Vista to XP charge leads to lawsuit

Emma Alvarado is mad as heck and she's not going to take it anymore. Alvarado purchased a PC from Lenovo on June 20, 2008, it came with Windows Vista Business and she to pay an additional $59.25 in order to "'downgrade' her operating system to Windows XP Professional."

Most people would have just complained about it and moved on. Not Alvarado. She decided she wasn't going to take it. Through the law firm of Arias, Ozzello, & Gignac, in Santa Barbara Calif., a law firm specializing in class action and consumer rights litigation, Alvarado is suing Microsoft, both on her own behalf and for other users who have been stuck with Vista and want XP. In short, she's started a class-action suit against Microsoft.

Linux users are long familiar with variations on this theme. Desktop Linux users usually have no use for Windows, but still have to pay for it on most PCs. You can get around paying the Microsoft "tax," but it's not easy.

Most Windows users, who want XP, don't even have the Linux user option. Unless you belong to MSDN (Microsoft Developers Network) or TechNet, you almost certainly don't have access to XP CDs. Your only way to get to XP is by paying the vendor's Microsoft bill.

Since many XP users can't stand Vista, Microsoft was forced to keep offering XP long after the boys from Redmond had hoped to kill it off. Heck, even Ballmer told users to skip Vista.

Now, Microsoft is singing a different tune. Aware that many Windows users are ready to skip Vista entirely for Windows 7, Microsoft is insisting that business customers should 'upgrade' from XP to Vista instead of waiting for Windows 7.

Yeah. Right. Tell that to Alvarado and the hundreds of thousands of other users who have been forced to pay out hard won cash for XP. I'm sure their lawyers would love to hear how moving 'up' to Vista was what they wanted. You'd think Microsoft would have learned their lesson from how 'well' the Vista Capable lawsuit has been going.