Microsoft Plans to Offer Windows 7 Students For Cheap

For many years Microsoft has offered a reduced version of Office to students for a much lower price than the full versions of Office that Microsoft offers. Microsoft has announced that a similar student discount offer on operating systems when Windows 7 arrives in October. Instead of a reduced version at a reduced price, Microsoft will be selling the full version of Windows 7 Home Premium but the purchasers will have to provide proof that they are qualified college/university students. For 30 dollars students will get to directly download Windows 7 and burn their own installation DVD.

On the surface Microsoft makes the discount program as a way of providing cash strapped students a cheap way to get away from Windows Vista, but then again Microsoft chose a date to ship Windows 7 that's about month after college and university students hit the books for another year. Microsoft, more than any other software publisher knows how much software piracy happens on college and university campuses. Many of the hacks to circumvent the Digital Rights Management that Microsoft has built in to prevent piracy of the Windows operating system such as Product Activation and Windows Genuine Advantage came from computer science students.

Rock bottom academic pricing on operating system software has worked well for Apple in the past, somethine tells me that it won't work so well for Microsoft.