Re: Ada is getting more popular!

["Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de>]

On Thu, 28 Oct 2010 11:41:27 +0200, Thomas L�cke wrote:

> On 2010-10-28 10:19, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:
>> On Thu, 28 Oct 2010 08:06:25 +0200, Thomas L�cke wrote:
>>
>>> If I buy a car, I can change it as I see fit.
>>
>> You cannot, there are serious limitations on what you allowed to do, at
>> least in Germany.
> 
> Luckily I don't live in Germany then!
> 
> The limitations in Denmark are solely a matter of whether your changed
> vehicle is allowed to drive on public roads, ie. can you get a license-
> plate for it.

This is what I meant, a car you cannot drive is not a car.

>>> I can take it apart and see how it works.
>>
>> This also may be forbidden. I believe taking apart a DVD player is
>> punishable under the DMCA.
> 
> The DMCA has no effect in Denmark.

For how long? 

>> According to the recent court rulings you can't even sell the thing you
>> once bought:
>>
>> http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/09/first-sale-doctrine/
> 
> You can in the EU.

Maybe yes, maybe no. The Pirate bay guys thought they have a right to turn
on a server and put it in the Internet. They were convicted in Sweden, an
EU member.

>>> But when buying software, I'm usually kept in the dark. No tinkering,
>>> no learning, no self-maintenance, no nothing. It's a black box.
>>
>> No, the problem is that the black box is sold with no warranty. The
>> producer must be liable to his product. The rule must be: more you close,
>> more responsibility you have to take for the money you charged.
> 
> Hmm.. Yes and no.
> 
> Back in 2000 I bought a product from a vendor. This product is an
> important part of my business. It has over the years evolved, and
> they've kept it running to my satisfaction. I've paid them A LOT of
> money to develop new features.
> 
> Then came Windows 7.
> 
> The vendor refused to update the software to be able to run on Win7,
> and while they were at it, they also decided to stop supporting the
> product completely.
> 
> They do not intend to offer a version 2 of this product.
> 
> The result of this is that my business is now running on borrowed
> time. There are no similar products readily available, and the ones
> there are, would require completely redifining how my business operates,
> re-schooling all my employees and telling customers that services
> they've relied on for many years are going to vanish.
> 
> I've asked if I could buy the source, and was met with a blank stare.
> 
> Black box.

Let you buy a necktie, which later goes out of fashion. That is your tie
and your problem.

> An extended warranty would hardly have solved this issue. This one
> piece of software, which 2 years ago was just a tool, has become a
> ticking bomb.
> 
> I can't upgrade to Win7. I can't get support. I can't do anything about
> it. I'm stuck on XP with a software suite that has been abandoned
> without any prior warning.
> 
> Fundamentally this is of course my own fault. Back in 1998-9 when I
> scoped the market for suitable products, I should of course have
> required a guarantee from the vendor that they product would not
> suddenly get dropped and that they would upgrade it to newer version
> of the Windows OS. Or I should just have required the full source. But
> then I would probably not have been able to buy it at all.  :o)

You should require MS to keep Windows backward compatible.

Economically open source does not solve the problem. Because software
developing vs. maintenance costs are estimated 1 to 10. That means,
economically it just does not make any sense to maintain others' products
at any statistically relevant scale. It can function only as a rare
exception, i.e. economically irrelevant.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de