[snip]...
Imagine if someone invented a widely known way to download a file by right-clicking and clicking download. That would be great, because then we could invent webapps that remove it and replace the feature with an invisible button.
Hey Ian, I found your problem.
As in:
"Hello, I'm your new stats-keeper for
<old-bit-of-kit-that-still-works>. Please create an account at
https://shonky-website-with-cruddy-scripts.com"
"Why? I have software that does that on my systems."
"Ah, but we're deprecating your old software, so when your next OS update happens it won't work any more, and we've decided you should use The Web Service instead."
"Why? I have terabytes of scale-out storage and my own substation onsite. Why not give me an appropriate update for the software?"
"Well, your kit is so old that everyone who worked on it is either retired or dead, and nobody really understands how it works anymore...*"
"
I do..."
"...so that involves hiring programmers who programme, rather than interns who know a bit of PHP and can find Bootstrap. See, it looks just like Twitter, and it keeps all your stats in the cloud."
"So, it exposes my stats to all kinds of privacy and commercial risks. Great! What about the ten years or more of stats I have in my database? Can I upload those too, just to make the thing so much better?"
"Of course you can. Just export each record individually as a single
.blx file and upload them one at a time..."
"!"
"Once you've installed our new driver, your kit won't talk to your old database at all, it'll all be in our servers."
"!!"
"Oh, and you don't own your information, either. We'll sell it to anyone we like, because you happen to live outside the area in which
<EULA> is enforceable."
"!!!"
We're barely a hair's breadth away from the Marketing Division of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation.
* Out of context here, but that's an actual quote. Yes, really.