5 ms·

Two thoughts come to my mind. One, this article and the project it covers will be good negotiating leverage against Microsoft's fee increases. I wouldn't be s

Two thoughts come to my mind. One, this article and the project it covers will be good negotiating leverage against Microsoft's fee increases. I wouldn't be surprised if they end up winning back lower license fees and sticking with MS in the long run. Two, what a boneheaded move on Microsoft's part, PR-wise. CERN is an internationally-respected research institution which is widely admired by the kinds of people who make purchasing decisions. Why poke the bear, especially when business is going so well?

downrightmike 7y ago
Short term investment's need for ever growing revenue/profits. If they raise everyone's license costs 23% this year, investors will be happy. Then MSFT will have to raise their rates again next year.
rat9988 7y ago
From a different point of view, I don't see using PR to have lower fees very ethical. It looks to me like "lower our fees, or we are gonna trash you in our PR, and you know we have a good reputation".
- rootsofallevil 7y ago
  I guess it depends on whether CERN merits academic status or not. If it does, then this is fine. If it doesn't then I agree. It seems to me that CERN is a research institute but whether that is counted as an academic institution, from a licensing POV, is a different question
  - jhbadger 7y ago
    As somebody who has worked at research institutes in the US, this comes up a lot. Some companies say that an academic user must have an e-mail address ending in ".edu" (which in the US means a school or university), but others define it more broadly to include non-profit research institutes as well. It gets murky because many research institutes actually have grad students doing their projects there (even if they are officially enrolled at a university elsewhere).
- carwyn 7y ago
  High end tech procurement is more like your average market stall haggling than you might imagine. It tends to be the middle ground that's most stable.
- Spooky23 7y ago
  Have you ever negotiated in a contested deal with a big company? They get way nastier than PR pieces.
- chucksmash 7y ago
  What's unethical about "if you do something we don't like, we're going to talk about it"? What would the more ethical alternative be? To just take the deal on offer or silently move on?
- dv_dt 7y ago
  That seems something of a double standard, companies are encouraged to use any legal means possible to improve profits, but customers need to stay silent about poor terms?
  - kretor 7y ago
    The parent didn't encourage companies to use any legal means necessary. You can't know their stance about this.
- gonzo41 7y ago
  I don't think that really holds water. The ethical thing for the researchers is to drive down costs everywhere they can to get the most money spent on research. M$oft wants to maximize it's profits and is negotiating from a position of strength knowing that big enterprise integrations can't just say "f-this, were off to use ubuntu".
  - bbarn 7y ago
    Funny how advice on this site is always "Charge what it's worth!" or "Don't be afraid to charge for your product!", unless of course, it's someone who's already made it, like Microsoft, and then it's the tired 20 year old "M$" meme again.
    - jgoodhcg 7y ago
      There is a difference between advice for a lifestyle business and critique of a fortune 50 company.
- tyingq 7y ago
  I didn't read any trashing. Just a general note that the current commercial terms aren't sustainable for them.
carwyn 7y ago
The first of these certainly does happen, in this case though I suspect it may be a bit of both. When it comes to negotiation this will likely go both ways, the prestige and association of a project like CERN is worth something to large tech companies, as is being involved with the people and projects. It's unlikely that they will be able to quickly or even ever move everything to new platforms, but with time there's a good chance they can move much of it. It will come down to the economics and time pressures of buy-in vs build-in.
notimetorelax 7y ago
It’s the usual, Oracle did something similar to CERN a few years back. Lock in and profit!
- tomxor 7y ago
  Did CERN manage to migrate away?
  - notimetorelax 7y ago
    Back then we just paid, don’t know if this changed. Oracle and PL/SQL was deeply embedded, I don’t think this would be feasible. There were terabytes of beam data in Oracle DBs and lots of software relying on the dialect.
Spooky23 7y ago
Usually the salespeople get a quota that can only be met by either moving Azure or hitting some impossible software target.
pkaye 7y ago
The court of public opinion is the way to get companies to do things these days.
- nercht12 7y ago
  Wish that was the case with Mozilla.

downrightmike 7y ago

Short term investment's need for ever growing revenue/profits. If they raise everyone's license costs 23% this year, investors will be happy. Then MSFT will have to raise their rates again next year.

rat9988 7y ago

From a different point of view, I don't see using PR to have lower fees very ethical. It looks to me like "lower our fees, or we are gonna trash you in our PR, and you know we have a good reputation".

rootsofallevil 7y ago
I guess it depends on whether CERN merits academic status or not. If it does, then this is fine. If it doesn't then I agree. It seems to me that CERN is a research institute but whether that is counted as an academic institution, from a licensing POV, is a different question
- jhbadger 7y ago
  As somebody who has worked at research institutes in the US, this comes up a lot. Some companies say that an academic user must have an e-mail address ending in ".edu" (which in the US means a school or university), but others define it more broadly to include non-profit research institutes as well. It gets murky because many research institutes actually have grad students doing their projects there (even if they are officially enrolled at a university elsewhere).
carwyn 7y ago
High end tech procurement is more like your average market stall haggling than you might imagine. It tends to be the middle ground that's most stable.
Spooky23 7y ago
Have you ever negotiated in a contested deal with a big company? They get way nastier than PR pieces.
chucksmash 7y ago
What's unethical about "if you do something we don't like, we're going to talk about it"? What would the more ethical alternative be? To just take the deal on offer or silently move on?
dv_dt 7y ago
That seems something of a double standard, companies are encouraged to use any legal means possible to improve profits, but customers need to stay silent about poor terms?
- kretor 7y ago
  The parent didn't encourage companies to use any legal means necessary. You can't know their stance about this.
gonzo41 7y ago
I don't think that really holds water. The ethical thing for the researchers is to drive down costs everywhere they can to get the most money spent on research. M$oft wants to maximize it's profits and is negotiating from a position of strength knowing that big enterprise integrations can't just say "f-this, were off to use ubuntu".
- bbarn 7y ago
  Funny how advice on this site is always "Charge what it's worth!" or "Don't be afraid to charge for your product!", unless of course, it's someone who's already made it, like Microsoft, and then it's the tired 20 year old "M$" meme again.
  - jgoodhcg 7y ago
    There is a difference between advice for a lifestyle business and critique of a fortune 50 company.
tyingq 7y ago
I didn't read any trashing. Just a general note that the current commercial terms aren't sustainable for them.

carwyn 7y ago

The first of these certainly does happen, in this case though I suspect it may be a bit of both. When it comes to negotiation this will likely go both ways, the prestige and association of a project like CERN is worth something to large tech companies, as is being involved with the people and projects. It's unlikely that they will be able to quickly or even ever move everything to new platforms, but with time there's a good chance they can move much of it. It will come down to the economics and time pressures of buy-in vs build-in.

notimetorelax 7y ago

It’s the usual, Oracle did something similar to CERN a few years back. Lock in and profit!

tomxor 7y ago
Did CERN manage to migrate away?
- notimetorelax 7y ago
  Back then we just paid, don’t know if this changed. Oracle and PL/SQL was deeply embedded, I don’t think this would be feasible. There were terabytes of beam data in Oracle DBs and lots of software relying on the dialect.

Spooky23 7y ago

Usually the salespeople get a quota that can only be met by either moving Azure or hitting some impossible software target.

pkaye 7y ago

The court of public opinion is the way to get companies to do things these days.

nercht12 7y ago
Wish that was the case with Mozilla.