Undoubtedly, someone will discover where the increment counter is for slmgr and you'll be able to do this indefinitely, but until then, Vista users will have a year to extend activation if they wish.
Tens of thousands of federal workers are prohibited from upgrading to the latest versions, according to memos seen by InformationWeek
In a memo to his staff, the DOT's CIO Daniel Mintz says he has placed "an indefinite moratorium" on the upgrades as "there appears to be no compelling technical or business case for upgrading to these new Microsoft software products. Furthermore, there appears to be specific reasons not to upgrade."
The proposal, made as part of the state's budget process, would pay for 100 percent of the conversion, would only allow touchscreen system for disabled voters and for early voting, and would upgrade those systems to include a paper trail. The move is a setback for paperless polling machines and a rejection of the contention by former governor Jeb Bush, brother of U.S. President George W. Bush, that touchscreen systems are reliable.
It doesn’t really matter how well a Real ID works when used by the hundreds of millions of honest people who would carry it. What matters is how the system might fail when used by someone intent on subverting that system: how it fails naturally, how it can be made to fail, and how failures might be exploited.
It was revealed in the course of last summer's landmark virus hack of a Diebold touch-screen voting system at Princeton University that, incredibly, the company uses the same key to open every machine. It's also an easy key to buy at any office supply store since it's used for filing cabinets and hotel mini-bars!
