[Asterisk-Users] Is the X100P a WinModem?

[Steven Critchfield]

On Thu, 2003-10-23 at 13:32, Ethan wrote:
> > what their costs are or what makes them successful.  Armchair
> > businessmen are a dime a dozen; it doesn't help that everytime you
> > post to the list, you advocate products which will undercut Digium's
> > source of revenue.
> 
> Isn't this what Linux is about?

Linux isn't necessarily about free as in cost. Nor is it necessarily
about being cheaper than the next guy. I'd even say that there are those
who would say it isn't cheaper with regards to total cost to set up, and
get started. The bump in the cost is usually due to the cost of
knowledge acquisition. It costs money or time to get this knowledge. 

I wonder if you are the kind of guy who regularly went to parties and
took the minimum amount of drink so you were not pitched out the door,
and then proceeded to siphon off what everyone else brought.  

> Every asterisk box helps to cause things like the layoffs of thousands of
> our peers that worked for Avaya/Lucent, Nortel, and others from the
> commercial PBX manufacturers. Times change, and I don't think the Winmodem
> hack will really hurt Digum that bad. Anyone serious will probably need
> the T1 card, as the Intel PC is a horrible hardware platform and really
> doesn't handle large numbers of expansion cards properly.

Hmm, None of those manufacturers where ever in the running for our
business when we choose to go with asterisk. I remember going to a
seminar put on by Nortel and laughing my ass off at the amount of money
they wanted for features that asterisk provided for free. I did thank
them for a nice lunch and a reason to be out of the office, and I was
nice enough to not ridicule their systems in front of other potential
customers. I'd say they are part of a flashy big business mentality that
doesn't go well during tough times. Linux is the answer for those that
have more time than money.

> If my project works out, I'd be happy to contribute money to the project.
> My side business (unrelated to the Asterisk project totally, we run on
> Lucent PBX that I paid $500 each for (including one with a full Intuity
> Audix platform, the other had the T1/PRI card, 100+ phones total) for the
> business and my home and that will never change (until I find g3
> definitys). Anyways, we already said with our hosting/coloc business that
> we will analyze all of the "free" software we utilize (MRTG, FreeBSD,
> Apache, inter7 products, etc) and donate to all of the projects.
> 
> I gotta admit, the X100P cost was the main reason I delayed so long in
> even trying to mess with asterisk. Even back when I did have a job and an
> income :-)

Why not try those lines of BS on GM and see if they lower the cost of a
car just so you can drive it.

> Why not just ask the winmodem hackers to donate money instead?

Yeah, then we would get people like you without a job saying you
shouldn't have to pay.
-- 
Steven Critchfield  <critch at basesys.com>