As already stated in the comments a few times, it will be free "forever" after you upgrade, since you already had a license. You still keep downgrade rights to the version you upgraded from. New PCs, if you wait longer than a year, and rebuilds where you don't have a license anymore, etc. will have to pay for a full license when it is out.

We use JIRA at Apache for all the Apache projects. I wouldn't say it's the best software in the world, but it is better than most of the other ones I've personally used. They don't seem to have the stability issues you listed . Some of my direct clients use JIRA as well, and they have never mentioned stability issues with it either...

Or how about you use a large-format "scantron". You fill in the bubble, and scan it. The paper copy can be re-counted, but it can be easily electronically calculated. Why do we need the touch screen? It seems like people want to introduce technology just for the sake of introducing technology.

So, you are saying that if you are blind or have partial sight there is no point in you ever being a programmer, maker or grid admin?

While I'm lucky to have most of my sight (I'm only blind in one eye), some of my good friends are completely blind. One is a system admin and is a very functional member of society. He admins a few dozen Linux servers but is completely unable to use Linux as a desktop.

But accessibility is not just about the blind or deaf. It also includes color blindness, those who are unable to fully click a mouse, etc. Having a myopic view of how people use computers is not a great position to be in. If you think about accessibility then your products (or apps you write) start to become more open and easier to use on other platforms like tablets, phones, tv's.

I could buy a copy of Windows for about $200 (retail). Since I pay my developers about $100 an hour, that means if they can't outfit the entire OS and window manager with basic accessibility functionality, then the choice is pretty easy. Even if I had to buy 100 copies of Windows at retail ($20,000), I'm sure I couldn't hire a dev to touch that many projects, considering the 100's of different communities, different programming styles, different languages and different systems. This is not just 1 app that isn't accessible, it's (pretty much) ALL OF THEM.

Even if you try to get a screen reader to launch (not an easy task), you will notice that it fires off something may once every 20 - 30 actions if you are lucky. If that is the only way to get feedback from your system that wouldn't be considered usable by any means.

JAWS used with IE under Windows is still the most popular, but others are quickly gaining momentum. It's still what everybody serious about accessibility tests with.

Surprisingly, accessibility support in OSX is almost at the point where it is better than Windows... Not every app just yet, but it has been getting a lot of attention and a lot of people trying it out.

Just because it's open source doesn't mean it's great. I'd classify accessibility for blind/less sighted users to be non-existent (with the exception of a few applications). Every iteration of X Windows since X11 has been worse and worse with its implementation, and if things go wrong it is nearly impossible to get around. A few applications that implement the full GTK stack /properly/ are passable, but those that use Gnome's or KDE's tools don't pass text back to a speech engine at all.

Console is fine, but as soon as you try and use a tool that uses ncurses or any other menuing application you are SOL.

Firefox hasn't worked well with a screen reader in about 5 years. Never was able to get Chrome fully installed.

Assuming you are only talking about last-mile video service.

If you bring data service into the mix, it drops down to Cable vs. "Ma Bell". While Sattelite technically have data solutions, they no longer qualify as "broadband" under the new definition. In many locations, DSL service does not qualify as broadband either.

If you bring content into the mix, Comcast bought NBC Universal, which owns a large set of channels. They've been using that position and extorting their smaller competitors in certain markets. Time Warner also comes with a set of channels making the merged company even more powerful in contract negotiations with their competitors in markers where they overlap.

Comcast would continue to be the largest ISP in the United States, and would essentially gobble up #3. This makes them more and more powerful for lobbying, regulations and pretty much everything else.

I live about 85 miles from the closest Apple store.. Pretty much every interaction I've had when them is through an authorized reseller or via web/mail/phone. Forcing you to go to a store to pick one up is pretty much a PITA. Oh, and I don't live in the boondocks -- I'm in a city of 300,000 people, but stuck between two major markets, so Apple has passed us by.

Cisco has been pushing SIP based IP phones for remote workers for years. Those remote workers may or may not have their phone in front of their firewall. These phones connect back through a session border controller at the edge of the company's network and then brings that traffic inside (think of a application-layer VPN tunnel).

I don't get what an SBC has to do with phone reachable from the outside. If it is reachable from the outside, then it is reachable, and people can POST XML documents to it to make it do weird things. An SBC only protects the inside of your network from the outside (like a firewall), but once the phone has been compromised then the SBC sees that traffic as legal traffic from a known device.

This could be a huge issue for toll-fraud. Scammers I'm sure will start scanning for this vulnerability and use valid phones that are exposed to the outside to route calls through people's phone systems.

That is how many items generated by the government get archived -- by paper. Even for phone records, once their "electronic usefulness has been outlived," they are printed, stored offsite and then deleted.

People know how to handle and read paper. People don't know how to handle .PST files.

They did. The response was that the State Department issued Blackberries that check the State Department email do not allow additional email accounts to be added to the device.

I remember going through these exercises on a daily basis for nearly 5 years when I was a kid. They weren't pleasant to do, and required a lot of time and concentration. My doctor wanted me to do them 3 times a day, which I did for a while, but there was no difference. His response was that it helped some people, and just to keep on it for the rest of my life. I gave up shortly after.

I can still see, although only through one eye at a time, and for me this is purely a cosmetic issue.

Except on most of those Signature Edition PCs, they still include a trial of Office 365 :) The HP's on the site have pre-loaded software that help you buy ink. So, it's halfway true...

It's just other people's trialware or junkware they don't include.