The WHO Radio Wise Guys
Brian Gongol


The WHO Radio Wise Guys airs on WHO Radio in Des Moines, Iowa on 1040 AM or streaming online at WHORadio.com. The show airs from 1 to 2 pm Central Time on Saturday afternoons. A podcast of show highlights is also available. Leave comments and questions on the Wise Guys Facebook page or e-mail them to wiseguys@whoradio.com.


Listener e-mail of the week:
Could you please take a look at this site. It's a well done web site and the spin is very intriguing, but it's hard to believe this is the real deal. Unless I have more information, I'm staying way clear of this. Is the method of buying-up extra product keys for independent sale a real practice? If it sounds too good to be true it usually is. Thanks.

- Tom
The short answer is this: OEM software is a legitimate phenomenon. I've purchased OEM software before, but always from vendors with whom I've done business before and whose legitimacy I can verify. The website you referred to includes the following note on its FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) page:
Will I receive sealed software?

No, this is how we pass on savings to you, because your not paying for a fancy box and manuals, you will receive the install CD and an activation key, serial number or CD key necessary to activate your software. You will not always receive original CD's. For example, say a corporation purchases 500 copies from Microsoft, Microsoft wouldn't send 500 disks-that would be silly. Now if we purchase say 100 leftover copies from this said company, we would only receive 1 Master CD and a list of 100 keys that were left over, so sometimes we must make copies of the install CD's. But this doesn't mean your keys aren't completely legal.
This would give me serious reservations: I would not use any program that doesn't come on an original disc with an original activation key attached.

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