yea know , i actually like you . you post here on a linux box , and give
people a clue that there really is an alternative to windows . all your
other posts are informative . i just can't understand this blind loyalty you
have in telling people things that aren't based on fact or law .
You're OK to Woody. I try and help, and since it's a PITA to use two
different Usenet apps on different boxes I've settled for PAN on this FC3
box, it's still not quite what Gravity was, but I'm learning and living
with it. I actually try and provide technical support in my off-times
because Usenet gave me so much assistance when I needed it, and still does
from time to time.
I have to blind loyalty to any Company, not even MS. As a business owner I
look at licensing a little differently than if I were a home user. In the
early days I used shareware without paying for it, downloaded as much as I
could to learn, even use to run a questionable copy of Borlands C and then
C++ product, but, after I started working with the local law enforcement
people I looked at how I was doing things and decided to buy licenses for
everything I used, including shareware. As it turns out, I spent about
$35K that year. According to some, I should have only needed one licensed
copy of each type of product as I was running the biz out of my home, but
when I called to determine licensing according to the vendors I decided
for myself that I would purchase the number of licenses they told me I
should have - this was Adobe, Microsoft, Borland, MacroMedia, and others,
it's not just limited to Microsoft. As the business grew I bought more
servers/workstations, upgraded all, and bought the licenses I needed
according to the licensing information I could find and from the vendors
and from the vendors agents like CDW, Insight, etc... I also spent several
days with MS in order to be taught how to properly license their products
so that it would pass any audit. I don't personally care if I've been
conned into purchasing to many licenses as I see nothing that indicates
I've done that, but I'm not about to risk having to few Adobe Acrobat
licenses, to few Photoshop/PageMaker, Windows 2003 Std Server, Exchange
2003 CAL's, etc... When I get a quote from Dell to furnish 25 6600 series
servers with Windows 2003 Server and 2 Exchange 2003 server and 100
workstations with XP Prof, and Office 2003 SBE, I'm going to have them
provide the licensing information, get a second quote from CDW/Insight,
and go with the best vendor for the software and licenses - same is true
with Symantec Corporate AV and SMS. This means that the customer is
covered and it's on paper as being covered, and when we've had customers
volunteer for an audit it's always passed perfectly - never had a comment
of "Oh, you've got too many licenses".
The fact that there is NO court case concerning home user rights does not
mean it's legal, and it doesn't mean it's illegal, but it also doesn't
mean I need to have my a$$ chewed out for following what I think is the
right direction regarding licensing and the qty I believe I need.
There are two sides to this issue, and since there is no legal case
proven, I'm going to stick with the side that errs on caution vs
recklessness.
