Lee Wiggers wrote:
Suck an egg, you arrogant bastards.
Sincerely,
Lee
Short, Sweet, and to the Point. I don't blame you one bit Lee, not that
I would blame any Club member to begin with. It seems a bit strange to
me that anyone would charge for a product which they plan to release for
free anyway, but Mandriva seems to think that their club is worth it,
without giving the members much (if any) type of membership support.
I think we've all seen list members complaining about the Club from time
to time and nothing ever seems to come of it. The only time that Club
members ever hear from Mandriva is when they want money.
It's a shame that they canned Gael, but there doesn't seem to be a
connection between that and how well the Club members have been treated
(with the exception that community support by Mandriva staff has almost
dropped off the planet), and we've all been aware that there have been
ongoing problems with the Club for quite a few years now, let alone
Mandriva themselves.
No, I'd have to say that Francois is steering Mandriva in the exact
direction that he wants and he's purposefully taking it in the same
direction as the other big commercial distros - enterprise class with
large support contracts.
Personally, I'm convinced that the Club is providing revenue to Mandriva
that will either help to keep them out of bankruptcy court or to help
them push the company to an enterprise-only company. The hints aren't so
subtle in the email they sent you.
With the sole exception of managing the Club site and the payments from
members (and I'll bet that it's mostly automated anyway), the Club isn't
costing Mandriva much of anything, so it's basically a cash-cow (albeit
a shrinking one) and they pay little or no attention to it's members.
IMNSHO, that adds up to bad judgement and bad business. I wonder how
they'll do when they finally start making real money from the Enterprise
market. Will their arrogance thrive once they've grown some or will they
figure it out and fix things? Only their bank accounts will decide.
What a shame.
DL
____________________________________________________
Want to buy your Pack or Services from Mandriva?
Go to http://store.mandriva.com
Join the Club : http://www.mandrivaclub.com
____________________________________________________
