The original poster, writing about IBM's decision not to provide official tech support for *BSD, writes: "Is it my imagination or does this seem strange for a company that seems to understand the Open Source idea? "

What part of "the Open Source idea" mandates that IBM commit resources to provide free technical support to ensure their laptop works with every open-source operating system?

Isn't the whole supposed advantage of open-source that when companies decide not to provide a feature or offer support for something that individual users are empowered (by possession of the source) to make it work if they really want to?

If IBM had deliberately designed the system to be incompatible, or if they refused to release technical details necessary to port to their machine, that would be one thing. But why should it be incumbent upon them to ensure that their designs are compatible with all of the open-source operating systems their users might want to use regardless of whether the pool of potential customers seeking such compatibility is big enough to purchase enough machines to offset the costs of compatibility testing and providing support?

So again: just what part of "the Open Source" idea *is* it that makes you think IBM owes you a free lunch?