Posters in the Microsoft newsgroups report they have purchased Microsoft Office for Mac 2008 or the beta, which was still in testing as of October 8. These reports spurred Emma Grant of MacBU to respond to one poster in the newsgroup and confirm that neither Office 2008 nor the beta are available legally for sale.
In a thread started Monday a poster reported he had purchased the Office:mac software and provided the link to the product on the site. However, a few days later the product was missing from the website. The poster later tried to reinforce that his purchase was legitimate by providing his electronic receipt.
However, Emma Grant posted this a few minutes ago within the thread:
Hello Jim,I sent you e-mail from my Microsoft email account earlier this week informing you that the site was selling illegal software and that the beta was a limited, invite-only beta which was not available for sale anywhere. The site has been reported to our anti-piracy team. Your current copy of the beta is considered illegal. The support you have received is not from Microsoft. IF we had a public beta, we would have acknowledged it on our public team blog and on Mactopia, our website. http://www.microsoft.com/mac. I appreciate your enthusiasm but unfortunately we cannot support for your current predicament.
-Emma Grant
Macintosh Business Unit
Microsoft Corporation
Piracy of any Microsoft software can be reported on their website at http://www.microsoft.com/piracy.
Note: As a Microsoft MVP I can confirm Emma’s post in the newsgroup is valid since I have had the pleasure of meeting her at various events for MVPs. You can confirm that I am a Microsoft MVP by viewing my profile on Microsoft’s website.
Comments (5)
Why would anyone purchase it when it's circulating on all the torrent sites and newsservers? Doesn't the beta have a definite expiration date. However, I didn't think the retail version was ready yet.
I assume that anyone buying Office 2008 before it has been officially released is simply unaware that he's purchasing pirated software and thinks he's purchasing the real deal. The job of con artists is to con people and some can fool even the best of us. Microsoft has also publicized two different purchase promotions already, which may be leading to the confusion.
The beta does indeed have an expiration date according to the newsgroup post. That's why the poster was asking for help.
And you're correct that the retail version is not available. It won't be available until it is released at Macworld 2008 on January 15 according to the "October 8" link in my post above.
As I read that Microsoft newsgroup thread, I think my original reaction was the feeling that the MVPs had been pretty light-handed with the guy.
It was just this side of incomprehensible that someone had bought an obviously pirated copy of the software and then wanted to argue that since he had paid ... well ... someone for it, that it must be a valid copy.
Then, I wondered why William would post this to the Entourage blog, but I suppose if there is one such user, there may be many more. It is probably a necessary warning for those that might get duped by sites offering illegal software.
Hi Joel!
You're on the money! The thread was just one of a few I've seen about someone "purchasing" Office 2008. My impression of the original poster is that he genuinely thought he had bought a legal copy of Office 2008.
But what's more important is Emma Grant's statement and that's why I decided to write this blog post. She provided an official statement in a public forum that Office 2008 is not yet for sale. It's something I could link to as conclusive proof that anyone selling the product before January 15 is a con artist.
It is not a secret that a lot of people and organizations all over the world use pirated versions of Microsoft software. And the main reason is the high prices of its software.
[Well, this year, Microsoft has offered theHome & Student version for a reasonable price.] Diane Ross