[Wolves] BBC Technology poll - vote now :-)

[Mark Harrison]

Richard Smedley wrote:
> On Fri, 2007-10-26 at 21:11 +0100, Mark Harrison wrote:
>   
>> The point about £500 pa was a comment on the "just pay a fixed fee per 
>> PC, irrespective of which MS software you load on it" licencing model. 
>> I'm not saying that this model is best, only that I _don't_ find it 
>> particularly morally reprehensible as an option.
>>     
>
> Hmm, I think in most walks of life this would be known
> as a protection racket :-/
>
>   
Really... Just trying to find examples:

- A video rental library that charges a flat monthly fee irrespective of 
how many videos/DVDs you borrow.

- Company van insurance. Pay one (higher premium) and be insured for any 
member of staff to drive the van, irrespective of whether all of them 
actually do.

- A health club that charges a monthly fee irrespective of whether you 
go or not in any given month.

- A broadband connection that charges a monthly fee, whether you use the 
service or not (or whether you use the service for an hour each evening 
to check email, or are a teleworker.) [ditto gas, electricity, phone, 
mobile phone, water, sewage contracts, many of which have "fixed monthly 
fee" plans.]

- Hell, if you want to go down that route, a bookshop that charges the 
same price per book, whether it is read by every member of your family, 
and loaned to your friends... or whether it is given as an unsuitable 
Christmas present, and never read.

In most walks of life, offering pricing plans that are "decoupled" from 
actual usage is the norm, surely? Or at least, an option that no-one 
blinks about.


I can't comment on a court case that the legal system dropped. My 
experience of court cases is that EVERYONE goes in thinking they have an 
excellent case, and 50% of people discover that they didn't. (I've been 
involved in exactly one court case, where my insurer and I believed the 
other driver was at fault, and the judge disagreed :-) )

M.


M.