| Is Linux Vendors' Short Support Good Enough? |
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The point of contention is simply how long a vendor should stand by its product, and how long customers should expect to qualify for free updates after purchasing an OS. Note that vendors can (and probably do) strike separate support deals with larger companies. For example, if a company wants to pay a large enough sum for Red Hat to continue to support version 6.2 into oblivion, I'm sure the company would oblige. The question is really how long the company will provide free security patches and bug fixes for rapidly aging applications.
There are several issues that the critics are glossing over. Let me address them separately.
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