graphic and Web designers, according to Chris Swenson, a software analyst at NPD Group Inc. Making Expression Studio freely available to students is "the fastest way Microsoft could jumpstart adoption," Swenson said.
The benefits of the DreamSpark program likely will cut both ways, Swenson added. "It looks good for a student to be able to put on his resume that he's using the full version of Visual Studio," he said. "And at the end of the day, how much money was Microsoft really getting from students?"
Basile agreed with the latter assertion, saying that most of his classmates simply pirate Microsoft's products or use the free open-source alternatives. "For a college student, it could literally be the choice between paying $50 for Visual Studio or eating that week," he said.
Making any software free and easily attainable for students, especially those in poorer nations, could help Microsoft cut the demand for "bogus bootleg copies," said Charles King, an analyst at Pund-IT Inc.
But couldn't DreamSpark itself make piracy easier, if people who aren't students manage to download the software being made available through the program? Microsoft doesn't think so. Wilson said that to try to limit downloads to legitimate students, the software vendor is requiring participants in the U.S. to either log into their college's network or to the Web site of JourneyEd, an online reseller of software for academic uses. JourneyEd, which is formally known as Journey Education Marketing Inc., maintains a database of students from 80% of American colleges and universities, according to Wilson.
He added that the process should be simpler in Europe, where even more comprehensive student databases have been developed. Meanwhile, according to a check by Computerworld, Chinese students can gain immediate access to the DreamSpark downloads site if they have an account with the CERNET multi-university network or the Graduate School of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Otherwise, they can apply for an International Student Identity Card.
To continue getting updates and patches, students will need to verify their identity with Microsoft annually, Wilson said.
The company will grant the software to students for educational uses only, meaning that they technically won't be able to use the free tools to develop commercial products or write code on a software-for-hire basis. Nor will they be able, under the letter of the law, to pass the software on to friends and family members who are doing such things.
But Microsoft has no plans to enforce those terms, Wilson said. And the software vendor is fine with that. "You can never have a perfect system," he said. "There are too many smart, creative people out there. But the risk of the wrong person getting the free software is outweighed by the likelihood that the right people will get it."
Microsoft has no plans to offer Windows Vista or Office free of charge to students, Wilson said. But it may eventually expand the DreamSpark program to include other technologies, such as its Robotics Studio toolkit for developing robotic applications or its OneNote note-taking software.
Related news, commentary, and predictions:
- News: Open source, Adobe on campus prods Microsoft's giveaway
- Prediction: Yahoo to accept Microsoft acquisition by mid-March
- Analysis: Microsoft's unrealized online dreams
- Analysis: An Open Letter to Steve Ballmer
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