Every version of Windows is accompanied by a EULA. This document is a contract that specifies your rights with regards to the copy of Windows you just obtained. The thing is, most people--over 90 percent--get Windows with a new PC, according to Microsoft. And their rights are substantially different from the rights of a customer who purchased Windows at retail. More specifically, versions of Windows that come with a new PC can't ever be transferred to another PC. They are, quite literally, bound to the PCs with which they were purchased. Retail copies of Windows... that's a bit different. But only a bit. We'll get to that.

What's happened is that Microsoft has clarified the EULA for Windows Vista. They've made it more readable, for starters, so normal people can get by the legalese and understand what the document really means. The Vista EULA is also clearer about certain things, including one of the supposedly controversial "changes" that the previously named online pundits are railing against. It also mentions virtualization licensing rights for the first time.