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Microsoft Customers Get No Bang for Buck
sammy baby writes "Software missing its ship date is commonplace enough that it's usually only mentioned for yuks. However, subscribers to Microsoft's Software Assurance program are discovering that it can have some very real repercussions. According to NetworkWorld, many licencees are discovering that due to slipping release dates, many thousands of dollars spent on these contracts have brought them zero return."
Finally there are real, measurable monetary losses that customers can sue for.
let this thing linger for a few days/weeks, let more and more people vent their (righteous) anger at the utter waste of money that the licensing has proved to be and then, magnanimously, they will offer a renewal option for three years for the price of two with a guaranteed major release or a refund of half the price (or something like that). And all the while, they'll paint themselves as being responsive as opposed to the reality of them being abusive (in the monopolistic sense)
I am one of those IT managers that had a real problem with Microsoft's Licensing 6.0. By essentially forcing IT managers into pre-paying for upgrades every three years that they may or may not use and removing any possibility of customer loyalty upgrades, Microsoft went from fair preservation of their revenue flow to outright extortion.
Essentially you are being asked to pay a substantial amount of your IT budget for an upgrade sight unseen. Usually before you bring a product into your company you evaluate it for technical soundness and applicability to user needs and business requirements.
Microsoft seems to assume that their upgrades will always meet these requirements.
If you don't want to repeat the past, stop living in it.
Every software developer knows that big releases to production systems is a bad idea. I would much rather have small incremental releases. That way when a release causes a problem only a small area has to be examined.
Maybe it's different with Microsoft software.
However I expect people like getting there shrink wrapped dvd new version rather than applying a small downloaded patch.
----
..that e.g. SuSE (with their Enterprise Software) offers something similar:
;-)
during the time you have a maintenance contract
- which is required to actually download
patches - you can also upgrade to a newer
version of the product, if it is available.
So you actually pay for the maintenance and get
upgrades "free".
Microsoft should do the same, then people would stop whining. At least for the above reason
Windows 2000 - from the guys who brought us edlin
Companies are not aware of thier SA bennies - like spread payments - training - home useage and purchase program, new version rights, support, etc...
Ignorance of bennies does not mean that the SA program is bad.
I reccommend companies using every single benefit therefore getting all the bang for their bucks.
SA is a good program - and there is such a thing as negotiations as well.
trust me, MS wants their customers happy
I happened to be in charge of IT for two different small companies near the Software Assurance deadline, and made the recommendation to decline the move to SA.
In both cases, it just did not look worthwhile... I didn't think the Microsoft product cycle was likely to be fast enough to warrant the subscription. (Plus I was annoyed with the enforced change, as were many other folks in the industry... but that wasn't sufficient basis for the decision, alas.)
But it was a pretty high stakes game. Guessing wrong would cost thouands of dollars in the long run for each company. It's quite a relief to see that I guessed correctly... so far.
Amusingly, Microsoft has now managed to give pretty much all of its business customers cause to be annoyed with them. The first group was annoyed by the enforced choice between the loss of upgrade value and the expense of Software Assurance. The second group, that chose SA, should be getting pissed off right about... [checks watch]... now.
With reasonable men I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter. -- William Lloyd
Thing is, how can Microsoft ever sell these subscriptions again to companies that paid and got nothing?
Reduce the cost to halfprice for renewing your old licence. That way those that got ripped off before won't feel so bad and those that haven't yet been ripped off still have that option available.
Small problem. There is a huge difference between publishing a roadmap/timeline and keeping it. Software is sadly a hugely complex product. Worse it is horribly interconnected meaning that it takes forever to properly test and you can bet the moment it is out someone comes accross a situation you never though off.
But this is well known. So nobody in their right mind counts on a software product being released on time or in a promised form. Like the real world you only trust what is actually right there in front of you.
Would you buy a car that during the testdrive fails the brake test but they promise they fix it in yours? Of course not. So why do you buy software that you tested as broken but they will fix it in a patch they are going to make?
This is even worse. This is like buying a car on the promise that if they come out with a better model in 3 years they will give you that one.
No the people who signed up for this are MS junkies of the worst kind. They will signup again cause it is easier then thinking. Worse if they don't signup again they will have to admit they weren't thinking the first time. Signup again and all they gotta do is gloss over the fact that nothing was received in return. That is easy.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Here in the UK you are entitled, to a large extent, to what you are told you were paying for.
If a salesman tells you there is a new release due at least seven months before the end of your contract, you have a reasonable expectation that it is included in the cost. If you don't get what you were told you were being sold, you are due a refund.
If it can be shown that the vendor (or sales representative) told you something they knew to be untrue, or undeliverable, they are liable to criminal sanction.
Any internal admission that the upgrade was not going to ship within the published timeframe, made before the contract was signed could land MS in deep do-do...
>>>>truth; beauty; unix.<<<<
I don't know the numbers but I do work for my state insurance fund and transportation department and every state agency here buys these licenses....
And in the end who really pays for it? We do....
How much longer are we really going to stand for this?
Or could it be I'm still pissed about moving into a state that has income tax......
"A $368 Office license would carry nearly a $107 fee for Software Assurance. "
Thats less than $10 per month.
Considering the number of stupid websites that are aching to charge $5 per month subscriptions, $10 a month regular for real software doesn't seem so bad.
Sam
blog.sam.liddicott.com
It appears to me that Windows/Office/etc. are finally becoming "good enough" and people/companies are not seeing the need to upgrade anymore. (I know.. both windows and office are still buggy and closed source, but for most desktop users they are good enough... finally). What does this do to Microsoft's business model of "force your customers to upgrade every x number of years"? I imagine that is why Bill G. wants the world to go to subscription based software (i.e. rent Office per month).
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= - The Celtic - =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
You are a CTO. You advised to buy the software assurance plan at first.
Now you have two choices. Recommended renewal and possible have to explain if your ceo is even aware that no the old subscription was perhaps not full value. (can easily be argued that instead you paid for the patches, god knows there been enougn for them. Also easy to show figures it is actually cheaper, MS salesrep can give you those).
OR you tell that you were wrong before and are responsible for wasting shitloads of money in a down economy for absolutly no return whatsoever.
Mmmm. Though choice ain't it? MS doesn't have to sell anything. All the people who bought it will sell it for them or be fired.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
This all is just a terrible misunderstanding.
Microsoft wants a fixed revenue-stream for the minimum of possible work.
No, I understood that. That's why I got in hot water with my boss for laughing at the IT Director when he told me they signed up for SA.
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!
What is more important is: Will the update worth it?
I mean who is stopping Microsoft in merely repackaging MS Office with some new icons or even better a new file format?
I personally think that's worse than no upgrade at all.
I've only experienced Office XP and I can say without a doubt that it's more resource hungry than OOo. I'm willing to assume that Office 2000 was a lot lighter, based on your comment. Both Office XP and OOo feel equally sluggish on this machine (P4 2.4GHz.)
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
which is less stable, less compatible and less resource-efficient than O2k
My crufty old P133 runs OpenOffice just fine, more efficiently than Word97 (and I'd be really surprised to learn the O2K is *more* resource-efficient than an older version...) Less compatible? I haven't had any trouble with any Word docs anybody sends me (though they do tend to have trouble with sxw docs I send *them* when I forget to do a save-as).
Slashdot's token middle-aged housewife
He's probably talking about 1.0, or an earlier version. They were considerably more resource hungry. (Of course, with so few details, one can't rule out a troll...)
Or it might just be that he doesn't notice how much of MSOffice gets loaded at boot time. And if you're using OOo 1.0, I wouldn't advise you to use the quickstart, because it's flakey. This is solved in the more recent versions.
But, depending on what you are doing, there are still places where OOo is notably inferior to MSOffice, at least on MSWind platforms.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.