BMS Blog: SBS Consulting in the UK

<rant mode on>

In this enlightened age it is rare that we come across the old school of bearded, bespectacled Unix infatuated dinosaurs of software developers that we had the misfortune to encounter yesterday.

Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against the various flavours of *nix etc. In fact I was treasurer of the local Linux User Group for a while. However, I do have a big issue with the fact there are still developers and support companies out there that think they are so superior to everyone else just because their program runs on Solaris. They:

1. Think they can charge for the privilege of returning your call even though you placed the call 3 days previous.
2. Refuse to provide clear documentation so that the convoluted keyboard commands that are specific to their program only can be properly understood.
3. Still insist on using a dial up modem for support rather than that new fangled Internet thingy.
4. Talk in an alien tongue so that even the most hardened MCSE doesn’t understand the first word that comes out of their mouths.
5. Are so stubbornly set in their ways they have to have a conference call with 10 other *nix developers because we want them to reset the stupid serial print queue that will only print to an outdated dot matrix printer running in a little heard of emulation mode on hardware that was out of date before the ark was even thought of!

So, if you are reading this Mr. Plant Machinery Hire software developer, your days are numbered. That doesn’t mean I’m so incensed by your total lack of disregard for your customers that I’m sending the boys round to batter you about the head with a copy of MS SQL until you can’t remember what lpstat -t is for - I don’t have to. You seem to be doing a perfectly good job of alienating your customers on your own.

Where have you been living for the last few years? It certainly isn’t in the same world as the new breed of customer focused, business savvy IT consultants that I know - a world where we help each other out and deliver what the customer wants in a friendly manner driven on by partnering with other like minded companies. Your monolithic approach is outmoded, outdated and smacks of desperation.  You are an analog company in a digital world and it is about time you pulled your bootstraps up and took that first step in to the 21st century.

<rant mode off>

We got this communication from one of our distributors today relating to the way Open/volume license media is distributed. It shouldn’t make too much of a difference to be honest, but it’s nice to know we can download the media FOC when the client can’t find the CD!

Open program change: media download offer to end users

A snapshot:

In line with Microsoft?s strategy to drive towards digital product delivery, we are adopting & promoting digital distribution of media bits in the Open Program.  In essence, this means transitioning media fulfilment from the channel and fulfilling the product directly to the end customer via eOpen/VLSC*.    There will be a phased roll out across EMEA from December 2007 (starting with UK, Germany & Austria) with other countries following in January/ February 2008.

The process:

End users will register on eOpen/ VLSC* and may then download (free of charge) and/or purchase physical media via this site.  If users require physical media they will be required to purchase directly from a fulfilment partner and not via the channel partner.  The fulfilment partner will then send the media ordered directly to the end user.

What benefits does this move offer you?

The benefits are summarized below:

?              Reduction in overhead associated with ?low value? transactions

?              Ability to have media download available within 3 ? 5 working days from release

?              Reduction of hot-calls from resellers and end-users

?              Simplifying licensing for the end-customer by directing them to a single location

?              Ensuring licensing compliance for the channel

*Volume Licensing Service Centre

Well worth signing up for if you want to know more about Sharepoint running on an SBS box and want to maximise your chances of solution selling SBS to your customers.

http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032352565&EventCategory=4&culture=en-GB&CountryCode=GB

This is part of the “Back To Basics Tour, more about which can be found over at David Overton’s blog post.