I know, I know... but it doesn't take long and after the conversion to debs the dpkg install was flawless. Not perfect, but it does the trick. I imagine they are not concerning themselves with package builds until they get a release candidate.
No, they are a private organization who manifestly acts as the government's surrogate enforcement agency in the realm of software IP. One could easily be fooled because of their clearly governmental-sounding name. They chose the word "alliance" over "association" for a reason. They chose to be known by a 3 letter acronym for a reason (IRS, FBI, CIA, FAA, FDA, you get the idea). There is no law per se, allowing them to come in and "raid" a company but they take a complaint and run to the nearest friendly federal judge, get a warrant, pick up a couple of federal marshalls along the way and they're in business. Effectively, the government tags along because they share in the bounty. As I posted a moment ago, they are the reason I decided my company would eliminate all commercial software and go with OSS/GPL.
The BSA is little more than a neo-fascist private entity with governmental power. I could go on about them for hours, but will instead get to the bottom line here. It is solely because of the BSA, their tactics and the enormous risk I encounter by using their members' commercial software in my company that I made the decision 18 months ago to use exclusively OSS/GPL software.
I started my company in 2001 after being laid off like many in our field then, with my own scarce capital and hard work. I managed to land a couple of large contracts within the first 8 months and began hiring staff as well as contractors. One employee, who came highly recommended with excellent references by the way, screwed up royally (over the course of several weeks) and nearly cost us our largest customer. I gave him a second chance and hoped after a long talk that it would work out. It didn't. A few weeks later he marched in and quit without giving notice and in less than a week the BSA came knocking on my door. This guy evidently decided when I nearly fired him to use his reprieve to find other work and to install as many pirated copies of various pieces of software as he could on his machine and actually on another as he somehow gained access to it. I didn't do it. My company didn't do it. The disgruntled employee himself did it, then snitched to the IRS - err, I mean, BSA and they came in with federal marshalls. It nearly wiped my business, and the 35 jobs we had by then created, completely out. Fortunately, I took out a 2nd on my house and we were able to weather the storm. I had to pay these crooks over $300,000 in extortion money to get them out of my office!
That was it for me. The next day I called in my CTO and told him to do whatever had to be done to get all proprietary software out of my company. Three months later we were exclusively in the world of OSS/GPL and we haven't looked back. Also, every employee and contractor that works for us now must sign a waiver, taking full responsibility for the software that exists on their system that is outside of our standard build. I may not be able to say that I know I'll never hear from them again, but I certainly feel that we have mitigated that risk quite substantially.
I have no problem with the notion of paying for software, i.e. - fulfilling the terms of an agreed-to two-party contract. I do have a problem with the risk associated with commercial software and the draconian practices of the BSA. The potential for sabotage is real, and the price tag can be staggering - even devastating - to a small business. This is without question the most compelling argument in favor of OSS in a business environment. I'll not be burned in such a way ever again.
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I always turn that damn thing off. Just like autocorrect and check spelling as you type. Annoying as hell.
I know, I know... but it doesn't take long and after the conversion to debs the dpkg install was flawless. Not perfect, but it does the trick. I imagine they are not concerning themselves with package builds until they get a release candidate.
Perhaps because it isn't burdened by the underlying sucktaciousness of Windows itself?
No, they are a private organization who manifestly acts as the government's surrogate enforcement agency in the realm of software IP. One could easily be fooled because of their clearly governmental-sounding name. They chose the word "alliance" over "association" for a reason. They chose to be known by a 3 letter acronym for a reason (IRS, FBI, CIA, FAA, FDA, you get the idea). There is no law per se, allowing them to come in and "raid" a company but they take a complaint and run to the nearest friendly federal judge, get a warrant, pick up a couple of federal marshalls along the way and they're in business. Effectively, the government tags along because they share in the bounty. As I posted a moment ago, they are the reason I decided my company would eliminate all commercial software and go with OSS/GPL.
The BSA is little more than a neo-fascist private entity with governmental power. I could go on about them for hours, but will instead get to the bottom line here. It is solely because of the BSA, their tactics and the enormous risk I encounter by using their members' commercial software in my company that I made the decision 18 months ago to use exclusively OSS/GPL software.
I started my company in 2001 after being laid off like many in our field then, with my own scarce capital and hard work. I managed to land a couple of large contracts within the first 8 months and began hiring staff as well as contractors. One employee, who came highly recommended with excellent references by the way, screwed up royally (over the course of several weeks) and nearly cost us our largest customer. I gave him a second chance and hoped after a long talk that it would work out. It didn't. A few weeks later he marched in and quit without giving notice and in less than a week the BSA came knocking on my door. This guy evidently decided when I nearly fired him to use his reprieve to find other work and to install as many pirated copies of various pieces of software as he could on his machine and actually on another as he somehow gained access to it. I didn't do it. My company didn't do it. The disgruntled employee himself did it, then snitched to the IRS - err, I mean, BSA and they came in with federal marshalls. It nearly wiped my business, and the 35 jobs we had by then created, completely out. Fortunately, I took out a 2nd on my house and we were able to weather the storm. I had to pay these crooks over $300,000 in extortion money to get them out of my office!
That was it for me. The next day I called in my CTO and told him to do whatever had to be done to get all proprietary software out of my company. Three months later we were exclusively in the world of OSS/GPL and we haven't looked back. Also, every employee and contractor that works for us now must sign a waiver, taking full responsibility for the software that exists on their system that is outside of our standard build. I may not be able to say that I know I'll never hear from them again, but I certainly feel that we have mitigated that risk quite substantially.
I have no problem with the notion of paying for software, i.e. - fulfilling the terms of an agreed-to two-party contract. I do have a problem with the risk associated with commercial software and the draconian practices of the BSA. The potential for sabotage is real, and the price tag can be staggering - even devastating - to a small business. This is without question the most compelling argument in favor of OSS in a business environment. I'll not be burned in such a way ever again.