Ok I had this old argument before, but my memory sucks so...
This is what I think. XP is more stable on average compared to W9X. Sometimes XP has a violent reaction to some people's systems, when W9X may or may not have the same violent reaction.
IF you pirate XP you can totally get around the bad license stuff(but you could very well be cut off from service packs, although it might be possible to download them from a non-MS source). As for the moral implications of this, I can sort of respect where some of the people here are coming from, but a person is alot more justified in pirating something like XP than he would be with W98 or W2K. XP screws the HONEST customer over, W98/W2K do not(at least license wise).
And regardless of whether it helps MS or not, consider this. If it helps MS, it has only helped them in the past. MS has been cracking down on pirates right? If pirating helped them any longer, they would allow it to continue.
Nonetheless, only pirate wind0ze out of personal thriftyness, it won't win the war(even if it does do slight damage to MS like I hinted at above), people must make the descision to embrace Linux if they truly want to make a difference.
Any arguments against XP should not just focus on the licensing, they should focus on issues that affect EVERYONE who uses XP. DRM and MS spying on you are good reasons indeed. But I don't understand DRM, I know about Palladium and TCPA, but how the hell does DRM(outside of TCPA and Palladium) work?
Besides MS privacy, and DRM, any other anti-XP reasons?