IIRC I saw someone somewhere say it was for tax reasons.

Oh how quickly the joy was dashed after opening the pack.  Don't get me wrong, I'm still amazed at being 1 of the 400 winners of the launch event software but it's labelled as a promotional pack?  There's nothing wrong with that, at least I thought there was nothing wrong but then I see that it's only a 12 month evaluation copy.  What I don't quite get is why it's only an evaluation copy of both Windows Server 2008 and SQL Server 2008 (when it's released) when it was meant to be a prize for only 400 winners.  I can't help but feel very disappointed that a prize has a time limit on it of 1 year when, if you download an ordinary trial of Server 2008, you can extend that to around 240 days without entering a key easily and legally.

Reading the terms and conditions I notice now it clearly states this is indeed the prize and that's my own fault for not reading them clearly before entering but again I have to ask how it's much of a prize when you can get a trial of the same software for roughly 8 months.  Kinda makes being a winner not worth much in the end.  Yay I won ..... a trial version.  Apologies in advance if I sound bitter but I guess that's the best way to describe it.