[plug] M$ again - Digital rights in Office

[Richard Meyer]

Just in case you were getting complacent about M$

RichardM

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http://news.com.com/2100-1012_3-5069246.html

                                                                                                
 Office 2003, the upcoming update of the company's market-dominating productivity package, for  
 the first time will include tools for restricting access to documents created with the         
 software. Office workers can specify who can read or alter a spreadsheet, block it from        
 copying or printing, and set an expiration date.                                               
                                                                                                




                                                                                                
 The new rights management tools splinter to some extent the long-standing interoperability of  
 Office formats. Until now, PC users have been able to count on opening and manipulating any    
 document saved in Microsoft Word's ".doc" format or Excel's ".xls" in any compatible program,  
 including older versions of Office and competing packages such as Sun Microsystems' StarOffice 
 and the open-source OpenOffice. But rights-protected documents created in Office 2003 can be   
 manipulated only in Office 2003.