Rotten Effort

I have the eerie feeling that AWC can expect a visit from the BSA in the short future. If not, then they probably have the publicity of this story to thank for it. Makes you wonder how many "costomers" do fold to these scare tactics.

Have you read the Ernie Ball story? You can find it here:

http://news.com.com/2008-1082_3-5065859.html

And a follow-up 3 years later:

http://www.osv.org.au/index.cgi?tid=91

the name of that person just makes me smirk!

I'm sorry, the name of what person?

I believe it's Janet Lawless, the microshaft extortion manager. Such an appropriate name!

From the article:

"When I phoned Lawless to find out, she referred me to Microsoft's PR machine. The responses I got through that channel stressed that Microsoft's aim is to help customers navigate the complexities of software licensing and that one of the roles of engagement managers is to assist in that effort by informing customers of a potential licensing risk. I was told to attribute the responses to Lawless."

Such wonderful "help". Threats and intimidation make such wonderful marketing tools.

I'm glad the lady who runs the local hardware store hasn't learned such "help" techniques. When I needed to work out the piping for a large air compressor (I'm not a plumber), she turned me loose with her plumbing inventory in her parking lot for an afternoon. After I finished, she came to my truck and made a list of what I'd used.

The point of this anecdote? I'm certain it is not unique. Just about everyone has such a tale of some business *person* going out of their way to help solve a customer's problem. Sometimes it's the whole company of people who bust their butts to get the customer's problems solved. People remember such help, and return.

The common theme of interactions with Microsoft is one of threats and intimidation over license "complexities". Makes me wonder if they created those complexities in order to provide themselves the opportunity to threaten and intimidate for more sales.

Sorry, I just totally missed that one. Thanks!

"The common theme of interactions with Microsoft is one of threats and intimidation over license "complexities". Makes me wonder if they created those complexities in order to provide themselves the opportunity to threaten and intimidate for more sales."

duh!

Somewheres, I don't feel like digging it out right now, Microsoft has an application for calculating licenses. That's right, their licensing is so complex they designed a software program to "help" "customers". I've heard many tales of the total tab varying depending on which "helpful" Microsoft person you talk to.

Also consider that it takes a less educated or technical person to threaten/intimidate and confuse than to actually solve or resolve a problem. Just hire a lot of cheap (outsourced) beaters. Good for the MS bottom line.

jimf --

I disagree.

The best leg-breakers know exactly where to apply the pressure.

It's an art.

dino,

I know that, but for 99% of the cases, a beater will do fine. Throw you to an outsouced Indian 'tech' and see just how long before you give up :D

> The common theme of interactions with Microsoft is one of threats and intimidation over license "complexities". Makes me wonder if they created those complexities in order to provide themselves the opportunity to threaten and intimidate for more sales.

Yep, the Mafia finally went legit. Or at least legal. Does this mean they'll drop drugs and gambling?

While threatening and intimidating may be the obvious aim of Lawless I wouldn't be surprised if another was espionage. Would MicroSoft like to audit AWC and see what non-MicroSoft products were in their datacenter? Maybe they'd like to know what open source software was there.

You couldn't sell this script to Hollyweird.

A person named Lawless working in Public Relations, charged with using hard-line threats and intimidation, via lawsuit threats, against customers, under the guise of helping them negotiate complex legalities, in order to drum up more sales, involving even more complex legalities, for a 'soft' company with an amazing string of lawsuits against them spanning over twenty years.

That's only 1 episode. They wrote millions.

Welcome to Beyond the Twilight Zone.

When does the sordid show get pulled for bad ratings?

moopst:

Bingo.

In sales, though, it's called prospecting.

For all the Sopranos fans:

It would appear that Ms. Lawless believes she is Bobby "Bacala".

Quoting:You know, I've been following the situation, and I gotta tell you, it doesn't make much sense to me. I mean you recently got an offer, for a lot of money. And, if you don't get paid, you can't feed your family. I presume you got a family. I got a family myself, and I gotta tell you I'd rather take two shots to the back of the head than not be able to feed my family.

[makes a gun with her hand and points it to the back of her own head]

One... Two... To the back of the head. You think about that.

If you have 500 employees and DON'T have 500 licenses of Office or WindowsXP (depending on how you do licensing of course) then you are automatically on the red list at Microsoft. After all... how would it be possible for you to have 500 computers that are not all running their software?

GNU/Linux (and FOSS apps) is truly a disruptive technology... :)

cjcox:

Heh. I hadn't thought about how it also disrupted their easy accounting!

They probably don't even use M$ Money for all of their accounting needs :)

> They probably don't even use M$ Money for all of their accounting needs

They give every employee a copy for their desktop, but use MySQL Ledger running on a BSD box in the Linux Labs for Central control.