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Does Your Employer Ban Skype?
neutralino asks: "This morning, we received an company-wide email stating that the Max Planck Society (a German government funded research organization) has outlawed the use of P2P software at all of its institutes (including ours). The statement specifically singled out the use of Skype for internet telephony. The reasons given for this were that 'the exchanged data cannot be controlled' (therefore it might be illegal) and that 'Max-Planck or research resources in general might be abused, if "only" for commercial purposes.' This caught us by surprise, since many of us use VoIP to communicate with friends and family and collaborators, in our respective home countries. Is it now standard practice for companies, government organizations, and universities to outlaw Skype? Should it be?"
And you were commenting on how it did not mean what they thought it meant. Just because _YOU_ don't know what a word means does not mean nobody else does. The way we are able to communicate with each other is with a shared understanding of what words mean. You jumped on the submitter's choice of words, but did it in a way that didnot indicate full understanding of the words used. I chose to show you a link to a definition of the words in question. you chose to call me a cock when you saw that you were wrong. Good comeback. :)
...all are investors, and read fairly conservative old mainstream investment periodicals. All those places are pushing heavy (follow the prooganda) for the telcos to limit such things as skype, so, knowing how monopoly cartels work, they are assured this will happen, by law or otherwise. Even if some places are using things like skype, or open source freebie ware, they get *nervous* when big costs aren't associated with something, they instinctively think it's a con, or a dodge, or something that eventually will get them screwed. They can't conceive of themseves giving something useful away, so they assume anyone else doing it has to be insane or a crook or both. If it's a con or dodge THEY think up, swell, most of them will try it out, but someone elses, with the word "free", just gives them the trembling buckwheats. The telcos are a big part of most execs portfolios. They want to support their "investments". The telcos hates the skypes and vonages, and are much bigger, and older and more entrenched and more bluechip, hence, they are the "good guys" and "real businesses" to most (not all, but most) management/boss class investor types. Even when they take a flyer on something like a google, look what just happened when google posted a slightly smaller profit increase,(stilol huge but apparently not huge enough) most of those boss-calss those investor types bailed out screaming. Because in their minds they knew it was too good to be true, because deep down google doesn't charge money for searching, and they can never understand how not charging will ever work. intellectually they might understand how it works, but in their hearts they just don't get it, and are hard wired in their brains to *never* get it..
This is also why there is such a struggle to get open source adoption, management level stock portfolios, both in corporations and in government. They see the word "free" and they start to sweat, free means somehow they get no money in their eyes,or their drinking buddies at ye olde skull and bones brewery get no money, and big business and entrenched big government (it's the same really) is completely based on the profits at any cost, got to keep growing and kill the competition theory. If it can't be owned and closed off and exploited, it's a threat, even it's in an industry outside their own interests, they still have to preserve their "way of life" with "investments". Anything outside that club is..outside, the enemy, jumpstart interlopers.
It's easier if you think of it this way, managers and above and big politicians and entrenched bureaucrats (in net parlance this is called the "monied elite") are Ferengi, there are some things they are never going to "get" no matter what. They are not normal human in their outlook for the most part. To them, Bill Gates = good. They understand a fellow ruthless pirate. Linus Torvalds (if they recognize the name) = someone who should be hung or deported at a minimum.
I don't see this as terribly good or bad, just "is" is all. Been that way since the first cave dude offered wholesale clubs for trade at very great expense and would brain the competition with his expensive product.