Re: [tlug] Total operational cost... hard stats anywhere?

["Lyle H Saxon" <llletters@example.com>]

On 8/19/07, Dave M G <dave@example.com> wrote:
> One of the things that many people wrote in about was the "total
> operational cost" argument, which I'm sure many of you have heard
> before. For those just tuning in, it's the claim that even though Linux
> is free in terms of money, the learning curve associated with
> transitioning takes so much time as to wipe out the benefits of the
> savings.

The irony with that is people spend a fair bit of time (and thus money
- "time is money") learning where the things they were used to on
older versions of brand-W have been moved, hidden, removed, or changed
on newer versions of brand-W.  The difference of course is that when
the people around you are in the same boat, you just help each other
out.  I spoke with an employee of Sun Microsystems here in Japan, and
not surprisingly they're not using brand-W, but rather Solaris.  She
said it wasn't a big deal for her to make the switch - her only
complaints were some issues of file compatibility with outside
companies and some Internet pages that didn't behave as "Designed for
brand-W".

It's really weird - people will put up with high prices, low security,
bugs, downtime, etc. etc. with the main ship brand-W, but will
blithely say "brand-E isn't ready" unless it's three times as good as
brand-W in every way, and is delivered from the sky from the hands of
an angle bathed in glittering light and with fluttering wings to a
chorus of back-up angles with blaring trumpets sounding from the
mountaintops.  It reminds me of a woman I knew who had broken the
antenna off of her Au cell phone and then complained that "Au has bad
reception!  I want to change to DoCoMo"(!!).

The switch could be made tomorrow. The hard part is getting the word
out.  Many people like to be on the biggest ship - no matter what it
is.  Lucky them if it's a good ship.  If not, it still seems safer by
virtue of it's bigness, unless/until it begins sinking, and then they
look for something else.  Too bad the justice department didn't do
something with the guilty verdict against Microsoft for engaging in
illegal business practices.

Lyle