I work for a rather large corporation. Some of us are allowed to telecommute a few days a week. This may cause some folks here on slashdot to call me un-American BUT I have had the opportunity over the past several years to work with a fine group of developers from India. They were h1b visa holders. Due to the impact of numerous layoffs it became more and more difficult to justify keeping h1b visa personel while laying off American workers. I am just being honest here now, so don't take this personally but the h1b developers I worked with worked harder, worked smarter and consistently turned out outstanding code. They were not satisfied with merely turning out code that functioned but would always attempt to optimize the code in order to make it work more efficiently. They are now gone, two have returned to india and one has taken a job in another state. These members of my development team have been replaced by ionter departmental transfers from other groups within the company. The Indian developers never left at the stroke of 5 when there was code that needed to be finished. I never heard them tell me "that isn't my job" when asked to look at something or to help with some project not specifically assigned to them.
I too used to wonder about h1b visa folks and now, off shore development famrs, taking American worker's jobs. I must say truthfully that if the cost is less and the level of professionalism approaches that of the folks I had the p[leasure of working with, it is no wonder businesses are turning to outsourcing. I am not making this a blanket statement but let's face it, many of us Americans are spoiled rotten and act like it too! Call my un-patriotic if you like but I woiuld gladly take the two developers who went back to India back into the group as outsourced labor over the 6 American developers here that "replaced" them. The project would not only be done faster but would have fewer bugs to be fixed and it would be running more efficiently as a side bonus!
I was wondering the same thing, are there really enough users needing tech support to support the entire slashdot community so I issued the following SQL query:
SELECT * FROM USERS WHERE CLUE > 0
0 Records returned....
Yep, guess there are!
There comes a time when things get so rediculous that discussing the merits of this SCO debacle on forums lik this one just doesn't cut it anymore. SCO offering to sell licenses to linux is like any other compoany offering to sell a license to a product manufactured by and sold by a completely unrelated company! If this licensing scheme (actually more like Racketeering scheme as what SCO is truly selling is "protection") works does that mean we need to prepare for the possibility that the manufacturer of the paint used by Ford Motor Company to paint the car I purchased from a Ford dealership could at some point in the future decide to require me to pay them a licensing fee if I wish to continue to "legally operate my vehicle"? This is completely and utterly absurd. It is high time for the leaders in the Linux community to stand up, in unison and voice their complete and total dis-association from SCO! I think a good place to start would be with the other members of the "United Linux" group. How does SuSE for example, feel about SCO charging their customers a license fee for the product they distributed? The other members ofg the United Linux foundation should all denounce the tactics being used by SCO to extort money from the Linux using populace of the world!
I can understand IBM biding their time up to this point as they most likely feel, rightly so, that SCO's claims have no merit BUT isn't it time to say enough is enough and publicly state the rediculous notion that SCO can claim to be due licensing fees for products distributed by others. Not only publicly but in the form of some sort of press release that would be just as visible and noticeable to the fortune 500 companies and others that just may give in to this extortion simply to hedge their bets. SCO does not deserve a single red cent from the linus community!
I have gone from being an interested observer of this case, to becomming almost boared with the FUD to now being exceptionally angry. I am normally a calm and patient person but isn't this a case where enough is enough?
I remember taking literally days working with my first slackware linux install, and after working through that frustration taking another day tweaking X so it would run. It took months before I fully appreciated the true beauty of Linux... yes DOS and even Windows installed far more easily and without any frustration whatsoever, but Linux, as I would find, had a payoff. After 6 months of running my slackware Linux system I had had to reboot due to "General Application Faults" or "UAE (Unexplained application errors) exactly ZERO times. So, put a little extra time and effort in up front and never worry about the stability of your system again. It was true then, it is even truer now as far as Linux installers have come!
Thank you Slackware!!!:)
Class Actiuon Suit Anyone!? It would seem to me that a great deal of harm is being done, not only to linux companies and direct users of Linux in business applications but also to those of us who have evangelized,supported, and encouraged the use of open source and linux technology in the sometimes rather large corporations we work for. I myself am employed by a large telecommunications firm and have supported and encouraged the use and deployment of linux as an operating system in talks with Executives and Vice Presidents within my company. This is damaging not only to those of us who occassionally develop or work on parts of various open source projects but it is damaging our reputations and possibly, in some cases our likelyhood of raises and adequate compensation. I can even imagine in some corporations people could be fired for being the one who puched through the decision to switch to linux. I am definitely not a lawyer but wouldn't a class action lawsuit against SCO for the damage their unsubstantiated FUD campaign is doing be perfectly reasonable? Any Lawyers out there? I'll be one of the first to sign up as a co-defendant!
It may well be that the current legal matters in question are between SCO and IBM, but here is a thought... I work for a large corporation as a software engineer. I have promoited, evangelised and even managed to garner some acceptance of Linux in particular and Open Source software in general within my corporation to my superiors (from my immediate management all the way up to the VP level). I am not alone and though the base of developers who contribute to the kernal development effort is large, suppose you add to that sys admins, networking forlks, IT managers and the like who understand the open source concepts and also support, evangelize, recommend Linux and Open Source software for use withing thier companies and organizations. This entire FUD campaign and the irresponsable casting of aspersions upon the integrity of open source developers and open source products by SCO is damaging the reputations and I'm sure in some cases perhaps even causing monetary problems (folks not being given a rasie based on their support of this now viewed as, legally shakey, OS operating system). It IS and will continue to affect many people who may not necessarily be connected directly to open source development.
I am no attorney, as I said I am a software Engineer, BUT is there an attorney out there who might wish to comment on the possible success of a class action suit, brought against SCO on the basis of their 1500 letters to major corporations and the slander and aaspersions being cast, without a shred of proof by them, on the entire open source software industry in their scontinued press releases and public comments?
Just a thought. If dsomeone wants to start such a class action suit, I would certainly sign up! Not expoect any monetary return mind you but rather to get the attention of SCO and let them know that perhaps, the UNITED community of open source advocates (again not just developers) may well become a more powerful threat to them than even IBM!
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I work for a rather large corporation. Some of us are allowed to telecommute a few days a week. This may cause some folks here on slashdot to call me un-American BUT I have had the opportunity over the past several years to work with a fine group of developers from India. They were h1b visa holders. Due to the impact of numerous layoffs it became more and more difficult to justify keeping h1b visa personel while laying off American workers. I am just being honest here now, so don't take this personally but the h1b developers I worked with worked harder, worked smarter and consistently turned out outstanding code. They were not satisfied with merely turning out code that functioned but would always attempt to optimize the code in order to make it work more efficiently. They are now gone, two have returned to india and one has taken a job in another state. These members of my development team have been replaced by ionter departmental transfers from other groups within the company. The Indian developers never left at the stroke of 5 when there was code that needed to be finished. I never heard them tell me "that isn't my job" when asked to look at something or to help with some project not specifically assigned to them. I too used to wonder about h1b visa folks and now, off shore development famrs, taking American worker's jobs. I must say truthfully that if the cost is less and the level of professionalism approaches that of the folks I had the p[leasure of working with, it is no wonder businesses are turning to outsourcing. I am not making this a blanket statement but let's face it, many of us Americans are spoiled rotten and act like it too! Call my un-patriotic if you like but I woiuld gladly take the two developers who went back to India back into the group as outsourced labor over the 6 American developers here that "replaced" them. The project would not only be done faster but would have fewer bugs to be fixed and it would be running more efficiently as a side bonus!
I was wondering the same thing, are there really enough users needing tech support to support the entire slashdot community so I issued the following SQL query: SELECT * FROM USERS WHERE CLUE > 0 0 Records returned.... Yep, guess there are!
There comes a time when things get so rediculous that discussing the merits of this SCO debacle on forums lik this one just doesn't cut it anymore. SCO offering to sell licenses to linux is like any other compoany offering to sell a license to a product manufactured by and sold by a completely unrelated company! If this licensing scheme (actually more like Racketeering scheme as what SCO is truly selling is "protection") works does that mean we need to prepare for the possibility that the manufacturer of the paint used by Ford Motor Company to paint the car I purchased from a Ford dealership could at some point in the future decide to require me to pay them a licensing fee if I wish to continue to "legally operate my vehicle"? This is completely and utterly absurd. It is high time for the leaders in the Linux community to stand up, in unison and voice their complete and total dis-association from SCO! I think a good place to start would be with the other members of the "United Linux" group. How does SuSE for example, feel about SCO charging their customers a license fee for the product they distributed? The other members ofg the United Linux foundation should all denounce the tactics being used by SCO to extort money from the Linux using populace of the world! I can understand IBM biding their time up to this point as they most likely feel, rightly so, that SCO's claims have no merit BUT isn't it time to say enough is enough and publicly state the rediculous notion that SCO can claim to be due licensing fees for products distributed by others. Not only publicly but in the form of some sort of press release that would be just as visible and noticeable to the fortune 500 companies and others that just may give in to this extortion simply to hedge their bets. SCO does not deserve a single red cent from the linus community! I have gone from being an interested observer of this case, to becomming almost boared with the FUD to now being exceptionally angry. I am normally a calm and patient person but isn't this a case where enough is enough?
I remember taking literally days working with my first slackware linux install, and after working through that frustration taking another day tweaking X so it would run. It took months before I fully appreciated the true beauty of Linux... yes DOS and even Windows installed far more easily and without any frustration whatsoever, but Linux, as I would find, had a payoff. After 6 months of running my slackware Linux system I had had to reboot due to "General Application Faults" or "UAE (Unexplained application errors) exactly ZERO times. So, put a little extra time and effort in up front and never worry about the stability of your system again. It was true then, it is even truer now as far as Linux installers have come! Thank you Slackware!!! :)
Class Actiuon Suit Anyone!? It would seem to me that a great deal of harm is being done, not only to linux companies and direct users of Linux in business applications but also to those of us who have evangelized,supported, and encouraged the use of open source and linux technology in the sometimes rather large corporations we work for. I myself am employed by a large telecommunications firm and have supported and encouraged the use and deployment of linux as an operating system in talks with Executives and Vice Presidents within my company. This is damaging not only to those of us who occassionally develop or work on parts of various open source projects but it is damaging our reputations and possibly, in some cases our likelyhood of raises and adequate compensation. I can even imagine in some corporations people could be fired for being the one who puched through the decision to switch to linux. I am definitely not a lawyer but wouldn't a class action lawsuit against SCO for the damage their unsubstantiated FUD campaign is doing be perfectly reasonable? Any Lawyers out there? I'll be one of the first to sign up as a co-defendant!
It may well be that the current legal matters in question are between SCO and IBM, but here is a thought... I work for a large corporation as a software engineer. I have promoited, evangelised and even managed to garner some acceptance of Linux in particular and Open Source software in general within my corporation to my superiors (from my immediate management all the way up to the VP level). I am not alone and though the base of developers who contribute to the kernal development effort is large, suppose you add to that sys admins, networking forlks, IT managers and the like who understand the open source concepts and also support, evangelize, recommend Linux and Open Source software for use withing thier companies and organizations. This entire FUD campaign and the irresponsable casting of aspersions upon the integrity of open source developers and open source products by SCO is damaging the reputations and I'm sure in some cases perhaps even causing monetary problems (folks not being given a rasie based on their support of this now viewed as, legally shakey, OS operating system). It IS and will continue to affect many people who may not necessarily be connected directly to open source development. I am no attorney, as I said I am a software Engineer, BUT is there an attorney out there who might wish to comment on the possible success of a class action suit, brought against SCO on the basis of their 1500 letters to major corporations and the slander and aaspersions being cast, without a shred of proof by them, on the entire open source software industry in their scontinued press releases and public comments? Just a thought. If dsomeone wants to start such a class action suit, I would certainly sign up! Not expoect any monetary return mind you but rather to get the attention of SCO and let them know that perhaps, the UNITED community of open source advocates (again not just developers) may well become a more powerful threat to them than even IBM!