Microsoft doesn't provide recovery/restore discs for download. Microsoft provides installation images that require and prompt for a valid product key and license to use the software (except Windows 10).
Most OEM Restore/Recovery media do not prompt the user for a product key. They either have key/license hidden on a recovery partition on the machine, stored in the firmware, or hardcoded on the disc.
It's unclear how his disc worked but what is clear is that he was not a licensed software distributor and did not have the rights to distribute Microsoft's media.
If someone gives away 100 free books, that doesn't give you permission to make copies of their book and sell them with the caveat that only people who received one of the free 100 books could buy them. How is this different?
Only recently did you need to enter your license key to download them. Regardless, you need the license key to activate the OS, so these disks did not enable anyone to use the OS who did not already own a legitimate license.
Microsoft's lost revenue came in the form of reduced sales of redundant licenses..
Your link is to installation media, not recovery/restore media. Microsoft does not make Recovery/Restore media.
Recovery/Restore discs are custom made by OEMs under license from Microsoft.
> Microsoft's lost revenue came in the form of reduced sales of redundant licenses..
If this were true then Microsoft would not have persuaded Federal prosecutors to lower their estimates. Originally prosecutors claimed the discs were valued at $299 a pop but Microsoft informed them that they sold refurbishers a license for $25 and that the discs were worth $20 at most.
Most OEM Restore/Recovery media do not prompt the user for a product key. They either have key/license hidden on a recovery partition on the machine, stored in the firmware, or hardcoded on the disc.
It's unclear how his disc worked but what is clear is that he was not a licensed software distributor and did not have the rights to distribute Microsoft's media.
If someone gives away 100 free books, that doesn't give you permission to make copies of their book and sell them with the caveat that only people who received one of the free 100 books could buy them. How is this different?