Re: GNU licenses

[David Kastrup]

Alexander Terekhov <terekhov@web.de> writes:

> David Kastrup wrote:
> [...]
>> Well, the last filing is at
>> <URL:http://biz.yahoo.com/e/060710/rhat10-q.html>, and lo-and-behold,
>
> See Full Filing, not summary, retard. Quotes from latest 10-Q:

The quotes don't change that the software subscriptions are their
major source of revenue, much larger than services and training.

While in the quotes you cited they state that there is a danger that
customers will elect not to renew subscriptions (as they are not
requires to do so), this number has vastly increased as to last year.

Up to now they are turning the major revenue with software
subscription services.

> They sell subscription service for freeware (revenue wise) delivery,

Uh, reality check.  The "freeware delivery" is their _main_ revenue
source right now.  They state that there is a danger that this may
collapse, and indeed, this a quite a real danger with free software as
customers can turn to other providers if they want to if they feel
dissatisfied: as opposed to proprietary software models, there is no
vendor lockin.

So this danger is something they have to keep in mind much more than
other vendors do, and they are right in stressing this difference to
"normal" software shops in their filings: it is something that
investors need to be aware of in order to weigh the possible impact of
business decisions: dealing in free software is not easy.

But this does not change that their dominant revenue source is
subscriptions for free software, still.  Even though their financial
controllers are probably not all too happy to have to base their
planning on that.

> maintenance service, blah-blah-service-la-la, moron.



-- 
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum