[mythtv-users] Why Free Software has poor usability ?

[Nate Bargmann]

* Jason Antman <jason at jasonantman.com> [2008 Aug 08 11:44 -0500]:
> It looks like this thread is wrapping up (finally - it got a bit heated
> a few times) but I just wanted to throw one more thing in:
> 
> Raphael wrote:
> >  MS has 
> > intentionally obsoleted it's own older software (as it is still trying 
> > to do with XP), but that certainly doesn't have much bearing on the 
> > question of whether OO is obsolete or not.
> >   
> The question here is how we define the word "obsolete". I lot of vendors
> (especially think of network hardware vendors) try to convince you that
> once a new version is out, the old version is obsolete and needs to be
> replaced. Some less scrupulous vendors do this by having very short
> support lifecycles or, in the case of Microsoft, making fixes to
> previous versions but not backporting new features.

Obsolete in software has more to do about its licensing than any other
reason.  For example, the license may not allow installation on
another computer or transfer to another computer or the vendor could
revoke your license to use the software at any time.

> In the end, "obsolete" should be defined by the the end-user's needs. I
> have a storage server running SuSE 9.3. It hasn't been supported, or had
> fixes released, in probably 3 years. But all the box does is connect to
> 3 backup machines via a dedicated LAN, and provide storage. Novell might
> say that 9.3 was obsolete years ago, but it does everything I need it
> to, and there's no reason for me to change unless my needs change.

You have this ability because the licensing of the majority of the
software in SuSE 9.3 gives you the freedom to do just that.

> On the same note, my main LAN at home runs on a Bay Networks BayStack
> 450-24T switch. The thing is probably 15 years old. I bought it surplus
> from a large company, who moved to Gig-E (among other newer
> technologies), and considered it obsolete. But all I need is a 10/100
> switch, and it does the job wonderfully (and, at $10, a lot cheaper than
> brand-new consumer-grade hardware).
> 
> Regardless of whether a vendor says a product is obsolete or not (and
> when they do, we must consider their financial motives), as far as I'm
> concerned, nothing is obsolete if it meets the user's requirements and
> expectations.

Vendors like to use licensing of "Intellectual Property" as a club and
dictate behavior that is contrary to market forces, which may result in
unintended market forces.  Fortunately, these instances are few, but
they've been tried and some will continue to try them.

While home users can usually get away with ignoring licensing terms,
for the most part (conscious permitting), business users can't as they
often can face severe consequences for doing so, which is why IT
departments are generally quite anal.

As for hardware, I have a lot of "obsolete" stuff around the house.

- Nate >>

-- 

"The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all
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