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From: Sarah Bernadette Kelly <sbk98 at uow.edu.au>
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Subject: Re: [H-GEN] The Gates Retirement Fund
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[ Humbug *General* list - semi-serious discussions about Humbug and ]
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I have one thing to say. Rich Text Format. (rtf)
:)
On Thu, 4 Oct 2001 ben.carlyle at invensys.com wrote:
> [ Humbug *General* list - semi-serious discussions about Humbug and ]
> [ Unix-related topics. Please observe the list's charter. ]
> [ Worthwhile understanding: http://www.humbug.org.au/netiquette.html ]
>
> Hmm.
>
> Your story of software theft? I doubt the media would look on that kind of
> activity any more favourably than local law enforcement agencies or
> Microsoft themselves.
>
> I haven't commented so far on this thread, because I am a software villan.
> I have paid money to Microsoft because I have used Microsoft products and
> at times have found them enitrely indispensible. It is both a moral and a
> legal choice to pay for the software I use, or at least to use a license
> that someone else has paid for in the past is not currently using.
>
> I believe this thread is about something more than avoiding payment to the
> evil one for software that you find indispensible. It's your obligation to
> pay for such software. The thread is about finding ways to replace tainted
> software with clean software, which is a much harder thing to do than to
> steal the tainted software.
>
> I can only speak as a hypocrite on this subject. I use Microsoft products
> in the office, mainly because it is the corporate standard and I can't
> avoid it. Corporate policy dictates that we use Lotus notes on windows
> platforms. Corporate policy dictates that we submit our timesheets in
> excel format. It's a big corporation, and these policy decisions have been
> made by people with a much better strategic view and plan than I could
> come up with so I'm not in a position to protest.
>
> In the home I have a wife who is studying and Microsoft Office
> applications are an exremely imporant part of the course she is involved
> in. I use licenses donated by people who have moved onto newer versions of
> the Microsoft products in question, but the money has still been sent to
> Microsoft by someone. When this software is required on my machine and
> fulfils everything we need to do with the machine, it's not even worth
> having a home UNIX installation.
>
> All my software development occurs via my work laptop, which runs
> exclusively on free software. Business policies come into play here too,
> requiring that I use various Sun compilers and other proprietary
> development tools. Most of the work done by my laptop is to act as a
> glorified Xterm, which is a disappointing achievement on my part in terms
> of free software implementation.
>
> Views are changing in the business, of course. Linux servers are popping
> up for various purposes that linux has proven it's self in, but our system
> administrator wants packaged solutions rather than tools that can build
> solutions to problems that have already been solved by other vendors. He
> wants to be able to put a RedHat cd into the drive and build a machine in
> less than half a day to do whatever he requires. He wants RAID and
> journalling filesystems, and due to the fact that many of the technoligies
> he wants are new to linux the out-of-the box installations don't always
> provide them.
>
> My boss has been looking very seriously at alternatives for the Microsoft
> Office suites installed on every windows machine in the office. Each suite
> is not in use most of the time, but the license arrangements are per-user
> not per-machine so he has few recourses to reduce the cost within the
> Microsoft framework. Because of corporate decisions on file formats it's
> very difficult to break this mould. Until another set of formats is
> adopted as the coporate standard (which would also impact heavily on our
> customs who require access to many of our documents) it's really a sign of
> lunacy to attempt to use anything but the microsoft products. It's not
> worth the secretarial time that would be spent reformatting each document
> to put into the final Microsoft-based format.
>
> On a corporate scale it's a very difficult thing to break the mould. This
> has a strong affect on business within the corporation, and due to the
> wide use of Microsoft applications it applies heavily to education and
> thus to individuals even outside this structure. Without a clear
> alternative to what really is a feature-rich Microsoft business product,
> the entire industry will continue to be a difficult nut to crack. Free
> alternatives will only survive in niches not under the influcence of this
> global phenomenon.
>
>
> And
> if
> they want to prosecute and take away my tv and computer (because that's
> all
> i own that's worth more than $20) then I"m sure one of the current affairs
>
> shows would love to hear my story ;-)
>
>
>
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