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US Military Settles Software Piracy Claims For $50M
Rambo Tribble writes "The BBC reports that the U. S. government has agreed to pay software maker Apptricity $50 million to settle claims that the U.S. Army pirated thousands of copies of the firm's provisioning software. The report indicates 500 licensed copies were sold, but it came to light an army official had mentioned that 'thousands' of devices were running the software." $50 million in tax money could have paid for a whole lot of open source software development, instead.
$50 million could have paid for a whole lot of private sector open source software development.
If the military had spent the money on development, they might have finished the request for proposals before running out of funding...
it could have also paid for the software... and probably be a lot cheaper then $50 million on open source...
I only say this because there is an obvious 'zomg go open source' vibe to the post... Obviously, it would be nice id governments threw money at open source software development, but then o then taxpayers would probably complain since it doesn't directly benefit them in a way their minds can comprehend
$50 million in tax money could have paid for a whole lot of open source software development, instead.
Bullshit. A government designed website cost over $600 million, for $50 million you only get the committee that argues about the design, and only for a year or so.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
$50 million in tax money could have paid for a whole lot of open source software development, instead.
How would that not be spending tax dollars to compete with private industry? What kind of an ass backwards priority system does this poster have? Take money away from honest citizens at gun point and give this money to their competition? How is this even remotely ethical?
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
I think timothy added the FOSS douchebag statement, not the submitter.
Tired of being "punished" by the Slashdot $rtbl since 2002. I'm now over at http://soylentnews.org/ .
Most likely what happened is the US Military bought the software, which may or may not be the best solution but clearly it was the most viable software solution available suited for the specific needs of modern arm forces logistics. Then what happened is the user seat requirements outstripped the original purchase numbers. BECAUSE THE FRIGGIN' SOFTWARE is written on a per seat basis and most likely a timed rental lease. And this is why the distribution became a warez situation.
EVERYBODY wants to pull a Microsoft and create something that becomes a cash cow that feeds them beyond the actual value of the original creation, is timed to expire and cause the users to send more cash.
Now we complicate the situation with the recent cutbacks in military funding for procurement of frills like this software. Someone with a hand on the accounting made the decision that increasing the site license numbers was not financially justified. This in turn caused the military IT person(s) responsible for deployment of this software to but heads with staff that was lower down than the pencil necks that cut their procurement budgets. So most likely some Colonel somewhere reamed out the poor IT staff so bad about not having the rights to deploy more copies without the budget that they just turned a blind eye and handed out copies instead of facing some Colonel Blowhard every time Lieutenant Hothead complained about the IT department not letting them accomplish their mission.
This message was not sent from an iPhone because Peter Sellers really was a deviated prevert without a dime for the call
Random teenager downloads enough music CDs to fill his iPod -> millions in damage representing the sum of the full price of each song
US government downloads software on more devices it's licensed to -> get's a 90% discount in the fine and not even a warning