FOSTER CITY, Calif. (AP) – Hironori Sato grabbed his laptop, his digital camera and his modem before heading downtown to take on the corporate giants.
At Microsoft Corp.’s Foster City offices, Sato joined about 100 computer users demanding refunds for Windows software they say they didn’t want to buy and don’t plan to use.
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”I’m protesting and I’m downloading these images around the world,” said Sato, a computer engineer.
Around him, demonstrators bearing signs, pagers and laptop computers, looked for Microsoft officials to hear their cries.
”I got stuck with this software because I couldn’t buy a laptop without it,” said Charles Lingo, a retired maintenance engineer from San Jose. “It’s a rip-off by a monopoly.”
About 90 percent of personal computers sold these days come pre-loaded with Microsoft’s Windows software, which runs all the other programs on the computers.
But Lingo and most of the demonstrators are among a growing minority of computer users who don’t care for Windows. They have chosen to operate their computers with Linux, a system with a cherubic penguin mascot that has risen to the forefront among the relatively unknown products that can substitute for the Windows operating system.
Microsoft spokesman Robert Bennett said his company isn’t forcing anyone to buy Windows.
”You have the choice of operating systems,” he said. “You can buy a personal computer with a non-Microsoft operating system, you can buy a computer with no operating system at all. Most customers choose Windows but you certainly don’t have to.”
He said that although Microsoft won’t give them refunds, they could go back to the company that sold them the computer.
It’s not that simple though.
IBM, Compaq, Acer and other computer companies do not offer refunds to customers who aren’t going to use the Windows software on their machines.
