[ale] B$A and Ernie Ball electric guitars

James P. Kinney III jkinney at localnetsolutions.com
Wed Mar 19 08:40:13 EST 2003


This is a situation that just BEGS for a Samba server to store all the
company data on. In the event of BSA Nazis barging in, pop the drivewipe
floppy into EVERY machine on site and have the Linux installs running
when the Marshals arrive. The data is secure on the server, the now
unused M$ products are sitting on a shelf pronounced as "failed test
products".

Of course, not having any products from the software mafia at all would
be the best situation.

On Wed, 2003-03-19 at 01:54, Bob Toxen wrote:
> On Tue, Mar 18, 2003 at 11:47:11AM -0800, Marvin Dickens wrote:
> > Hello everybody!
> 
> 
> > "Two years ago, the maker of Ernie Ball electric guitars and strings
> > was slapped with a $90,000 fine by the Business Software Alliance for
> > what the company says was unwitting use of eight unlicensed copies of
> > Microsoft Office.
> 
> If anybody *knows* the details, please explain:
> 
> 1. How the BSA (who has no legal authority) can talk a company into
>    giving up $11,000 per unlicensed copy of software that retails for
>    maybe $1,000 each?  Why didn't they say "go sue us"?
> 
> 2. Why anyone would let the BSA goons in without first checking their
>    systems?
> 
> I keep reading accounts like this and I'm astounded that anyone allows
> themselves to be bullied out of so much money.
> 
> > Microsoft then clipped a news story referring to Ernie Ball's run-in
> > with the BSA, an industry association it co-founded, and attached it to
> > a letter to area businesses warning they could face similar fines. The
> > letter also pitched Microsoft software upgrades as a way to eliminate
> > that risk. Ball paid the fine. Then he wiped Windows and Office off
> > his firm's 80 personal computers and switched to ''open-source code''
> > software programs, which do much of what Microsoft's products do at a
> > fraction of the cost."
> 
> 
> > Here is the article if you wnat to read it:
> 
> > http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20030227/4902704s.htm
> 
> I did read it.
> 
> > Best
> > Marvin
> 
> Bob Toxen, happily M$-free
> bob at verysecurelinux.com               [Please use for email to me]
> http://www.verysecurelinux.com        [Network&Linux/Unix security consulting]
> http://www.realworldlinuxsecurity.com [My book:"Real World Linux Security 2/e"]
> Quality Linux & UNIX security and SysAdmin & software consulting since 1990.
> 
> "Microsoft: Unsafe at any clock speed!"
>    -- Bob Toxen 10/03/2002
> _______________________________________________
> Ale mailing list
> Ale at ale.org
> http://www.ale.org/mailman/listinfo/ale
-- 
James P. Kinney III          \Changing the mobile computing world/
CEO & Director of Engineering \          one Linux user         /
Local Net Solutions,LLC        \           at a time.          /
770-493-8244                    \.___________________________./
http://www.localnetsolutions.com

GPG ID: 829C6CA7 James P. Kinney III (M.S. Physics) <jkinney at localnetsolutions.com>
Fingerprint = 3C9E 6366 54FC A3FE BA4D 0659 6190 ADC3 829C 6CA7 

 This is a digitally signed message part




More information about the Ale mailing list