St. Charles County Technology Committee

Thank you for visiting the web site of the St. Charles County League of Chambers Technology Committee. If you are a member of any St. Charles County chamber of commerce, please create an account for yourself.

The mission of the committee is twofold: First, to promote the use of technology which benefits the chambers of commerce and their members. Second, to educate the members of the chambers of commerce on the use of technology.

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Seven months ago, I switched from Windows XP to Ubuntu Linux on my primary business computer. Life has not been perfect with Ubuntu Linux (it wasn't perfect with Windows, either) but I certainly judge the experience to be an overwhelming success.

If you are considering trying Linux, and I strongly encourage you to at least give it a look-see. You can now download both the instructor's and student's guides for a ten-part Ubuntu 7.10 desktop training course.

In case you are unaware, Microsoft, Adobe, AutoDesk, and several other companies, are very serious about making sure that you actually purchase licenses for all of the software that you are running in your business. You may have heard of the Business Software Alliance (BSA); it is the company which runs around collecting fees for "unlicensed" software. What you may not know is that BSA targets small businesses, not just "the big guys," and that it actually pays informers, offering up to $1M.

Software Piracy Fight Makes Enemies gives a pretty good description of the BSA and its tactics and is well worth the read, especially if you use software by companies such as Microsoft and Adobe and AutoDesk. Here are a few particularly frightening quotes: