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On Mon, Feb 16, 2009 at 2:19 PM, Neil Winchurst wrote: > As you can see the article was all about warning companies not to use > unlicensed software. But, there was no mention anywhere about open > source software, nothing to tell anyone that it is possible to avoid > both the hassle and the cost of the above problems. > > Strange that, isn't it? Why can't companies, especially small > businesses, find out about the advantages of open source? The message > just isn't getting out yet, is it? Firstly, the article[1] doesn't exactly exhibit a great understanding of numbers. It claims software piracy is costing businesses (almost) 2 million pounds a year and while this 2 million pounds is supposed to sound like a huge amount of money it is actually less than a quid per business. Secondly, it talks about the estimated number of jobs lost due to software piracy. I'm not sure if any research has been done on the effects of free, open source software on the number of jobs, but it's not immediately evident that it's not costing any jobs. It'd have been nice though had they mentioned a business that did not pay anything for their software, yet did not breach any law. [1] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/article-1145579/High-cost-illegal-software-small-businesses.html Martijn. -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/linux_adm/list-faq.html