Microsoft charity crackdown spurs boycott

Microsoft faces a backlash from thousands of aged care providers and charities that are set to dump its software to avoid some A$50 million in price hikes.

The Redmond, Wash., giant is pressing ahead with new global software licensing agreements, some imposing a whopping 500% price increase, to stamp out what it initially claimed were illegal uses of its discounted offerings by not-for-profit agencies.

Australian aged care and charity organizations have sworn to dump the vendor if it enforces the policy change and are prepared to tear out established Microsoft infrastructure to implement open source alternatives.

They argue the price hike will eat into revenue generated by taxpayers and donations for charitable activities like homeless shelters and free healthcare services.

While the new software licence model, Charity Open, is commensurate with the 80% discount of its predecessor Academic Open, the clincher for many not-for-profits is the introduction of eligibilty guidelines which could force more than 2800 aged care facilities alone and still more charities onto full commericial licences.

Paula Carleton, CIO of the not-for-profit Baptist Community Services, told Computerworld she is investigating how to move its 850 Windows desktops to open source following Microsoft's decision to force it to a full commercial licence.

"Every dollar we are forced to spend on software is a dollar less spent on the charitable services like homeless and crisis care that we deliver," Carleton said, adding that it is a public benevolent organization according to the tax office.

"We have to understand the implications of implementing open source... based on the figures we are looking at, we would be crazy not to roll it out. We've been looking at the major players like Red Hat and Novell.

"It is difficult to understand software assurance or enterprise payment models because it varies depending on the software we use," she said.

Baptist Community Services has been whacked with an 200 percent price hike through a 12 month transitory licence, starting at the end of this month, after which it must strike up an enterprise agreement or pay full commercial rates to use Microsoft products.

Its predictament is not unqiue, according to the Aged Care Association Australia which represents some 2800 aged care providers or about 98% of those operating in the country. CEO Rod Young suggests about 85% of its members have or will be forced onto commercial licences by failure to meet the eligibility guidelines, at a estimated cost of between $50 million to $70 million.

"They have targeted the biggest providers and none of them have qualified in any way shape or form. We are fearful that the small community providers will be cut off if Microsoft interprets the criteria in black and white which it has so far," Young said.

"Half the industry doesn't know about the licence changes... those well down the path of IT enablement - at the behest of organisations like us and the government - are intensely considering open source.