From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Dec 30 10:04:40 1997 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) id KAA10983 for chat-outgoing; Tue, 30 Dec 1997 10:04:40 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from onyx.atipa.com (user20169@ns.atipa.com [208.128.22.10]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.7/8.8.7) with SMTP id KAA10953 for ; Tue, 30 Dec 1997 10:04:25 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from freebsd@atipa.com) Received: (qmail-queue invoked by uid 1018); 30 Dec 1997 18:10:49 -0000 Date: Tue, 30 Dec 1997 11:10:49 -0700 (MST) From: Atipa X-Sender: freebsd@dot.ishiboo.com To: "Lee Crites \(AEI\)" cc: "Jordan K. Hubbard" , hackers@FreeBSD.ORG, chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: fbsd & commerce (Re: Informix on FreeBSD (maybe)) In-Reply-To: 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 Welcome to world of VARs! (Value Added Resellers) You are not charging for the software; you are charging for the software packaging on the CD, and you are then selling your brain. I think a good portion of the people on this list are making money because they understand FreeBSD. Kevin On Tue, 30 Dec 1997, Lee Crites (AEI) wrote: > On Mon, 29 Dec 1997, Ruslan Shevchenko wrote: > > => That's why Linux have better commerse success then FreeBSD. > => > => I think, for supporting commmerce users of FreeBSD, must exists > => firm, which sell commerce version of FreeBSD, which must be identical > => to free version, + some customization and preinstalled software > => and provide aggressive marketing of FreeBSD. > > This brings up a question which I have thought of a time or two. > I had a fairly good level of success giving away some fbsd 2.2.1 > cd's (thanks, Jordan!) to companies around the Austin area. The > success was enough that I thought of retailing the os along with > system support. What would FreeBSD's "official" stand be if I > started charging for the os? Something like: > > The AEI FreeBSD Operating System: > $X,XXX loaded and installed > $X,XXX for 12 months of OS maintenance, including > os upgrades > $X,XXX for System Administration training > > I already did something like this with two clients in this area. > I gave them a copy of the 2.2.1 cd and my consulting company > billed them for setting it up. So far, I only had two people I > spoke with refuse to look into fbsd. Some moved from sco and > some from that "other" free un*x. For the rest (I only gave 16 > total), they were either educational, had NO computer system, or > moved from windoze (these are the ones I am happiest about). The > limiting factor was they had someone who knew something about > un*x already. I haven't really tried a brand new to un*x company > yet. > > But I digress... > > How would the FreeBSD Project feel if they found some rogue > company in Austin was charging for FreeBSD, installing, training, > and support? > > Lee Crites > > >