Many "server" orientated techies out there are oblivious to the fact that large organizations require the discipline of running a managed desktop. This means as much as possible desktops should be in a managed state through a consistent desktop image deployment followed by managed updates. This misconception that desktop users have more "freedom" is demonstrated by the confusion that this "internal" note within IBM has caused so many, when in fact it is a simple policy that prevents headaches. You think managing a server farm of 1000 servers is difficult? Try managing 100,000 desktops where globally you need to ensure you can deploy the same suite applications and support various country customizations like language support.
More than most Fortune 500s, IBM has a lot of different applications from developer tools to web applications used by their backoffice and sales staff. Nobody managing such a large desktop infrastructure would not do all they could to mitigate the headache having to fix desktops where the user thought through all the hype that it would be smart for them to download and install SP2. You may even laugh to know that in my experience (not at IBM of course) the techies are the worst of the lot. Thinking, hey I'll just install this because the IT guys will come install it sooner or later anyway...and I want a more secure desktop as the people on Slashdot keep telling me how insecure my XP box is. And then boom, there come the support calls:
"Half of all my applications don't work anymore"-Mr Smarty "Did you install anything before this happend"-Support "Nope. I was minding my own business and now half of my applications don't work, and I get this new icon in my system tray. Now I can't do my work."-Mr Smarty "Are you sure you didn't install anything?"-Support "Well, there was this update...uhm, XP SP2"-Mr Smarty Click... -Support
Corporate espionage is something that is feared; however, all this really does in inconvenience those who are using these devices legitimately. I would trust that in an organization who has a real security concern, that they would have appropriate ACLs in place so that data theft would be limited to what the user that already has security clearance.
Now if you have already cleared someone to be viewing and working with such data, you have much bigger problems than fearing them stealing it with a USB device. It's like trusting your employees with your business in their day to day operations but keeping office supplies under lock and key. It just doesn't make sense. If someone is intent on ripping you off, they would't go for the small stuff. Similiarly, if your business depends on these people who have access to such "crown jewel" data you'd better hope that you have a good hiring process and that you are keeping your employees happy.
A side rant: so you're all concerned about people with USB devices; yet, you're fine with shipping your data off to some foreign land for outsourcing. Hmmm... If only the world were based on logic!
It is egocentric of one to think that the Chinese are actually worried about isolation. Although, the majority of it's population could be classified as poor and rural, the fact remains that there is a market of close to 1.3 billion people there. Why wouldn't they help themselves before helping foreigners?
On a hair blow dryer. A little research found that a company was sued when a guy used his hair dryer to keep himself warm by turning it on and throwing it in his blankets. He fell asleep and became crispy after the fire that started. Amazing, the moron won.
I say warnings like this should be omitted on purpose so that people without this common sense are weeded out of the gene pool.
I've been in IT for just over ten years now. I'm just as worried as any other; however, I do see a diminishing rate of return from people with simply more "programming" experience.
How much a premium do you pay for someone with 10+ years of C++ experience? If you have budget for five senior development staff, would you get the same value by hiring two 10+ year experience individuals to supervise and mentor six with only 2 years experience?
I guess this all has to be taken in context though. For just a code monkey position, really do you need someone with that much experience? Just having someone churn out code?
But let's say you code specialized derivatives trading algorithms or something that is deemed a major revenue producer product, where 10+ years of C++ plus 10+ years of business logic understanding...that's where you pay top dollar.
This is also the basis of a lot of "outsourcing" arguments. Code monkeys are the next McD's workers unless you have an intimate understanding of the business or have other non-IT skills that make you sell yourself better than the next guy.
What about allowing only VPN connections through your Wireless router? This would detach your reliance on the wireless protocol's security. Even if someone is sniffing or even breaks your WiFi security, all they will get is your encrypted VPN traffic.
It is not arrogance. In what way is Real number 2 even? Things could have been different for Real, there was a time when they were at the forefront of streaming technology. They lost this spot in my eyes when the began to lose focus an instead of concentrating on technology and finding sustainable revenue streams, went for the cheap shots of getting people to pay for what others offered for free, making it very difficult to find the free version of their product, and above all loading people's desktop with tons of garbage. I have lived life without the Real player and when a site does not give me a choice, I show them my contempt by leaving the site.
If this is a next gen review of email clients, well Outlook 2003 is newer significantly different. Just because it comes from Microsoft doesn't mean it should automatically be discounted.
There is nothing here that is out of the ordinary with any other consumer good. The money is in making products with high consumer demand, and hence consumer monitor manufacturers are stepping up to the high demand on LCD panels versus CRTs.
The market that you fall into is what would be "specialty".
Red Hat manages the product life cycle of open source projects, are you certain you understand what this means? I'm sure most people working on open source projects would beg to differ. Your assertion that RH manages product life cycle, would in the least mean that RH defines scope and direction for projects such as SAMBA. Your comment would mean that RH provides direction into what new functionality should be added into GNOME. Please let me know if I have misinterpreted you.
I would like to add my comments that are quite contrary to yours. I have had no difficulties with tech support from any of our global vendors. that my company deals with. I have issues escalated to level three support personel in a timely manner.
The difference here is that you get what you pay for. If you paid nothing for your support, you can't really expect too much. Because for every one person like you, there really are dozens who call and the basic checks like "Is it plugged in?" or "Did you turn the power on?" actually resolve the problem. The difficult is that technology support desks used to service technically savvy customers who could rebuild it themselves if they had to. Today, technology consumers are far less tech savvy.
To top this off, I never have issues with "pay-per-incident" support. Because I only use those when I have exhausted every resource available to me. I have had a certain company assist me through an issue that took them sixteen hours to resolve for me. Not because of their lack of compentence; but, because of the complexities in our environment. It was a steal, as I had three engineers working on it and the final price tag was a twentieth of what it would have cost if a consultant spent sixteen hours on it.
I've seen an argument that open source is only free is one's time is worthless. I work for a multi-national and we have similiar requirements of twenty-four hour worldwide support. From what I've seen in technology three is never a swiss-army knife solution despite what many people here on slashdot believe, open source is not always the best answer.
Nowadays, management has a very different spin on IT. Gone are the days where IT wrongly drove business and the CIO had the company by the privates. Management teams are now IT savvy, and no longer write blank cheques to IT based on IT's requirements.
The argument that, if it is broken we have the source and we can fix it is no argument at all. Unless you are an IT company, your core business is not the business of IT. Why would you pour resources into IT to develop a skillset in your company to maintain software? How does that improve profitability? It doesn't. The cost of having one expert to fix a handful of problems, will never be competitive against an organization who's business model revolves around maintaining their product.
Take a look at how commercial software is built and maintained. Direction is driven by customers and revenue. How is open source driven? I don't know, maybe someone can help me. Who manages the product life-cycle in open source?
I am not anti-open-source, nor anti-Microsoft. I believe that for your case, you should ask management for their requirements. If one of their answers is 24/7 world-wide vendor support. You just have to accept it and move on. Sometimes their answers are not technically driven. Remember you are probably working for a company built on capatilism. Again, accept it and move on. They sign your paycheques not the other way around.
-Many recipes are "open source." Why do people still eat out? You'd pay less than half, and have control over the source if you cook yourself!
There is a definite correlation between a product's upcoming end of life and a rebate offer. I find that many tech vendors use rebates as a method of discounting their products that are nearing end-of-life to assist retailers in moving out old inventory so that they can bring in the new. With so many replies on this topic, it appears that they are quite successful too.
The manufacturer you must remember as well does not typically have direct financial relations with the retailer, so it would be difficult for them to credit the retailer for their existing inventory. So this is win/win for the manufacturer. As discussed many times above, they are betting on the fact that a certain percentage of people will not make use of the rebate but still purchase the product. A well known manufacturer need not be purposely deceitful in their rebates. In fact, they have done their math otherwise they wouldn't offer them in the first place.
I had to take the "free" out, because Americans are obviously just brave. The US is a country that lacks:
1) Freedom of speech 2) Freedom to smoke natural unprocessed plants 3) Freedom of press, (yeah, CNN is NOT a propaganda engine, keep telling yourself that)
Americans are sure quick to fight wars in foreign lands, while leaving their homeland unprotected from tyranny.
I think it wise to separate the logic that states: 1) IE is a core part of Microsoft OS 2) Microsoft is unable to remove IE as a core part of the OS
Number (1) may be true but number (2) definitely is not. The browser may be key to the UI for windows, but they could quickly remove it and replace it with non-browser based components if they chose to. They simply chose not to right now.
The "dark ages"? Oh you mean when content was delivered to me a a nicely formated text form without the bright flashing and popping ads coming from nowhere? Sure, bring it on. My personal website is usable and pretty and made with only HTML. Not because lack the knowledge to do scripting or use my cr@cked copy of Flash, but because I chose not to sully my pages with dirt.
I hate plug-ins and scripting within webpages. I disable all plug-ins and scripting on my browser when I surf. I notice the most annoying of pop-up, pop-back, animated advertisements dissappear or at least are rendered broken in some respect.
I'm sure Microsoft cares, but I miss the days when web pages only contained tightly written HTML and all that was used to display and collect information.
Whoever this company is, they're trying to generate news just for the PR. Check link for contact: http://www.searchking.com/news/skad.htm
Instead of message submit or email address, you get an ad for themselves selling ad space because he recognizes the exposure he'll get for the lawsuit.
Someone please call this company and tell him he is an idiot. I think he doesn't know.
Any child should be wary of talking to strangers. Parents do a good job of educating kids on the dangers of talking to strangers, before they put their kids online they just need to re-iterate that it is dangerous to talk to strangers, and that it is no different online. Few children would give out their phone number or address to a stranger on the street, they shouldn't on the net either.
The revenue model here is practiced by many industries apart from computer printers. Razor manufacturers, water filtration devices, and motorized tooth brushes are good examples. Razors, Brita water filteration units, and electric motorized tooth-brushes are sold at cost and sometimes below cost by manufacturers because they know the real revenue stream is the consumables that are used later on.
If you don't like it, just don't buy a printer. Why have a hard copy anyway? Just killing trees for no reason.
My rant at this point is how I try not to laugh when I see people printing out online documentation. Hello, it is online, why bother printing it?!?!
You have an interesting stand point. Here are my answers to some of your questions:
They're just trying to make money
Sure, by using up resources that they did not pay for. 1) I pay for internet access so that I can communicate with those I want to 2) resources are being wasted to store and forward the spam emails 3) resources are being wasted to delete the email
...it's really not that hard to delete the stuff.
It's really not hard to do a lot of stuff. Like protecting yourself against criminals isn't that hard, perhaps we don't need police? Seriously though, it doesn't matter that it is not difficult. It is the sheer volume. I have some email accounts that I use as "fake" email accounts when I think I'll be spammed by the people I'm giving out my email to. One of these accounts gets at least 50 spams a day. Now if I were some poor newbie, tell me how much effort it would take to filter out the one email a day I get that I did intend to receive. If you don't get enough spam to think it is a problem, just change your email address from samsa@@@anitisocial...com to your real address.
Why in the world should it be illegal?
Because in California it is.
Slashdot Mirror
Many "server" orientated techies out there are oblivious to the fact that large organizations require the discipline of running a managed desktop. This means as much as possible desktops should be in a managed state through a consistent desktop image deployment followed by managed updates. This misconception that desktop users have more "freedom" is demonstrated by the confusion that this "internal" note within IBM has caused so many, when in fact it is a simple policy that prevents headaches. You think managing a server farm of 1000 servers is difficult? Try managing 100,000 desktops where globally you need to ensure you can deploy the same suite applications and support various country customizations like language support.
More than most Fortune 500s, IBM has a lot of different applications from developer tools to web applications used by their backoffice and sales staff. Nobody managing such a large desktop infrastructure would not do all they could to mitigate the headache having to fix desktops where the user thought through all the hype that it would be smart for them to download and install SP2. You may even laugh to know that in my experience (not at IBM of course) the techies are the worst of the lot. Thinking, hey I'll just install this because the IT guys will come install it sooner or later anyway...and I want a more secure desktop as the people on Slashdot keep telling me how insecure my XP box is. And then boom, there come the support calls:
"Half of all my applications don't work anymore"-Mr Smarty
"Did you install anything before this happend"-Support
"Nope. I was minding my own business and now half of my applications don't work, and I get this new icon in my system tray. Now I can't do my work."-Mr Smarty
"Are you sure you didn't install anything?"-Support
"Well, there was this update...uhm, XP SP2"-Mr Smarty
Click... -Support
Corporate espionage is something that is feared; however, all this really does in inconvenience those who are using these devices legitimately. I would trust that in an organization who has a real security concern, that they would have appropriate ACLs in place so that data theft would be limited to what the user that already has security clearance.
Now if you have already cleared someone to be viewing and working with such data, you have much bigger problems than fearing them stealing it with a USB device. It's like trusting your employees with your business in their day to day operations but keeping office supplies under lock and key. It just doesn't make sense. If someone is intent on ripping you off, they would't go for the small stuff. Similiarly, if your business depends on these people who have access to such "crown jewel" data you'd better hope that you have a good hiring process and that you are keeping your employees happy.
A side rant: so you're all concerned about people with USB devices; yet, you're fine with shipping your data off to some foreign land for outsourcing. Hmmm... If only the world were based on logic!
It is egocentric of one to think that the Chinese are actually worried about isolation. Although, the majority of it's population could be classified as poor and rural, the fact remains that there is a market of close to 1.3 billion people there. Why wouldn't they help themselves before helping foreigners?
On a hair blow dryer. A little research found that a company was sued when a guy used his hair dryer to keep himself warm by turning it on and throwing it in his blankets. He fell asleep and became crispy after the fire that started. Amazing, the moron won.
I say warnings like this should be omitted on purpose so that people without this common sense are weeded out of the gene pool.
I've been in IT for just over ten years now. I'm just as worried as any other; however, I do see a diminishing rate of return from people with simply more "programming" experience.
How much a premium do you pay for someone with 10+ years of C++ experience? If you have budget for five senior development staff, would you get the same value by hiring two 10+ year experience individuals to supervise and mentor six with only 2 years experience?
I guess this all has to be taken in context though. For just a code monkey position, really do you need someone with that much experience? Just having someone churn out code?
But let's say you code specialized derivatives trading algorithms or something that is deemed a major revenue producer product, where 10+ years of C++ plus 10+ years of business logic understanding...that's where you pay top dollar.
This is also the basis of a lot of "outsourcing" arguments. Code monkeys are the next McD's workers unless you have an intimate understanding of the business or have other non-IT skills that make you sell yourself better than the next guy.
What about allowing only VPN connections through your Wireless router? This would detach your reliance on the wireless protocol's security. Even if someone is sniffing or even breaks your WiFi security, all they will get is your encrypted VPN traffic.
It is not arrogance. In what way is Real number 2 even? Things could have been different for Real, there was a time when they were at the forefront of streaming technology. They lost this spot in my eyes when the began to lose focus an instead of concentrating on technology and finding sustainable revenue streams, went for the cheap shots of getting people to pay for what others offered for free, making it very difficult to find the free version of their product, and above all loading people's desktop with tons of garbage. I have lived life without the Real player and when a site does not give me a choice, I show them my contempt by leaving the site.
If this is a next gen review of email clients, well Outlook 2003 is newer significantly different. Just because it comes from Microsoft doesn't mean it should automatically be discounted.
There is nothing here that is out of the ordinary with any other consumer good. The money is in making products with high consumer demand, and hence consumer monitor manufacturers are stepping up to the high demand on LCD panels versus CRTs.
The market that you fall into is what would be "specialty".
Red Hat manages the product life cycle of open source projects, are you certain you understand what this means? I'm sure most people working on open source projects would beg to differ. Your assertion that RH manages product life cycle, would in the least mean that RH defines scope and direction for projects such as SAMBA. Your comment would mean that RH provides direction into what new functionality should be added into GNOME. Please let me know if I have misinterpreted you.
Journalists are sure a confused bunch. How is it a hoax, if it is a "real" project and they are building and expecting to build a prototype?
Is it me, or have journalism is a dying art?
I would like to add my comments that are quite contrary to yours. I have had no difficulties with tech support from any of our global vendors. that my company deals with. I have issues escalated to level three support personel in a timely manner.
The difference here is that you get what you pay for. If you paid nothing for your support, you can't really expect too much. Because for every one person like you, there really are dozens who call and the basic checks like "Is it plugged in?" or "Did you turn the power on?" actually resolve the problem. The difficult is that technology support desks used to service technically savvy customers who could rebuild it themselves if they had to. Today, technology consumers are far less tech savvy.
To top this off, I never have issues with "pay-per-incident" support. Because I only use those when I have exhausted every resource available to me. I have had a certain company assist me through an issue that took them sixteen hours to resolve for me. Not because of their lack of compentence; but, because of the complexities in our environment. It was a steal, as I had three engineers working on it and the final price tag was a twentieth of what it would have cost if a consultant spent sixteen hours on it.
I've seen an argument that open source is only free is one's time is worthless. I work for a multi-national and we have similiar requirements of twenty-four hour worldwide support. From what I've seen in technology three is never a swiss-army knife solution despite what many people here on slashdot believe, open source is not always the best answer.
Nowadays, management has a very different spin on IT. Gone are the days where IT wrongly drove business and the CIO had the company by the privates. Management teams are now IT savvy, and no longer write blank cheques to IT based on IT's requirements.
The argument that, if it is broken we have the source and we can fix it is no argument at all. Unless you are an IT company, your core business is not the business of IT. Why would you pour resources into IT to develop a skillset in your company to maintain software? How does that improve profitability? It doesn't. The cost of having one expert to fix a handful of problems, will never be competitive against an organization who's business model revolves around maintaining their product.
Take a look at how commercial software is built and maintained. Direction is driven by customers and revenue. How is open source driven? I don't know, maybe someone can help me. Who manages the product life-cycle in open source?
I am not anti-open-source, nor anti-Microsoft. I believe that for your case, you should ask management for their requirements. If one of their answers is 24/7 world-wide vendor support. You just have to accept it and move on. Sometimes their answers are not technically driven. Remember you are probably working for a company built on capatilism. Again, accept it and move on. They sign your paycheques not the other way around.
-Many recipes are "open source." Why do people still eat out? You'd pay less than half, and have control over the source if you cook yourself!
There is a definite correlation between a product's upcoming end of life and a rebate offer. I find that many tech vendors use rebates as a method of discounting their products that are nearing end-of-life to assist retailers in moving out old inventory so that they can bring in the new. With so many replies on this topic, it appears that they are quite successful too.
The manufacturer you must remember as well does not typically have direct financial relations with the retailer, so it would be difficult for them to credit the retailer for their existing inventory. So this is win/win for the manufacturer. As discussed many times above, they are betting on the fact that a certain percentage of people will not make use of the rebate but still purchase the product. A well known manufacturer need not be purposely deceitful in their rebates. In fact, they have done their math otherwise they wouldn't offer them in the first place.
I had to take the "free" out, because Americans are obviously just brave. The US is a country that lacks:
1) Freedom of speech
2) Freedom to smoke natural unprocessed plants
3) Freedom of press, (yeah, CNN is NOT a propaganda engine, keep telling yourself that)
Americans are sure quick to fight wars in foreign lands, while leaving their homeland unprotected from tyranny.
What a scary thought, the name of this company has an uncanny striking resembelance to virus Ebola. Coincidence or foreshadowing? Hmm...
Flawed logic?
I think it wise to separate the logic that states:
1) IE is a core part of Microsoft OS
2) Microsoft is unable to remove IE as a core part of the OS
Number (1) may be true but number (2) definitely is not. The browser may be key to the UI for windows, but they could quickly remove it and replace it with non-browser based components if they chose to. They simply chose not to right now.
The "dark ages"? Oh you mean when content was delivered to me a a nicely formated text form without the bright flashing and popping ads coming from nowhere? Sure, bring it on. My personal website is usable and pretty and made with only HTML. Not because lack the knowledge to do scripting or use my cr@cked copy of Flash, but because I chose not to sully my pages with dirt.
I hate plug-ins and scripting within webpages. I disable all plug-ins and scripting on my browser when I surf. I notice the most annoying of pop-up, pop-back, animated advertisements dissappear or at least are rendered broken in some respect.
I'm sure Microsoft cares, but I miss the days when web pages only contained tightly written HTML and all that was used to display and collect information.
HTML puritans rejoice!
Whoever this company is, they're trying to generate news just for the PR. Check link for contact:
http://www.searchking.com/news/skad.htm
Instead of message submit or email address, you get an ad for themselves selling ad space because he recognizes the exposure he'll get for the lawsuit.
Someone please call this company and tell him he is an idiot. I think he doesn't know.
Wait a sec, China promotes freedom. Who is communist now?
Any child should be wary of talking to strangers. Parents do a good job of educating kids on the dangers of talking to strangers, before they put their kids online they just need to re-iterate that it is dangerous to talk to strangers, and that it is no different online. Few children would give out their phone number or address to a stranger on the street, they shouldn't on the net either.
The revenue model here is practiced by many industries apart from computer printers. Razor manufacturers, water filtration devices, and motorized tooth brushes are good examples. Razors, Brita water filteration units, and electric motorized tooth-brushes are sold at cost and sometimes below cost by manufacturers because they know the real revenue stream is the consumables that are used later on.
If you don't like it, just don't buy a printer. Why have a hard copy anyway? Just killing trees for no reason.
My rant at this point is how I try not to laugh when I see people printing out online documentation. Hello, it is online, why bother printing it?!?!
Does anybody have URLs or information in regards to laws against unsolicited fax and email? And how to take similiar cases to small claims court?
They're just trying to make money
Sure, by using up resources that they did not pay for. 1) I pay for internet access so that I can communicate with those I want to 2) resources are being wasted to store and forward the spam emails 3) resources are being wasted to delete the email
It's really not hard to do a lot of stuff. Like protecting yourself against criminals isn't that hard, perhaps we don't need police? Seriously though, it doesn't matter that it is not difficult. It is the sheer volume. I have some email accounts that I use as "fake" email accounts when I think I'll be spammed by the people I'm giving out my email to. One of these accounts gets at least 50 spams a day. Now if I were some poor newbie, tell me how much effort it would take to filter out the one email a day I get that I did intend to receive. If you don't get enough spam to think it is a problem, just change your email address from samsa@@@anitisocial...com to your real address.
Why in the world should it be illegal? Because in California it is.