Re: The current MC engine contains a time-bomb

Steve Pothier (starnet!apple!saic.com!pothiers)
Fri, 4 Nov 94 06:49:22 MST

Recently a metacard user wrote:

> I am angry because of the bad-will the use of MC may have caused
> between my company and one of our customers. The implications of
> releasing a product that suddenly fails to execute based upon the
> calendar date are abhorant.
>
> Is anyone else as disturbed as I am?

While I can understand Mr. Pothier's disapointment with the way
MetaCard has put an expiration date in the BETA versions of their
software, I can't say that I am "disturbed" by it. Here are my
reasons:

1) Contrary to what Mr. Pothier indicated, MetaCard did tell customers
that there was an expiration date in the release announcement message.
Obviously MetaCard did not do a good enough job at getting this
message out. I have briefly looked through the 1.4 README files and
did not find mention of it.

We have 5 MC licenses here. One email was sent (to me) that spoke of
the expiration date. I installed the beta in a common area and all
developers used it. I failed to tell them about the expiration date.

So, if by "customers" you mean all licensed users; then they were NOT
all told. I admit that I screwed up.

-Pothier-