1 Mar
2003
1 Mar
'03
2:58 p.m.
I know that there are quite a few musicians on this list so I thought
they might be interested in this (if they didn't already know about it).
I was reading an article yesterday (I don't remember where) that was
talking about the BSA fining businesses for unlicensed software. Lo and
behold, the first business cited (for 8 unlicensed copies of M$) was
Ernie Ball/Music Man. Apparently they got stung for $90,000.00 US. The
article stated that Ernie Ball immediately switched to "open source" and
never looked back. Being a curious person, I sent an email to Ernie
Ball to find out what "open source" meant. The answer is Red Hat
Linux. It's nice to see a fairly large music business getting the
message.
It appears that the BSA may be one of open source's biggest allies.
Jan
1 Mar
1 Mar
3:54 p.m.
On 01 Mar 2003 12:42:44 -0600
"Jan \"Evil Twin\" Depner" <eviltwin69(a)cableone.net> wrote:
It appears that the BSA may be one of open
source's biggest allies.
There was a story on Slashdot yesterday
( http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/03/02/28/1317244.shtml?tid=109 )
about how the BSA sent a "cease and desist" order to the University
of Muenster in Germany for having copies of M$ Office on their FTP
server.
Unfortunately, the files were actually RPMs of OpenOffice. Seems
the BSA just looked for the word "office" and automatically sent out
their harassment letters.
Sheesh.
--
======================================================================
Joe Hartley - Senior Unix Admin - Ingenta inc.
111R Chestnut St., Providence, RI 02903 - cell 401.338.9214
Joe.Hartley(a)ingenta.com - AOL IM: JoeHartley
Without deviation from the norm, "progress" is not possible. - FZappa
6:45 p.m.
I remember reading about this some time ago.
The BSA is running into a very interesting problem: Their heavy-handed
tactics are driving customers away. Basically, they got their $90K out of
Ernie Ball, and went away short-term happy, so Sterling decided to make
their long term numbers suffer.
Anyone want to start a betting pool on the next company to switch to
Free/Open Software due to the BSA?
The thing is, though, is that Ernie Ball is a relatviely small company,
and making a complete switch (almost literally overnight) was not that
difficult for them. Now what would happen if, say, HP got hit by millions
in fines from the BSA (other than more layoffs...)? They wouldn't have the
ready option of switching because they are too big of a company.
Since most music companies are smaller (Yamaha being a notable exception),
I wonder if any others have plans to follow suit just to avoid an audit...
Anyone know?
-- Darren
Jan \Evil Twin\ Depner
I know that there are quite a few musicians on this list so I thought
they might be interested in this (if they didn't already know about
it).
I was reading an article yesterday (I don't remember where) that was
talking about the BSA fining businesses for unlicensed software. Lo
and behold, the first business cited (for 8 unlicensed copies of M$)
was Ernie Ball/Music Man. Apparently they got stung for $90,000.00 US.
The article stated that Ernie Ball immediately switched to "open
source" and never looked back. Being a curious person, I sent an email
to Ernie Ball to find out what "open source" meant. The answer is Red
Hat
Linux. It's nice to see a fairly large music business getting the
message.
It appears that the BSA may be one of open source's biggest allies.
Jan
Regards,
Darren Landrum
7:19 p.m.
On Sun, 2 Mar 2003 18:38:01 +0700 (GMT-7)
"Darren Landrum" <consul(a)studioconsul.net> wrote:
The thing is, though, is that Ernie Ball is a
relatviely small company,
and making a complete switch (almost literally overnight) was not that
difficult for them. Now what would happen if, say, HP got hit by millions
in fines from the BSA (other than more layoffs...)? They wouldn't have the
ready option of switching because they are too big of a company.
Since most music companies are smaller (Yamaha being a notable exception),
Hmmm, I'd love to figure out how to sic the BSA on Sony, BMG, the RIAA,
and the MPAA. Is this the sort of thing they mean when they say two
wrongs make a right?
--
======================================================================
Joe Hartley - Senior Unix Admin - Ingenta inc.
111R Chestnut St., Providence, RI 02903 - cell 401.338.9214
Joe.Hartley(a)ingenta.com - AOL IM: JoeHartley
Without deviation from the norm, "progress" is not possible. - FZappa
7:33 p.m.
Joe Hartley writes:
Hmmm, I'd love to figure out how to sic the BSA on
Sony, BMG, the RIAA,
and the MPAA. Is this the sort of thing they mean when they say two
wrongs make a right?
I wonder how much of the BSA's money comes from just such organizations...
Truth to tell, I think the larger monoliths would be able to dance around
the BSA's audits somehow. It would be interesting to see it in action.
Have any huge companies been hit by an audit?
-- Darren
7:57 p.m.
On Saturday 01 March 2003 18:11, Joe Hartley wrote:
On Sun, 2 Mar 2003 18:38:01 +0700 (GMT-7)
"Darren Landrum" <consul(a)studioconsul.net> wrote:
Oh s**t!! Thanks for the laugh! I don't know if this was an intentional
humorous poke at the acronym-oriented society of today, or if you're just
some nerd with a cell phone and PDA. But it was very funny nevertheless!
Larry
The thing is, though, is that Ernie Ball is a
relatively small company,
and making a complete switch (almost literally overnight) was not that
difficult for them. Now what would happen if, say, HP got hit by millions
in fines from the BSA (other than more layoffs...)? They wouldn't have
the ready option of switching because they are too big of a company.
Since most music companies are smaller (Yamaha being a notable
exception),
Hmmm, I'd love to figure out how to sic the BSA on Sony, BMG, the RIAA,
and the MPAA. Is this the sort of thing they mean when they say two
wrongs make a right?
8:17 p.m.
If I were running a large company I'd start moving now. If that's what
you get for 8 unlicensed copies I'd hate to see what would happen with
500.
Jan
On Sun, 2003-03-02 at 05:38, Darren Landrum wrote:
I remember reading about this some time ago.
The BSA is running into a very interesting problem: Their heavy-handed
tactics are driving customers away. Basically, they got their $90K out of
Ernie Ball, and went away short-term happy, so Sterling decided to make
their long term numbers suffer.
Anyone want to start a betting pool on the next company to switch to
Free/Open Software due to the BSA?
The thing is, though, is that Ernie Ball is a relatviely small company,
and making a complete switch (almost literally overnight) was not that
difficult for them. Now what would happen if, say, HP got hit by millions
in fines from the BSA (other than more layoffs...)? They wouldn't have the
ready option of switching because they are too big of a company.
Since most music companies are smaller (Yamaha being a notable exception),
I wonder if any others have plans to follow suit just to avoid an audit...
Anyone know?
-- Darren
Jan \Evil Twin\ Depner
I know that there are quite a few musicians on this list so I thought
they might be interested in this (if they didn't already know about
it).
I was reading an article yesterday (I don't remember where) that was
talking about the BSA fining businesses for unlicensed software. Lo
and behold, the first business cited (for 8 unlicensed copies of M$)
was Ernie Ball/Music Man. Apparently they got stung for $90,000.00 US.
The article stated that Ernie Ball immediately switched to "open
source" and never looked back. Being a curious person, I sent an email
to Ernie Ball to find out what "open source" meant. The answer is Red
Hat
Linux. It's nice to see a fairly large music business getting the
message.
It appears that the BSA may be one of open source's biggest allies.
Jan
Regards,
Darren Landrum
7940
days inactive
7940
days old
linux-audio-user@lists.linuxaudio.org
6 comments
4 participants
participants (4)
-
Darren Landrum -
Jan "Evil Twin" Depner -
Joe Hartley -
Larry Troxler