On Sat, 2005-02-12 at 12:38 -0500, K.S. Bhaskar wrote:

[KSB] <...snip...>

>         Last but not least, buy support contracts - from your hardware
>         vendor, for your operating system (you can purchase support for
>         all major Linux distributions - Crawford Rainwater may want to
>         comment here), for GT.M, and, if you are not supporting VistA
>         yourself, then for VistA.

In the "and now a word from our sponsors" department, since this
paragraph was all the way at the end of my post, let me at least make a
posting with it at the beginning.  My apologies in advance for the
redundancy.

In the software industry as a whole, there is a lot of FUD that says
that open source free software is not commercial and not supported.  The
truth is that the issue of support is orthogonal to the issues of
whether the software is open source and whether it is free of license
fees.  The business model for GT.M on Linux is one free licenses and a
charge for support and services.  We offer 24x7 support for GT.M
wherever in the world you happen to be.

(I have to admit that there is an interesting dilemma in the business
model for commercial open source free software.  The way to pay the
bills successfully in the software support business is to sell support
services, and make the software so robust that people don't find
themselves needing to call.  But if the software is so robust that it
never needs support, then people won't feel the need to buy support...
Sometimes I feel like the Master of Ceremonies in a National Public
Radio fund raiser!)

-- Bhaskar

***************************************************************************
This electronic mail transmission contains confidential and/or privileged 
information intended only for the person(s) named.  
Any use, distribution, copying or disclosure by another person is strictly 
prohibited.
***************************************************************************

NOTE: Ce courriel est destine exclusivement au(x) destinataire(s) mentionne(s) 
ci-dessus et peut contenir de l'information privilegiee, confidentielle et/ou 
dispensee de divulgation aux termes des lois applicables. Si vous avez recu ce 
message par erreur, ou s'il ne vous est pas destine, veuillez le mentionner 
immediatement a l'expediteur et effacer ce courriel.





-------------------------------------------------------
SF email is sponsored by - The IT Product Guide
Read honest & candid reviews on hundreds of IT Products from real users.
Discover which products truly live up to the hype. Start reading now.
http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_ide95&alloc_id396&op=click
_______________________________________________
Hardhats-members mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/hardhats-members

Reply via email to