Blogosphere launches virtual ‘Occupy VMware’ campaign

As a software developer, tester, or someone just trying to learn and understand VMware’s virtualization or cloud-related technologies, would a relatively inexpensive, nonproduction, annual subscription to its software prove beneficial to the task? If VMware offered a subscription service of its software to the development community, in a similar manner to how Microsoft currently provides the MSDN Subscription for developers or the TechNet Subscription for IT professionals, would you be interested?

You might be surprised to hear VMware offered just such an animal in the past. It was called the VMware Technology Network (VMTN) Subscription. While the “subscription” part may not ring a bell for many of you, the “VMTN” name probably does, as the acronym represents the official VMware Community itself.

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First introduced in June 2005, the VMware subscription gave developers and testers an opportunity to cost-effectively get their hands on VMware virtualization software for an entire year at a time. But less than two years after the initial launch of the VMTN subscription program, VMware decided to abruptly pull the plug.

Fast-forward to 2011, and it’s obvious that this void still exists (and has, in fact, grown), and there remains a need for such a program. Now members of the VMTN community and the extremely active VMware user blogosphere are coming together and expressing themselves with the mighty pen — or, in this case, the mighty keyboard. Mike Laverick, a VMware vExpert and U.K.-based freelance virtualization trainer and contractor, helped kick off what could be described as a virtual “Occupy VMware” campaign. Its aim is to bring visibility and awareness to the lack of a subscription-style program for the growing community at large who need more than a 30- or 60-day evaluation software license to become proficient at the technology.

In addition to blogging about the issue, Laverick started a new thread on the discussion forum on the VMTN community site — specifically, the forum operating within the office of VMware CTO Steve Herrod. Community members have been appealing directly to Herrod to help affect change by reinstating the VMTN subscription program.

Compared to other topics on this forum, the thread has blown up with activity. To date, the initial request from Laverick has been viewed more than 5,000 times and has received over 180 replies from community members.

This isn’t the first time that evangelists, bloggers, and vocal community members have come out in numbers to express their opinions to VMware. The most recent explosion took place after VMware announced a new pricing model and price increase with the launch of VMware vSphere 5. At that time, community members spoke out in disagreement and VMware executives listened by making a change to their vRAM pricing structure.

Once again it looks like VMware executives are paying attention to vocal community members. Blogger and VMware employee Duncan Epping announced on his blog that VMware is investigating the option to reinstate the VMTN Subscription program. However, he writes:

Keep in mind that starting a program like this does take time and the program will need a serious overhaul. As such I cannot make any promises on when this will happen. I do want to stress that all feedback is highly appreciated, we are listening!

The fight isn’t over. The campaign may have reached the ears of VMware executives, but the battle won’t be won in a day, a week, or perhaps even a month. If you believe there is personal value in the VMTN Subscription, you should visit the community thread and express your interest. And if you want to seriously affect change and bring this program back, I suggest you reply with a reason for why you want a subscription program to return — let them know how it will affect you or your organization in a positive way, or more importantly, how it can affect VMware in a positive way.

At the end of the day, VMware will understand the value in a VMTN Subscription for the user community, but the program has to provide the company with something positive as well (or more to the point, it should not and cannot negatively affect the company’s bottom line).

In a world where the hypervisor is being seen as a commodity technology play and at a time when folks are sneaking off the reservation to try out “freebie” platforms such as Hyper-V, Xen, or KVM, VMware might well listen to its community of users and throw them a serious bone to maintain loyalty and capture new loyalty from developers who simply cannot afford a vSphere development or testing environment without such a program.

Hey, VMware, a VMTN Subscription program might be a good way to further boost your virtualization development ecosystem! It might be the shot in the arm that you need to expand your cloud and Java development ecosystems as well.

This article, “Blogosphere launches virtual ‘Occupy VMware’ campaign,” was originally published at InfoWorld.com. Follow the latest developments in virtualization at InfoWorld.com. For the latest business technology news, follow InfoWorld.com on Twitter.