Stephen Shankland says it all.
Copyright © Despair, Inc.
Update (24-Sep-2007, 19:35): A friend pointed this comic out. I got into this battle while I worked at Microsoft and SCO Group first sued customers. I pointed out it was a suicidal thing to do if they were a "real" company, and not the anti-VC (i.e. a company that acquires old technology and litigates money out of the marketplace.) Vendors will occasionally sue customers in 1:1 situations e.g. a license dispute, in a similar way that customers occasionally sue vendors in one off disputes for non-performance, but a vendor NEVER sues customers over general things like IP infringement. It sets a tone for all customers that is ... suicide. Your top sales people will simply leave. They know customers are now viewing business with the vendor as possibly tainted by lawsuits.
I also pointed out that IBM wasn't going to let anything bad happen. A company investing a BILLION dollars in Linux could afford to weather even a few tens of millions of dollars of legal debate over several years while they determined how bad it may or may not really be. Frustrating and distracting? Certainly. So what? The customer is king.
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