Free software not really free (Score 0, Interesting)

Let's be clear, free software is not really free. I worked for a company that jumped heavily into a linux-based product and we soon found bugs in all kinds of underlying linux infrastructure... Sure it's open source, but realistically no small company that is cutting cost to deploy open-source in the first place will have the resources to go in and hack code to fix bugs. We ended up spending a small fortune in consultant costs to hire outside programmers to fix small bugs thoughout several linux subsystems... and the kicker was we were theoretically expected to release those fixes back into the open-source community. Needless to say, our executives said "screw it, let everyone else figure it out for themselves". Yes, you can cut costs with open source, but god help you if you need to fix something because you won't have the expertise to do it anymore that you'd have the expertise to recompile MS Office. This isn't a rant against open source (I use several open source packages myself), but it isn't a panacea and you still need to allocate funds for things like developing your own bug fixes. Nothing is truly free.