From owner-freebsd-chat Mon Jul 26 17: 5:39 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Received: from gbtb.com (modem11.tekrab.net [208.30.20.211]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id CF59E14DA9 for ; Mon, 26 Jul 1999 17:05:34 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from mrami@gbtb.com) Received: from localhost (mrami@localhost) by gbtb.com (8.9.2/8.9.2) with SMTP id UAA32372 for ; Mon, 26 Jul 1999 20:03:28 -0400 (EDT) (envelope-from mrami@gbtb.com) Date: Mon, 26 Jul 1999 20:03:28 -0400 (EDT) From: Marc Ramirez To: chat@freebsd.org Subject: Miscellany of chat-type questions... Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org As customers and, I assume, some vendors, (1) How do ye FreeBSD list-ers feel about the free source/paid support model of software distribution? I.e., free source and/or binaries, free bugfixes, paid customer support/modifications? How do your managers feel? :) I've lived a short life, and I've had the luck of only working under people who, at heart, were misers. So I've never encountered the "costs a grand, must be great" mindset. My gut (and maybe Debian) tells me that if I print up a set of manuals in nice glossy covers and hire a graphic designer to draw a nice, stylish box, I could probably sell something out of one hand that I'm giving away out of the other. Part of me questions the ethics of that, but I could probably live with it if I sold support separately from the box (i.e., download and buy support). I should mention that I'm not talking about reselling FreeBSD, I'm talking about distribution of my own stuff, written in-house. I'm not thinking of one of those "tap the internet open-source lovefest for profit" things like Mozilla; I think it's in my best interest to distribute the source to people who can use it to their benefit, especially if my target market is professionals, because it increases trust in the product. At least, that's the warm fuzzy I get from FreeBSD. Plus, I can't tell you how many times I've wanted to diff the latest release because they broke something... :) (2) Would anyone want to use COBOL on FreeBSD? Why? :) Marc. -- Marc Ramirez - Owner Great Big Throbbing Brains mrami@gbtb.com http://www.gbtb.com Our brains throb, so yours won't have to! To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message