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| HP Bringing the Hobbyist Program In-House |
 HP has decided to take ownership of delivering licenses for Hobbyist users, making it an official Customer Engagement function. As such, Hobby Licenses will no longer be available through this site. Details of the HP's delivery of licenses to Hobbyist Users is still under development and I hope that they will have an announcement soon.
I've been involved and hosting licensing for the Hobbyist Program for nearly 15 years. Hard to believe that it's been that long. And many of you have been around since the beginning. Few products in this industry have that kind of customer retention.
I'd really like to thank Pat Jankowiak and Mark Gorham for making the Hobbyist Program possible. Sue Skonetski and Stephen Hoffman for all their technical assistance over the years. Ian Miller, Bruce Claremont, and John Malmberg for helping admin the site. Thanks to all the various Chapters from around the world for their support. And of course, all the Hobbyists who have enjoyed the program.
And of finally, I would like to thank my colleague, my friend, and the Best Man at my wedding, John Wisniewski. He spent a lot of time convincing the Digital VP's that this was a good thing.
Here's to another 15 years!
David Cathey aka HobbyistOne
REI
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on January 25 2012 08:58
I wait and wait and wait and .....
I still don't have the licenses for my VAX-kit, so what now ? |
on January 25 2012 12:41
This is either odd or not well thought out.
If they were actually planning to continue offering Hobbyist licenses it would seem that they would have worked out a transition with you which would/should have been seamless for the hobbyist community.
This way, they've taken away a working system with no visible plan for a replacement.
How are they hurt by leaving the existing system in place until their capabilties are ready to be rolled out? It is not as if the PAK licenses which you've been issuing are of indefinate term. They all timeout in a year or less so those folks who are continuing to use this have always needed to come back and renew their interest.
If the real purpose of this change is to possibly leverage the community as resources, they haven't started out on a good foot.
If they're looking to potentially draw revenue from the community, they also haven't started themselves out well since more folks will come to get licenses, find none and then walk away forgetting about VMS forever.
Maybe it would be worth raising the above point(s) to them to see how they feel about it.
Mark Pizzolato |
on January 25 2012 19:40
Most regrettable. This site is what keeps the VMS community alive; asking it to step back without having a replacement available immediately sounds like a strange strategy.
Do you happen to have any names within HP we can contact to hear about what's going to happen next? |
on January 26 2012 04:54
Mark, while I don't disagree, admittedly the license agreement could probably use a review (it hasn't been changed since Compaq bought DEC!), and the layered products probably hasn't been reviewed for royalty issues for a several years. |
on January 26 2012 04:57
@LennertVA - The VMS group is working on it, so I wouldn't suggest anyone needs to bother them about it. |
on February 07 2012 02:51
Hi HobbyistOne,
Just wanted to express my appreciation for your work and efforts to keep this hobbyist program going. I got my first VAX in 1997 and since then I've been enjoying it very much. Thanks to the hobbyist licenses.
To 15 years more!!
Cheers,
Marcio Pocciotti - Brazil |
on February 15 2012 06:44
Yes - many thanks to Hobbyist One, "Deep in the heart of Texas" (or North) |
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