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Re: [OCLUG-Tech] OCLUG AGM - discussing change

Then you alienate people in the east end and centretown. Travelling to
Algonquin from Gatineau is going to take me ~1 hour, each way, IF I catch
my connections. Heading downtown is 25 minutes at most. That's what not to
like.

On Fri, Mar 23, 2012 at 11:28 AM, Jon <je_oclug [ at ] kronos [ dot ] honk [ dot ] org> wrote:

> On 21-Mar-12 3:23 PM, Bill Strosberg wrote:
> > I have not attended meetings for years - when the meetings moved from
> > the Lees Algonquin campus downtown, it became painful enough to not
> > bother.  Subsequent moves westward were just as bad for me.  There have
> > been many meeting topics that were interesting, but not enough to
> > commute in from the far east end where I live.  No matter who is happy,
> > not everyone will be.
>
> Moving meetings back east-ward would cause headaches for folks in the
> west end.  The Algonquin location is a good one - right on the
> transitway.  Close to 417.  What's not to like, other than a few extra
> minutes en route?
>
> > People's value of knowledge is directly proportional to the amount of
> > pain it engenders in it's acquisition.
>
> True.  If it's hard to make do what you want, then it's probably not
> very good.  If the designers put that little thought and effort into the
> interface, one must wonder about the quality of the underlying code.
>
> >      From that perspective, most new
> > people today just don't value Linux as much as us elder statesmen.  I
> > gave up long ago trying to explain why Linux is a great choice for many
> > real tasks.  If people are foolish enough to pay a lot more, get a lot
> > less and then depend on companies that make them listen to endlessly
> > looping interactive telephone queues in call centers in Asia, that is
> > their problem.  Perhaps North America's infatuation with avoiding actual
> > critical thought in business decisions is part of the reason why their
> > kid's better start learning Mandarin to converse with their new
> > overlords.
> Learning Linux isn't going to change the fact that our critical
> infrastructure is being sold off to our chinese overlords.  Examine the
> track records of current and past Liberal and Conservative governments
> if you want to complain about the impending "buyout".  Greed in the name
> of "shareholder value", speculators and a public interested only in the
> lowest price, quality be damned, are the problems.  I recently bought a
> BBQ.  Primary criteria (other than it being a reasonably good unit) was:
> Not Made in China.  I prefer to keep jobs on this side of the ditch.
>
> > What is a corporate license of Microsoft
> > Office from 2001 worth today?  Nothing.
> What is a linux disk from 2001 worth?  Or a 2001 Dodge Caravan?  You got
> it, nothing.
>
> > If the same license acquisition
> > value (mulitplied by desktops in service) had been invested in IT
> > people, those few IT people could support all the desktops using
> > LibreOffice (or whatever the flavour de jour) for a fraction of the
> > ongoing expense.  Stupid, plain and simple.
>
> Those IT people would have moved on in late 2001 or 2002, maybe 2003
> when the company went bankrupt and was sold (to chinese "investors").
> Further, those IT people would have been tearing their hair out trying
> to get those documents printed (at all, let alone with any form of
> pretty - and reliably reproduceable - formatting).  Yes, you pay for MS
> Office, but OTOH, you truly do get what you pay for in the alternatives.
>
> Now, I'm not gonna say that the alternatives are better... IMO, all OS's
> are flawed.  Some just work better for some tasks and do more poorly at
> others.  As professionals, we need to put personal propaganda aside and
> pick the best tool for the task at hand.  I stopped preaching years ago
> - noone takes evangelists seriously (and all OS's have made significant
> improvements over the last few years, anyway) and we all just want to
> get our tasks done, have a couple pints and spend time with our families.
>
> If OCLUG does die out (which will be unfortunate), just do not transfer
> any assets to groups in TO (hey, gotta keep the inter-city rivalry
> going, yes?)  LOL
>
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