Jerry,

Clipped this bit, as I am sort of confused...

>Not surprisingly, however, the hardball tactics are having a negative effect on customers.
>
>"We were nailed for tens of thousands of dollars," said Cary White, an IT manager at a financial services company in San Diego who acted on a letter from Microsoft. "We received a letter addressed to our CEO that they received a tip we were not compliant with Windows, Word and Excel. ... That was a fishing expedition."
>
>"My company is to completely go away from Microsoft," White said. "We're not going to buy any more Microsoft products. It's my decision. They're alienating their customers. I don't trust them."

So, were they nailed for actually being out of compliance? Or is he talking about the time his business lost as the "gestapo" was sniffing around? I mean, if they were actually out of compliance and they got hit, I don't feel sorry for them. Whether or not you believe MS is gouging customers or the BSA is heavy-handed, piracy is piracy, and being non-compliant on licensing can cost a lot of money. That's just the way it is. I'm not going to feel sorry for a company that uses commercial software but doesn't properly pay for/license it...

It looks like this fellow should have seen the Open Source light _before_ the gestapo came a-knockin'...

JoeK