COMMON and UG's

Hi All,

Listening to the discussions, griping and debates around the cost of
COMMON and discussions regarding your user groups, appreciate the fact
that you have them. Over here in South Africa we do not even have a user
group! Not one in the whole country!!! To attend something like COMMON
we have to fly to Europe. Admittedly, we probably have less AS/400 and
iSeries machines in the whole country than you have in NYC alone.

In some ways the only interaction that I have with competent AS/400 or
iSeries people is on this list. For this, I must express my gratitude to
David (Gibbs). If it were not for this forum, I would only have access
to the skill/knowledge base present within midrange-l if I were to do an
annual pilgrimage to Europe. 

Do not be mistaken, we do have IBM sponsored events locally. It is just
that these are often not applicable to us/our customers,

Looking at the hurdles that IBM S.A. has placed in the way of my partner
and I in terms of becoming business partners, I sometimes wonder why I
don't just say to hell with the 400. Our skills on M$ and Linux will
continue to carry us. I suppose it is a case of not selling anything
that I would not use myself.

Please excuse my rant. Truth-juice (beer) in copious amounts is a
bastard :-).

Cheers.

Jan.
BTW,