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Apple Offers Cheap Jaguar Server Upgrade for XServe
MaxVlast writes "Macintouch is reporting that Apple is extending the Mac OS X Up-to-Date and Mac OS X Server Up-to-Date programs to include Jaguar Server upgrades for just $19.95 in response to intense criticism. This is good news to people who just bought an expensive XServe with expensive Mac OS X Server who don't very much want to pay the full upgrade price." Apple also added that people who bought Mac OS X 10.1 retail, by itself, can get an upgrade if purchased July 17 or later.
Since you're posting as an AC, I have no idea who you are or what your background is. So I'll assume that you're just ignorant, and not stupid.
Free or super-cheap software upgrades are kind of a myth. For example, Microsoft offers upgrades to Windows XP for owners of '98, ME, NT4, and 2000 only, and that price is $199. If you're still running '95, you can only upgrade to XP by buying the full $299 retail package, or by buying a new computer.
At the high end, you typically only get upgrades on operating systems if you buy a support contract. I don't know about Sun or HP or IBM, specifically, but with SGI you have to pay $500 for each point release of the OS, unless you stay under a support contract. (Until recently, it was $2,000 per release.) So to go from 6.5.15f to 6.5.16f, it's $500, and from 6.5.16f to 6.5.17f, it's another $500. And these are minor feature releases, sent out every quarter. They're tiny in comparison to Apple's mostly-annual major feature releases. (SGI has two OS branches: feature [f] and maintenance [m]. You get bug fixes for free within the same major release, but you have to pay for new features. The maintenance releases have replaced the old patch system, where each bug fix was packaged separately and could be downloaded individually.)
So the idea that you should get OS X 10.2 for free or almost for free is out of line with the way the industry works. Bug fixes are free: 10.0.[1-4] and 10.1.[1-5] were free downloads to all users, whether they were under AppleCare or not. Hell, Apple didn't even check to see if you had a pirated copy of OS X; the OS has no serial number mechanism in it at all, so everybody gets bug fixes for free, even if they didn't buy the OS.
And as new feature releases goes, $129 is the lowest price in the industry, as far as I know.
So no, you're wrong. Pricing 10.2 as a for-sale upgrade only (except for specific price-protection situations) won't "sour anyone who bought 10.1 server." Unless they're pretty unreasonable and unrealistic people with no knowledge of how this sort of thing usually works, they won't be "soured" at all.
While I would feel like a cheap-skate, I would feel vindicated at this outrageous racketeering - $129 for an OS update. I thought only Microsoft (Win98 SE) pulled crap like that.
Read this post. Microsoft and every other OS vendor in the industry charge for feature releases. And all of them charge more for their feature releases than Apple is charging for Jaguar.
The fact that you bought the OS once doesn't mean you're entitled to a free copy of every release of the OS forever. That's a nice idea on its face and all, but it's not in line with industry practices.