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Linux And Hip Hop
greybeardthelonely writes: "TwoMobile.com has a great story on how Linux is like hip hop and rap music. There's even a hip-hop penguin ..." You should read this, even if you can't stand rap music. Here's a quote: "Just like Linux, rap music was something that scared corporations until it was big enough to be profitable, and suddenly everyone wanted a piece of the action."
Before 1990, rap music was not thought of as being as profitable as other forms of music.
Why is that? Before 1990, the Billboard lists were not compiled based on actual data, rather they were based on hearsay on what albums were selling the most from the record stores.
When soundscan was implemented in the summer of 1990, I believe it was, the first week's top 10 from Billboard based on actual album sales featured a VERY big surprise.
NWA was in the top 10, and at #2 that week with the album 'Efil4zaggin'. They were #1 the next week. Darn good album too, even though Ice Cube left NWA before it.
Much is the same with Linux and Microsoft. The old metrics of OS sales do not apply anymore, since Linux uses a different distribution method than Microsoft, as well as the traditional distribution channels. Now that the actual population of linux servers is being measured against the actual population of MS servers, the metrics have changed. In other words, the old methods of measuring OS penetration (physical sales) are like the pre-Soundscan methods (hearsay).
I am looking forward to seeing actual counts of Linux servers in corporations. Boeing has been cited as having over 50,000. I would especially like to see what percentage of the corporate mail server market Linux has over MS and Lotus.
In this way, Linux is like rap music, in that it was ignored because of methods of measuring sales and distribution that did not truly reflect actual figures.
That's right. Some dude went out into a field, found a whole bunch of rocks, and started selling them. All of the suddent, he had the number one selling novelty/toy on the market. Of course, now you get laughed at if you have a pet rock.
That's right, Goddard was laughed at, but when he showed that you could launch anything with highly explosive fuel and not hurt yourself, governments started taking notice and now we have rockets everywhere.
People used to think that NASCAR was a joke, something that a bunch of hillbillies watched when grandma wasn't showing them how well she could hit squirrels with pine cones, but then they actually counted the number of hillbillies watching NASCAR and saw that it was way more than the number that was watching NBA basketball and realized it was The Next Big Thing(tm). Now we have Jeff Gordon losing to the Pepsi girl and drivers going to Hardee's in their racecars.
Hell, no one thought you could make a living selling computers out of your garage, but then everyone realized that it was cheaper and hipper to buy them from hicks than from corporate moneymen and now they have multi-gazillion dollar companies. Who woulda thunkit?
From humble a humble start as 'Chips N Dips' (or something), people started noticing Slashdot when they reported on things other than Microsoft. Now all of the sudden, Slashdot comments are quoted as insider comments ("Mr. Coward wrote in reply to the judge's findings, 'First post!'") and Slashdot is getting bought out by every major Linux company that exists.
Everyone thought they were a wannabe country, a bunch of freedom fighters who were being brats about paying their taxes, but whoa, they started noticing when America would walk into other countries, pick fights and, holy cow, win! Now everyone recognizes that no matter how small others may think you are, all you have to do is speak softly and carry a big stick and you can put a McDonald's wherever you damn well please.
People thought these Christian Jews were wackos until they started converting everything under the sun. The world took notice when the largest empire in the world adopted Christianity through its emperor and the rest, well, it's in the Bible somewhere.
Come on people, we can make useless analogies all day long. Linux is a phenomena, and you can compare it to a lot of other phenomena. Trying to say it's like something else, though, takes away a little bit from the true magic of what happened in this specific instance and begins a group down the road of trying to develop in a manner similar to some other reference, which takes away from the spontaneity of what may happen and may serve to derail the power of the change.
The development of Linux is like the development of Linux. Enjoy the ride; don't analyze it.
Everything big once started out small