On Wed, 2002-12-11 at 12:15, Roman Rokytskyy wrote:
> > In our case it is the legal department. Something about insurance
> > cover in case our systems 'blow up' something at the customers site.
>
> Hmmm... Insurance for software. Interesting concept... :)

Yes, and I have looked into insurance for data loss. So companies can
feel comfortable storing there db with us. If anything happens, they get
a big check. That along with a recent backup helps to keep
customer/clients happy.

Although from my recollection the insurance I was looking into did not
specify proprietary software to open source? I may not have seen it, but
it would not surprise me.

I had more of a need for the insurance at a previous business of mine
running proprietary industry specific software, developed for Microcrap
OS's only. I spent a week one year just after Christmas manually
re-entering invoices that were lost. In the end the software cost us
more than it was worth. If I had insurance then, my premiums would be
through the roof.

Since I have switch to real software that works, I have had no problems.
In fact I have found it pretty hard to justify the expense on insurance.
I spend the time and money instead maintaining backups, and backup
plans. Although aside from an Earthquake or Fire that takes out my
offices and most likely me, I see no immediate need. I did see a need to
insure myself so if anything happens to me my company/clients would be
taken care of financially. Since I tend to live a more dangerous life
than my servers. ;)

Then again I guess it comes down to how important the data is and how
much people will lose/cost them if it's lost/damaged.

If I owned an insurance company I would prefer open source. The last
thing I would need would be to pay out claims on problems that existed
because of design flaws in proprietary software. Flaws that I could not
determine the source of, since I would have no access to the original
code.

Just my 3 cents.

--
Sincerely,
William L. Thomson Jr.
Support Group
Obsidian-Studios Inc.
439 Amber Way
Petaluma, Ca. 94952
Phone 707.766.9509
Fax 707.766.8989
http://www.obsidian-studios.com