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20th January 2002 |
AND THE MONEY KEEPS ROLLING IN ... |
Brian Grainger |
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Two news stories this week highlight how Microsoft intend to make money and split the opposition to its licensing policy. Clackmannanshire Council wanted to extend the number of Office 97 licences it held. It had a Select agreement with Microsoft but decided to buy 470 licences cheap from a reseller. I wonder if that is because they cannot get Office 97 from Microsoft anymore and they did not want the cost of upgrading to XP? Anyway, they got their licences cheap and then, complying with a request to audit their software by Microsoft through the Business Software Alliance, Microsoft decided the licenses were fake. It did not stop there though. They were taken to court and fined over £42,000. In addition they still had to get the extra licenses so decided to get Office XP - at a cost of over £100,000. That's over £200 each by my calculator. Not much discount there. Sadly, the second news story is a bit late for Clackmannanshire Council. SOCITM, the IT Managers user group for local government, have been forthright in their opposition to Microsoft's new licensing terms. This week Microsoft proposed a new deal to them. Neither side are making the details public so it looks as if Microsoft intends to deal with each detractor individually. Currently, the UK government is a big Microsoft customer and have bargaining power. Pity the poor small business who will not be offered a chance to negotiate a sensible price. |
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