Interesting... I guess this sort of argument could be used in lots of small businesses. And it would have been costly for them to gain true peace-of-mind with MS Office.
However, to me, this doesn't seem like a real conversion because it was only a matter of installation. I'd like to know about a business that had to convert at least a few templates, and may have stories about interoperability problems with customers/vendors.
I think in a way you're right, web-based email is a great example.
But, I think that you are forgetting about one important point. Market share in the case of Office Suites is an important factor. Moving from any one suite to another, for any sized business, is a costly venture. Companies have enough problems just with the M$ upgrades.
As an example of my point, I'd like to use OO.org (you broght it up;) ). It is free, and capable of everything that 90% of MS Office users need.
So why is it not the market leader?!! I'm not asking because I think you're wrong, I'm asking because I'd love to know the magic words to get people away from MS Office!
I hate to be a dick, but you are giving me the technical arguments that I'm already aware of...
What I'm looking for are the non-technical (non-logical) arguments that could be used to sway management away from MS Office. Cost-savings is a big deal, but cost savings hasn't moved anyone away from Windows. There are tons of easier to manage, cheaper alternatives to Microsoft's products, but they don't gain ground. Why? Because it is sort of a catch-22, market share is a marketing factor. For instance, if everyone is using office, new users will want to interoperate with existing users, thus, increasing total number of office users.
What I meant to ask above is if anyone has been able to sway a significantly large organization away from MS Office. You seem to have made a good point, now go tell your PHBs what you've told me, and when your organization has dumped MS Office, let me know exactly what was said because I would LOVE to get rid of MS Office here.
I'm not disagreeing with you, but from my perspective, here are the problems with your argument:
I agree that people are getting sick of the viruses, but the more common response is to invest more heavily in AVS. When I get email in the office about new viruses I usually see a blurb at the end suggesting everyone update their virus definitions files.
The IBM name may carry weight, but it hasn't been enough weight to keep their Lotus Suite in the position it once had. There was a day when Lotus 1-2-3 was the top dog, but their name wasn't enough to beat Microshaft in the past, how will it be enough to beat them today?
Not *trying* to get MODded down, just don't believe that this will take any significant chunk of market share.
Although many of us here may see the immediate benefits of this over MS Office, has anyone ever been able to sway non-techie management away from Office?
Goodwill with the tech crowd will go a long way. There are some companies that play nice with our crowd and prosper from it... Apple for one has tried to deliver what we want and now they are doing better than they did 4 years ago.
Although, I think we're both just feeding the troll.
Currently working in a Java/JSP/Sybase-based web programming environment and I love it.
But, I will give perl it's props.
I often use it to prototype large projects. Despite most arguments for other languages, I will say that you can pump out perl code pretty fast and it does help when you need some mockups and basic functionality to sell a concept.
It's not that AOL's IP stack is different, it is that AOL uses a different data link protocol than most dialup ISPs. Rather than opening a PPP session, when you connect to AOL, you establish a bastardized L2TP session with a machine referred to as a BERP. The BERPs essentially act as proxies for everything you attempt to access once you are connected. There are open source attempts to reverse engineer their protocols with pengAOL being the only one I can remember off the top of my head.
In regard to using proprietary protocols, it isn't that AOL has some master plan to lock customers into this proprietary infrastructure, it is just the way AOL has evolved. Imagine for a second, that you worked at an ISP with 22 million customers (up to 35 million at your peak). There is a point where the open protocols just don't fit your needs any more. AOL simply patched a solution together that has been working ever since.
This guy is right, the market sets the price for goods, and the execs at corporations have a fudiciary obligation to shareholders to maximize profits. Thus, the savings rarely reach consumers. The price drops mentioned in the parent's parent post cannot be proven as a consequence of cheaper foreign labor. IMO, the lower cost of today's vehicles is a matter of better manufacturing processes. As plant technology improves, cars can be made faster/cheaper.
My biggest problem with outsourcing is that savings aren't reaching consumers. IT isn't the only industry losing jobs to India. There are quite a bit of collections jobs being sent to India. These weren't necessarily high-paying jobs to begin with, but they are jobs none-the-less. One example is American Eagle. Their collections department uses an Indian firm to make their outgoing calls. Has anyone seen any kind of price drop on American Eagle clothes? Another example is HP/Compaq. Everyone's favorite CEO (Carly) has been a big proponent of outsourcing recently, but I don't see HP's PCs coming down in price. Yet, because of her cost-cutting efforts she is hailed as an excellent executive in the business community. Despite laying off tons of American employees, she is still approving cush expenses on things like company-owned airplanes. I'm not expecting a big drop in price every time a company saves money, but there is currently too much pressure on public corporations to increase the profit margins. On a macro-economic scale, the only people to benefit are going to be the wealthy.
So, that would be my question to parties that are pro-outsourcing.... What will be done to make sure cost savings achieved by corporations trickle down to consumers? What can be done to educate shareholders on the value of retaining American jobs, which in turn become American customers?
Makes me want to jab a stick in my eyes and welcome the sweet sweet nothingness.
Do it... seriously... better yet, do it, take pictures with your digital camera, put it on a website, and send me the link beforehand. This way I can have it put up here on/. and maybe you'll be happy... Unfortunately, you'll pay the sacrifice of never being able to see again, and you won't be able to enjoy the non-crap news you created, but sometimes someone has to take one for the team.
I tried to email to the address offering up the land I bought from the lunar embassy to lease to them. I was disappointed to see that I got an auto-response. I was really hoping for their business.
Email message was as follows (if you're interested):
Hello,
I recently found out about your decision to expand your operationsoff-planet. I applaud your efforts and wish you the best.
I would also like to offer one of my plots of terrain for your newcomplex. I believe I can provide a very fair and reasonable lease rate on a twelve-month renewable contract.
Please, let me know if you arecurrently entertaining offers.
Thanks! And I look forward to doing business with you.
Is this where someone is supposed to make a reference to the urban legend about someone attaching a jet engine to their car and crashing into the side of a mountain? You know, the one where they say that they only found a few teeth and fingernails embedded in the dashboard.
Well... I am not completely sure, but I think it is on here because and anonymous reader submitted it and CmdrTaco approved it. I'm sure there are some more mechanics behind it, but there is probably more information in the FAQ.
Still, as long as the software folk treat it as "always chatting" communication, and build in the proper safeguards, rather than assuming that every conversation is spawned by a dedicated request to speak, things should be fine.
Sure... they just need to follow ethernet as an example. I mean, think about how secure and un-snoopable ethernet is, err... wait a seCARRIER DROPPED
I would have laughed, but Jim Varney is dead. Sadly, if there will be a Toy Story 3, someone else will be reading the part of Slink. (/me feeling really lame that I know this)
I mean, before the.com boom, companies usually only went public because they needed money to grow. Google seems to sustain a very healthy bottom-line and I think they have yet to figure out what they want to grow into.
heh, don't get me wrong I wasn't slamming you, I was just musing to myself how nice it would have been to work there, since the very stuff I was sick of doing you seemed unallowed to do:)
I suppose at the same time, you would have liked to work in the environment I was in a few years back.
My choice of serverOS and hardware as long as I could make a legitimate claim that more capacity was needed.
My choice of supporting software for taking care of my administrative duties.
The only problem I had was a severe lack of supporting personnel, these choices were all up to me simply because I was the only one taking care of the stuff.
You simply inherited a subscribership You didn't care about spam-filtering (and this actually *kept* your customers from leaving) You didn't have to fix stuff unless mgmt considered it broken
Where was this that you worked again? Paradise? Utopia? Are there any more openings;-)
Slashdot Mirror
Interesting... I guess this sort of argument could be used in lots of small businesses. And it would have been costly for them to gain true peace-of-mind with MS Office.
However, to me, this doesn't seem like a real conversion because it was only a matter of installation. I'd like to know about a business that had to convert at least a few templates, and may have stories about interoperability problems with customers/vendors.
I think in a way you're right, web-based email is a great example.
;) ). It is free, and capable of everything that 90% of MS Office users need.
But, I think that you are forgetting about one important point. Market share in the case of Office Suites is an important factor. Moving from any one suite to another, for any sized business, is a costly venture. Companies have enough problems just with the M$ upgrades.
As an example of my point, I'd like to use OO.org (you broght it up
So why is it not the market leader?!! I'm not asking because I think you're wrong, I'm asking because I'd love to know the magic words to get people away from MS Office!
I hate to be a dick, but you are giving me the technical arguments that I'm already aware of...
What I'm looking for are the non-technical (non-logical) arguments that could be used to sway management away from MS Office. Cost-savings is a big deal, but cost savings hasn't moved anyone away from Windows. There are tons of easier to manage, cheaper alternatives to Microsoft's products, but they don't gain ground. Why? Because it is sort of a catch-22, market share is a marketing factor. For instance, if everyone is using office, new users will want to interoperate with existing users, thus, increasing total number of office users.
What I meant to ask above is if anyone has been able to sway a significantly large organization away from MS Office. You seem to have made a good point, now go tell your PHBs what you've told me, and when your organization has dumped MS Office, let me know exactly what was said because I would LOVE to get rid of MS Office here.
I'm not disagreeing with you, but from my perspective, here are the problems with your argument:
I agree that people are getting sick of the viruses, but the more common response is to invest more heavily in AVS. When I get email in the office about new viruses I usually see a blurb at the end suggesting everyone update their virus definitions files.
The IBM name may carry weight, but it hasn't been enough weight to keep their Lotus Suite in the position it once had. There was a day when Lotus 1-2-3 was the top dog, but their name wasn't enough to beat Microshaft in the past, how will it be enough to beat them today?
Not *trying* to get MODded down, just don't believe that this will take any significant chunk of market share.
Although many of us here may see the immediate benefits of this over MS Office, has anyone ever been able to sway non-techie management away from Office?
Goodwill with the tech crowd will go a long way. There are some companies that play nice with our crowd and prosper from it... Apple for one has tried to deliver what we want and now they are doing better than they did 4 years ago.
Although, I think we're both just feeding the troll.
This is amazing, a +3 Troll ?!?! This a rare find in the /. jungle.
Now, hold on while I try to stick my thumb up it's butt.
Glad you can take it without insulting me right back... I'll give you credit though, it is *Monday*
How about a book on using HTML? Pay close attention to the chapter on closing your tags.
Currently working in a Java/JSP/Sybase-based web programming environment and I love it.
But, I will give perl it's props.
I often use it to prototype large projects. Despite most arguments for other languages, I will say that you can pump out perl code pretty fast and it does help when you need some mockups and basic functionality to sell a concept.
It's not that AOL's IP stack is different, it is that AOL uses a different data link protocol than most dialup ISPs. Rather than opening a PPP session, when you connect to AOL, you establish a bastardized L2TP session with a machine referred to as a BERP. The BERPs essentially act as proxies for everything you attempt to access once you are connected. There are open source attempts to reverse engineer their protocols with pengAOL being the only one I can remember off the top of my head.
In regard to using proprietary protocols, it isn't that AOL has some master plan to lock customers into this proprietary infrastructure, it is just the way AOL has evolved. Imagine for a second, that you worked at an ISP with 22 million customers (up to 35 million at your peak). There is a point where the open protocols just don't fit your needs any more. AOL simply patched a solution together that has been working ever since.
Heh, This guy will soon end up in the oil company holding cell with the guy trying to make a porcelain engine that runs on water.
This guy is right, the market sets the price for goods, and the execs at corporations have a fudiciary obligation to shareholders to maximize profits. Thus, the savings rarely reach consumers. The price drops mentioned in the parent's parent post cannot be proven as a consequence of cheaper foreign labor. IMO, the lower cost of today's vehicles is a matter of better manufacturing processes. As plant technology improves, cars can be made faster/cheaper.
My biggest problem with outsourcing is that savings aren't reaching consumers. IT isn't the only industry losing jobs to India. There are quite a bit of collections jobs being sent to India. These weren't necessarily high-paying jobs to begin with, but they are jobs none-the-less. One example is American Eagle. Their collections department uses an Indian firm to make their outgoing calls. Has anyone seen any kind of price drop on American Eagle clothes? Another example is HP/Compaq. Everyone's favorite CEO (Carly) has been a big proponent of outsourcing recently, but I don't see HP's PCs coming down in price. Yet, because of her cost-cutting efforts she is hailed as an excellent executive in the business community. Despite laying off tons of American employees, she is still approving cush expenses on things like company-owned airplanes. I'm not expecting a big drop in price every time a company saves money, but there is currently too much pressure on public corporations to increase the profit margins. On a macro-economic scale, the only people to benefit are going to be the wealthy.
So, that would be my question to parties that are pro-outsourcing.... What will be done to make sure cost savings achieved by corporations trickle down to consumers? What can be done to educate shareholders on the value of retaining American jobs, which in turn become American customers?
Makes me want to jab a stick in my eyes and welcome the sweet sweet nothingness.
/. and maybe you'll be happy... Unfortunately, you'll pay the sacrifice of never being able to see again, and you won't be able to enjoy the non-crap news you created, but sometimes someone has to take one for the team.
Do it... seriously... better yet, do it, take pictures with your digital camera, put it on a website, and send me the link beforehand. This way I can have it put up here on
I don't even see the encoding anymore, I just see blond, brunette, redhead...
Email message was as follows (if you're interested):
Is this where someone is supposed to make a reference to the urban legend about someone attaching a jet engine to their car and crashing into the side of a mountain? You know, the one where they say that they only found a few teeth and fingernails embedded in the dashboard.
why is this on slashdot?
Well... I am not completely sure, but I think it is on here because and anonymous reader submitted it and CmdrTaco approved it. I'm sure there are some more mechanics behind it, but there is probably more information in the FAQ.
Still, as long as the software folk treat it as "always chatting" communication, and build in the proper safeguards, rather than assuming that every conversation is spawned by a dedicated request to speak, things should be fine.
Sure... they just need to follow ethernet as an example. I mean, think about how secure and un-snoopable ethernet is, err... wait a seCARRIER DROPPED
Here, if you don't want to burn down their servers or if you don't want to launch acrobat/xpdf
I'm waiting for the trilogy boxed set uber extended special edition whth all directory commentary in all the languages of middle earth.
Heh, I'm waiting for the new special DVD feature: "The Making of the Special DVD features"
I would have laughed, but Jim Varney is dead. Sadly, if there will be a Toy Story 3, someone else will be reading the part of Slink. (/me feeling really lame that I know this)
I mean, before the .com boom, companies usually only went public because they needed money to grow. Google seems to sustain a very healthy bottom-line and I think they have yet to figure out what they want to grow into.
I suppose at the same time, you would have liked to work in the environment I was in a few years back.
- My choice of serverOS and hardware as long as I could make a legitimate claim that more capacity was needed.
- My choice of supporting software for taking care of my administrative duties.
The only problem I had was a severe lack of supporting personnel, these choices were all up to me simply because I was the only one taking care of the stuff.wow, let me sum this up...
;-)
You simply inherited a subscribership
You didn't care about spam-filtering (and this actually *kept* your customers from leaving)
You didn't have to fix stuff unless mgmt considered it broken
Where was this that you worked again? Paradise? Utopia? Are there any more openings