LXer: At the expense of GNU/Linux.
 

Published at LXer:

This article is based on a true story. The names have been changed to protect the individuals involved. It all occurred in a government department where an IT lady had a great idea about converting their computers to GNU/Linux. Let's call her Gillian. Gillian was assigned to research GNU/Linux...

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To play devil's advocate here: all the work was done, as far as I can tell, on company time so she was reimbursed for it and most companies will do the same - look at alternate vendors and then use that to leverage a discount. It's called business. Although it does Gillian no good (though I'd hope she would use this to leverage a pay rise - lots of work, saving for the company) and it does the community and GNU/Linux no good, it has had an effect for her company and that is good.

Who knows, maybe one day her paper will be dusted off and used for the right reasons one day?

As a practicing consultant, I can say this sort of stuff is beyond commonplace. Frequently I'm hired AFTER management has made up its mind, it just needs an "independent" bit of research to support its indisputably brilliant preconceptions. Pretty much any consultancy on the planet has to adapt to this reality or go bust. Gillian was just an internal consultant and the outrage at the "misuse" of her research just indicates a huge level of naivety about how businesses actually work.