Why Linux will win and Micro$oft will lose

[Bob Cober]

Interesting point George.

Today I work for a medium sized company (1000 employees) that is owned by a
very large Parent.  The Parent controls some IT selection (Like Lotus
Notes), but does not mandate the desktop.  Our infrastructure people have a
standard NT/Novell desktop and control pushing applications to each users
desk.   Switching to a new desktop will cost a tremendous amount for our
1000 employee company.  Currently they use NT and Novell and the
infrastructure folks want to move to 2000 and Novell.

7 years ago I worked for a smaller (350 employees) company that had just as
big a parent.  The difference was that they had no stsandard desktop.
Different divisions and people had different set-ups - Accounting ran
Windows 3.11, Actuarial - Windows For Workgroups, Underwriting OS/2, IT ran
mostly Solaris I think.  The parent used mostly OS/2.  The funny thing was,
the competencey/computer aptitiude of the employee base at this place was
substantlially higher.  They didn't pay their people more, or formally
require them to know more, it's just that the culture of the company had
computer literacy ingrained.  The IT infrastrucure people provided a file
system sharing network, access to the company mainframe, and hardware
support.  The users picked the OS.  Typically the manager of a division
would pick an OS and stick with it.  Alot of this may also have been caused
by reluctance to use OS2, but the result was the same.  More capable staff.

My (lengthy) point is this.  Hopefully, someday in the future, the company
will not provide your OS or even your hardware.  You will bring that with
you.  Your PC is like your wallet, or even part of your own brain.  You will
bring it with you from job to job.  All the company IT people do is provide
a place for you to plug in.  As long as we use more and more Open Standards
like TCP/IP, this might be possible.  Let the user select his own computing
device...!!!!



----- Original Message -----
From: George Toft <george@georgetoft.com>
To: <plug-discuss@lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us>
Sent: Saturday, November 10, 2001 4:18 PM
Subject: Re: Why Linux will win and Micro$oft will lose


> Joining the battle . . .
>
>
> Short version: Converting to Linux costs much, much more.  An
> example is presented for a "hypothetical" local company converting
> their desktop to Linux.  Result is that it will cost over
> $900K - just to avoid a $150K license.
>
>
> Long Version:
> There in only one reason Linux will not monopolize the desktop,
> and you said it:
> > The all American Dollar rules. What becomes
> > a standard is determined by economics
>
>
> Big companies spend big bucks.  Big bucks demand support
> contracts so the Board of Directors and every manager all
> the way down the food chain can point the finger at someone
> else when XYZ app breaks.  Let's take a big financial
> organization here in the valley that has a blue box for a
> logo.  Do you think they are going down to Fry's to buy
> bargain boxes to put Linux on?  The decision makers are
> taken out to lunch/dinner/golfing by the IBM Sales Team.
> (Did I mention the CEO of one company is on the Board of
> Directors for the other?)  That way, if there is a problem
> with the computers, IBM is on site in a flash with a replacement.
> And it runs Windows NT, so all the users can use Visio, Word,
> Excel, and Lotus Notes.
>
> So now you might say, let's migrate them to StarOffice and
> some Linux Notes Client (which, by the way doesn't exist, but
> you can kludge it under WINE).  Big companies (big money) are
> so entrenched with the Windows technology on the desktop, they
> will never switch.  The migration simply costs too much for
> the benefit gained.
>
> Let us convert 3000 users from Windows to Linux.  We save 3000
> licenses.  But they come with the computer - part of that per
> computer licensing plan from Microsoft.  Sure, we can buy
> boxes with Linux preloaded from IBM, but MS gets their royalty,
> and the box costs the same.
>
> For argument's sake, let's say IBM discounts the price by the
> Windows License (assume to be $50).  We just saved $150,000.
> Now train 3000 users (assumed employee base for local blue box
> financial company) for 1 hour on how to use it.  We just spent
> $36,000 and have nothing to show for it.  Consider lost
> productivity as the users get used to the new look and feel.
> Assume 50% less productivity for one week and we just lost
> another $720,000.  Add to that the users copying their files
> from the old computer and personalizing the desktop, and you
> lose another half day, for another $144K.
>
> So, how is it that Linux saves us money?  We just spent $900K
> to avoid paying $150K in licensing.
>
> The only way Linux will save money on the desktop is in small
> companies, or very early in the IT adoption process.  We have
> to avoid the labor-intensive migration costs.
>
> An alternative plan would be to cut labor costs 84%, then it
> will be cost effective, putting out $12/hour worker at $2/hr,
> which is not legal in that industry.
>
> George
>
>
> jeffrey l koehn wrote:
> >
> > Linux will win and Micro$oft will lose. So
> > sit back and watch it happen.
> >
> > That's right, Linux will be on every desktop
> > and server and you can damn me all to hell
> > for saying so, but that is how it will be.
> > The all American Dollar rules. What becomes
> > a standard is determined by economics
> > ( the cost of the product).
> > There was a time when you could get Windows 3.1,
> > for $30.00 and that is when Micro$oft
> > became a standard, it was'nt because of
> > superior technology.
> > The genie (GPL, Linux, Open-Souce) was let out
> > of the bottle long time ago and as time passes
> > it will consume everything. If you ask me, it
> > reached critical mass in 1998. The genie can not
> > be put back into the bottle. And so the
> > next business/technology model has
> > already been determined.
> >
> > Why?
> > Because:
> > 1)Lower Cost ( The Linux Kernel doesn't cost anything)
> > 2)Open-source Kernel
> > 3)The "GPL, Linux, Open-Source Kernel"
> > is the perfect technology foundation
> > for Manufacturing and the masses
> > because people, businesses, universities,
> > governments contribute to it.
> > 4) Linux can scale up or down
> > 5) Linux is hardware agnostic
> > 6) "Linux, Open-Source" can and
> >      will morph into future tecnologies
> >      that will benefit all.
> >
> > If your not using Linux and your
> > still using MS windows, you better
> > wake up and smell the coffee
> > because the world has changed.
> > ------------------------------cyclox
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