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But Oracle actually is evil. Evil is stomping a kitten to death. Evil is the gulag, the concentration camp, the cultural revolution. Oracle is just a busines

by bdunbar 14y ago

But Oracle actually is evil. Evil is stomping a kitten to death. Evil is the gulag, the concentration camp, the cultural revolution. Oracle is just a business.

obtu 14y ago
They tried to make APIs copyrightable. That's about the same magnitude of evil as legalising software patents.
hammersend 14y ago
And the GP was giving his honest opinion. An opinion that is held by many people I've interacted with in the open source community regarding Oracle. Maybe instead of browbeating him over it you could consider encouraging Oracle to pay attention to things like this and do something about recovering their image. BTW, it isn't illegal in any jurisdiction I am aware of to harbor personal feelings towards brands and companies. That's what marketing is all about anyway.
- skorgu 14y ago
  For a large segment of us (presumably the target market) there's no point in Oracle trying to recover their image. Based on direct personal experience I will fight tooth and nail against giving Oracle one red cent or one idle second. I can't think of anything they could do in the short or medium term that would change my mind so why waste time trying? Buying purchasing managers steak dinners and lapdances has a much better return on investment.
- bdunbar 14y ago
  And the GP was giving his honest opinion I was giving my honest opinion of his honest opinion. An opinion that is held by many people These people have a weak grasp of the concept of 'evil'. In my opinion. Maybe instead of browbeating I wasn't doing that. My opinion. You could consider encouraging Oracle I'm nobody Oracle is going to listen to. I say this as a guy who has been dealing with Oracle for about a decade, supported database and application servers. Oracle pays attention to guys that write checks. And not just any checks but big checks. If the CIO of (say) AT&T brings this up with his sales rep, things will happen. Me .. not so much. BTW, it isn't illegal I believe you are reading things that I did not write.
russell 14y ago
Businesses can be evil. Crushing your competition via patents is evil. Damaging others way out of proportion to your own gain is evil. Buying elections with a flood of money is evil. The Libor scandal is evil because it screwed millions of contracts. Stomping a kitten is pretty tame by comparison.
- taligent 14y ago
  You're completely warped view on life warrants serious psychiatric help. And surprised that you think defending patents is evil because almost every major IT company right now is doing that.
  - Produce 14y ago
    >And surprised that you think defending patents is evil because almost every major IT company right now is doing that. If all the sheep walk off the cliff then it's the right thing to do!
  - chris_wot 14y ago
    Non sequitur. If everyone does something and it's an evil thing to do, then everyone is being evil and should stop being evil. Don't argue that patents are good because everyone uses them. Find a better rationale for your patent love!
- bdunbar 14y ago
  You have a weak grasp of the definition of evil. Have a good day.
cloudyjoe 14y ago
An example of software-industry practices by Oracle: After Oracle bought ATG (e-commerce software vendor), they assigned an engineer to remove the code that detected and limited the number of concurrent users. ATG software is licensed by the number of concurrent users, and had for a long-time a mechanism to limit usage to the actual number of licenses for that specific customer. Oracle removed the limit code so that some customers would unwittingly exceed their licensed number. The intent was that these customers could be targeted by Oracle's license police, who'd extract high financial penalties. A hard-nosed business decision. Potentially lucrative, profitable. Not illegal. But demonstrating utter contempt and manipulation of their customers. If this is how Oracle treats its own customers, how do you think they treat competitors like CentOS and the OSS community?
- quicksilver03 14y ago
  I am quite familiar with ATG, having worked with the product since 2001. I don't believe that Oracle removed the license limitation on purpose, but rather to make ATG consistent with their other products which you can download, install and develop with, but as soon as you use them for production you have to pay. You also have to factor in that ATG's old licensing department was chronically incapable of delivering the correct license files: they used to send out production licences for the wrong IP addresses, session limitations or bad expiration dates, and it wasn't uncommon to have 3 or 4 runarounds with them in order to have what you paid for. That said, I'm not looking forward to use Oracle Linux in any of our production servers, unless my clients specifically asks for it and pays for the support. And this support has to be of very high quality, it will take me just one canned reply to put CentOS back in.
blindhippo 14y ago
Businesses are sociopathic - especially since corporations claim the rights of a "person" under law. Current North American society appears to deem sociopathic behavoir as being evil - so it's not much of a stretch to claim businesses are evil. Not saying they can't act good or do good in society though as many obviously do. It's also worth noting that good/evil are not objective binary things - so your definition of evil is likely different then the GP's.
- bdunbar 14y ago
  Current North American society If this is an actual opinion held by North American society - whatever that is - then NAs needs to re-think it's definition. It's also worth noting that good/evil are not objective binary things - so your definition of evil is likely different then the GP's. Ah. I hold to the - possibly old-fashioned - notion - that there is good, there is evil, and they are objective binary states.
swa14 14y ago
>>Oracle is just a business. It's just that it's the kind of business that makes me glad kitten stomping doesn't have an appreciable ROI .
keithpeter 14y ago
"Oracle is just a business." True, and one that exists to maximise shareholder value. Alas, that aim may not contribute positively to the larger picture, hence various forms of regulation that exist in many countries. This is an issue too large for this particular page.

by bdunbar 14y ago

But Oracle actually is evil. Evil is stomping a kitten to death. Evil is the gulag, the concentration camp, the cultural revolution. Oracle is just a business.

obtu 14y ago

They tried to make APIs copyrightable. That's about the same magnitude of evil as legalising software patents.

hammersend 14y ago

And the GP was giving his honest opinion. An opinion that is held by many people I've interacted with in the open source community regarding Oracle. Maybe instead of browbeating him over it you could consider encouraging Oracle to pay attention to things like this and do something about recovering their image. BTW, it isn't illegal in any jurisdiction I am aware of to harbor personal feelings towards brands and companies. That's what marketing is all about anyway.

skorgu 14y ago
For a large segment of us (presumably the target market) there's no point in Oracle trying to recover their image. Based on direct personal experience I will fight tooth and nail against giving Oracle one red cent or one idle second. I can't think of anything they could do in the short or medium term that would change my mind so why waste time trying? Buying purchasing managers steak dinners and lapdances has a much better return on investment.
bdunbar 14y ago
And the GP was giving his honest opinion I was giving my honest opinion of his honest opinion. An opinion that is held by many people These people have a weak grasp of the concept of 'evil'. In my opinion. Maybe instead of browbeating I wasn't doing that. My opinion. You could consider encouraging Oracle I'm nobody Oracle is going to listen to. I say this as a guy who has been dealing with Oracle for about a decade, supported database and application servers. Oracle pays attention to guys that write checks. And not just any checks but big checks. If the CIO of (say) AT&T brings this up with his sales rep, things will happen. Me .. not so much. BTW, it isn't illegal I believe you are reading things that I did not write.

russell 14y ago

Businesses can be evil. Crushing your competition via patents is evil. Damaging others way out of proportion to your own gain is evil. Buying elections with a flood of money is evil. The Libor scandal is evil because it screwed millions of contracts. Stomping a kitten is pretty tame by comparison.

taligent 14y ago
You're completely warped view on life warrants serious psychiatric help. And surprised that you think defending patents is evil because almost every major IT company right now is doing that.
- Produce 14y ago
  >And surprised that you think defending patents is evil because almost every major IT company right now is doing that. If all the sheep walk off the cliff then it's the right thing to do!
- chris_wot 14y ago
  Non sequitur. If everyone does something and it's an evil thing to do, then everyone is being evil and should stop being evil. Don't argue that patents are good because everyone uses them. Find a better rationale for your patent love!
bdunbar 14y ago
You have a weak grasp of the definition of evil. Have a good day.

cloudyjoe 14y ago

An example of software-industry practices by Oracle: After Oracle bought ATG (e-commerce software vendor), they assigned an engineer to remove the code that detected and limited the number of concurrent users. ATG software is licensed by the number of concurrent users, and had for a long-time a mechanism to limit usage to the actual number of licenses for that specific customer. Oracle removed the limit code so that some customers would unwittingly exceed their licensed number. The intent was that these customers could be targeted by Oracle's license police, who'd extract high financial penalties. A hard-nosed business decision. Potentially lucrative, profitable. Not illegal. But demonstrating utter contempt and manipulation of their customers. If this is how Oracle treats its own customers, how do you think they treat competitors like CentOS and the OSS community?

quicksilver03 14y ago
I am quite familiar with ATG, having worked with the product since 2001. I don't believe that Oracle removed the license limitation on purpose, but rather to make ATG consistent with their other products which you can download, install and develop with, but as soon as you use them for production you have to pay. You also have to factor in that ATG's old licensing department was chronically incapable of delivering the correct license files: they used to send out production licences for the wrong IP addresses, session limitations or bad expiration dates, and it wasn't uncommon to have 3 or 4 runarounds with them in order to have what you paid for. That said, I'm not looking forward to use Oracle Linux in any of our production servers, unless my clients specifically asks for it and pays for the support. And this support has to be of very high quality, it will take me just one canned reply to put CentOS back in.

blindhippo 14y ago

Businesses are sociopathic - especially since corporations claim the rights of a "person" under law. Current North American society appears to deem sociopathic behavoir as being evil - so it's not much of a stretch to claim businesses are evil. Not saying they can't act good or do good in society though as many obviously do. It's also worth noting that good/evil are not objective binary things - so your definition of evil is likely different then the GP's.

bdunbar 14y ago
Current North American society If this is an actual opinion held by North American society - whatever that is - then NAs needs to re-think it's definition. It's also worth noting that good/evil are not objective binary things - so your definition of evil is likely different then the GP's. Ah. I hold to the - possibly old-fashioned - notion - that there is good, there is evil, and they are objective binary states.

swa14 14y ago

>>Oracle is just a business. It's just that it's the kind of business that makes me glad kitten stomping doesn't have an appreciable ROI .

keithpeter 14y ago

"Oracle is just a business." True, and one that exists to maximise shareholder value. Alas, that aim may not contribute positively to the larger picture, hence various forms of regulation that exist in many countries. This is an issue too large for this particular page.