Robin's Hood

The Globalisation Institute's concept of selling cold iron PC's with no operating systems is a brilliant one and a dumb one all at the same time. Let me tell you why.

Having worked in a corporate environment I know how cheap Windows XP is for what you actually get. It costs a mere few extra dollars on top of the cost of the PC. In fact to large suppliers like Dell I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft were giving Windows away. The real cash cow for them is Office of course.

The idea of simply inserting a DVD on a bare naked PC and having it work first time is absurd. There are all sorts of driver issues and compatibility issues that the man on the Clapham omnibus has no desire to contend with.

Having said that I am all for opening people's minds to the idea of demanding an alternative in the store. I would happy to see the EU invest money in an awareness campaign.

If fines are imposed or legal action taken like in the Media Player case then although it may sound noble, but it has all the hallmarks of protectionism, collectivism, and lots of other '-ism's from the Soviet era ;-)

EU thinktank calls for naked PCs - ZDNet UK: "'There is no meaningful competition between operating systems for commodity computers.'"