Well, I suppose that if I actually own3d this network and paid for it with my own dollars I'd have to agree with you. Unfortunately, I can't possibly indemnify every student that uploads a Justin Timberlake song, nor can I distinguish between that activity and a student trying to upload a GPL'd document. As it is, Internet filters are a blunt instrument - often it is all or nothing, but it's all I have to work with.
Another issue is, organizations like the RIAA can spend the money to simply monitor my network (and others) for me - whether I want them to or not. Like many others in my field, I am caught in the middle of it. This is a battle I cannot possibly win with the meager resources I have, and I'm certain that Linden Hall is not interested in directly challenging a billion dollar industry either.
But this type of debate has happened here before. When I arrived here in 1999 the students were not allowed to use any sort of Instant Messaging. Both the students and the parents complained because it is, after all 'free' communication and we do have international students here.
However, I opened the biggest can 'o worms when I allowed it because I realized that other than shutting down the entire Internet, I had no real way to adequately control it. I mean sure, you could shut down ports, but could you do it by time? And even if you could, would that stop the girls from using Java-based clients and chatting on Port 80?
Keep in mind that some of these girls would stay on all night, every night if we let them. This is not what parents have in mind when they send their girls to school here. It is only this year that a suitable solution has arrived for us (ImMarshal).
Nonetheless we are making some progress. At least we've gotten beyond the stage of using coffee timers on the hubs (as it was when I first arrived), or scripting the web/firewall proxy services to shut down at XX:XX times for study hall and lights out. Sheesh. Believe me, the boarding school environment is in some ways more demanding than corporate.
Well... I suppose if I had nothing better to do I could do that. Unfortunately like so many others of my kind I am the sole admin in a 200+ user network. Even that wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that fully half of these machines are student owned.
Yeah, I know you'll flame me for this but, we ban all PtoP activity here - now more than ever.
I used to allow it - sorta. Basically, if a girl here could figure out how to get her PtoP app to work through our proxy I let them do it - until last year. Last year, I received a cease and desist order from the RIAA. Apparently one of our girls had left Bearshare on all day... Uh... For two weeks! And had transferred some 2.6 GB of music (mostly Blink 182).
After studying the order I also thought about how slow the net had seemed lately.:P So, in the general interest of the school and bandwidth, we now block where we can and bandwidth limit the rest. This isn't college mind you, this is a 6-12 boarding school, so we do have a little more control here.
But imagine this scenario for a second. Imagine being subpoenaed by the RIAA. I keep logs because I HAVE TO. While we might be able to avoid direct litigation with the RIAA and parents, it would sour relationships - not good for a reputation. The girls hate the ban, and I'm not too happy about it either, but we simply have to play it safe.
Hey, it's your money - defend MS and closed source all you want. But just think for a minute and look at the incredible progress OOo/StarOffice has made in the last two years of development since Sun took over the code and released it.
Two years ago - while OOo/StarOffice was still in beta my school was in a quandry. We needed more MS licenses (a lot more), due to our adding teacher and student computers. It chafed me to think that we'd end up getting MS Office again, and then again in 2003, all the while dealing with their 'secure' initiatives like activation and the like.
So we instead to the road less travelled and went with OOo/StarOffice. It was rough because OOo wasn't yet out of beta and StarOffice was still 5.2. But by late October, everything was straightened out and last year went very smoothly.
The advantages for us were overwhelming: free copies of OOo for every student and faculty member, a $79 site license for StarOffice on every on-campus machine, and compatibility with what we already had.
We are a private school here in PA. I took a major risk and it was worth doing (i.e. I got to keep my job after all).:) But think about the public schools. Think about your tax dollars and how much of that goes back to MS and other closed source vendors. I'm not saying that they shouldn't use it - if they need it. We determined that StarOffice would do everything we needed it to do.
But do you think it even gets a fair hearing? With cities like Philadelphia getting sued by the BSa for copyright violations simply because they wanted to communicate with their home districts, why shouldn't they at least consider an alternative - ANY alternative? Shouldn't these things go out for some sort of bid? I dunno, that's just what I think. I'm frustrated because it all works so well here and I have a hard time understanding why it wouldn't elsewhere (other than your usual naysayer resistance).
People bitch that Open Souce software is disorganized or doesn't ever seem polished. OOo is proof that it can be, with guidance and vision. How would it be if more companies would be willing to sponsor development like this?
Those people were totally screwed in later releases. Not only was it the buggiest of all versions, but the least compatible since Works 2.0.
International support between versions doesn't exist - well supposedly until Office 2003 so if you have something written in Office 97/Korean, don't plan on being able to properly open it here.
XML write support is only supported in the enterprise edition of Office. Secure document initiatives in Office 2004 will insure that portability of documents can and will be restricted. While this could be conceived as a feature, it will also be a pain in the ass - mark my words.
Publisher users know all too well what happens between ANY version revision.
Who knows what other wonderful and mysterious changes will be in store?
The article didn't list what version of patch StarOffice was at. The current patch is PP3, but I believe around January PP2 would've been out.
Each patch has significant bug fixes and MS Office compatibility tweaks so it's hard to tell from the article what level they were at.
I can say this with precision: OOo kicks total ass with MS compatibility now. I have yet to see a corrupt table! Check out 1.1 RC3 - or just wait for the final - should be out anytime now.
That's true - MOST of the time. Troubleshooting can be a bitch though - especially when you're relying on error messages from foreign software. Grrr..
Last year however, I had a few Korean computers that really boggled me. They came shipped from the manufacturer with an 'egg' theme. Everything was eggs. Sunny side up, scrambled, hard boiled, hatching, hatched, a small chicken standing next to an egg, a large chicken next to one, a vibrating egg, a egg on it's side, an egg right side up, two eggs with wires, etc. I understood some of the metaphors, but some just made no sense at all. That totally blew me away.;)
Oh yes I do - TESTIFY! What's more, how can you even begin to troubleshoot an issue when you can't read Korean or Japanese (I work for an international school)?
There are no easy answers. Fortunately, I work in a small school, so I take the time to try and do updates on each machine when they come in. We run adaware on each, and then install the network version of Sophos so they are protected from viruses.
From that point, we have to hope that the firewall filters do their job in keeping out the junk, but it's certainly not perfect. We've often toyed with the idea of mandating our own dorm terminals, and know schools that do, but we're not ready for this kind of expense yet. Of course, in my environment, I have a bit more flexibility than you might in yours.
We do offer leased computers though, and this year we had more takers than ever - even though the price was as high as a fully equipped desktop system! Some parents just don't want to have to deal with the updating, anti-virus, and other issues. The obvious advantage to this is that we can start these systems out fresh and updated every year. It's tempting to lower that price a bit just to get more takers and therefore, less issues.
The problem is we're continually keeping SCO in the press all by ourselves. We don't even need Darl(ing's) encouragement anymore. All they have to do is sit back and laugh. Remember, this is a company who, six months ago was getting no press at all.
My prediction is, when the smoke clears, SCO's employees, users, and vendors will be screwed but their execs will be sailing off the gold coast. There's really nothing that can be done about it I suppose.:(
...but I say, SCREW YOU! You 'opened this ball' - as ESR put it, and now it's time to deal. We should not back down on these people until the threat is completely gone. I don't know what that means, but it's sure as hell going to take a lot more than some obscure magazine interview to, as Darl(ing) puts it, 'come clean'. I want this sort of thing in writing folks.
This is just like Russia telling us that they are no longer targeting their missles directly at the United States. Whew! What a relief! Now at least we'll have an additional 15 minutes to ponder our final destination.
No. Give them no quarter. The line is drawn here, NO further! (Obligatory Star Trek referrence added);)
Oh that would be terrific except that the EPIA boards don't yet support AGP. They come with ONE PCI slot. I suppose you could stick a PCI version of a GeForce 4mx on there, but... Why?:)
I imagine it won't be long before VIA 'fixes' this, but I'm not sure they're in a hurry to. The purpose of the EPIA mini-itx board isn't performance gaming. And to be honest, I'd hate to see them lose focus on what is working so well for them.
I suspect that no sooner than they add an AGP port we'll have Tom's, Sharkey's, Anand's, and others ripping the performance of the CPU and trying like hell to get Doom III running on it.
VIA simply can't compete with the likes of AMD and Intel on their own turf. This mini pc market is one that VIA and Shuttle have almost single-handedly wrested from the industry and caught them completely off guard.
And the funny thing is, its not as though it's cheap - believe me you pay for convenience. It's around $180 at Newegg.com. It's worth it, if you need it, but obviously you can put together a better Nforce2 deal for not much more if size, weight, and heat aren't important. For some of my projects they are, or they're going into older cases and that's why I use these things.
Obviously you've never used VIA processors before. They are notorious for their slow FPU's. In fact, before their latest top-of-the line model - the Nehemiah, their FPU's of previous models always ran at HALF CLOCK. Ouchy.
But, even at full speed a similarly clocked Celeron kicks it's ass in every which way. That said, high performance is not the stated purpose of the Centaur/Via CPU. Its low watts, coupled with the decoder make for an excellent all-around box. I've built around 7 or 8 of these myself and they are excellent for what they are designed for (think: mom and dad or net terminals, not Half Life 2).
I have a few of these floating around the school here now as basic net access / workstation terminals and they are hugely popular - especially in light of what they replaced (AMD 300's). There's nothing like tearing apart some ancient computer and putting one of these boards in it. 90% of the time, it's simply cavernous in there (so much space!)
Last week I put one in an Aptiva and realized that if I was an enterprising person (read: man with a Dremel) I could have fit TWO of them in there as a dual workstation!:O
So to sum up, they're small as hell (you have to see it to believe it), simple, fun, easy to configure, but don't plan of using them at the next Fragfest 2003 (c)
...is their PRICING. When our school went to purchase a new license for Exchange it cost as much as the Exchange server license plus Windows 2003 license plus 200 CALs. And that's ACADEMIC pricing. Unbelievable.
They think they're God because they are a gold partner with Microsoft. Well, basically, I told them what they could do with themselves and went with Sophos instead who offered much more (an entire SITE license) for only half that price.
In light of this new info (concerning product activation), I'm that much gladder we didn't go with them this time around. Too bad, I rather liked Norton on Exchange 2000. But, there comes a time when you realize that paying more for the anti-virus software than for what the anti-virus software is running on simply doesn't make sense.
Don't forget about the employees, resellers, and users (yes, there still are some). The poor employees have been duped into believing that 'Hey yeah! They HAVE stolen our stuff!' But the sad truth is, they're not the ones holding the platinum ripcord on the golden parachute. They'll be joining all the others looking for work - trying to compete with India and China.
The resellers are going to have a tough time because support is gonna be tough to come by. No open sourcer is going to want to touch SCO with a 10 foot pole now, and since so much of it is based on a curious combination of open source projects like GCC and SAMBA and closed source, it will be 'teh suck' for all involved.
Lastly, the users get the shaft most of all because they 'just want to LIVE!' And damnit, you can't blame them for that.
Something else everyone seems to forget. Video production costs, promostional costs, and a lot of other BS has gone through the roof since 1983. CD's aren't just music anymore - even though that's basically all you still get (well, that and smaller album covers).
Go ahead and look at the video quality from 1983 (except for perhaps Duran Duran - they started the million dollar video), and you'll see what I mean.
Most of these videos that are made today will never even see the light of MTV anyway but you'll pay for them by simplyh buying the $17 dollar CD. Well when I do buy said CD.. WHERE'S MY FUCKING VIDEO??! I've paid for it, and I feel like I'm being ripped off - you should too.
If the music industry wants to compete they need to do just that - COMPETE.
Yeah, I know you may not care but I do. This was one of the primary motivators for our school to move to Open/StarOffice.
As an international school, we never know what version of MS Office a student might have, foreign or domestic - but if it's foreign then you have a whole other set of issues.
Sometimes that Korean doc will open in an American version of Word and print in the lab, other times, it locks up Word and/or the print driver.
Since we switched to Open/StarOffice, this isn't even an issue anymore. Each student gets a copy when she arrives here, and we've never had a problem with language support, printing, or lock ups (well, since 1.0.1 that is!)
McBride has done a pretty good job of BSing their employees that they've had all their work 'stolen' from them, if what I've been reading is correct. This is also why you don't hear much from them - even on the d/l. Most of them appear to support SCO's position.
Look at how they reacted when local Linux LUG picketers arrived; the PROGRAMMERS - not the execs, showed them up with signs like, 'SCO should give away their code for free' and crap like that.
There was some USENET post not too long ago from a SCO programmer who needed info on GCC and he was getting razzed by others. I don't exactly remember the language he used but he signed off something like, 'Sad and tired...' I imagine so.
Nonetheless, having been in a similar situation with an employer, I do feel for them. Scabs need work too. They are so screwed.
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Well, I suppose that if I actually own3d this network and paid for it with my own dollars I'd have to agree with you. Unfortunately, I can't possibly indemnify every student that uploads a Justin Timberlake song, nor can I distinguish between that activity and a student trying to upload a GPL'd document. As it is, Internet filters are a blunt instrument - often it is all or nothing, but it's all I have to work with.
Another issue is, organizations like the RIAA can spend the money to simply monitor my network (and others) for me - whether I want them to or not. Like many others in my field, I am caught in the middle of it. This is a battle I cannot possibly win with the meager resources I have, and I'm certain that Linden Hall is not interested in directly challenging a billion dollar industry either.
But this type of debate has happened here before. When I arrived here in 1999 the students were not allowed to use any sort of Instant Messaging. Both the students and the parents complained because it is, after all 'free' communication and we do have international students here.
However, I opened the biggest can 'o worms when I allowed it because I realized that other than shutting down the entire Internet, I had no real way to adequately control it. I mean sure, you could shut down ports, but could you do it by time? And even if you could, would that stop the girls from using Java-based clients and chatting on Port 80?
Keep in mind that some of these girls would stay on all night, every night if we let them. This is not what parents have in mind when they send their girls to school here. It is only this year that a suitable solution has arrived for us (ImMarshal).
Nonetheless we are making some progress. At least we've gotten beyond the stage of using coffee timers on the hubs (as it was when I first arrived), or scripting the web/firewall proxy services to shut down at XX:XX times for study hall and lights out. Sheesh. Believe me, the boarding school environment is in some ways more demanding than corporate.
Well... I suppose if I had nothing better to do I could do that. Unfortunately like so many others of my kind I am the sole admin in a 200+ user network. Even that wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the fact that fully half of these machines are student owned.
Yeah, I know you'll flame me for this but, we ban all PtoP activity here - now more than ever.
:P So, in the general interest of the school and bandwidth, we now block where we can and bandwidth limit the rest. This isn't college mind you, this is a 6-12 boarding school, so we do have a little more control here.
I used to allow it - sorta. Basically, if a girl here could figure out how to get her PtoP app to work through our proxy I let them do it - until last year. Last year, I received a cease and desist order from the RIAA. Apparently one of our girls had left Bearshare on all day... Uh... For two weeks! And had transferred some 2.6 GB of music (mostly Blink 182).
After studying the order I also thought about how slow the net had seemed lately.
But imagine this scenario for a second. Imagine being subpoenaed by the RIAA. I keep logs because I HAVE TO. While we might be able to avoid direct litigation with the RIAA and parents, it would sour relationships - not good for a reputation. The girls hate the ban, and I'm not too happy about it either, but we simply have to play it safe.
Hey, it's your money - defend MS and closed source all you want. But just think for a minute and look at the incredible progress OOo/StarOffice has made in the last two years of development since Sun took over the code and released it.
:) But think about the public schools. Think about your tax dollars and how much of that goes back to MS and other closed source vendors. I'm not saying that they shouldn't use it - if they need it. We determined that StarOffice would do everything we needed it to do.
Two years ago - while OOo/StarOffice was still in beta my school was in a quandry. We needed more MS licenses (a lot more), due to our adding teacher and student computers. It chafed me to think that we'd end up getting MS Office again, and then again in 2003, all the while dealing with their 'secure' initiatives like activation and the like.
So we instead to the road less travelled and went with OOo/StarOffice. It was rough because OOo wasn't yet out of beta and StarOffice was still 5.2. But by late October, everything was straightened out and last year went very smoothly.
The advantages for us were overwhelming: free copies of OOo for every student and faculty member, a $79 site license for StarOffice on every on-campus machine, and compatibility with what we already had.
We are a private school here in PA. I took a major risk and it was worth doing (i.e. I got to keep my job after all).
But do you think it even gets a fair hearing? With cities like Philadelphia getting sued by the BSa for copyright violations simply because they wanted to communicate with their home districts, why shouldn't they at least consider an alternative - ANY alternative? Shouldn't these things go out for some sort of bid? I dunno, that's just what I think. I'm frustrated because it all works so well here and I have a hard time understanding why it wouldn't elsewhere (other than your usual naysayer resistance).
People bitch that Open Souce software is disorganized or doesn't ever seem polished. OOo is proof that it can be, with guidance and vision. How would it be if more companies would be willing to sponsor development like this?
Those people were totally screwed in later releases. Not only was it the buggiest of all versions, but the least compatible since Works 2.0.
International support between versions doesn't exist - well supposedly until Office 2003 so if you have something written in Office 97/Korean, don't plan on being able to properly open it here.
XML write support is only supported in the enterprise edition of Office. Secure document initiatives in Office 2004 will insure that portability of documents can and will be restricted. While this could be conceived as a feature, it will also be a pain in the ass - mark my words.
Publisher users know all too well what happens between ANY version revision.
Who knows what other wonderful and mysterious changes will be in store?
...for saving in PDF - they'd be doing them a favor. Adobe would most definately sue MS if you were then able to EDIT said PDF after the fact.
Adobe doesn't care if you create the thing - it's the editing part that they expect you to pay for.
The article didn't list what version of patch StarOffice was at. The current patch is PP3, but I believe around January PP2 would've been out.
Each patch has significant bug fixes and MS Office compatibility tweaks so it's hard to tell from the article what level they were at.
I can say this with precision: OOo kicks total ass with MS compatibility now. I have yet to see a corrupt table! Check out 1.1 RC3 - or just wait for the final - should be out anytime now.
Which is really what's funny about this. By so helpfully providing the links in the complaint, one needs to only do a little more searching.
:)
It would've been a LOT more fun had they actually linked them all...
Heh. I still use it in my sig...
That's true - MOST of the time. Troubleshooting can be a bitch though - especially when you're relying on error messages from foreign software. Grrr..
;)
Last year however, I had a few Korean computers that really boggled me. They came shipped from the manufacturer with an 'egg' theme. Everything was eggs. Sunny side up, scrambled, hard boiled, hatching, hatched, a small chicken standing next to an egg, a large chicken next to one, a vibrating egg, a egg on it's side, an egg right side up, two eggs with wires, etc. I understood some of the metaphors, but some just made no sense at all. That totally blew me away.
Oh yes I do - TESTIFY! What's more, how can you even begin to troubleshoot an issue when you can't read Korean or Japanese (I work for an international school)?
There are no easy answers. Fortunately, I work in a small school, so I take the time to try and do updates on each machine when they come in. We run adaware on each, and then install the network version of Sophos so they are protected from viruses.
From that point, we have to hope that the firewall filters do their job in keeping out the junk, but it's certainly not perfect. We've often toyed with the idea of mandating our own dorm terminals, and know schools that do, but we're not ready for this kind of expense yet. Of course, in my environment, I have a bit more flexibility than you might in yours.
We do offer leased computers though, and this year we had more takers than ever - even though the price was as high as a fully equipped desktop system! Some parents just don't want to have to deal with the updating, anti-virus, and other issues. The obvious advantage to this is that we can start these systems out fresh and updated every year. It's tempting to lower that price a bit just to get more takers and therefore, less issues.
The problem is we're continually keeping SCO in the press all by ourselves. We don't even need Darl(ing's) encouragement anymore. All they have to do is sit back and laugh. Remember, this is a company who, six months ago was getting no press at all.
:(
My prediction is, when the smoke clears, SCO's employees, users, and vendors will be screwed but their execs will be sailing off the gold coast. There's really nothing that can be done about it I suppose.
That's good advice - I tried a Morex case once and thought I had a PS supply problem. I did. Huh. :)
...but I say, SCREW YOU! You 'opened this ball' - as ESR put it, and now it's time to deal. We should not back down on these people until the threat is completely gone. I don't know what that means, but it's sure as hell going to take a lot more than some obscure magazine interview to, as Darl(ing) puts it, 'come clean'. I want this sort of thing in writing folks.
;)
This is just like Russia telling us that they are no longer targeting their missles directly at the United States. Whew! What a relief! Now at least we'll have an additional 15 minutes to ponder our final destination.
No. Give them no quarter. The line is drawn here, NO further! (Obligatory Star Trek referrence added)
Oh that would be terrific except that the EPIA boards don't yet support AGP. They come with ONE PCI slot. I suppose you could stick a PCI version of a GeForce 4mx on there, but... Why? :)
I imagine it won't be long before VIA 'fixes' this, but I'm not sure they're in a hurry to. The purpose of the EPIA mini-itx board isn't performance gaming. And to be honest, I'd hate to see them lose focus on what is working so well for them.
I suspect that no sooner than they add an AGP port we'll have Tom's, Sharkey's, Anand's, and others ripping the performance of the CPU and trying like hell to get Doom III running on it.
VIA simply can't compete with the likes of AMD and Intel on their own turf. This mini pc market is one that VIA and Shuttle have almost single-handedly wrested from the industry and caught them completely off guard.
And the funny thing is, its not as though it's cheap - believe me you pay for convenience. It's around $180 at Newegg.com. It's worth it, if you need it, but obviously you can put together a better Nforce2 deal for not much more if size, weight, and heat aren't important. For some of my projects they are, or they're going into older cases and that's why I use these things.
Obviously you've never used VIA processors before. They are notorious for their slow FPU's. In fact, before their latest top-of-the line model - the Nehemiah, their FPU's of previous models always ran at HALF CLOCK. Ouchy.
:O
But, even at full speed a similarly clocked Celeron kicks it's ass in every which way. That said, high performance is not the stated purpose of the Centaur/Via CPU. Its low watts, coupled with the decoder make for an excellent all-around box. I've built around 7 or 8 of these myself and they are excellent for what they are designed for (think: mom and dad or net terminals, not Half Life 2).
I have a few of these floating around the school here now as basic net access / workstation terminals and they are hugely popular - especially in light of what they replaced (AMD 300's). There's nothing like tearing apart some ancient computer and putting one of these boards in it. 90% of the time, it's simply cavernous in there (so much space!)
Last week I put one in an Aptiva and realized that if I was an enterprising person (read: man with a Dremel) I could have fit TWO of them in there as a dual workstation!
So to sum up, they're small as hell (you have to see it to believe it), simple, fun, easy to configure, but don't plan of using them at the next Fragfest 2003 (c)
Looking at their pricing nowadays you'd think they WERE incorporating HASP or some other hardware method!
...is their PRICING. When our school went to purchase a new license for Exchange it cost as much as the Exchange server license plus Windows 2003 license plus 200 CALs. And that's ACADEMIC pricing. Unbelievable.
They think they're God because they are a gold partner with Microsoft. Well, basically, I told them what they could do with themselves and went with Sophos instead who offered much more (an entire SITE license) for only half that price.
In light of this new info (concerning product activation), I'm that much gladder we didn't go with them this time around. Too bad, I rather liked Norton on Exchange 2000. But, there comes a time when you realize that paying more for the anti-virus software than for what the anti-virus software is running on simply doesn't make sense.
I was not laying any blame, I was simply stating fact - and man, that's FACT.
...will assume the position.
Don't forget about the employees, resellers, and users (yes, there still are some). The poor employees have been duped into believing that 'Hey yeah! They HAVE stolen our stuff!' But the sad truth is, they're not the ones holding the platinum ripcord on the golden parachute. They'll be joining all the others looking for work - trying to compete with India and China.
The resellers are going to have a tough time because support is gonna be tough to come by. No open sourcer is going to want to touch SCO with a 10 foot pole now, and since so much of it is based on a curious combination of open source projects like GCC and SAMBA and closed source, it will be 'teh suck' for all involved.
Lastly, the users get the shaft most of all because they 'just want to LIVE!' And damnit, you can't blame them for that.
Hmmmm - let's see:
- SCO ammends lawsuit to claim damages done by IBM's 'interference' with their business.
- SCO announces new 'secure' initiative (don't they all)
- Darl McBride claims that the original BSD/AT&T lawsuit is invalid and therefore not relevant to SCO, i.e. 'All Code Are Belong To Us'
- SCO accuses the GPL as promoting communism in China, socialism in Europe, and drug use in California.
- David Boies will never make another appearance unless SCO 're-rents' him for another day.
- SCO will continue to reap the benefits of open source projects like GCC and SAMBA and yet slam the GPL for being too 'restrictive' on IP.
Far Future Prediction:
SCO's execs will be living in luxury on some tropical island while their customers, users, resellers, and programmers get totally screwed.
"That's just the way it is. Some things will never change." - Bruce Hornsby
You know, I just have to log on to Slashdot (SCOdot?) just to keep updated on the SCO silliness, but it's getting stranger than fiction now.
SCO: Part entertainment, part pit bull
Something else everyone seems to forget. Video production costs, promostional costs, and a lot of other BS has gone through the roof since 1983. CD's aren't just music anymore - even though that's basically all you still get (well, that and smaller album covers).
Go ahead and look at the video quality from 1983 (except for perhaps Duran Duran - they started the million dollar video), and you'll see what I mean.
Most of these videos that are made today will never even see the light of MTV anyway but you'll pay for them by simplyh buying the $17 dollar CD. Well when I do buy said CD.. WHERE'S MY FUCKING VIDEO??! I've paid for it, and I feel like I'm being ripped off - you should too.
If the music industry wants to compete they need to do just that - COMPETE.
Yeah, I know you may not care but I do. This was one of the primary motivators for our school to move to Open/StarOffice.
As an international school, we never know what version of MS Office a student might have, foreign or domestic - but if it's foreign then you have a whole other set of issues.
Sometimes that Korean doc will open in an American version of Word and print in the lab, other times, it locks up Word and/or the print driver.
Since we switched to Open/StarOffice, this isn't even an issue anymore. Each student gets a copy when she arrives here, and we've never had a problem with language support, printing, or lock ups (well, since 1.0.1 that is!)
No, sadly this is just not the case.
McBride has done a pretty good job of BSing their employees that they've had all their work 'stolen' from them, if what I've been reading is correct. This is also why you don't hear much from them - even on the d/l. Most of them appear to support SCO's position.
Look at how they reacted when local Linux LUG picketers arrived; the PROGRAMMERS - not the execs, showed them up with signs like, 'SCO should give away their code for free' and crap like that.
There was some USENET post not too long ago from a SCO programmer who needed info on GCC and he was getting razzed by others. I don't exactly remember the language he used but he signed off something like, 'Sad and tired...' I imagine so.
Nonetheless, having been in a similar situation with an employer, I do feel for them. Scabs need work too. They are so screwed.