Exactly! Even though I'm in an urban area, when the cable does go down,
it can be more than a week before a maintenance visit is possible.
So, both on principle and in practical terms, what MS is doing is stupid and
unwarranted. Blows my mind anyone thinks this is acceptable. Trouble is,
just like every time certain freedoms & rights are eroded, there are those
who just don't care (thank heaven they weren't the majority in 1939), thus
making it easier for ever more draconian measures to be pushed through.
Hate to say it (because the irony is extreme), but it's in the US where much
of this erosion is taking place, measures which are then adopted by other
nations because the US is such a huge market for entertainment products.
It's as if US citizens' rights are being slow-boiled away like a frog in a pan -
bit by bit, so each change doesn't seem so bad and the majority either
accept or ignore what's happening. This time though, what MS has done
all in one go is very significant; I really hope Americans vote en masse
with their cash and buy elsewhere.
Ian.
PS. By irony I meant the fact that the US has a constitution which is well
respected worldwide for the rights it's supposed to afford its citizens. Any
non-US person who's seen all of West Wing will know what I mean.