A strange IBM decision

From my friend BenBen:

This is the IBM 32-bit Runtime Environment for Java 2 (JRE), Windows Edition.

To be able to install this JRE your computer must

be an IBM system, as shown by a BIOS check. It must also be running Microsoft Windows Me, 2000, or XP. Or it must be updated with the latest WMI classes if running an older Microsoft operating system. And, finally, you must have Administrator level access.

This artificial restriction prohibits the IBM JDK for Windows from running on non-IBM systems.  The logic for this escapes me right now, but removing the restriction would allow people to run the IBM JDK for Windows on Dell, HP and other systems.  I don’t see how this hurts IBM.

And it’s not as if the users of these other systems don’t have the option of using a JDK from Sun, BEA, Apache (well, almost) or elsewhere. *

More here.