I know piracy is always a big issue for any software company, but the new Microsoft telephony system used to activate products is nothing short of madness! Here is what I had to do to to activate my copy of MS Project 2003:
1. Type in the product key during installation. Ok, this is a regular 25 character key that we are all familiar with. I don’t have a problem with that.
2. Once the installation has finished and I open the application, I am presented with a screen that tells me I can execute the application “49 more times before certain functionality is disabled”. This is fair enough. I then select to “activate via telephone” (the internet activation does not seem to work through a proxy) and call the number.
3. Now the real fun begins. I have to read a total of 54 characters, 6 characters at a time to the voice recognition system. It stops me every 6 digits to confirm the correct characters have been recognized! So far we are up to 54 + 25 = 79 characters (including the product key).
4. The telephony system then reads back to me, 6 characters at a time, a 42 digit “activation key”. I have to say, “Yes” every 6 characters to confirm I have not fallen asleep. This brings us to a grand total of 79 + 42 = 121 characters just to activate this product!
I know what Microsoft is trying to achieve, but I had to activate 3 different applications over the last few days and it was driving me crazy! I am an MSDN Universal subscriber and didn’t expect to have to go through all this pain just to get Office installed on my PC!
