Software as a Service is a key to Linux Growth

There are many very good sites that offer software that many Linux and other Opensource OS's can use to expand their usefulness and presence in the average Joe's home desktop.

Sites like American Greetings design and print allows people to sign up for a yearly membership and print commercial quality paper goods in their own home. Often, the home software version of this can cost anywhere between $20 to $100 and become outdated each year as the newest version is introduced.

Millions of users like to use and want to be able to print greeting cards at home. I am not one of them, but my wife is. So are many people I know. They consider it big time saver and have the opportunity to customize and make a card or printed item more personal by having access to software like this.

What other kinds of software is missing from the free software world that hasn't made it over yet? How many of these are available as a service? A great many of them.

So, what's the problem? Why aren't Linux and other OpenSource users signing up en masse to use these services?

The vast majority of them intentionally design their websites to work specifically with proprietary software. On most of these sites, if you go to look at system requirements, they will brazenly tell you their website is optimized to work with Microsoft or Apple software.

Now, any first year web design student can tell you that there are design standards in place that designers are encouraged to follow that will make a website software independent. in other words, there are recognized and known ways to make these sites work with any and all software thereby making access available to anyone, regardless of the OS or browser they use.

Wouldn't this make more sense to a company who wants to sell more memberships or units or whatever from their website? To make it as accessible as possible and not cut off potential customers, especially when they don' t have to?

Why then do these companies not only persist in supporting a legally recognized monopolist and practitioner of unethical business tactics, but actively promote that relationship. They actually brag on it.

Is it to have the country club effect? By making their product exclusive, they make more people want it because they have to pay more or socially conform to get access to it? It's been a recognized and highly used sales strategy for years.

Create an artificial cap or limit on supply to increase the assumed demand and maintain a certain floor on cost as well.

Software as a service is booming and is actually a very good idea for delivery of services and product.

On the other hand, the OS and other aspects like file storage and security should stay local and have nothing to offer but corporate and government snooping and mishandling of data, your data.

Oh yes, the popular argument against that is that our personal data is already spread across the entire world and web so why should we care now about our data.

For the same reason people say they want to cure AIDS and cancer and any other mas social problem. Just because it exists, doesn't mean it is acceptable. At some point in the future we want to arrest that situation and cause it to cease to exist or exist in a controllable manner. Maybe the effort is futile, but it is worthwhile to work toward regardless.

Please, call, email, write to the consumer dept of your preferred software/service provider and inform them they they are limiting themselves and only enabling these monopolistic companies to maintain their stranglehold on future development and access to goods and services.