All Six Vista Versions on One DVD

Well how could this possibly go awry? Instead of selling the six upcoming versions of Vista on their own discs, Microsoft is putting all the code for all the versions on DVD. You'll simply use the appropriate registration key when installing to get the right version installed.

Why would Microsoft want to do this? Sheer marketing, of course. If you've bought Vista Home Basic Edition already, Microsoft might be able to convince you to shell out an extra $40 for Home Premium when you're doing the installation (or after you've already been using the OS for a few weeks). Or another $60 on top of that for the Business Edition... and so on.

Ars Technica has more analysis of this issue, including commentary about how Microsoft's future plans involves Vista add-ons that won't work with certain versions of the OS. Again, more incentives to sell you an upgrade later. You already have the DVD.

Of course the big question here is piracy: Will criminal types purchase Home Basic and then install Ultimate Edition instead through a crack or stolen serial number? Probably, but this type of piracy is actually quite rare, and frankly Microsoft would probably be thrilled to get a few hundred bucks out of a pirate instead of the usual nothing. Serious pirates will bypass the disc altogether and just download a cracked Vista off the Internet.

Which, of course, you should totally not do.