vendor product certification : stealing candy from a baby's mouth

lets make this as plain and simple as possible.

I would like to assume that you have a university degree.
Then they ask you to PAY to be certified for a software or a hardware product to be eligible. A s/w or h/w that you spend money to learn, and in order to make the most out of it, you become a salesperson for that company, for no extra money. DUH!

I am an engineer and proud to be born one. I learn all the s/w and h/w on my own, if the pdf's are out there for free, or I do not accept that hardware. So par example I replace a very expensive router/ firewall with a Draytek that's a third of the price and easier to program than a dvd player.

I expect the company to promote their stuff and train me for free. Nobody was ever fired by purchasing IBM, still the planet is moving and according to MY believes the era of uniqueness at the s/w or h/w level is gone, well before the end of this decade.

If you have no abilities and believe that you should be certified at stuff that are inherent to your profession, that's fine, for YOU. But there should be a legislation to protect you from such companies, that exploit their dominant position in the market to get money out of the poor soul than actually sell their stuff to the big guys.

On the other hand, what if we all dump universities and live on certifications. It'll be much much cheaper, and definitely cash flow controled to our benefit. huh?