Testking & Microsoft

Static M.e.

"So, a booth babe and a geek walk in to a bar..."

http://blogs.msdn.com/trika/default.aspx

Though some of you might find this interesting

So I got the OK to share some news about Microsoft's settlement with Testking. From our perspective, and hopefully your perspective, and hopefully the perspective of other IT certification programs... it is really good news. Here is part of the internal announcement from Shon, our Microsoft Learning guy who focuses on issues like this:

Microsoft has reached a settlement with Testking, the world’s largest braindump distributor, to immediately cease illegal use of Microsoft Certification exam content. ....Braindump companies provide a “shortcut” to IT certifications by helping people with limited product knowledge and expertise pass IT exams. Ultimately, this devalues the achievements of the many individuals who legitimately passed exams thanks to in-depth study and hands-on technology experience. ....Under the terms of this settlement, Testking has agreed to immediately cease marketing, selling, distributing, publishing, reproducing, disseminating, offering or otherwise knowingly transferring in any way any actual Microsoft Certification Exams content.

Top two reasons we think this is really good news:

Testking is really big, and will now only be providing legitimate study materials via Testking.com and their other websites.
This should raise awareness about what is/is not acceptable use of intellectual property in the certification world -- and discourage other 'braindump' providers -- so that those of you who make the effort and commitment to pass exams on the real get the recognition you deserve.

_CreeD_

I don't think it goes far enough though. I wonder where they draw the line between a braindump and a reworded question from the real thing. Plus there was no retribution and therefore no real deterrent to similar companies. Not that big of a deal anyway as the only real solution lies with exam vendors like Msoft increasing their question pool to the point that a dump is pointless. Surely it'd be much less effort than trying to litigate or go to extremes as they seem to be doing with the MCA (just look at all the pre-requisites for that thing). They have a solution they can implement staring them in the face and have never bothered to use it.

mick.fr

That's a good news, even if I am not convinced it will really heradicate all "braindump" sources, but definitely Testking is the biggest with a few satelite websites.
That will be great if some IT guys would actually open a book, read and understand it rather than learning by heart the replies and pretend to be a sys admin because they hold a MCSA or MCSE.
But Microsoft is not the only company and cert path image affected.
CompTia is hugely affected, Cisco and Redhat a lot as well.

Anyway there will always have a fundamental difference between the braindump user (or abuser) and a real good IT guy : The salary, the recognition and the respect !

Lazyness has never paid :-)