Slashdot Mirror
Choosing Microsoft Products May Cost 10-40% More
securitas writes "Jupiter Research has issued a report that says businesses that choose to stay with Microsoft products may end up paying anywhere from 10%-40% more than if they chose another solution. Software Assurance clients will see the lowest costs and SA-have-nots will see the highest costs. The rationale is that Microsoft's strategy of integrating server and client software, as it has done with the new Windows Server 2003 and Microsoft Office 2003 suite, will force costly upgrades and licenses. Ultimately the goal is to transform Office into a platform instead of a collection of applications. Analyst Joe Wilcox says, "Microsoft argues that increased integration will cut down ongoing costs, maintenance and what not, but whether that will be the case has yet to be seen. The increased acquisition costs, though, are pretty clear." This leaves the door open for other office suites like Corel WordPerfect, Sun StarOffice and OpenOffice. More on costs and integration at Jupiter/Wilcox's Microsoft Monitor Blog."
FuckMicrosoft.com has the largest list of Microsoft-alternative software that I have ever seen.
There are other costs associated with software than the upfront cost paid. This article does not account for those costs. Second, for those under SA you don't see the big costs of upgrading.
Costs that come up when switch.
Testing (QA) on the new product, mainly to help develop some means of support across the organization; ie standards. You also have to determine the best install of the package and how to deliver it. (is it easy to push?)
Training. Sure it might LOOK like package X. The key is finding the quirks that generate support calls and find solutions.
Prior investment. If it works, its even cheaper to not upgrade and keep the old stuff.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
I assume you're joking, however I'll still bite. You've made several bad assumptions:
"Microsoft argues that increased integration will cut down ongoing costs, maintenance and what not, but whether that will be the case has yet to be seen...
Yeah, like how integration of IE into windows OS has cut down on maintenance costs.
If you look at the actual article, they note that "Wilcox estimates that firms taking Microsoft up on its offer to integrate back-end processes with front-end client software on the desktop may run up tabs 10 to 40 percent higher than with earlier editions of Microsoft's products, depending on the server licenses and client access licenses (CALs) they purchase. "
That is all. This is not a comparison against Linux, Macintosh or whatever competing Office suites may be left. This is simply an alalysis of how Microsoft's vendor lock-in--- umm, i mean, how the vertical integration of Microsoft's products affects the amount that companies will pay to use those products.
Isn't it grand how monopolies lower prices for consumers because they're more Efficient? Ahhh.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
dear worker drones:
- My Documents is now
/home/drone
- you'll be using mozilla instead of IE for the internet. you'll notice the lack of popups.
- the big K = start button
Thanks.management.
p.s. since we have transitioned over to linux, and saved shitloads, we'll be upping the christmas, er, holiday bonus this year.
sure, there is support options. but look at it this way: if you save money on software licenses, virus attacks, security holes, etc., then you got a few bucks to hire a linux admin. nuff said. it is that easy. businesses just have to be willing to bite the bullet.
My problem? I was perfectly gruntled, until some numbnuts came by and dissed me.
The article is not about the cost difference between say Office and Open Office, but between the current pricing and software structure versus the future.
It would be ludicrous to use this articele as a vehicle to prove the viability of Star Office, say, versus Office. I find the description of this article very misleading. Any new generation/paradigm(is it a paradigm? I'll check Kuhn) can result in a rise in total cost of acquisition or even ownership.
This applies to any software, free or not. If PHP or HTTP were radically changed, would it not require significant investment to reintegrate old applications? IPv6, while necessary in the lon run will undoubetedly cause an initial cost of migration.
What are the costs of migrating from office to Open Office? What are the costs of then intregrating Open Office into the organization as tool for scheduling, data sharing, etc.?
do busineses really sit down and say, "first you take the mouse, move it over the text, push and hold the button, no the left one..."
Hell yes, they do! And it's not because their employees are "stupid" or whatever other moronic arguments you make.
If you work in IT, then it's obvious that you know something about how to use a computer. Sure, some companies expect some people in some jobs to have computer literacy skills, and usually those skills are on MS Office, or Wordperfect or Lotus 1-2-3. Training and retraining really is expensive. People in, say, accounting or manufacturing know how to do THEIR jobs, not YOURS. They don't spend their days tinkering with computers, they spend it doing a real job for which they get paid real money.
If you were to take my marketing job, I GUARANTEE you would get your ass handed to you, day in and day out, forever. You don't know how to use a machine tool? You don't know how to close a company's quarterly books? You don't know how the mailroom works? Boy, you must be a complete moron.
Yes, you're expected to know how to "use a freaking computer". That computer is called an x86 personal computer running Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office. My marketing job is not valuable unless I know how to use that OS and those applications, and I know how to use them well.