The Register: Getting Red Hat Network Support for Free Just Got Harder

“With the impending rollout of Red Hat Advanced Workstation the
company has made another move to ‘encourage’ users to pay for Red
Hat Network support. As you’d expect it’s a mixture of carrots and
sticks, but some of the sticks look quite painful for people who’re
trying to run businesses off of the free RHN service–presumably
this is deliberate.

“‘Demo subscriptions,’ as Red Hat is now calling them, will
continue to be available, but ‘we will… introduce some new rules
that will make it easier for us to provide service to these
accounts.’ Be afraid? Perhaps.

“First, all demo accounts have to confirm their email addresses,
otherwise they’ll be disabled. And demo accounts using non-unique
email accounts will be disabled ‘in accordance with our terms and
conditions.’ This process Red Hat calls, in terms that remind us
of, um, somebody else, a ‘maintenance process…'”

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