back to article Apple in iWork piracy boost

A support document has appeared on Apple's website stating that a serial number is no longer required for the installation of the latest version of Apple's productivity suite, iWork '09. Serial number-based piracy protection was a "feature" of iWork when it was introduced in January 2005 as iWork '05 and has remained an iWork- …

COMMENTS

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  1. P. Lee
    Pirate

    Stopping Piracy?

    I suppose they might, but you'll only run it on a Mac.

    Apple store is selling a Leopard, iLife and iWork bundle for USD 169. That seems life a bit of a bargain compared to MSOffice (149.95) + Windows + whatever the equivalent of iLife is. I've seen people looking at windows and mac laptops and having difficulty choosing until an apple salesman walked over to demonstrate - then it was all over!

    More likely, all that software is a loss-leader for the hardware and online services which provide a more controllable revenue source than any serial key will give you.

  2. raving angry loony

    why bother?

    I'm quite happy with the MacOSX native version of OpenOffice 3.0 myself. Although Keynote is a tremendously powerful application, most of my presentations need to be prepared with very short deadlines, and I for one don't have the time to learn Keynote well enough to prepare the gorgeous presentations it can be used for. The other iWork applications, although "nice", don't really rock my boat either.

    OpenOffice is where it's at. Screw Microsoft (with a rusty chainsaw).

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Halo

    serial still required for trial

    A serial is still required for the download trial version if you want to remove the 30 day trial period.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    You could already install iWork on multiple machines

    Even with the Serial number, you could already install earlier versions of iWork on as many Macs as you liked (though going against the EULA, of course). The serial just activated the product but it didn't prevent you from installing it elsewhere if you wanted to.

    Fwiw.

  5. Thomas

    @raving angry loony

    You're happy with OpenOffice? I chucked it as soon as I observed that command+cursors skips back and forward words as expected, but the shortcut to highlight words is option+shift+cursors — which makes no logical sense and is extremely awkward to do physically.

  6. Kenny Millar

    @raving angry loony

    Hey, you don't get it!

    It will take you less time to learn-and-prepare a keynote presentation than it would to prepare a presentation in the cumbersome OpenOffice or PowerPoint - it really is child's play.

  7. Jon Ramster

    OpenDocument support?

    Do they now support OpenDocument? If not, why not?

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Pirate

    Openoffice or Priate Bay

    Apple got enough money out of me for the hardware - and that was not worth the extra money I paid.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Suspicious Minds

    Simple explanation – it brings iWork in line with iLife and OS X itself – neither of which prompt for serials.

    I have a suspicion that Apple would actually like to make iWork part of the basic Mac bundle in the same way that iLife is – i.e. iLife helps generate more money selling Mac systems than as a standalone application. The problem is, that would directly offend their friends at Redmond – they do not want to push them into cancelling MS Office for Mac.

    (The funny thing is how little most Mac users are aware of the level of basic Word support in the built in TextEdit)

    As for OpenDocument support – while it would be nice, iWork is commercial proprietary software. The MS Office support is there because it commercially makes sense, but it’s not as if there is a lot of real (economic) demand for OpenDocument support yet. What would tip Apple’s hand with OpenDocument will be public sector institutions insisting on OpenDocument support / documents.

    Bear in mind that PDF is considered an acceptable open standard by most institutions for read-only documents, this would only be required for editable/collaborative documents.

    I also suspect it would suffer the same issues as existing MS Office support in iWork – i.e. Word does not support all the same layout features as Pages, which is closer to a DTP package in some respects (actually, closest comparison would be MS Publisher, which even MS haven’t included in OOXML).

    I’m unsure as to what degree OpenDocument is better than OOXML in that respect?

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Apple Remote

    Can you control the presentation in KeyNote with the little remote.... you can apprently in NeoOffice.

  11. Bad Beaver

    Bundle

    Pfff, that Mac Box Set bundle. Was that close to getting it. Then I noticed $169 translating directly to €169. 'Course it's still heck of a bargain, but I don't see why I should pay €40 extra just for being European when 2/3 of the package will come free with the next machine anyway.

    Oh and raving angry loony, in my experience OO3.0 is mindbogglinglidinglylishly sluggish on non-Intel Macs. In the time it takes to launch and start up a new presentation, I would be half-done making a new quick one in Keynote. Also, Keynote doesn't take much learning. That is exactly the the appealing part about it. It's dead easy and you get results that make PPT-users eyeballs implode in no time.

  12. N

    Years ago

    When Excel came on three floppy disks, if you remember them & would install with no unlock key which must have helped sales as more than a few people said "if they make an office suite with this, Ill buy it"

    So they just might be right.

  13. Law
    Pirate

    RE: Apple Remote

    (Un)fortunately, they have an iPhone application that lets you do all sorts of nice things with keynote, providing you use wifi... but not bluetooth... because for some reason Apple STILL haven't implemented decent bluetooth support... arses...

    Had Keynote, and the other bits on my comp for ages, never ever thought of using them, OpenOffice and a tpb'd copy of Office for Mac work alright, I only have them on as the wife insists on using Office for work (she's in the council)... personally I just use Google Docs....

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    Keynote @ raving angry loony

    As an occasional user of Keynote and Powerpoint, I think the whole thing about Keynote is that it *doesn't* take a lot of learning, effort or time to create fantastic looking presentations. In fact you can knock them up in minutes - that's what makes it a cut above Powerpoint (and Powerpoint 2008 isn't exactly a poor piece of software either).

    Mind, if you get by with OpenOffice then all power to you. It's certainly best value.

  15. Ian Ferguson
    Paris Hilton

    Or

    If iWork.com is successful and the best element of iWork, maybe you'll need to prove existence of an iWork license when you log in? (with serial number or maybe Apple login)

    This move would simply remove the annoyance of having to prove your right-to-use twice.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    Should I mention ?

    schoolyard drug dealers ? Give it away for free now to get a steady income stream later.......

    No wonder Apple posts record profits.

    Somebody please think of the children...

    Paris - she gives it away for free and pays for it later (oh er missus)

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