Locked out of Beta.

[Guest]

No rewards are promised to any of the Vista Technical Beta testers.
Some hope for something, but even fewer expect something.
And NONE are promised or entitled to anything.
Most that I know did it for two reasons:
1. To get an early look at something new.
2. The challenge of learning something new while at the same time hopefully
contributing to its development.

Measuring contributions is extremely difficult especially from outside
Microsoft.
Microsoft has chosen an extremely wide cross section of computer users.
Everyone from those minimally familiar but at least able to install an
operating system to IT professionals at all levels.
Wide ranges of occupations are also represented from doctors, housewives,
lawyers, fast food employees,accountants etc.
You name it, there is probably a Beta tester who does it.
They are also from a wide range of countries all around the globe.

If you wanted to be in the Vista Beta, 2 years ago may have been a good time
to start, that is when I discovered I would probably be in the Vista Beta.

As I suggested before, plan now for a future Beta that will interest you.
When you finally see it, hopefully you have already taken steps since at
that time it will again be to late.
There is another OS on the distant horizon, what are you doing now to help
get yourself a place in that Beta?
Now is the time to start.

--
Jupiter Jones [MVP]
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar
http://www.dts-l.org





No rewards were promised - and no expectation of reward has been expressed on my part either. The statement is and was that whether a contribution was made last month or two years ago is also an arbitrary consideration. The only thing that should matter is whether or not the contribution is genuinely valuable or not - and that shouldn't be an impossible thing to consider at all.

Moreover it is all very well for someone to say that they are not even a
little motivated by a degree of self interest - since if form is anything to
go by, MS will pretty much hand out free licenses to everyone on their
official Vista beta program anyway, regardless of whether they have made any
genuine contribution or not - and will probably ignore the contributions that
have been made by others. I understand your curiosity, I understand wanting
to get a first look at something, I share your interests - but I can't help
but thinking that you might be a little less motivated, and a little less
thorough if you didn't think there was at least a slight chance (no matter
how slight that chance might be) that you would be rewarded for your efforts
in the future.

Not that there is anything wrong with that - as in reality Microsoft is
hardly a charity and they stand to make a considerable sum of money from your
efforts. In that sense it is not you who is 'freeloading', it is in fact
almost exactly the opposite way round.

Symantec had a similar beta program a couple of years ago (and they may well
still have on their more recent betas) where if users were able to report
previously unreported bugs they were awarded licenses for the final
production code (along with other promotional goods). Not everyone won out
(and those who didn't contribute got nothing) but Symantec got excellent
feedback and everyone was motivated just that little bit more by the prospect
that through contributing they might stand a chance of winning a prize. It is
what motivated people to work just that little bit harder and to dig that
little bit deeper to find and report real bugs. If they hadn't done this I
doubt they would have had quite so many people genuinely hunting for and
reporting bugs to them.

 

[Guest]

OK, it happend exactly the way I envisaged it. Here is the anouncement I read
today.

"Not everyone saw it coming… nothing came in Office 2007 for testers but
Vista was always a hell of a lot bigger than Office 2007. Windows Vista
released to manufacturing last week, and MSDN and TechNet Plus subscribers
could get it… and those with Volume Licensing access… and now fellow testers
can!

If you’re a Vista tester, Windows Vista Business (by default, Ultimate if
you ask for it) is yours - check your email account associated with your
Connect profile. If you qualify (if, that is) then you’ll get a free copy in
form of a unique Connect invitation to a new sub-page with the build on. You
must have submitted one bug at least to get a free copy and be on the
technical beta.

You can activate the copy of Vista unlimited times on one machine (not
entirely sure how the licensing thing works, just going off internal
sources). Anyway, those who have contributes certainly deserve it - enjoy
your reward"

That realy sucks. I am a non technical beta tester and I literaly busted my
balls hunting down bugs for Vista - I am not sure how many exactly - but
certainly it is in the dozens - from beta 2 onwards - some of which were real
screamers - and some of which I'm pretty sure were only fixed after I
reported them.

So I sweat my nads off for MS and get nothing - while a whole bunch of lazy
SOB's many of whom probably made little or no effort at all, get a big fat
Windows Ultimate Licence?

Thanks a bunch MS. That is really a big encouragement to help you in the
future.

 

[Kristan Kenney]

I believe it was made perfectly clear to all Customer Preview Program (CPP)
participants that you would not receive a free copy of the final product.

--
Kristan Kenney
Windows Live Butterfly

News and Experiences on Windows Vista
and beyond: http://www.windows-now.com

This post is provided "AS IS" with no warranties,
and confers no rights.

 

[Guest]

Yeah your grattitude is overwhelming.

I believe it was made perfectly clear to all Customer Preview Program (CPP)
participants that you would not receive a free copy of the final product.

--
Kristan Kenney
Windows Live Butterfly

News and Experiences on Windows Vista
and beyond: http://www.windows-now.com

This post is provided "AS IS" with no warranties,
and confers no rights.

 

[Kristan Kenney]

I'm not trying to be rude or anything, but like I previously stated, it was
made clear that there would be no free product at the end of the Customer
Preview Program. Beta Testing isn't about receiving a free copy, it is about
improving the product.

--
Kristan Kenney
Windows Live Butterfly

News and Experiences on Windows Vista and beyond: http://www.windows-now.com

This post is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[will]

OK, it happend exactly the way I envisaged it. Here is the anouncement I read
today.

"Not everyone saw it coming… nothing came in Office 2007 for testers but
Vista was always a hell of a lot bigger than Office 2007. Windows Vista
released to manufacturing last week, and MSDN and TechNet Plus subscribers
could get it… and those with Volume Licensing access… and now fellow testers
can!

If you’re a Vista tester, Windows Vista Business (by default, Ultimate if
you ask for it) is yours - check your email account associated with your
Connect profile. If you qualify (if, that is) then you’ll get a free copy in
form of a unique Connect invitation to a new sub-page with the build on. You
must have submitted one bug at least to get a free copy and be on the
technical beta.

You can activate the copy of Vista unlimited times on one machine (not
entirely sure how the licensing thing works, just going off internal
sources). Anyway, those who have contributes certainly deserve it - enjoy
your reward"

That realy sucks. I am a non technical beta tester and I literaly busted my
balls hunting down bugs for Vista - I am not sure how many exactly - but
certainly it is in the dozens - from beta 2 onwards - some of which were real
screamers - and some of which I'm pretty sure were only fixed after I
reported them.

So I sweat my nads off for MS and get nothing - while a whole bunch of lazy
SOB's many of whom probably made little or no effort at all, get a big fat
Windows Ultimate Licence?

Thanks a bunch MS. That is really a big encouragement to help you in the
future.

I agree with you
some of the tech beta probably deserved it
but like I've always said, even without submitting bugs the contribution
that the CPP have made just by running vista in order for MSFT to get all
the crash data that they used to fix and improve vista has most likely
been the greatest contribution of all.

I know and realize that no promises were ever made to the CPP or technical
beta so personally I didn't expect any reward, but I see absolutely no
reason at all why the technical beta testers are treated as if their at a
higher level or for that fact bigger contributors than the CPP

 

[Mr. Vista]

"Beta Testing isn't about receiving a free copy, it is about improving the
product."

Using your logic, there is no need to give *any* beta testers a copy,
including those on Connect.

 

[Guest]

I understand that. However the 'effort' that others made was recognised - as
it was always pretty much implicitly clear that it would be.

I guess I mistakenly hoped that perhaps if I made enough of an effort, my
contribution might be recognised too.

But again, this appears to not have been the case.

 

[will]

I'm not trying to be rude or anything, but like I previously stated, it was
made clear that there would be no free product at the end of the Customer
Preview Program. Beta Testing isn't about receiving a free copy, it is about
improving the product.

your not being rude, your just ill informed
people in the CPP realize that there was no offer of free software
my point is that the technical beta testers also weren't promised anything
but they did get a free copy after all, well only the ones that submitted
a bug report.

my point is that as a group the CPP have made a bigger contribution than
the technical beta, merely due to the fact that there were a few million
CPP participants who's crash data would of been priceless to MSFT, without
it MSFT would not of had enough data to improve vista or fix the bugs.

 

[Mr. Vista]

I posted on this issue in the thread "Microsoft Rewards Vista Beta Testers
Handsomely"

"Microsoft should provide CPP members who submitted "a single bug" report
(using the bug reporting tool) with a copy too, because they too
contributed* to the success of Vista."

 

[Mr. Vista]

Your effort should be rewarded. My opinion is posted in this ng:

"Microsoft should provide CPP members who submitted "a single bug" report
(using the bug reporting tool) with a copy too, because they too
*contributed* to the success of Vista."

 

[Tim Draper]

your not being rude, your just ill informed
people in the CPP realize that there was no offer of free software
my point is that the technical beta testers also weren't promised anything
but they did get a free copy after all, well only the ones that submitted
a bug report.

my point is that as a group the CPP have made a bigger contribution than
the technical beta, merely due to the fact that there were a few million
CPP participants who's crash data would of been priceless to MSFT, without
it MSFT would not of had enough data to improve vista or fix the bugs.

agree 100% with that. without the CPP's priceless real-world data,
some/most bugs would still exsist, just waiting for RTM.
but business sense says they cant afford to give out free copies to a
million users

tbh, the reason i beta test (public beta...) is to get to grips with the
latest and greatest software. it's generally stable enough for my uses,
main use for me using vista is i know i'll have to upgrade to it for
DX10 game support, so i'd rather be part of the beta fault-finding
process than to find out when it goes retail that it dont work fully.
also, 64bit is a huge plus - performance reasons.

my opinion on this is that you obtain public beta-release drivers from
hauppauge, creative or nvidia.... you dont expect free hardware in
return, nor do you expect any support becuase it's beta - betas
generally dont have ANY offical support and generally rely on newgroups
or forums for user>user support. beta's will never change in that
respect. they are always 'run at your own risk'.

besides, the major plus you have atm is that you know how vista works,
where settings are etc, so your knowledge you have learnt will provide
invaluble in 2-3 months time when the retail-release users get their
hands on it, and cant configure because they cant find a setting that
was there in XP.
sometimes your 'bonus' isnt always physical. it can be knowledge aswell.

tim

 

[will]

agree 100% with that. without the CPP's priceless real-world data,
some/most bugs would still exsist, just waiting for RTM.
but business sense says they cant afford to give out free copies to a
million users

tbh, the reason i beta test (public beta...) is to get to grips with the
latest and greatest software. it's generally stable enough for my uses,
main use for me using vista is i know i'll have to upgrade to it for
DX10 game support, so i'd rather be part of the beta fault-finding
process than to find out when it goes retail that it dont work fully.
also, 64bit is a huge plus - performance reasons.

my opinion on this is that you obtain public beta-release drivers from
hauppauge, creative or nvidia.... you dont expect free hardware in
return, nor do you expect any support becuase it's beta - betas
generally dont have ANY offical support and generally rely on newgroups
or forums for user>user support. beta's will never change in that
respect. they are always 'run at your own risk'.

besides, the major plus you have atm is that you know how vista works,
where settings are etc, so your knowledge you have learnt will provide
invaluble in 2-3 months time when the retail-release users get their
hands on it, and cant configure because they cant find a setting that
was there in XP.
sometimes your 'bonus' isnt always physical. it can be knowledge aswell.

tim

Your correct in that way.
my main reason for being in the CPP was to get an advanced preview of
vista because I build computers and provide support to my clients. So I
guess my reward for being in the CPP will come in the form of having a
good knowledge of vista and how it works and how to install and fix it.
this will definately put me ahead of most others in my field, the first
most of them will see of vista is when it goes on sale to the general
public.

 

[Guest]

That isn't really the point. The point is that even those who contributed
very little WERE rewarded - while those who may have contributed much more
were not.

In any case it isn't all just about personal gain. Even if I had received an
email saying 'thanks for your effort.' it may have been enough. But I
literally got nothing. Not even that.

I am not looking for MS to give away 'millions of licenses', simply that
they should recognize people's individual contributions on their merit -
regardless of their status.

But I get the impression that I am shouting in the wind, so there is no
point in continuing with this.

I may simply be more wary about what I agree to test again in the future.

 

[Nobody]

Boo hoo

 

[Jeff]

lol-yup

Boo hoo

 

[Guest]

I am a CPP person. I joined the program in the assumption that I would get
the production version of Vista free. Why else would I put myself through
hell and high water only to the have to shell out $600 or so to upgrade my
system or reinstall XP ?

I am on a buggy RC1 version. To my horror I found that I could not get RC2 -
what kind of rubbish is this ! I now have the situation where unless I shell
out bundles of cash I am stuck on RC1 and next July it will expire. I also
see somewhere that the prodiuction version may not upgrade from RC1. So I may
be up for a full re-install. Cheee.

I am not happy.

 

[Bill]

I am a CPP person. I joined the program in the assumption that I
would get
the production version of Vista free.

Obviously you didn't read the CPP page.

CPP = Customer Preview Program.

That means you were allowed to preview the OS, help with bug reports,
develop applications for compatibility, etc. There was never any
mention of a free copy.

 

[Bill Frisbee]

Why would you ASSUME you would get anythign for free?

I don't know ANY (non-open source) company that gives software away for free
for Beta testing.

Why would you put yourself thru hell and highwater?

To help Microsoft release a better operating system and help your fellow
computer users.

My god, are people that greedy they only do things to get something in
return?

The UPGRADE from XP to Windows Vista isn't $600, heck its not even $200.


Now if your post was sarcastic... so be it, if you were serious, you best go
back and read the beta EULA.


Bill F.

 

[Mike C.]

I know nowhere where Microsoft had stated that any person, at all, even the
Technical Beta testers, would get a free copy of Windows.

Technical testers did not know until a couple of days before they actually
got it.

Keep that in mind.