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China fact of the day
Microsoft spent millions of dollars advertising its next generation OS 'Windows Vista' in China, in fact the IT juggernaut threw up the biggest Vista Ad on the 421 meter high Jin Mao tower in Shanghai China. However after 2 weeks (Jan 19 to Feb 2) from launch Microsoft managed to sell a mere 244 copies of Windows Vista. Software piracy is rampant in the middle kingdom and a pirated version of Vista sells for a mere $1 on the streets.
Here is the source.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on April 19, 2007 at 03:05 PM in Web/Tech | Permalink
Comments
I doubt 244 includes the copies that were bundled with new PCs.
Posted by: Ponder Stibbons at Apr 19, 2007 3:40:55 PM
Or sales to companies.
244...that is actually starting to sound high. Who were these 244 and why do they hate their own money?
Posted by: aaron_m at Apr 19, 2007 4:23:06 PM
I bet that even the pirated versions of Vista are not selling well -- the product fills no compelling need; perhaps the $1 price reflects an oversupply.
Posted by: David Zetland at Apr 19, 2007 4:24:50 PM
Tyler,
This comment has nothing to do with the post at hand. I was hoping you
could add something to your list of "50 questions".
The conventional wisdom seems to be that each year we graduate too many
lawyers, and too few doctors, engineers, and scientists (I happen to agree
with the CW). However, the fact that lawyers make huge salaries says to
the economist side of my brain, that lawyers can't be in oversupply or
they wouldn't be making so much money. What is going on?
Some possible explanations are: 1) the average lawyer doesn't make as much
as I think, 2) we import doctors, engineers, and scientists, and thus don't
need to train/become them ourselves, and 3) only a relatively small
percentage of lawyers work as lawyers for their entire careers, so the
high turnover causes a need for new blood.
I would love to hear a good explanation of this.
Posted by: Jim Clay at Apr 19, 2007 4:42:06 PM
The Japanese-language article that post links to doesn't say that at all. It says that one specific store in China sold 244 copies, not that the entire of China only had 244 copies sold, and it clearly says that some other online shopping site sold 8844 copies.
Tyler, please find some honest and reputable sites to link to before your own reputation becomes tarnished.
Posted by: Andrew at Apr 19, 2007 8:45:55 PM
Ooops.
Maybe the alternate China fact of the day should be that Chinas GDP grew at an annual rate of 11.1% in the first quarter...even though the Chinese government is tryin' like hell to slow it down.
Posted by: alphie at Apr 19, 2007 10:07:11 PM
Piracy in China is actually good for Microsoft (compared to the most likely alternative). The reason is that absent piracy, the hundreds of millions of consumers (who can't afford Windows and Office) might likely switch to Linux and Open Office. For Microsoft, the last thing they want to see is a critical mass of hundreds of millions of Linux users. It's better to get a few bucks for their software if they can (hence the efforts announced today for a $3 version of their software) but, barring that, it's much better to have users pirate the software than to use something else.
Posted by: Slocum at Apr 19, 2007 10:17:18 PM
So I have an "update" on my computer. It "helps" me by ensuring my copy of Windows is genuine and properly licensed. I'm not even in China.
Posted by: lee at Apr 21, 2007 1:35:51 PM
大家好，我是臺灣人，從臺灣一個人搬家來到美國，環境很陌生，感覺很孤單。以前在臺灣幾家知名的徵信社工作過，我是一個優秀的徵信工作者，希望早點找到適合自己的工作。希望通過貴站，認識更多的朋友。
Posted by: 謝文豪 at Apr 2, 2008 2:42:55 AM
