[arkades]

> No activation was not removed, a license is still required.

This was even explicitly stated in the linked article, but for some reason people keep asserting in this thread that it was a cracked version of windows.

Am I missing something, or are people just making big assumptions and not reading the article?

[lucb1e]

I can't legally give you something copyrighted even if you can't use it without a valid license code. It's still copyrighted.

But that's not what Microsoft is asserting here: the headline (which arguably conveys the main point) says it's about the anti-circumvention clauses of USA's DMCA law.

[LorenPechtel]

Yeah, because while distributing the basic .iso is illegal what are Microsoft's damages? They distribute it for free anyway, their losses are $0 from someone else distributing it.

[wvenable]

If JK Rowling gave away Harry Potter ebooks because of COVID-19, you can't just take those books and replace all instances of "Wand" with "Penis" and distribute it because she made it available for no money. It's not all about money but also about moral rights; The right to the integrity of the work.

[dathinab]

I think no one is claiming that distributing modified isos is legal, actually even distributing the unmodified ISO files would not be legal.

The problem is that Microsoft didn't make a take down request based one them distributing ISO files. But based on them "disabling features in windows" in that ISO files.