Sun Tries Subscription Software Pricing

Sequoia writes "According to this article, 'The company's new pricing model for its systems will be based on a company's employee count, as declared in a company's annual filings with government regulators. Sun will charge $100 an employee for a single package that includes an application server, a Web portal and security software, among other components -- all of which Sun executives say will work together in a more integrated fashion than they did previously.'" Sun's press information is a little more informative.

Comments

Re:OMG!

[Schwartzboy]

Thought it was MS, never mind, my bad. ;)

Okay, okay, just RTFB (blurb) already. Not only does it refer to "Sun", which is a bringer of light and all things good and shiny, which is obviously anti-MS, but the /. blurb also claims that the licensing is $100 per employee. If it were an MS strategy, there'd be some extra zeroes...either that, or it'd be $150 per to start and $100 per "essential patch", plus complete ownership of any and all works produced by any users, authorized or not, while using the system. Duh.
Seriously, this doesn't seem like such a horrendous idea in and of itself, but I wonder if there are any companies x such that y number of users within the organization will not want to/be able to switch, or be required to run, say, Mac OSX on lime-green iThingies because they're tied to some Mac-only apps. Would companies still be charged per-employee in that case? Still a very good deal I'd argue, if said employees were in a significant minority, but some CTO out there might not like his $50K quarterly bonus being eaten into to the tune of $699...er, $700 for that handful of marketing drones. I'm sure that a question like this will pop up eventually, or not.