inferior to Apple in every way, and stop it , with the superior attitude. You worked in a shop for gods sake, you're not Bill Gates ' right hand man. You can just about put a sentence together (badly), never mind make judgement on what OS out performs another. I now use an Apple mac. Never ever had a problem. Had numerous Microst OS machines, and never had a week without a software problem of some sort. If you don't want to pay the extra for the Apple, that's your perogative. Don't slag them off , because you run windows 7.
Windows Live User
Wow! No wonder it was on sale for a couple of quid MS once blocked a version of Windows I had on my pc but after letting the adviser have control he told me it was not a fake. Still took him 4 nights of calls from India to get it working though LOL
Dale Oxborough
I wouldn't worry about the company being French owned . Once Microsoft has finished with them , I think Comet will be gone .
eqinox187
This is not new news i used to work for currys / PCworld and they do the exact same thing the only diforance they descise it by nameing it "pc set up" were esensualy the customer is pushed and pushed to buy this service for around £30 that involves a person at the store turning on the laptop letting it load and then turning it of that person then copys a windows backupfile to blank dvd disks. So what comet is doing is not uncomen they were just not as smart as there competitors when they implomented it.
pfmartin
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eqinox187
Rolls eyes at the pfmartin troll....... tip of the day get a life
pfmartin
@eqinox, or do you mean equinox. Can't even spell his own name. I am trying to point out that you shouldn't be explaining the rights and wrongs of the computer industry, if your qualifications are , A): illiteracy.... B): worked in pc world. I am not a troll, i just make an effort to communicate in the queens english, whereas you don't even know how to spell the name you call yourself. Tip of the day, don't roll your eyes, when you are being educated. That's how you become so poor at the English language.
Dan Brown
pfmartin has it ever occurred to you that he might be dyslexic? it didn't do Richard branson any harm and is no reflection or indication of his intellect! judging by your attitude it's quite obvious that you need to make your sorry little life seem slightly better by knocking other people! were you the school bully by any chance??????????
eqinox187
@pfmartin Again you show how little you clearly know about the computer world or about simple log in acounts and the fact that when you make a name up and that name is taken it provides the nearest name so equinox187 is already used by another so it becomes eqinox187. As for spelling Dan is correct i am dyslexic this however only affects my spelling and not how inteligent i am. However insulting someone you know nothing about because of there spelling is a clear indication of someone lacking inteligence and just looking make them self look better by pushing others down (possable bully complex as dan said) and as dan said there are many people out there that can not spell and that are very smart and also there are millions more that can speak and spell this queens language off yours perfectly but cant change a light bulb. So it would be great if you used alittle tool called google to learn more about something befor you come here on your little box pointing out every little spelling error and then judging people based on it
pfmartin
Dan Brown, if you read back you will see that it is equinox, who began patronising people. He is not dyslexic, but you have given him a way out, by sugesting he might be. Dyslexia, in spelling would manifest itself in such a way,that it would be obvious. In that case i wouldn't suggest he was challenged. In this case however , i am responding to attacks by Equinox, on other people. His defence of microsoft , is based on his poxy salesmans job.Oh, and who are you, the Lone effing Ranger.
pfmartin
oops, i spelt suggesting wrong, does that mean i am dyslexic. Don't be pathetic.
Ray Gardner
First of all, The recovery disk should be supplied automatically, when you pay £100's for a pc/software. Secondly, If Microsoft got their software working properly in the first place, you wouldn't need a recvery disk. 16 times today I got the message, Internet explorer has stopped working, or i get blue screen of death., Can microsoft spend more time sorting out these problems than suing people. Otherwise we'll just use Linux and Micorsoft will lose money
eqinox187
With respect Raymond when i worked for PCworld and when people came in with a broken comp 8 out of 10 times it was user error ether they install lots of free sortware / free games / free security or they run the comp without security and get a virus or they deleat something they shouldent or the install a ton of addons into there browser or simply fail to turn it of properly causing OS file coruption and the worst unsafe internet ussage. The fact is no OS is perfect but windows 7 is by far the most stable in this the crash statistics speak for them self. Personaly on my comp the only time it crashes is when i ask it to do to much at one time and that admitedly is my fault not the OS fault. About linux its a great little program and i use abuntu on my other comp but the problem with that there is so few programs work on it and there is limited security software for it
Gordon Wright
When buying a new computer, it is now customary for the buyer to create his/her own recovery discs. Why can Microsoft not supply a copy of the operating system like they used too????
eqinox187
Its simlple cost saveing Gordon. I remmber sometime back that it acualy costs close to £15 per disk to create now times that by the number of PCs being sold thats hundreds of thousands perhaps millions and this was costing them a fortune to do so understandably they stoped it and have now made it the responcebility of the user to make it.
Neil Servis
Comet are due to close shop altogether...this will be the final nail in the coffin for them, they should have known what they were doing was wrong !!, maybe microsoft should try ebay, you will get loads of copies on there
Adrian Wagstaff
You will notice ... Comet are suggesting ... they were trying to help us poor customers who are, as so many have commented, charged hundreds and hundreds of pounds and dollars for computer technology. Microsoft, as anyone knows monopolises a great portion of the computer market and Comet are stating they were only trying to help us poor customers by providing some cheaper programs than it would otherwise cost us. What ... is ... the ... real-crime? ... I think, everyone has a right to make a reasonable profit and people also have a right to help ... poor people. I think they ... should ... come to some kind of amicable-business-settlement.
Name witheld
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Stephen Hockell
It's wrong
Stephen Hockell
Well if microsoft done a better job with window's and ironed out any bug's that could screw up people's pc's window's would be better follow apple mac or linux
Paul Grassick
There's two reasons comet is not making money the staff haven't got a clue and the prices are a too high I asked a member of staff yesterday what's the best Eco friendly fridge in store he just look at me and said DON'T KNOW MATE just work here part time
Criss Nash
what would microsoft do if the general public decided to sue them for the bug filled operating systems they provide then see what it would do to thier so called reputation. the only decent operating system they ever nade was windows 98 but since then its been a stream of failures and faults which begs the question who should be sueing whom. You wouldnt buy faulty car or buy a jig saw with bits missing yet microsoft release computers with faulty software and say and do very little about it and still people buy it, shows how good microsofts spinners truely are. i went MAC as its stable and reliable i wouldnt trust microsoft as far as i could throw them not that i would ever want to touch them.
pfmartin
Dan Brown to the rescue, yeyyyy. Reads half the posts then begins accusing others of attacking a half wit. It was the half wit who kicked it all; off with his attitude, by the way. Hey Dan, you're a bit slow, aren't you.
Jim Ford
equinox187 stated: "About linux its a great little program and i use abuntu on my other comp but the problem with that there is so few programs work on it and there is limited security software for it" This tells you all you need to know about ex PCWorld/Currys staff - they know just about as much about PCs to be able to tell the difference between a laptop and a jar of pickled onions! Linux is not a program - it's an operating system, provided as part of the Ubuntu (and many other) Linux distributions. As regards programs working on it, there are many thousands of programs available with Linux distributions (most of which are free) and many Windows programs will also run on it using 'Wine'. Linux is _far_ more secure than any Windows system - it's the difference between the security of the 'garden shed Windows' and the 'Fort Knox Linux'! It doesn't need anti-virus software and the inbuilt IP Chains statefull packet filtering firewall is used as the basis of many separate router/firewalls. Jim
eqinox187
Acualy an OS by its very definition is a program and acualy if you bother to check ubuntu is a development of linux with linux providing the base code with ubuntu providing the desktop functionality not the other way around as you sudgest. Yes there are thousands of programs out there made by 3rd party developers however very often they are unstable even dangerus to use and or often with out suport tho yes there are some nice free ones out there however tell me how many games will work on it with any level of stabily ? tell me how many drivers you can get for it to make your hardware run corectly thats right very few drivers suport linux and tell me this how many programs out there like mainstreem programs like 3D rendering / video editing the facts are there arnt many and sure you can use other programs to emulate windows but often there stability is compromised this also if is a fact if you bother to check . As for your claim in its security i am sorry to say you are mistaken they used to say the same about mac OS but these days your just as likely to get a virus on a mac or linux as you are a windows based PC this also is a fact.. Also "the inbuilt IP Chains statefull packet filtering firewall" is not a form of virus protection and in no way protects your pc from a virus it is however designed to provent hakers accessing to your computer remotely that is after all what a firewall dus and not proventing viruses from entering your PC as you sudgest.
Jim Ford
In reply to equinox187 Egregious bilge! Jim
eqinox187
Hmm no not "Egregious bilge!" what ever that is it is infact cold hard and rather simple facts if you cant handle the facts thats not my fault!
paulnaylor
im with equinox on this one all the way, and just like to say its obvious a firewall is not an antivirus protection.
fleur black
if Comet is selling computers with Windows that needs the customer to immediately make a backup disk then they are guilty of misselling unde EU rules that say 'the rpice you pay shsould show the total package'' so if the new computer system needs a backup then it shoudl be included in the package price.
Janet Gough
Wanadoo didn't exist a few years ago. I started with Freeserve who then became Wanadoo. Wanadoo were taken over by Orange and that was a good many more than a few years ago. How do you get an Orange homepage when you are with O2? I'd check and see if you are paying 2 ISP providers because O2 doesn't have an Orange homepage.
Andy Smithies
3:07pm on 4/1/2012
And if Microsoft didnt charge so much for recurring products it may not have happened!!