Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft 'Open Value Subscription' is None of the Above
daveofdoom writes "This week Microsoft launched an SMB program that contains the words 'open', 'value' and 'subscription', none of which are common to Microsoft products, culture, or marketing. Digging in a bit I found myself confused not only by what the program portends to be but why it would be called 'Open Value Subscription' unless they were hoping to leverage buzzwords and concepts related to open source and SaaS (software as a service). It's such lame and dishonest branding the marketing group should be ashamed."
Microsoft has referred to their MSDN stuff as a subscription, or at least used to. I dunno, I weened myself off the redmond teat a long time ago and no longer have to deal with their crappy products.
And now that I think about it, Value is a pretty normal thing to put in the name of something. So that leaves us with Open, and if you read what the thing actually is, a slightly flexible account without exact license numbers on it, that actually makes some sense.
In other words, this is a pretty normal product name, a guy going off in a post for no reason to abuse Microsoft when there are plenty of GOOD reasons to abuse Microsoft, and an editor who really, really can't tell what is news.
7. What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence.
I'm guessing that the submitter is a Linux guy looking to make some anti-Microsoft noise on a slow news day. Why?
Digging in a bit I found myself confused not only by what the program portends to be but why it would be called it 'Open Value Subscription' unless they were hoping to leverage buzzwords and concepts related to open source and SaaS (software as a service).
It's not an attempt to trade on buzzwords and concepts related to Open Source and SaaS. Microsoft has used the term "Open" for years in their licensing programs (at least a decade that I'm aware of).
For years there have been three main categories of volume licenses. They are "Open" (for small businesses who only buy a handful of licenses at a time), "Select" (for large businesses with higher purchasing requirements) and "Enterprise" (for the largest organizations). As you move up the tiers the per-license cost gets lower and the associated benefits increase. For example, if you have an Open license you are expected to buy a license before deploying software. With the higher level agreements you are required to perform a regular "true-up" where you audit the number of licenses in use, compare that count to the number of licenses you own, and then buy enough to cover the gap. At the highest level you are only required to true-up annually. As you can imagine, this makes it a lot more difficult for the BSA to come in and claim that you're using unlicensed software.
The "Value" part of the name refers to features that are included with the volume license plans, and the actual "Value" increases as you move up the tiers. "Value" benefits can include a set number of Microsoft Consulting hours per year, a number of "free" support incidents, and a number of units of training on Microsoft products. Some even include vouchers for Microsoft certification exams.
The "Subscription" part of the name refers to the fact that you are paying an annual licensing fee. This used to be simply called Software Assurance, but nobody was buying it. Instead they started bundling more benefits and called it what it is, an annual subscription.
So there's no mystery there, and certainly nobody trying to trade on the good names of "Open Source" and "SaaS."
I just love how people who know nothing about Microsoft other than "I'm supposed to hate them" are always jumping to the most nefarious conclusions based on the most flimsy and innocuous of evidence.