Summary: Novell's attempt to defend itself from negative publicity does not go down well

SOME days ago we wrote about Novell's response to the Los Angeles loss. It is also a loss to Novell's partner, Microsoft. Matt Asay, who is a former employee of Novell, took another angle and told Novell off for the way it treats its customers. He explains why insulting the customer is the worst one can do.

Novell, however, attacks Los Angeles' decision, arguing "The City of Los Angeles should have opted for this proven product [GroupWise] to ensure the security of its data and to save taxpayer money. They have taken a risk with no reward."

Translation? "We think Los Angeles is run by a bunch of fools who aren't smart enough to know what's good for them."

This is no way to treat customers.

It's not made any better with this throwaway line: "However, as a valued customer, Novell will continue to offer our world-class support to the City of Los Angeles during the transition."

As we pointed out the other day, Novell is promoting its proprietary software here (nothing to do with "open source"). OStatic has written an article about it, which apparently misses this point about Groupwise. The third comment brings it up and the first comment says:

Novell got two faces and no spine. They are the jellyfish of OpenSource and Linux. One face picks on Google and propietary solutions.

The more important face to notice is that they barely semipromote their own products (their SLES/SLED 11 roadshow appeared as a Microsoft-entourage). Even more interesting is the well organised astroturfing and FUD campaign against GPL.

On the face of it Stallman is the target, but the real objective is undermining GPL. Just read the Novell blogs in the Monosphere for starters.

They also systematicly attacks Ubuntu rather than competing with Windows on the desktop. Frequently I spot Opensuse users at work undermining Ubuntu. They probably be better off promoting their own product rather than bashing their fellows.

Why go for the crumbles when there is a basket full of bread just in front of you?

By end of 2012 Novell is owned by Microsoft formally and not just de-facto. We have shifted everything from Novell to RedHat. Novell is a dead end.

From the comments we gather some other interesting information. Over in IRC, we have had anonymous people ask us if we heard about more Novell layoffs. Is something going on that Novell did not announce? ⬆