Bink is reporting about the end of the road for OEM XP installations coming at the end of the year. That’s right, coming January 2008 you will no longer be able to purchase a brand new computer with Windows XP.

To most of us in the IT world that use Vista there is probably little compassion on this front. First, Vista rocks. Second, if you’re a business you can purchase Windows under volume licensing programs that allow for use of previous releases of the software. So who does this impact?

SOHO’s and small business that doesn’t subscribe to Volume Licensing because of the “double licensing charge”. SOHO is not getting Software Assurance. Small business that doesn’t have a predictable growth pattern will buy systems one at a time.

So where are these segments going to? It pains me to say, but we’re seeing more and more Apple systems out there used in business. What does this mean for Microsoft? Well, they could again try to lower the bar on piracy so more people would install the useful higher-end versions of Vista… but I doubt that will happen. Piracy has been marginalized in business due to two factors: security and fairness. First, you can no longer trust that the image you get from a warez site (new kids read: bittorrent) is not loaded with rootkits, etc. Second, consumers are less likely to commit a criminal act of theft if they can get a reasonable alternative at a reasonable price. For example, Mac OS X is around $100 and upgrades for less than that. Ubuntu Linux is free. Both present a compelling alternative to a startup that is not bound to Microsoft’s platform.

Why am I telling you all this? Well, this market development is causing Own Web Now to start supporting these alternative platforms because they are showing up at our clients sites. Customer is always right, eh?

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