[lug] M$ does it again...down under

[Taz]

When I posted this almost a week ago, I had no idea that I would get this
kind of response.  Anyway, I have never been a big fan of M$ and I won't
bother to hide it.  However, M$ does not support Win9x anymore.  They offer
no support to their older product lines whatsoever (not like their support is
very good for their current product lines).  I'm not saying that it gives the
np groups the right to install and distribute the old computer with Win95.
M$ could've looked the other way.  That would've been the better PR move.
They didn't.
M$, in this case, is not concerned at all with their so-called intellectual
property.  They care about one thing:  the bottom line.  In their view,
giving away software that they no longer support takes away proffit.  Had
they given the licenses away, they could have taken the write-off for tax
purposes.  They receive the full retail value for the "donation".  You could
also argue that this could have benefited them (M$) in the future.  If a
customer learns on a particular product, typically they will stick with it in
the long term.  Apple knows this.  Why do you think that Apple gives
educational facilities such deep discounts?  Their smart.  They put their
product into the consumers hands as soon as possible.  I'll ignore the fact
that the Mac is, technically, a rock solid machine and arguably superior.
It is my opinion that they (M$) have no interest in donations, just proving
to those that do not have the money to fight that they can bully them; just
the behavior that the US government would like to put a stop to.  Two
different courts have told them their behavior is illegal.  They differ on
the remedy, but the verdict has not changed.  Guilty.

Jeff
(now stepping off my box)

John Karns wrote:

> One thing I forgot to mention is that the Caldera OpenDOS includes Stacker
> and Personal Netware - DOS with integrated networking - what a concept!
> ... and a nice menu-driven front-end for the configuration.
>
> On Wed, 8 Aug 2001, John Karns said:
>
> > There are some examples of OS's & applications which are distributed to
> > educational or other non-profit org's with relaxed license terms.  One
> > example is Caldera's OpenDOS (evolved from DR-DOS) ver 7.01 which is
> > available to educational institutions without a fee:
> >
> > "Caldera grants you a non-exclusive license to use the Software in
> > source or binary form free of charge if (a) you are a student,
> > faculty member or staff member of an educational institution
> > (K-12, junior college, college or library), a staff member of
> > a religious organization, or an employee of an  organization which
> > meets Caldera's criteria for a charitable  non-profit organization" ...
> >
> > Perhaps those people who refurbish the older hardware could be somewhat
> > creative in chosing alternatives, for example they might look into the
> > availability of the old GUI that was a would-be Windows competitor, GEOS
> > IIRC.
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> John Karns                                        jkarns at csd.net
>
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