"Letting" companies sell things like software with nasty licensing is called capitalism. Socialism would be a system under which governments can dictate what can and cannot be sold. With capitalism, the only choice we have is to vote with our wallets, which is STILL much better than what you're suggesting.
The thing is that you're not a typical user of any kind. Normal people can't "experiment" with a $2000 gizmo. Realize that you're lucky and very wealthy, and don't condescend to the rest of us truly normal people by calling yourself a normal person.
If so many Windows users hate Windows, then why aren't they switching? I know exactly where my local Mac store is. I've even played with them. I've heard that there are Apple ads on TV every few minutes these days. If masses of people wanted to switch, they would. Nobody is holding a gun to the back of my head forcing me to use Windows.
It's very unlikely that many (if any) Wal-Mart employees are manipulating Wikipedia. Most of them don't make enough money to own a computer and have an Internet connection. Even if they do, they're too busy working a second job just to make ends meet. Sad but true.
You're right... The problem is that software consumers already have a mindset that makes broken programs OK, and the way to fix them is by buying the new version. One of the worst offenders that I've seen in Intuit. Intuit is famous for releasing new programs every single year, regardless of whether or not anything has actually changed. They're also notorious for simply not fixing old code after the new version is released, with the official response of "Your problem is fixed in the new version. Buy that one." This is grossly fraudulent, in my opinion.
The problem is that we all, as consumers, already accept this kind of shit as acceptable. I wish I knew a way to reverse this, but realistically, I don't see this mindset changing any time soon.
Speaking of which, I would like to say that I genuinely appreciate all early adopters that make it possible for technology to quickly advance without me having to spend an arm and a leg. Thanks to LOTS of people with disposable income, the PC's that I buy at my local thrift store at $25/each are FANTASTIC! I don't know what all of the wealthy geeks are using their new fancy equipment for, but I don't care! If not for them, I wouldn't be able to know that I don't even have to look at the specifications for old machines these days because they always do whatever I need. Not that I'd ever use it for anything remotely important, but I'm hoping to see used PC's hit my local thrift stores soon that incorporate "outdated" 802.11b technology (which works fine, of course). Thank you, rich geek consumers!
I imagine several confirmation boxes asking you to engage in a binding legal agreement saying that you understand that Microsoft did not write the plugin, and holding Microsoft harmless in the event that the plugin does not translate documents correctly, damages your computer, or directly causes terrorist attacks on the United States.
No, you're right. MS (heck, any company), should voluntarily accept legal liability for an add-on to their poroduct that they had nothing to do with. I *knew* that I should have sued Toyota when that lift-kit that I bought at CarQuest fucked up my truck. Leave it to the Slashdot Hive Mind to come up with great ideas!
The thing is that yeah, they sell name-brand stuff, but it's not the same name-brand stuff that you buy elsewhere. They put so much pressure on the manufacturers, that most of their manufacturers have one regular version, and a Wal-Mart version. That's PART of the reason that I would never spend any money at Wal-Mart:
The absolute, bottom-line Chinese component manufacturers will somehow make even cheaper and shoddier stuff, because that's what Wal-Mart and Wal-Mart's customers demand. Maybe we'll start to see hard-drives with no warranties at all, and power supplies that catch on fire after 20 hours of use.
In all honesty, I don't think that it'll have any impact on the market. The bottom-feeders that shop at Wal-Mart are exactly that: bottom-feeders. The computers that they previously would have purchased pre-assembled were all just loss-leaders, anyway. The same bottom-line manufacturers willing to make $1 per PC will be doing the same thing, but will instead be shipping the parts before going through the final screwdriver-assembly phase of manufacturing.
Lose ground.... so what? Hell, if MS took all of their cash and put it in FDIC insured securities, and didn't sell a single thing, they'd still make more money than all of the other software companies on the planet combined. They don't need to sell anything.
You're close... Google would have to make their own desktop OS, market it and get it in the hands of 95%+ of all users on the planet, AND make their own browser, THEN they could have google.com be the default and not have to pay for it.
Obviously, it's cheaper for them to drag out the lawyers than it is to actually compete fairly with Microsoft. Google's just as bad as every other big company, and I'm getting sick of them. I may just change my default search engine...
But there are people who are waiting for it to come out before buying a new computer with a soon-to-be obsolete operating system.
There are? Really? Really? In all honesty, I don't think that I've ever heard any non-OSS zealots complain about Windows XP. It's essentially a finished product. There aren't really any major problems left to hammer out, or functionality to add, as far as I'm concerned. What, specifically, are "people" waiting for in Vista? I consider myself a geek, and I don't even know or care what Vista is going to do. Windows 2000/XP work just fine for us.
they deserve the mass defections that hopefully will be coming.
Defections because why, exactly...? Do you know anybody who NEEDS Vista? I certainly don't. Windows 2000 and XP are pretty damn good products, and I know that we're not upgrading because there's no reason to. Vista will be just a "gee whiz, this is neat" thing if/when we ever buy new computers again.
Luckily for us, MS is doing a great job creating those problems.
Thanks for the info. I've always gone to Vegas, and while there are grandmas playing slots, I have never been when there was not plenty of hot ass to go around.
I kinda' thought that this point was self-evident, but somehow, you completely missed it... The point is not that everything has to be useable by 5 year olds. The point is that time=money, and FOSS isn't any cheaper or free-er than regular closed source software if you have to be a geek to use it. I can, already, with my Windows OS, my Intuit software, etc. do whatever I need to do with my PC. If some FOSS comes out to replace anything that I already use on my PC, but I have to turn around and learn some complex stuff to get it to do the same thing that I'm already doing, then it's not really all that free, now is it?
I don't know any way that this simple point can be explained any simpler. Maybe if I explained it in terms of.config files and compiling you'd understand...
You hit the nail on the head. That's the main problem with OSS. Either it's shitty software that requires tons of support, in which case it's not necessarily any cheaper or better than proprietary stuff, or it's so easy to use, that there's no way to make money off of it. The only OSS we use is VNC because it works. I certainly have no need to ever pay anybody for VNC, and I never will. Anything else I've tried has been so convoluted that it ended up being grossly more expensive than something shrink-wrapped and closed source.
If you'd RTFA (actually, a marketing press release), you'd see that Microsoft was mentioned -zero- times because the migration was from "a costly UNIX platform".
C'mon kids, let's put some more effort into the trolls, at least.
The webserver has already been commoditized. So has the OS. So has the database. Very few companies will see a competitive advantage to re-writing any of these pieces. These are important, but certainly not competitive points. There are lots of parts of businesses that are simply fixed costs like these. Sure, I could maybe save a few bucks here or there switching between competing products, but that's not a big deal. A few months ago I got rid of incandescent lightbulbs in favor of compact fluorescents. Done. Big deal.
I'm talking about software that does real work... I have a retail store that uses software (that I wrote) that lets us put all of our inventory online, in real-time, straight from our POS system. New items get added instantly, and the inventory is always correct, and it's all processed in the same system. That software puts us waaaaay ahead of most of our competition in the industry. THAT software most definitely gives us a competitive advantage which would be eliminated if I gave it away in the hopes that somebody will fix a bug or two, or just to get some non-existent "We use OSS" PR. THAT kind of thing is what this article is about... not Apache vs. IIS or Linux vs. Windows. That whole MySQL vs. MSSQL thing has been beaten to death, and quite honestly, isn't really relevant at all.
As long as there is a competitive advantage to be gained, major banks and financial firms will not contribute back to the OSS community if there's even the slightest possibility it will cause them to lose that advantage. It's their corporate culture and I don't think it'll change anytime soon.
Any company that is run by anybody with an IQ greater than that of an eggplant that has a competitive advantage with their software will realize that "contributing" will hurt their bottom line. That's just business 101. OSS people should really stop holding their breath.
Simple example for simple people: Wal-Mart is the largest retailer in the world largely due to their back-end supply-side JIT software. They're not just going to give that away so that *maybe*, some hack will find a few bugs for them. That would be financial suicide, and the shareholders would sue (rightfully) the people would decided to do that.
Working on a common code base for the good of all helps companies leverage each other's abilities to get more work done on fewer resources.
The thing is, in a relatively free market, the goal of companies is not to help other companies, but to take their customers. Software provides a competitive advantage that can't be overlooked. It certainly does in my own business, and I'll share my software only over my dead body. If not for my custom software, I would not be able to compete as well as I do. I don't want to help other companies in my same industry.
I understand that... but sharing software within an industry eliminates any competitive advantage that software gives a company within that industry. This is *always* ignored by OSS supporters, and I don't understand why competitive advantage is so easily written off. Is the underlying assumption that software simply isn't important or relevant in business?
You're right. That doesn't have any bearing on your job if you're hired as a programmer and asked to rush something out the door. That's *exactly* the attitude that the guy quoted in the article is talking about.
Slashdot Mirror
"Letting" companies sell things like software with nasty licensing is called capitalism. Socialism would be a system under which governments can dictate what can and cannot be sold. With capitalism, the only choice we have is to vote with our wallets, which is STILL much better than what you're suggesting.
The thing is that you're not a typical user of any kind. Normal people can't "experiment" with a $2000 gizmo. Realize that you're lucky and very wealthy, and don't condescend to the rest of us truly normal people by calling yourself a normal person.
If so many Windows users hate Windows, then why aren't they switching? I know exactly where my local Mac store is. I've even played with them. I've heard that there are Apple ads on TV every few minutes these days. If masses of people wanted to switch, they would. Nobody is holding a gun to the back of my head forcing me to use Windows.
It's very unlikely that many (if any) Wal-Mart employees are manipulating Wikipedia. Most of them don't make enough money to own a computer and have an Internet connection. Even if they do, they're too busy working a second job just to make ends meet. Sad but true.
You're right... The problem is that software consumers already have a mindset that makes broken programs OK, and the way to fix them is by buying the new version. One of the worst offenders that I've seen in Intuit. Intuit is famous for releasing new programs every single year, regardless of whether or not anything has actually changed. They're also notorious for simply not fixing old code after the new version is released, with the official response of "Your problem is fixed in the new version. Buy that one." This is grossly fraudulent, in my opinion.
The problem is that we all, as consumers, already accept this kind of shit as acceptable. I wish I knew a way to reverse this, but realistically, I don't see this mindset changing any time soon.
#1 in my book, which you seem to have forgotten: RELIABILITY! I won't be getting rid of my cat 5 cables any time soon for this reason alone.
Speaking of which, I would like to say that I genuinely appreciate all early adopters that make it possible for technology to quickly advance without me having to spend an arm and a leg. Thanks to LOTS of people with disposable income, the PC's that I buy at my local thrift store at $25/each are FANTASTIC! I don't know what all of the wealthy geeks are using their new fancy equipment for, but I don't care! If not for them, I wouldn't be able to know that I don't even have to look at the specifications for old machines these days because they always do whatever I need. Not that I'd ever use it for anything remotely important, but I'm hoping to see used PC's hit my local thrift stores soon that incorporate "outdated" 802.11b technology (which works fine, of course). Thank you, rich geek consumers!
I imagine several confirmation boxes asking you to engage in a binding legal agreement saying that you understand that Microsoft did not write the plugin, and holding Microsoft harmless in the event that the plugin does not translate documents correctly, damages your computer, or directly causes terrorist attacks on the United States.
No, you're right. MS (heck, any company), should voluntarily accept legal liability for an add-on to their poroduct that they had nothing to do with. I *knew* that I should have sued Toyota when that lift-kit that I bought at CarQuest fucked up my truck. Leave it to the Slashdot Hive Mind to come up with great ideas!
The thing is that yeah, they sell name-brand stuff, but it's not the same name-brand stuff that you buy elsewhere. They put so much pressure on the manufacturers, that most of their manufacturers have one regular version, and a Wal-Mart version. That's PART of the reason that I would never spend any money at Wal-Mart:
Good example of the Wal-Mart version
The absolute, bottom-line Chinese component manufacturers will somehow make even cheaper and shoddier stuff, because that's what Wal-Mart and Wal-Mart's customers demand. Maybe we'll start to see hard-drives with no warranties at all, and power supplies that catch on fire after 20 hours of use.
In all honesty, I don't think that it'll have any impact on the market. The bottom-feeders that shop at Wal-Mart are exactly that: bottom-feeders. The computers that they previously would have purchased pre-assembled were all just loss-leaders, anyway. The same bottom-line manufacturers willing to make $1 per PC will be doing the same thing, but will instead be shipping the parts before going through the final screwdriver-assembly phase of manufacturing.
Lose ground.... so what? Hell, if MS took all of their cash and put it in FDIC insured securities, and didn't sell a single thing, they'd still make more money than all of the other software companies on the planet combined. They don't need to sell anything.
You're close... Google would have to make their own desktop OS, market it and get it in the hands of 95%+ of all users on the planet, AND make their own browser, THEN they could have google.com be the default and not have to pay for it.
Obviously, it's cheaper for them to drag out the lawyers than it is to actually compete fairly with Microsoft. Google's just as bad as every other big company, and I'm getting sick of them. I may just change my default search engine...
But there are people who are waiting for it to come out before buying a new computer with a soon-to-be obsolete operating system.
There are? Really? Really? In all honesty, I don't think that I've ever heard any non-OSS zealots complain about Windows XP. It's essentially a finished product. There aren't really any major problems left to hammer out, or functionality to add, as far as I'm concerned. What, specifically, are "people" waiting for in Vista? I consider myself a geek, and I don't even know or care what Vista is going to do. Windows 2000/XP work just fine for us.
they deserve the mass defections that hopefully will be coming.
Defections because why, exactly...? Do you know anybody who NEEDS Vista? I certainly don't. Windows 2000 and XP are pretty damn good products, and I know that we're not upgrading because there's no reason to. Vista will be just a "gee whiz, this is neat" thing if/when we ever buy new computers again.
Luckily for us, MS is doing a great job creating those problems.
What problems, exactly?
Thanks for the info. I've always gone to Vegas, and while there are grandmas playing slots, I have never been when there was not plenty of hot ass to go around.
You apparently have never been to a real life casino, have you...? They're very different from what you see on TV.
I kinda' thought that this point was self-evident, but somehow, you completely missed it... The point is not that everything has to be useable by 5 year olds. The point is that time=money, and FOSS isn't any cheaper or free-er than regular closed source software if you have to be a geek to use it. I can, already, with my Windows OS, my Intuit software, etc. do whatever I need to do with my PC. If some FOSS comes out to replace anything that I already use on my PC, but I have to turn around and learn some complex stuff to get it to do the same thing that I'm already doing, then it's not really all that free, now is it?
.config files and compiling you'd understand...
I don't know any way that this simple point can be explained any simpler. Maybe if I explained it in terms of
You hit the nail on the head. That's the main problem with OSS. Either it's shitty software that requires tons of support, in which case it's not necessarily any cheaper or better than proprietary stuff, or it's so easy to use, that there's no way to make money off of it. The only OSS we use is VNC because it works. I certainly have no need to ever pay anybody for VNC, and I never will. Anything else I've tried has been so convoluted that it ended up being grossly more expensive than something shrink-wrapped and closed source.
1. Not at all.
2. Not at all.
If you'd RTFA (actually, a marketing press release), you'd see that Microsoft was mentioned -zero- times because the migration was from "a costly UNIX platform".
C'mon kids, let's put some more effort into the trolls, at least.
The webserver has already been commoditized. So has the OS. So has the database. Very few companies will see a competitive advantage to re-writing any of these pieces. These are important, but certainly not competitive points. There are lots of parts of businesses that are simply fixed costs like these. Sure, I could maybe save a few bucks here or there switching between competing products, but that's not a big deal. A few months ago I got rid of incandescent lightbulbs in favor of compact fluorescents. Done. Big deal.
I'm talking about software that does real work... I have a retail store that uses software (that I wrote) that lets us put all of our inventory online, in real-time, straight from our POS system. New items get added instantly, and the inventory is always correct, and it's all processed in the same system. That software puts us waaaaay ahead of most of our competition in the industry. THAT software most definitely gives us a competitive advantage which would be eliminated if I gave it away in the hopes that somebody will fix a bug or two, or just to get some non-existent "We use OSS" PR. THAT kind of thing is what this article is about... not Apache vs. IIS or Linux vs. Windows. That whole MySQL vs. MSSQL thing has been beaten to death, and quite honestly, isn't really relevant at all.
As long as there is a competitive advantage to be gained, major banks and financial firms will not contribute back to the OSS community if there's even the slightest possibility it will cause them to lose that advantage. It's their corporate culture and I don't think it'll change anytime soon.
Any company that is run by anybody with an IQ greater than that of an eggplant that has a competitive advantage with their software will realize that "contributing" will hurt their bottom line. That's just business 101. OSS people should really stop holding their breath.
Simple example for simple people: Wal-Mart is the largest retailer in the world largely due to their back-end supply-side JIT software. They're not just going to give that away so that *maybe*, some hack will find a few bugs for them. That would be financial suicide, and the shareholders would sue (rightfully) the people would decided to do that.
Working on a common code base for the good of all helps companies leverage each other's abilities to get more work done on fewer resources.
The thing is, in a relatively free market, the goal of companies is not to help other companies, but to take their customers. Software provides a competitive advantage that can't be overlooked. It certainly does in my own business, and I'll share my software only over my dead body. If not for my custom software, I would not be able to compete as well as I do. I don't want to help other companies in my same industry.
I understand that... but sharing software within an industry eliminates any competitive advantage that software gives a company within that industry. This is *always* ignored by OSS supporters, and I don't understand why competitive advantage is so easily written off. Is the underlying assumption that software simply isn't important or relevant in business?
Why is it that every OSS zealot insists on ignoring the competitive advantage that software can provide?
You're right. That doesn't have any bearing on your job if you're hired as a programmer and asked to rush something out the door. That's *exactly* the attitude that the guy quoted in the article is talking about.