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Warnings to Red Hat about AOL Buyout
andyo from O'Reilly
submitted linkage to a report he wrote over there where he urges Red Hat to
think twice
about letting AOL eat them.
Talks about GNN, as well as Netscape. I'm sure this isn't the last
word we'll hear on this subject either.
I bet we would not see an AOL client for linux.
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WHO ATE MY BREAKFAST PANTS?
Justin Frankel and his nullsoft team created the popular mp3 player for windows, winamp. It was free. It was good. AOL bought them. Justin and the nullsoft team are rich. Winamp is still good and free. It's not called AOL Winamp, the presence of AOL is not there in any new version of winamp.
Perhaps AOL buying Red Hat might not be a terrible thing. Besides, as with the many alternative mp3 players, there are other linux distrobutions out there.
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Check out my blackbox styles
AOL: "Yes of course."
Red Hat: "I have heard all of these nasty rumors that you are only using me for who I am and that you don't care about me at all. Is this true?
AOL: "Perhaps...Oh wait, I mean NO! NO! Who told you such things?"
Red Hat: "Your ex: Netscape."
AOL: "That stupid bitch."
*shrugs*
stupid advertisement
www.angstmonster.org
Now, I don't mean to be a troll or anything... but such an obvious typo is infuriating. Whatever happened to the high quality of reporting/editing of Slashdot? "O'Reily" is an unforgivable error... you guys have to pay attention and proofread before you post; this would be unacceptable in any other major news source, internet or not.
good work.
first few lines:
Think Twice, Red Hat
by Andy Oram
Jan. 19, 2002
Be the Ultimate Ninja! Play Billy Vs. SNAKEMAN today!
He doesn't adress the most plausible scenario, in which AOL is mearly picking up another weapon with which to threaten Microsoft. Like Winamp, Redhat woudl probably be let alone to continue development, but AOL could say, "Look BIll, we would like to see some AIM and AOL integration with Windows. We don't need your cheeseball OS, we can take our ball and go home."
... sometimes AOL leaves companies they buy alone and sometimes they don't. The question Red Hat has to answer is: are they are willing to take that chance?
I don't think I would.
--jeremy
http://www.LinuxQuestions.org
For one thing it would give me ammo to get my company to support Linux as a whole rather than testing our software just with Redhat.
I don't mean this as a flame, but if AOL buys RedHat, that will cheapen it as a business oriented distro. Maybe it shouldn't, but it will.
"Oh my God. This is terrible. This is the end of my Presidency. I'm fucked."; ~ Donald J. Trump
Apparently, AOL hoped to capitalize on the Netscape home page, which most Netscape users left as their default when starting up their browser. That's about the flimsiest grounds I can think of for purchasing a whole company--along with the commitment to maintain and enhance its products.
Perhaps. But as many have pointed out before, one of Netscape's biggest corporate weaknesses was that they didn't capitalize on this, which virtually guaranteed an immediate and huge subscriber base for whatever on-line service they chose to offer. The fact that Microsoft chose to build a competing browser from the ground up and give it away for free, largely to do the same thing, vindicates this strategy. Remember this was when the dot-com upswing was well underway, and everybody and their uncle was turning their site into a portal ...
Toronto-area transit rider? Rate your ride.
i could see favoring a profitable buyout, especially in an unstable market... but truthfully, i think redhat has a duty to the community ... (hell, why not?) ... to society as a whole to continue to fight against corporate monsters like AOL rather than sell they're souls just so the exec's can have a secure retirement fund.
I was talking with my fiancé Yves about the possibilitie of a merger when I first heard the news on the Slashdot previous night. His words were along the lines of "It will do the Linux communitie good; perhaps the corporate supporting will help finally make Linux ready for the desque top." I do not buy this. Even if AOL does produce an excellent desktop systeme for Linux, one could be sure that it would be very, very proprietary and that it will be littered with advertissements for the AOL's services (much like their Netscape browsers are becoming now). What would be worse would be when other companies start to build their software systemes so that they only run on the most popular AOL distribution!!
No thanks to you, AOL. I am much happier with my KDE systeme ^_^
Sincerely yours,
Chloë
In the article it cites GNN and Netscape as companies that have failed under AOL. The difference is they were admitted failures before AOL even acquired them.
Red Hat on the other hand IS successful. It is a bit of a stretch to suggest AOL is going to kill something that is dying, because it didn't save others that were past their use-by date.
While it would be nice for RedHat to get a bigger bankroll from a profitable corporation, I fear that AOL will stifle the creative expansion of the OS. Hating Micro$oft is not enough to make a good ally. I feel that AOL is just as proprietary and control-freakish as Micro$soft, only not nearly as successful. I fear that if RH were to really take off after the merger, it would end up like another Windows: closed, limited, and expensive, and we would have a new software giant taking advantage of a monopoly. Thank goodness there are several great Linux distros available.
Transistors and Beer!!
Imagine getting sets of eight CDs in your mailbox a couple of times a week: "AOLinux: Now with NO CREDIT CARD REQUIRED!"
- They buy Netscape for millions, and turn around and use Internet Explorer
- They buy Mirabilis and keep using their own featureless IM client
- They buy Nullsoft and, well, don't do anything
What do they plan on doing with Red Hat? (insert punchline here)
Am I the only one who's getting sick and tired of those behemoth's who have NO vision or PURPOSE other than making money. Hey, don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with making money, just when it's the ONLY thing. At this point, I suggest for AOL not to buy ANY other corporation. As a matter of fact, they should spin off some of the previous aquisitions.
I don't see the problems. You will still be able to modify things to suit you. AOL users will get what they want. Red Hat will be assured survival under the world's largest ISP. Microsoft will improve or die.
.... might have her actually use her machine some more and definatly enjoy it more. If AOL bought Correl, she would be very happy indeed.
There is no way for AOL to destroy the modular design of Linux/GNU software. To do so, they would have to custom modify and maintain far too many packages. Why would they go to such effort and cost? The average AOL user never ever bothers to venture furthers that far, so "digital rights management" and advert cramming will be maintained by default, just like they are on M$ platforms today. AOL useres actually use AOL's client and browser there and they will under Linux. You will still be able to replace bogus packages and use the ones you want.
What this is going to be, is AOL being able to send out a shiny new CD when M$ breaks their customer's machines. The customer can sit happy knowing that they won't have to buy a new computer and that they can get the things they expect from AOL. My mom is a good example. She has used her computers for three application and only three applications. She has used AOL, Word Perfect, and Quicken. I'm not sure she uses Quicken any more. She uses AOL's instant messenger and email. The rest of her computer means nothing to her, and could be running anything. When ME meets it's two year obsolescence and her flaming nice PIII laptop starts spitting chunks, I hope AOL sends her a nice Red Hat CD. The other stuff, like Netscape, Electric Eyes, Gimp
This could kill Microsoft. It's one thing for my mom to have some friends and her son using Linux, it's another thing when she gets it, it works and does everything she wants it to. AOL has 100 million clients, think of the change in perception the world will have if just 1% revive their dead machines this way instead of buying a new $1,000 computer. AOL users, the scorn of M$ elitist derision having computers that work and cost less. Supposedly the most clueless computer population on earth suddenly having tools and stability M$ loosers pay big money for but never recieve. Surely word of mouth will sweep the world, and M$'s already weakened position with hardware makers will collapse.
Reasonable hardware standards may yet see light of day. Without M$ to hord up ever changing API's and that magic flag on the box, we may see hardware maintains stable open interfaces. I am trully filled with hope today. This is great news.
What's the best that could happen? They give Bill Gates a good, swift kick in the balls.
Sounds good to me.
Find free books.
I think a partner ship is better
I agree I dont think redhat should rush to sell to AOL. I do think a partnership however would be great.
I wouldnt mind a strategic alliance, a partnership, but a complete buyout could be a total disaster to linux like the buyout was a disaster for beOS.
A partnership, an investment by AOL, theres lots of ways to buy out a company without fully owning the company.
AOL wants to own redhat, its very very risky to sell to AOL simply because of their relationship with Warner, however I'd sell to AOL in a second if Redhat werent as profitable, or if I thought it would be good for the Linux community.
Right now, theres no way to know the motives of AOL, and losing redhat would be a very big blow to the linux community.
However consider how AOL treats Netscape and Nullsoft, I dont really think its such a bad idea in the short term, its the long term that I worry about.
Is it worth it to give linux a short term boost in the arm which will instantly ensure Linux a victory on the Desktop?
Or should we worry about how linux will be 10 years from now with AOL in control?
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Winamp is still good and free. It's not called AOL Winamp, the presence of AOL is not there in any new version of winamp.
Sorry about nitpicking, but there is a minor presence of AOL. Try installing a newer version of WinAMP - it'll offer you to place some AOL icons on your desktop. If you decline, nothing will happen. This is a pretty fair deal as far as I'm concernced.
BUT - have you installed ICQ 2001 lately? Without even bothering to ask me beforehand, it neatly placed six AOL links pretty much everywhere where there's place for an icon - start menu top level, start menu in some group, quickbar, desktop, favorites, and some other places. I really had to do a global search for "AOL" to wipe 'em all out.
However, if AOL involvement is limited to randomly placing AOL links somewhere on the desktop which today's Linux users surely steer clear of anyway, I'm all for it.
You see my new(Red)Hat? It's made of money!
Cisco pack-manning Red Hat.
AOL is way sub-optimal... it would only be a desperation move as one of the largest single-hulled super-tankers of the
Believe me when I tell you that $29/share is an excellent time to exit this stock. In six months, you'll feel as lucky as all those poor bastards that exited Enron at $40/share.
And remember... if you love Red Hat, it is your *duty* to sell AOL shares at low points in their slide down the slippery slope of "irrational exhuberance".
i have to admit that i myself have large reservations about capitalism as it is applied in North America, particularly in the freedoms whihc it allows to Corporations. But still, Open Source is about Information, not about little guys VS. corporations. It justhappens that the single largest opponent of Open Source and the GPL is also the single largest corporation(I don't have to say the name of the Beast, do I?).
As a community, we have to be careful about who we decide our enemies are. Linux has benefitted in the past from corporate involvement: Corel for Example. Red Hat(also Mandrake) has been held up as the flagship product of the Linux Community many times in terms of winning over the Windows/Apple user who doesn't want to take the time to understand all of the 'computer tech complexities' that they believe Linux involves. But we have to ask ourselves: If a large number of ex-Windows users get won over by AOL/RedHat Linux, have we really lost? It seems to me that a Linux user is a Linux user and that one more Linux user is one less customer for Bill and one less pocketbook supporting closed source.
Perhaps many of us would personally like to see AOL fall on it's face for unrelated reasons, but if they want to swing some of their weight around to back the Red Hat project, I don't think that we should necessarily get up in arms over it.
lysergically yours
I like Linux. It is the best. I think that everyone should use Linux.
For all the discussion about whether this would be good or bad for RedHat, linux, open source software, etc. an important point has been neglected. RedHat is a public company. It has an obligation to its shareholders.
If AOL offers enough money, RedHat is obliged to accept, even if they believe that being bought by AOL will mean the end of the RedHat distribution.
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
From CNet News
To counter Microsoft, AOL could couple its Internet service with Red Hat's operating system technology and could be configured to override Windows while launching a version of Linux, sources told the newspaper.
As if AOL's software is not scary enough and doesn't already take over too many aspects of your computer - now they may want to overlay linux on top of windows to run their software? Uhhhhh.....
I enjoyed your post.
If AOL thinks Netscape isn't easy enough to use to as their default browser, they shure as f**k aren't going to think linux is easy enough to use as their default OS.
If we send a greater beast, to kill a great beast...what do we do with him when he wins?
Nothing. We've just got a bigger, nastier, tougher beast to deal with.
AOL/TW owns the media. Magazines, books, music, movies, television, and a substantial piece of the internet. People are touting this as "a possible end to Microsoft". God I hope not..
AOL/TW, so far, has made: protesters and innocents look like criminals, criminals look like saints, the DMCA legitimate, politicians look like friends and worst of all, cancelled Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Do we really want them without a Microsoft to fight?
Don't do it, Red Hat.
AOL for a big company has earned alot of Respect.
They have never directly put any other company out of business, and when they have they purchased the Company right before it did (CompuServe?)
AOL buys alot of companies that were doomed and saves them, for our sake, not really because its profitable (Netscape, Mirabilis, Nullsoft) all of these companies would have went out off business if AOL didnt save them.
The one buyout AOL made which i didnt like was the buyout of TimeWarner, I dont like Time Warner.
What I worry about is Time Warner controlling Redhat, if it were AOL(before the merger) there'd be nothing to worry about.
I'd sell Redhat if it were to AOL, but time warner worries me.
It could be an attempt to CONTROL the last grasp of freedom we have, Linux.
I dont know if its a good move to sell because I dont trust Time Warner, not because I dont trust AOL.
AOL seems to be on our side for the most part, as is IBM, I wouldnt mind IBM buying Redhat either.
By being on our side I mean they want to sell services to the consumer, not sell content.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
now that the editors have removed the link from the story, they might want to remove it from the "Related Links" box just beside it.
:-\
Anyone have a mirror? Anyone?
-9mm-
Firstly, even the most clueless AOL users still use the web in general. I don't buy for a minute that they all stay firmly enclosed in AOL la-la land. In such a case, IE and plugins still matter.
Secondly, Microsoft is way ahead on device drivers. Users aren't going to be too happy when their new digital camera doesn't work with AOL-OS. There is more to a user enviroment than their online service. Unless AOL is able to make a substantial investment in device support, I don't see what there is to get excited about.
Could it be that O'Reilly is afraid of the publishing powerhouse of Time-Warner. Hey, if Time-Warner got serious about Linux publishing, O'Reilly would be back to publishing pamphlets on sed and coff. O'Reilly is a publisher. So is Time-Warner. They are competitors. Time-Warner could shove O'Reilly into the dust bin. Linux publications amount to about 75% of O'Reilly revenue. Take that away and he is left publishing Windows Problems (or somesuch title - I've seen it in his catalog).
So many people here are complaining about AOL possibly causing the end of Linux.
** RedHat != Linux **
Let them buy the company. Whats the worst that could happen? Lots of AOL users switch to Linux and the RedHat distro will be looked down upon slightly more than it already is.
But there is also a lot of potential here. AOL funding open source development. A new focus on making a better GUI for XF86. More hardware support. etc. etc.
If it were a sale to AOL there wouldnt be anything to worry about there, but Time Warner?!
The Movie Company? The Magazine Company?
Now, They do sell content, and they do sell services.
Which side are they on?
AOL sells services, I can imagine them supporting Open source even faster than I can imagine IBM doing it.
Time Warner however, is dangerous, isnt Time Warner a part of the RIAA? Their influence in Linux is what would worry me.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Just never forget, people invest money to make money. RedHat, as a public company, is certainly no exception to the rule, and they will take profits over ideology any day. Look for a buyout, because it will happen if AOL is really interested.
Is your company running tools written by ma
The fact that Microsoft chose to build a competing browser from the ground up and give it away for free, largely to do the same thing, vindicates this strategy.
It wasn't your point, I realize, but MSFT did not really build IE from the ground up - they started with several large bits of code and functionality from Spyglass, et al. ...)
And Netscape had been giving away their browser for free, as well (it's just they weren't bundling it with a desktop OS for which they had a monopoly
As far as Netscape not capitolizing on the traffic their portal generated; they did make some pretty nice ad revenue from it, it's just they got more interested in selling server software (because of the aforementioned lack of revenues from client software) and thought that'd save their bacon.
The points about buying the eyeballs of everyone who didn't change their default homepage (~90%+ of all users), and of getting a leverage point against MSFT are right on.
How different is AOL from the Microsoft Corporation that you claim to hate? I get like 15 AOL discs in my mail a week. Worse than spam in my e-mail. Their products suck as bad as Microsoft's. They are probably just as evil as Microsoft concerning their buisiness practices, just not as publicly scrutinized....yet. If they ever got to be "The Monopoly" they would be exactly like Microsoft, except for one thing, they would own a Linux Distribution. Think about it.
I think its important to remember that even though Nullsoft was swallowed up by AOL, Winamp didn't go down the tubes. They even hacked AIM to get rid of the ads after they had been swallowed up!
Another very important thing to think about is the fact that Microsoft needs a competitor. Yes, I know Linux is great and all now, but the fact remains that right now, after all these years of development, it remains a "geeky" OS. It just doesn't have the easy usability to compete effectivly against Windows for the "Grandmother" or "Mom and Pop" department. I think that if AOL were to buy Red Hat and develop it (keeping with the open source tradition) into a fullfledged Consumer OS this would be a good, maybe even great thing.
Just think of how Microsoft would have to change if AOL were successful. No longer could they be the only big kid on the block shoving around whoever they wished.
They only way to effectivly and permanently deal with huge overbearing companies is to fight them with other companies. So, with guarded optomism, I would support this, in its early stages.
O'Reilly is smart! *He* will make us go!
Think about this situation, We all could end up getting paid through AOL. AOL subcribers start paying alittle extra a month and this gets paid to us to write open source software (kinda like Mozilla)
I think for the open source economy it could be a good thing, IF AOL has good motives. Subscription for services COULD ruin Microsofts entire idea of "Pay for licenses and products"
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
New AOL Linux version 7, so easy to use no wonder it is number ! :-)
.NET
.NET strategy.
AOL eating RH may be the best thing which ever happened to Linux. AOL has lots of money and combined with TW, they have the user base and marketing capability to utterly destroy Microsoft. Aol has many years of user interface expereince
Linux has a great OS but lacks users, money for marketing and a decent user ionterface. yes KDE and GNOME are nice, but people are climbing over barbed wire to get them.
As Microsoft has shown the world, a webrowser makes a great user interface which people are instantly familiar with. In addition, you can configure Netscape to be the primary interface for any system. IIRC netscape also has a built in proprietary user interface modeling language which combined with xml and javascript provide a powerful front end for web based application er... I mean services... er I mean
AOL OS makes sense and is probably part of the long term plans of AOL.
In the enterprise side, a Linux based server would nicely integrate AOL email and IM and allow them leverage these assets to play on Microsoft's turf with the
It hsould also be noted that AOL has a nice history of not rebranding companies they buy, compuserve, Winamp, Netscape have all remained true to their original users.
And finally, we all will eventually be bombarded with free Linux distros on pretty colored cd's
I believe the reason why Linux has not become a complete hit in the amateur computer market, probably the largest computer market in the world, is because its not as user friendly as Windows. I think AOL has the resources to develop Linux to this state. By developing an AOL version of Red Hat, AOL may be capable of increasing the popularity of Linux. Plus, wouldn't it be nice to get the newest version of AOL Linux delivered to your door. AOL LINUX 6.0 The friendliness Linux ever
Famous Last Words, part 1.
My mom is a good example. She has used her computers for three application and only three applications. She has used AOL, Word Perfect, and Quicken. I'm not sure she uses Quicken any more. She uses AOL's instant messenger and email.
Pipe dream part 1. I don't buy this cheap market analysis, that there are these millions of people who want nothing from their computer but email and AOL. Peripheral support still matters. Plugins still matter. You can delude yourself into thinking that all of these users will have a useage profile that somehow prevents them from ever encountering any of linux's shortfalls on the desktop, but they will.
This could kill Microsoft.
Pipe dream part two. How many times has that been erroneously mentioned on this site?
At any rate, it's not obvious just what the results of taking over RHAT would be. There are ample possibilities for both good and ill, from many perspectives:
On the one hand, "If AOL/TW thinks there's something to it..." but then if they do something silly, credibility can get badly hurt.
Enter a new set of "policy controllers." Again, this can be good or bad.
Ambiguous again.
One interesting effect, regardless, is that a bunch of people that invested in RHAT will get some pretty substantial value out of it. If things go bad, Debian is still there, and we might see some made-rich hackers get into new involvements. Hopefully a little more computing-related than jwz's DNA Lounge, but that's not to be a flame of jwz...
If the result is that AOL/RHAT "craters," there's always Debian, Slackware, Mandrake, SuSE, and the BSDs still around...
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
It seems to me the better idea would be for AOL to buy Mandrake if it really wants to make a desktop OS. Mandrake is already close to a very good setup now.
When I think Red Hat I think servers (even though we run Debian on ours) and a decent desktop. I think it would really hurt the Red Hat image as a server OS to be bought by AOL. Even if AOL leaves them totally alone they will still be battling an image problem for a while.
Linux = Redhat
AOL = INTERNET
To corperations and casual users this is a constant.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
How is AOL going to compete with Microsoft by just selling a Linux distro? First off, who uses AOL? Newbies; in fact, newbies who already own computers. Computers they bought that came shipped with MS Windows. Now, AOL buys Red Hat and says, "Use Linux." What percentage of these absolute newbies are going to be talked into installing a new operating system?
Furthermore, Linux as it is now is not tailored for newbies. Yes, it is ten times better than it was just a couple of years ago, but it's still not as easy to use or install or configure as Windows is, plus it lacks the software that everyone and his mom have used before at work/school. So AOL will need to build software too, now, eh? Maybe they leave that in Red Hat's domain, but now they're adding onto their expenses.
Even with software support, no de facto AOL user will ever be talked into switching operating systems. It isn't a newbie-level task. The only hope is if vendors sell the computers with this Linux distro already on it, or if AOL gets into the computer hardware sales arena, which would be beyond crazy, especially when considering the entrenched market leaders are having a difficult time in this economy. So AOL would have to convice Compaq/HP/Gateway/etc. to sell Linux versions.
Of course, Microsoft wouldn't like this and would strongly encourage them not to do this. Ad campaigns would convince the newbies that if they bought AOL Linux they couldn't use their favorite software, or play their favorite games. Come on AOL, you can spend your money better than by trying to compete against Microsoft in the desktop arena. Stick to your ISP business, stick to your media empire - dominate there and work WITH Microsoft to blend the media and the computer age.
I could not justify my existence if I were a turkey farmer. Would I terminate myself? Undoubtably, yes.
Then again i bet they are funding Lindows.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
I think what happened to netscape was a terrible thing, and I'd hate to see the same fate befall Linux, and really the flagship line of linux is Redhat, so as Redhat goes so goes linux. I can only imagine that they've got planned some new cable-box with linux and web access, to trump Xbox's console. On the other hand this combination would most likely eventually provide a user-friendly system that sat on top of linux. The simple fact that AOL has millions of subscribers and Time Warner also has millions of subscribers could conceivably destroy the desktop OS monopoly held by microsoft in several small steps. However, I've long believed that this need by the linux user community to enter the desktop arena is a rediculous one that will do nothing but undermine the idea that Linux is a server strength OS, something that it has achieved after a long struggle. (There's enough people already prejudiced by its open source nature) I can only hope is that this merger will not happen because Linux will lose its credibility in the server arena.
After being trapped in AOHell for nearly five years, i have to say that if AOL aquires Red Hat, you may as well kiss it goodbye. AOL has made some of the worst written software in history, their service is a joke, and their tech support is nearly non-existant. Now, i respect the people at Red Hat (i now use Red Hat 7.2), and i think that they make a great product, but if AOL gets ahold of them, they're gonna disappear so fast that it'll make David Copperfield look like an amateur!
The people at RH need to get a clue: AOL is only buying them for their name, they have no interest in open souce software, nor do they care about the average computer user (for five years, i dealt with a 19.2kb/s connection on a 59kb/s modem. they blamed faulty installations of the software every single time. of course, everybody else that i knew that used AOL had the same problem).
Red Hat is seen as the foremost distributer of linux. if this deal were to go through, I would be truly worried about the future of open source software.
Perhaps AOL will ruin Red Hat, perhaps there will be no change, perhaps AOL will better Red Hat.
I have certainly seen AOL do all three to different pieces of software/companies that they have "acquired".
Let us not be too hasty to judge: AOL has ruined some, left some alone, and bettered some. Only time will tell (should they be "looking at" Red Hat at all).
I think, therefore, I'm smarter than our president.
If anyone were to go after Redhat, it would be IBM. With IBM's commitment to Linux, IBM might have something to gain. However, given IBM's huge research department, I don't think it has any urgent need to buy RHAT, either.
Finally, the open-source nature of Linux makes a buyout even harder to imagine. While companies like RHAT have some great people working for them, I don't think those people can be considered "strategic" enough to justify an acquisition.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
It's time for IBM to get back into the
desktop business. I'm watching football
today and they feature an ad with "Linux", playing
on an "all-star" team, dunking the ball. Aside
from the fact that the actors are little
old and out off shape, it's a great commercial.
If IBM can put their engineering muscle and
not just their marketing droids on the problem;
IBM could wrestle back the desktop from Microsoft.
They could certainly borrow from AOLs playbook,
however. If they can flood the market with freebie linuxes (maybe even ones that run
"under" windows; i.e. a program that freezes windows and it's device drivers and takes over
and releases windows back when Linux is unloaded),
this could show users the power of GNOME+GNU+Abiword+gnumeric+gnomebill+etc.)
Really, AOL doesnt profit from selling software, Microsoft does.
AOL is a company who would support open source software, in fact they already do.
So their philosophy on open source is compatible.
The only thing i would worry about is the influence of Time Warner and the RIAA.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Suppose AOLTW bought Red Hat and took the software into Closed Source? Could they try this? Yes. Would they get away with it? One supposes that might depend upon what your definition of "get away with it" means. Who could afford to sue them back into compliance with the GPL? Would the GPL prevail? (It's never been tested in court.) Would tying a lawsuit up the courts for 5-10 years mean they "get away with it" win or lose?
If AOLTW took Red Hat closed source, Mandrake and other Red Hat based distributions would be up the creek. Mandrake (the slickest desktop Linux now) would have to change their base distribution, at great cost and delay. The resulting loss of momentum would surely hurt them and might even stagnate and kill Mandrake. This wouldn't be good.
So, if AOL buys RedHat, will the stock prices of RedHat skyrocket? Should I consider buying stock in RedHat now?
Here they are:
AOL, in the kernel.
What follows is a repost of a comment I made on Kuro5hin.
On Slashdot the news of potential purchase of RedHat by AOL has mostly been received with much rejoicing at the potential demise of MSFT's monopoly power.
I am curious as to why people don't fear AOL/TW. From where I sit they already own too much and already influence the perceptions of millions of people with their ownership of Netscape, Nullsoft, ICQ, Time magazine, CNN, WB television network, Time Warner records, Warner Bros. movies, and a lot more that I can't remember right now.
Microsoft may own the OS that most people run but AOL/TW controls the news magazines they read, the music they listen to, the movies and television shows they watch, and how they connect to the Internet as well as most of what they view while online.
Interestingly I'd like to see how a user modifiable OS like Linux interacts with AOL/TW's music and movie divisions that would like to see DRM support implemented in all software from operating systems to browsers. This should be interesting (kinda like NullSoft releasing Gnutella only for AOL to get mad)
aolinux?
The top honors at the CES were for a set top box called running linux called Moxio (I think). AOL had a stake in this company created by a former Web TV pioneer. AOL's plan is to use embedded linux to create interactive set top boxes for its time warner cable television service. As well as gain a ground on the operating system market. Red Hat has the brand name and AOL will just pour some money into Red Hat and leave them to do their thing. Conglomerates have this itch that gets scratched by buying up well known corporations. AOL Time Warner is enormous. We need this buy, don't you all see what will happen? New windowing systems (probably proprietary like Winamp 3 for Linux is (and it still kicks ass)), AOL for linux and a seperate operating system for net access using AOL (probably looking like the new iMAC made by dell compaq hp or whoever (or all of them)).
Now the babble begins:
The embedded linux is like gold to AOL, think about paying licenses on every set top box to microsoft (that's insane). Listen if you want interactive television and want to order dominos from your tv and pay you credit card bills on your tv and even vote from your tv this buy has to go through.
If you are all about "free" software then use GNU/debian. Red Hat said they are an OPEN SOURCE company not a "free software" company. People need to eat man. I think this deal is great, it will mean a new system for AOL users and it will open up the doors to interactive television which I think is pretty elite. Imagine if we could vote from our televisions. The world would change in an instant, all the young people (18-24) who don't
give a damn now would have a say and we would see legalized marijuana. This is a must it's part of the natural evolution of human interconnected consciousness and the evolution of operating systems. Peace to all my open source friends and may we all enjoy listening to internet radio and watching the endless entertainment that will be available once this streaming broadband stuff gets some support. I sit back and watch everything unfold before my eyes and I am happy. If I can say one thing when I get old it would be "Linux is
on my television and marijuana is legal!" yeahhh
NC State University has been looking for a tenant to replace Lucent on centennial campus. RedHat is in the process of making a deal with us. I wonder what affect being bought out by AOL would have?
The good news about the acquisition (if it happens) is that the code is still GPL, so if they fuck it up, so what? Someone else can distribute. I think this could be a positive thing.
20721
Maybe AOL could inject enough motivation/cash/experience/exposure/whatever to Red Hat to make the final push to being a truly competing desktop OS.
If they did that, as much as I hate AOL, I'd applaud them and potentially support them by buying the product.
Let's face it, there seems to be a LOT of people out there who don't know any better and use AOL, so maybe AOL saying "use this OS instead of MS" to their subscriber base could be what it takes to turn the tide.
$0.02 (CDN)
Theres 0 percent chance of them making it closed source.
They always supported open source because they dont sell the software itself, they sell the services. The subscribers of AOL pay for winamp, netscape, icq, and so on. You dont buy this stuff, its free.
I dont think we need to worry about them closing source.
As far as other companies, do you really think IBM would sit around and let AOL take over their Linux? Hell no.
IBM would most likely Buy Mandrake and compete with AOL and keep Mandrake Open Source.
IBM invests 1 billion in Linux every year, Mandrake only costs about 20 million from what i hear.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Stop bitching about desktop Linux, this ain't about desktop Linux. Think set-top boxes. Think hand-held electronics and the emerging portable media market. I thought /dot guys were sharper than this.
I still CANT believ eit !!!!!!!!!
Whats up with u REd hat!!!!
"To counter Microsoft's desktop hegemony, New York-based AOL Time Warner could use the deal to couple its America Online software, the market leader with more than 33 million Internet subscribers, with Red Hat's operating-system technology, sources said.
The AOL online software, which consumers can install for free from the Web or a compact disk, is now designed to run on Microsoft's Windows operating system. But the AOL software could be configured to override Windows and launch a version of Red Hat's Linux operating system, sources said.
With such a move, AOL Time Warner could potentially make significant inroads into Microsoft's bread-and-butter business. An even graver challenge to Microsoft would be for AOL Time Warner to develop a rival operating system that works exclusively with the media giant's own Internet service provider, its Web browser or proprietary content."
If AOL ate Red Hat, would they swallow them or would they just spit them back out?
IF Apple, who has far less money than AOL, could produce OSX which destroys WindowsXP in ease of use.
In a year I think AOL could have a Linux that destroys WindowsXP in terms of ease of use, and that runs windows programs, all hidden from the user will be the advanced stuff. With a few billion dollars to develop KDE 4.0 and Xfree we could have thousands of paid programmers writing open source code which is then further enhanced because its open source by thousands of programmers who arent paid, what you'll end up with, is an OSX or better GUI within about a year.
Sure if they do like Eazel and waste all their money it wont work but this is AOL here not Eazel,
AOL has the money
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I think Steve Case and Bill Gates are sharing the same bed and perhaps semen as well.
Think about it. Aol buys Netscape. Keeps on using IE, thus further killing Netscape.
Now they buy RedHat. Hide it under the bed and continue using Windowz?
eTrade SUCKS
AOL certainly has the means to distribute red hat and they know how to cater to computer users. both could be very good for redhat.
aol CDs are EVERYWHERE, every stop at wal mart i grab a dozen or so for coasters and frisbees. imagine if redhat were like that. instead of d/ling the new distro, you just grab it on your way out of the grocery.
i know AOL is dumbed down and simple, but they may be able to streamline redhat and make it as simple to use as aol which would allow aol user types to switch to redhat.
I think that AOL's involvement may save linux and encourage expansion in the field. I gained alot of respect for AOL today. If AOL was a topic it went from (-1, Flamebait) to (1, Interesting).
forget it.
If you are not Erris, then this post is probably the most blatent plagerism I have seen on slashdot.
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
but Redhat owns Cygnus. I don't want AOL controlling gcc. Not that I believe any of it.
If AOL were to buy them, they would become very large and an obvious competitor for MS. But AOL has a way of tainting things that they touch seems to turn into an AOL advertisement.
You can be sure if they do buy redhat, the lilo boot screen will have a tiny AOL ad in the corner. Could this and the fact that they're working on an AOL linux client be coincidence? I think now.
Wtih the popularity of RedHat Linux and the explosion in free digital video technologies, redhat could make a large p2p redhat linux version that competes well with aol/tw w/Road Runner.
--Mindshare, isn't that today's game?
It makes perfect since to buy Lindows, if not, then go for Redhat.
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Despite AOL Time Warner's alterer motive behind there desire to buy RedHat, I think it could be greatly beneficial to the linux 'cause' due to the money and resources that they could bring to RedHat. If it does all go pearshaped then people can always just turn to any of a number of other distributions.
Time Warner however, is dangerous, isnt Time Warner a part of the RIAA? Their influence in Linux is what would worry me.
How true this is today, I don't know. But FWIW I used to work for Time (pre Warner) in the early '80s. This much I'll say for them - they were always bleeding edge with their computer tech. Bastards to work for, but very technicaly astute.
One good thing that will come of this, no matter what happens, is that GNU/Linux will attain greater visibility. "Hmm, if AOL/TW is interested, maybe I should be looking into this..."
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
Basically Redhat will be squashed just like Netscape, as AOL is in-fact in bed with Microsoft.
I was really hoping they'd stay on their own or that IBM would buy them before anyone else. If AOL does aquire them, it will certainly mean the demise of RedHat Linux. Fortunately there are many alternative Linux distros.
Sadly, it's all part of the game of going public.
MS got to where they are today by taking advantage of several business practices tied directly to their ability to "lock in" their users and partners. For MS, it's all about leverage, not to higher profits, but to doing what will lock in their users in ways that are profitable to them.
With Linux, that's impossible. Due to licensing and open technologies, you can't hide system calls, you can't obscure protocols or file formats. You can stamp up and down and insist that only you can change the technology, but nobody will realy listen, even if you're using an embedded box. (Thus the arise of the Tivo hacker.)
What MS has been trying to do is to extend their lock-in beyond just desktop software -- to servers (mission 40% accomplished), set-tops, portables, and now to data and the internet itself, first with MSN (where they learned it's not so easy) and now with .Net and Passport (where they'll learn they haven't learned their lesson yet, IMO).
If they were to be successful at creating a model that allows them the same sort of monopoly lock-in with set-top boxes as they have had with software, the big corporate media nonsense you see happening right now would be a pittance. Want to burn a copy of that Universal CD you're listening to? MS wants to be the company that gives you the permission - or prevents you - from doing so. Want to play XBox Madden 2005 against your friend in Springfield? MS will make it possible, with your Passport data from zone.com - and keep a record of what you've done.
This is all wild, idle speculation of course. My crystal ball has been totally wrong before. But MS is close to reaching the upper limit on the desktop, as far as how much revenue they can squeeze out of IT departments for forever upgrading Windows and Office. that's why they're now going to software "rental" plans, anti-piracy raids, and XP installation verification.
That's difficult stuff to push on a bust market that's a little skeptical of the promise of tech, but MS has no choice really; if their stock price does not continue to increase, their employees take the hit. For MS, it could be a case of grow or perish. They already gave more stock out once to counter the employee's needs when the stock stagnated for a while... they surely can't do that during an extended period of time.
Think about it: AOL has a ton of cash. They are maybe one of the only companies that could really stand up to M$. Yes, they do everything half-assedly, but still. In any case, a divided "MS Market" (basically, every PC except for Linux/Unix/Mac) will crumble more easily. As always, more choice is beter.
OK, let's pretend this deal is really in the works....
I would think that AOL is also planning to either introduce a hardware platform of their own to run their Linux and AOL client on, or pick somebody else's rather rigid platform, since it would be next to impossible for them to support *every* type of modem and hardware configuration modern PCs have to offer under Linux (as we are painfully aware as Linux users). Just think WinModems and PCChips integrated motherboards.
This deal would then validate the idea of Sony-Linux-TimeWarnerAOL axis (PlayStation II/III running Linux as a host OS for AOL, which would provide dialup and/or broadband access for online gaming and e-mail and web browsing), which would compete against Microsoft XBox-MSN-AT&T (if I'm not mistaken) combo.
Latest Red Hat CD in the mail every month. Free! Woo hoo!!!
Their stocks steadily went down as has been the trend looking at their entire stock history.
Their stock peaked at 20 times it's IPO price, shockingly quickly. Obviously (to anyone not following the "bigger sucker" theory of investment) it was only headed back down from there when people came to their senses. I think if you take the split into account, they're actually trading ~10% above their IPO price again, which IMHO is a pretty fair valuation finally.
Honestly I'd like to see a competitor come out with an alternative OS. The main issue will be software support. Remember back to the VHS/Beta days - Beta was better (technologically), but VHS won out because of its far larger library of videos. Same thing with Apple/Macs and PC clones.
If AOL could create an easy-to-use OS that could run Windows programs, I'd consider buying it, as, I think, many others would. However, as you mentioned, this would require years and billions of dollars. And, of course, the time and money it takes AOL to start this project, Microsoft, of course, is innovating and continuing to swallow up more market share.
To restate what I sort of skimmed on at the end - I think AOLs best bet would have been way back before MSN was created to partner with Microsoft. Now it may be too late, with MS entrenched in MSN and the like, although who knows. It would be kind of neat to see a merger forming AOL-MS-Time Warner.
I could not justify my existence if I were a turkey farmer. Would I terminate myself? Undoubtably, yes.
Banish any thought from your head about open-source, about GNU, and even about Linux. AOL doesn't know about it (much), doesn't care about it (much) and has become large, rich and influential without it.
AOL wants it for two reasons:
1. So Microsoft can't buy it
2. So they can become larger, richer, and more powerful, which would be partly stymied by #1 above.
Let me explain. AOL/Time-Warner knows its business quite well, and its business has nothing to do with software and everything to do with charging people for access to content they desire.
They can't do that if Microsoft, through MSN, is charging people for access to THEIR content instead. Therefore, they must counter or thwart every attempt by Microsoft to eliminate other options by which consumers might get to ATW (not MS) content. Since Microsoft pretty much owns the desktop, and with the sellout of the Justice Department effort against them has pretty much a clear shot to extend that domination into online content.
And not just web content. We're talking interactive messaging, video-on-demand, online commerce and a bunch of other potentially-moneyed pursuits that AOL wants to have or keep for itself.
I think AOL realistically looked at it and realized that (as a piece I read on CNet the other day pointed out) most consumers online in Murka are not the techs and geeks of the old days, they're just McCitizens who (a) don't know about and (b) don't care about "the desktop," "the operating system," or even the hardware. They just wanna send pictures to their Aunt Edith, buy some stuff off Eddie Bauer, check out some choice pron, or watch "Sudden Impact" for eleventeenth time.
How they do it, they don't care. In the 1930s, nobody knew what tubes were in their Philco radios, they only wanted to hear Jack Benny. Or how about now -- can you name the theatre chain in which you saw "The Matrix?" Do you really care? What color was the wallpaper?
This means AOL has "network appliance" in their heads. They've watched the stuff being done with embedded Linux (like the DVRs that aren't all that popular yet but they work). They looked to see who was the big cheese, the Biggest Name In Linux, and it was RedHat. They buy RH, they can have them develop an AOL Network Appliance, basically a box you turn on and it delivers... AOL and Time-Warner content. No Microsoft anywhere to be seen, which means no chance for Microsoft to hijack future revenue streams.
I personally think AOL is torqued off about the whole go-round with Instant Messaging and vowed never to get dicked by MS like that again.
This is not the end of Open Source. Anyone who thinks so radically overestimates the influence of RH on the Linux world. Yes, it's a big influence, and a lot of the way things are can be traced to them, but if RH vanished tomorrow, someone else would step up. I wouldn't be surprised, as a matter of fact, if AOL didn't slurp up the company, then spin it right back out after working out some very favorable licensing deals and pulling in key development staff.
Their track record is strange: they pretty well fouled up Netscape by forgetting there are non-AOL users of the tool, but they left Nullsoft alone and they're as fine as ever. But the strength of open-source is... we don't "need" any one distribution. If we did, we'd have been hosed long ago.
Turtle
---------------------------------------
Rotate the pod, please, HAL....
If they make a box that connects to a TV and records content etc, using their broadband backbone, to play their content (on demand movies, etc) then I could see the pieces coming together. Still doesn't explain why they'd pay millions for something that is available for free (the source code) and hire developers to make their proprietary stuff on top.
I thought it worked like this:
Even if tons of now GPL'd code would be made closed source in the future, there would still be no hindrance to use the source code and programs that are out there now, is there? I mean, once someone has released their program in one specific version under a certain license, they can't very well call it back? Or?
Sure, the next versions might not be released publically, but that would be up to any copyright owner, or so you would think. I don't think that would matter whether the GPL holds in court or not in this case.
The Linux community could just take the last free versions and continue to build upon them, sadly lacking quite a number of old contributers, but it wouldn't mean that the programs as of today would be illegal to use?
Since I am not very good at the finer points in license/law stuff, and certainly not American copyright/law (and how it would affect overseas) I don't know, but anything else would be too strange to consider, and it would effectively make it more or less a total gamble to trust such a system of licenses if they could be revoked at any point.
What if Larry Wall took a nasty hit to his head and decided he, and only he should be able to use perl, so he revokes the license (or at least, his substantial parts of the core and lots of modules)? Would noone ever be able to use it then, no matter what old version? I think not.
Then again, the guys with the money seems to make the rules in the courts where it matters, so I can't be too sure. Can anyone enlighten me?
How about to compete in the internet apliance market by using "Red Hat Embedded Linux" merged with AOL internet service. This then benefits both companies and keeps an open road for growth for AOL sence their original money maker (introducing new users to the internet) seems to be slowly decreasing.
Redhat is NOT some AOL competitor like CompuServ that they're buying out to fend off competition. They want to do something with it, and the entire OSS community stands to benefit.
-3Suns
~~~~
The Revolution will be Slashdotted
Do they plan to try to use their leverage in the internet service provider market to persuade some hardware manufacturers into packaging a different OS into their machines? A new OS based on Linux (so we wouldn't mind), but with an easy-to-use [AOL] interface and only one real way to connect to the internet [AOL](so the average Joe Schmuck could use it). Obviously, AOL would be trying to use a monopoly it wishes it had in order to maneuver itself into a new market. Does anyone else see any possible antitrust implications inherent in this deal?
This is exactly what people blame Microsoft for doing, only in the opposite direction.
Lack of eloquence does not denote lack of intelligence, though they often coincide.
Red Hat is (AFAIK) the only distribution with absolutely no closed source-software.
Red Hat used to sell some closed-sourced stuff (CDE & Motif come to mind), but they got the religion so hard that they dumped all of it (at least from the standpoint of the Linux environment - the Cygnus stuff is still closed, AFAIK).
Red Hat seemed to be the main reason that TrollTech came up with an open-source license for Qt on UNIX (KDE) - I remember the memos on their website.
Red Hat's fanatical adherence to this open-source philosophy has carried them through some really bad releases (7.0, for example). They also do not take adequate customer input for new release development (I will never run ext[23] again, for example), and the timing of the releases is driven more by marketing/accounting than by quality technology. But you know with a Red Hat distribution that all of it is open, and it will stay open, or it won't be in the distribution anymore.
From this perspective, I wish AOL would buy Mandrake, Suse, or Caldera, and leave the real gem alone.
And speaking of what they want to do with Linux, remember that article just a few days ago about some big companies (incl. IBM and Toshiba, I think) announcing plans for a new OS to be embedded in net-access-only systems? Could AOL be thinking of selling "AOL PC's" in the big chains (Circuit City, etc.) that have a Linux-derived OS and do nothing but AOL access???
I mean, alancox@aol.com? He'd rather shave his beard off...
They could do a few things.
1, make it so the OS itself doesnt run any programs directly, All your programs running off of AOLs main server which you can only access when you are subscribbed to AOLs network. AOL offers a napster like program which you can only access when subscribbed to AOLS network, also allowing Access to movies and so on through their subscription.
Service based software.
While this isnt all that bad, AOL will become your portal through which all your software runs, another version of
Want access to the code? They'll force you to subscribe.
Another possible situation is AOL, the RIAA poisining the Linux Movement with $$ influence.
Controlling where development goes, slowing it down in places they dont like, so they dont like your software which breaks the DMCA, they make their package management and installer core software closed source and only allow licensed developers to use their nice installers, now your anti DMCA software becomes so hard to use that only programmers can handle it,
Fine for programmers like us but for casual users who dont know linux at all, they are locked out of all the little hacks to the AOLinux software
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Unlikely reasons:
We need to face the music here, kids, the only ones who care about a Linux based desktop are all here, except the two that forgot to read this site today.
and here's why :
/usr/lib/gcc-lib/i386-redhat-linux/3.01/specs
imagine this :
$ gcc -v
Reading specs from
gcc version 3.01 20030731 (Red Hat/AOL Linux 8.0 3.01)
I would eat my redhat
Most of the article is BULLSHIT!!!!
AOL needs a Desktop, Not a server. THere are lot's of alternatives and RH does not make any sense for them at all. That is, unless they are ready to commit themselves 100%, but the history doesn't quite show that.
For me RH IS Linux and I can't afford a mistake.
If not, I say Red Hat goes it alone. Red Hat is a server OS company; AOL has no interest in this sector.
If AOL had kept iPlanet (or ever done anything with AOLServer), then I might be saying something else, but things are as they are; AOL did it's best to bury Netscape's server product line, and they will with Red Hat's, too.
Worst case, Red Hat hires Raster back and spins him off into the Red Hat Desktop/OS, then sells him to AOL and pockets the change.
Whatever happened to that Corel Linux distribution? I bet AOL could have that for a song.
Time Warner duh
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
As I'm sure most /. readers know, the webserver core of GNN is now known as AOLserver.
It's open sourced under the MPL and it's actually a pretty darned interesting hunk of Unix application code.
Personally, I do not care for the way that AOL tries to make their dial-up customers dependant on them. The browser brokenness that their customers and many webmasters have to endure ("AOL customers click here...") would probably not persist if AOL didn't lock less-savy users in the way that they do.
But they have dumped a bunch of money into some very cool stuff and have set it free with an astonishingly small number of strings attached, and I for one have trouble not being thankful for that much.
Back in 1998, both Netscape and Intel invested in Red Hat. See this Article at wired for details. Unless AOL have since sold the shares that Netscape acquired, they already have a piece of RH. The specific details of how much was invested weren't divulged, so who knows, this could have just been a marketing exercise...
AOL buying Red Hat is merely one more sign that AOL is looking to sock it to Microsoft in the core of their business - the OS market, and with AOL's huge amount of capital/resources, perhaps they'll be able to grow RH from a minority player to something much more prevalant. Perhaps the ultimate release of the AOL/Redhat OS would be a distant version of what we know now, but like Apple's OS X, if there's a unix based kernel at the core of the OS, it will let the tech-folk play dirty while the non-geeks can still have a simple-to-operate user experience.
It's kind of short sighted to look only at Winamp. Sure, it's a great program, and it's swell of them to distribute it. But they're doing it because they think it fits into their agenda.
And on the other hand, they're gutting Time Magazine and using it to shill their movies and records. Are people who pick the bottom line over journalistic integrity going to pick the integrity of a linux distro over that same bottom line?
I hope that this is just a pissing contest, and that they don't buy redhat. It's really hard to make a coherent argument that MS is more evil than AOL/Time-Warner -- these guys are the worst possible people to buy RH.
Gosling made an interesting point about Linux's licenses. Sure, in theory anyone could fork the kernel. But on a practical level, Linus gets to decide what goes in. There are enormous barriers in place that make forking key components very difficult, and RedHat pays an awful lot of developers -- the Cygnus group was a key aquisition. They control gcc.
Don't kid yourself -- if AOL buys RH, they'll have a lot of power over the Linux universe, as much as anyone. It won't be absolute, completely unchallengable power, but it will be real and substantial, and it will be wielded in AOL's interests, not in ours.
What's important? Beating MS at all costs? Is it worth it to have AOL ship a kazillion Linux cds to mopes around the world, even if the Linux on those CDs is philosophically different from what we have now?
Do we want the guys who are shooting for the $230/month cable bill standing on our necks?
Kudos to the folks at ORA for speaking up.
The last coupla months there has been a shitload of JL at several sites for linux related stuff with aol. Maybe this has been in the works for some time.
Look, it's not the most obscure reason in the world why Time Warner (think MPAA) and AOL (think screwing end users) would want to buy Linux (last bastion of freedom)
What is the one and only real objection to the SCSSA bill at the moment? It's that Linux will never accept digital rights management, and even if they did, we'd all work on it from outside America, leaving the US wallowing in a technological vacuum.
So what do we see now? We see AOL buying redhat, and installing digital rights management on it. We see longtime redhat supporters (especially businesses) buying it anyway, and even better, we see it given to all the clones running AOL at home.
Think ahead. It's going to become socially acceptable to lock down and license every piece of electronic equipment, unless the public can see where they're being led, and what they can do about it.
AOL may be interested in Linux for three reasons:
;)
1) To create a proprietary PC, with Linux as the Operating System, Netscape as the Browser, WinAMP (ported to X) for Multimedia, and AOL as the content provider. This PC would probably be a stripped down version of RedHat, being a single-user system that booted straight into X windows (with a nice AOL screen to hide bootup messages). The Desktop Environment would not be Gnome or KDE or anything else--too complicated. Instead, the desktop would be an integrated AOL/Netscape/WinAmp application. You wouldn't be able to do much else on this system, but I doubt a lot of AOL members want to use a command line anyway. It would sell cheap (maybe $150 with monitor), but you would have to be an AOL subscriber to use it.
2. To create a set top box to compete with Microsoft's WebTV/XBox/MSN box. This would probably be able to play DVDs, CDs, and possibly games. Again, it would be based on Linux, and use AOL/Netscape/WinAMP. This would be cheaper to produce than an entire PC, and would probably sell better.
3. To compete with Microsoft in the server market. Maybe least likely, because if they had wanted to compete here, they would have used BSD
The World is Yours.
Something I haven't yet seen on the /. boards are reference to AOLServer. I know all you guys are apache fans, but AOLServer is a fantastic database-backed web programming server. It runs postgreSQL and tcl flawlessly, regardless of it's AOL prefix. Nothing really changed when AOL bought it besides the name. Same with Winamp. I think it is safe to predict the same result with the purchase of Red Hat.
People could design a bootable floppy disk or CDROM to circumvent any protection that AOL/RH might have installed.
I suffer from attention surplus disorder.
AOL, Asia Online. It is pretty simple. With the latest proclamations of several Asian nations that they are going to Linux on government PCs it is logical to imagine that those government workers would use Linux on their home PCs (If they have them.)
The next "Big" market for Online services and controled content is in Asia. Plus, the Chinese government would probably love a company like AOL, if they only provide government approved content.
It could even be made into the only officially sponsored online services. The Chinese government wouldn't need to do it themselves. AOL would make their money and the Chinese government would have all the controls that they tell AOL to include.
Just a rabid guess...
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
I would hat to have see this being discussed openly like because I'm sure that the folks at Red Hat don't know what they are doing. It's so important for them to realize what AOL will do to them. Look at what they did to ICQ.
Once upon a time you could download the program for free. Now you have to actually pay for it and every other IM you write gets an advertisement attached to it.
Look at WinAmp. Another free product that AOL has corrupted and ruined. have you noticed the monthly charge they've placed on it?
Or AOLServer. I can't believe they actually open sourced their own web server. What a bunch of idiots, I'm sure they'll get around to making that propietary soon.
And lets not forget how they closed down the mozilla project.
Oh and I remmeber when their TOC protocol for their AIM program accidentally "leaked" out, they shut down all the projects out there that used the protocol.
I'm sure that if AOL takes over redhat, they will propietize linux, they might even charge for the distrobution. They WILL destryo red hat out of spite.
thank god thats not going to happen
I think Andy's wrong in saying that being bought by AOL is a recipe for failure. Here's a list of acquisitions and how they looked from the inside:
- GNN: That was a flop. No question. It was also one of the first buyouts AOL ever did, and frankly, few people at AOL had any idea what to do with the Internet at the time (like much of the rest of the world). The clumsy attempt at infrastructure integration also hurt. At the time, we were still running on an old, clunky, non-modular architecture that was largely unchanged from its days running Q-Link and PlayNet. Also, if I recall, GNN used BookLink's browser, because we hadn't integrated IE yet. I'm surprised the AOL GNN lasted as long as it did.
- Netscape: I think that's going to be a ninth-inning major success. I think getting the Netcenter home page was certainly one goal, but another was hiring lots of experienced Internet developers, and that's been a HUGE win. Also, now that the Microsoft exclusive contract has expired, I definitely think AOL's gonna end up replacing IE with Netscape. The latest Compuserve beta has the Gecko engine. CS has a few million members, so it's a natural testbed for a technology before it goes into full distribution in the AOL client. Bang.. out of nowhere comes W3C compliance and serious competition for IE.
As for AOL failing to pick up Netscape's vision, well... I'm not sure Netscape had any particular vision by the time we bought them. Heck, most of their executive team did stay on and continue to run the show. Any lack of vision is simply something AOL failed to add, not something they took from Netscape.
- CompuServe: Took a dying service running on 36-bit PDP-10s running custom-made hardware (!) and managed to transition the vast majority of it to a web-based service using the AOL client as a dialer/browser. In effect, this is really the service we tried to create so many years before, but it worked this time. True, you never hear anything about it, but it's still more successful than MSN, so who cares?
- Time Warner: Waaaaay too early to call, but I think there will be some wins. These are two huge companies, and they are being very careful about trying to force them to integrate for buzzword's sake. When I left AOL in August, there was a big push to use AOL's developers as TW's technology infrastructure group, they were setting up ways to find-the-smart-guy-in-the-other-company, and they had combined the help-desk and other support infrastructure. I'm not sure how much difference it will make to end customers, but there are certainly efficiencies they can get as a company.
And don't forget about the less well-known purchases:
- Navisoft. Resulted in AOLServer, one of the best-performing web servers ever, which is free and open-source.
- WinAmp. Still doing fine.
- Personal Library Systems (www.pls.com). Resulted in some excellent intelligent-text-search functionality in the AOL service.
I think Red Hat could be great for a few reasons, aside from the obvious potential for giving Microsoft a run for its money, and creating a workable UI for Linux. Most importantly, AOL has one of the most demanding infrastructures of any site anywhere. We were regularly finding bugs in every OS we ran, even the fault-tolerant ones. And the AOL approach to system operation is fairly rigorous, requiring a lot of maintenance and reporting tools and 24x7 hot-pluggability of everything.
Red Hat could really become a leader in stability, performance and monitorability if AOL is buying it for their own back end.
Anyway, food for thought.
What if AOL directs RedHat's large development staff to make all *future* module development and device support in closed source binary form? Sure, the existing code-base remains GPL, but that code-base could start to fade into obsolesence, an open glue holding together large closed components, as AOL enters into partnerships with hardware manufacturers and net service providers.
is it me, or is AOL/TimeWarner becoming microsoft's new worst enemy?
slowly but surely...
i may dispise AOL, but i hate microsoft much, much more.
while you make pretty speeches...i'm being cut to shreds. you throw me to the lions...a delicate balance.
1. Most of the software people use is either private/non-Open sourced, or its the open source software that makes up the huge chunk of what we think Linux is.
2. Even the Redhat specific software (the RPM system, for example) isnt going to change, why would they acquire a company w/ the most popular Linux distribution and then change it up so that it doesnt work w/ previous releases (the same reason you can still run some 16-bit code on WinXP)
These people know what they are doing, they're professionals at acquring other businesses...and the whole deal about Time-Warner being part of the RIAA, that's as about irrelevant as you can get.
Think before you post, folks.
Beer, now there's a temporary solution -- Homer Jay S.
I can envision a distro of Linux that is analogous to the way ICQ became when it was AOL-ized: bloated, slow, too many bugs *ahem* features, etc. That's not what I want to see in a distro.
The EFF would do its very best to battle of this travesty against the LGPL, GPL and other Open Source Licenses. They pit all of their guardians of the law and freedom against the neverending juggernaut of money that AOL/Time Warner is.
The EFF does its best and attempts to battle in court, but is just unable to handle the onslaught of 250 AOL/Time Warner lawyers. The three to five EFF Lawyers begin to buckle.
In the last hour they cook up a scheme to be able to battle back. They put up a plea for freedom and ask that every geek give them $21.99 every month to help build a mighty legal team.
All of use look at their request and then get nasty about it all over Slashdot. Three days later, the EFF goes down and OSS is forever destroyed.
Two weeks later, Steve Case and Bill Gates sign an agreement extending AOL's use of Internet Explorer as the only AOL Browser for the next 1000 years. Thus, the 4th Riech is born.
I think that is the worse that could happen...
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.sig seperator
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If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
This AOL RedHat deal should churn out a lots of deals for the consumer. The Server Admins and users crowd should especially be pleased with addition of Voice notification for SendMail. "You Got Mail" I love that feature. For those who fear the strong server capabilities of Red Hat Linux, I expect to see offers such as "1000 Free Hours of Apache"
Goly,
I can't wait.
Two Towers-Two Worlds.One seeks triumphs and freedom for man.The other deems man unworthy and wrecks them.
I've been telling AOL to eat me for quite some time now.
Java is the blue pill
Choose the red pill
I can tell you one thing, I won't be using Red Hat Linux anymore.
"What kinda computer you have, IBM or Mac?"
"Neither, I run Linux."
"Didn't AOL just buy those guys?"
This scares the living shit out of me. Whether you agree with me or not, RedHat is Linux at least in corporate and business world and I don't want power hungry executives from big company to have the control over the most important Linux distro. What's next? Maybe they'll buy our water plants or something. Between MS and Time/AOL/Warner/CNN/... they'll own 90% of the US. And in the future who knows, maybe MS will merge with Time Warner. It's a fooking twilight zone.
Imagine your Grandma getting the new AOL 10.0 CD in the mail. Grandma is excited to get on the Internet, as that's what everyone was talking about down in the geriatric ward at the local hospital, when she was there because she fell and broke her hip. She takes out the beverage coaster, with its shiny, sparkly, reflective surface and puts in into her WindowsXZ computer. She is given one of two options "Switch to AOL for this Session" or "Install AOL Operating System." The interface has more information about how the new AOL Operating System is easier to use, faster, free, and has all the same type of applications that she is use to in WindowsXZ. It also mentions that it makes AOL and the Internet easier to use. So she decides to go with the AOL Operating System. When she presses that fateful button her hard-drive is reconfigured. XZ is deleted like the infestation it is, while the new AOL Operating System converts her NTFS partition to ext3. When her computer boots up, she gets the friendly "You've Got Mail" chime, and when she checks it, it's an email from the Linux Counter project asking her to go signup. She's now just entered a world only 3 years ago dominated by pretentious youth and opinionated technical professionals. Go Grandma. But the thing is she doesn't know it. Not only does she not know it, if said pretentious youth, and/or opinionated technical professionals looked at her computer initially, they don't see GNOME 3.0 or KDE 4.0, they see America Online, with it's handy yet somehow amazingly lame ART format and colorful pictures arranged in a cluttered yet somehow aesthetically pleasing way.
When posed the question "What is wrong with this?" I have to answer nothing at all. As a matter of fact this just did the one thing that we as a community have been trying to do for the last 9+ years. It has gained legitimacy for *our* movement. Sure it was at the cost of selling our souls, and giving in on what we thought was right, but hey, Now WindowsXZ has a run for its money. Even though when you boot it up, you start to fly around your room with Madonna. How can throwing our ideals out the window be good?
Remember my friend, Linux is not an operating system. It's an operating system kernel, and a way of doing things. By grandma running AOL Operating System based upon the Linux kernel, all that hard work that Linus has been doing for all those years has just hit the real mainstream. We're talking major support for devices, we're talking mass distribution the likes Linux hasn't seen before. That's because by this time, everyone has a computer. No I don't just mean those pesky white middle class folk, I mean everyone. See the government has pony'ed up and bowed to the pressure that the internet was a racist/bigoted/insert bad term here because the lower class individuals couldn't afford the equipment required to let them on the Internet. And Tom Dashill has decided that's America's fault. But enough of that. See these poor internet users can't afford the $200 license fee that M$ is now charging for Windows XZ Home. And instead of being anally raped by the Business Software Alliance, they choose to install the AOL Operating System. Get it?
Now on to the bad side of things; It's somewhat ironic that *the* company that bought all my favorite little companies may be bought by AOL. You see they went out and bought Hells Kitchen Systems, they made my credit card processing software CCVS. And then proceeded fuck it up beyond believe. Customer service became a thing of the past, and as soon as their contract allowed them, the developers got out of RedHat faster than a husband falls asleep after pulling out of his wife. But wait don't stop there, RedHat next on its acquisition trail through my technical life bought C2Net. ISP turned commercial Apache vendor. Having been a long time fan of C2Net for their commercialization of Apache, which benefited me greatly in my business I made good friends with much of the staff, of which a few remain now that Stronghold is a RedHat product. RedHat then in its next stage of becoming the M$ that the stock market wants them to become saw a hole in their enterprise level strategy, which was the RDBMS area. To compete with M$ they needed a database that could compete with SQL Server. Now, based upon the previous history you would think that they were ripe to pick up the PostgresQL startup Great Bridge. After all Great Bridge had 2 things going for it. One, their primary investor was the primary investor in RedHat when it started. Two, they had members of the PostgresQL development crew on staff! But instead of pursuing something to acquire Great Bridge, RedHat decides to put them out of business. In the summer of this year, less than 6 months after the announcement of the "Red Hat Database" which is PostgresQL, Great Bridge closes its doors. And my friends at Great Bridge are looking for jobs.
All that being said, why am I unhappy about the thought of AOL buying RedHat? It's pretty simple actually. In my head it lowers the already borderline esteem I have for the distribution which commonly gets referred to solely as "Linux." RedHat, for all its history, is primarily responsible for the legitimization of Linux in the business community. RedHat has been the torch bearer for our trusty UNIX variant. They've paid for open source programmers to program open source projects, they've co-sponsored conferences, and events. RedHat has, in fact, done for Linux, more than most other Linux related companies have done. Who's to say what their focus will become when they are more concerned about Grandma's ability to send email to her grandchildren then they are about making reliable, secure by default operating systems?
...with builtin copy protection, etc. AOL/Warner would own your linux box and control a good part of what you did with it. If legislation passes (the SSSCA or whatever it's called) then Redhat, with AOL at the controls, would become the only valid version of linux in the USA (and other contries the USA bullies into passing similar laws) because it would have that builtin copy protection crapola.
In Bushworld, they struggle to keep church and state separate in Iraq as they increasingly merge the two in America.
... Big Blue? IBM's commercials are pushing Linux more and more, and when it come to IBM, when you're talking Linux, you're talking Red Hat. What would a buy-out of RH by AOL leave them? Would there be deals made between AOL and IBM for the use of their software, or would IBM just whip up a distro of their very own? Or find another distro to hop into bed with?
Maybe they're just buying redhat for leverage or backup. Seeing how microsoft always find some way to make the competition invisible and inaccessible to the new user they might be scared that AOL be blocked or stunted by Microsoft in order to make MSN more popular. With a linux giant AOL could always say "Give us what we want... or else."
Spare your breath, Bill....:)
AOL wants Red Hat for one reason: post-pc devices.. The first device they want to develop is something to go along with their $230 cable plan .. Develop a box for cable/email/internet/etc for the millions of people out there that really don't need a computer -- its great. Why Red Hat? 1. free OS = cheaper boxes 2. competent programmers to develop the boxes.
Of course, they could probably use Red Hat for internal IT development -- but as far as Red Hat how it is known today -- forget it, if AOL buys them, you can kiss Red Hat goodbye -- there is absolutely no reason AOL would keep them around.
*sigh*
Obvious answer, Microsoft.
Yes friends, Microsoft in a stunning religious epiphany realizes its opposition to GPL code has been misguided, and to set thing in order will fund a GPL infringement suit against AOL for violating the GPL.
During the press conference, notes that none of their code is GPL based, and their recent conversion to supporting the GPL will have no effect on their codebase.
Since no one has mentioned this option yet, it must be extremely brilliant or extremely dumb. What about AOL using Linux as the base for a Windows clone running all Windows programs but not owned by Microsoft?
.NET. Microsoft may soon be able to muscle in on bank transactions, credit card companies, eBay, Sony Playstation, AOLs ISP business and everything else that involves a computer. The only logical thing to do is for everyone to come together and offer a free Windows clone.
The whole world is scared of
It would be extremely difficult for AOL to get Linux for the desktop going. It would face the same chicken and egg situation that Apple and Linux have always faced. Why would developers write all their apps for a platform with few users? What about total compatibility with Microsoft Office and all their other apps? I just can't see AOL attempting to take this on. And people are used to Windows. They don't want to learn new software.
AOL is just one program and AOL users are not that pathetic that they can't switch to another ISP. If they have to give up AOL or every Windows program they now use they will give up AOL. Microsoft has everyone much, much stronger than AOL does.
So maybe the point is just to use Linux as a base and put the Windows API on top of it. They could sell it on an AOL PC and it would be cheaper because Microsoft wants to make $75 for each Dell sold, but AOL simply wants the user to use AOL and view whatever ads AOL puts in front of them.
Is the idea of AOL or other companies making a good Windows clone technically possible and reasonable? It seems like the obvious thing for the Fortune 500 to do to protect themselves from Microsoft.
If this deal goes through (and even if it doesn't really), does anyone think that AOL wouldn't be the exact same beast as M$ is now, given the opportunity?
IF they buy RH, and IF they somehow put everything they own together into a credible threat to Windows, and IF that threat succeeds in dethroning the king somewhere down the road, do you think for a second that the new king won't be just as bad as the old?
They absolutely would be, their business practices are questionable now (no, not nearly on M$'s level, but give them time!).
This sale doesn't bode well for anyone but AOL shareholders.
I tend to disagree with that statement. A company should have both a good business plan, and an equivally good technical plan. Look at what Microsoft does. It has both of these. Otherwise it would have been dead long ago. What Microsoft lacks technically, it compensates in its deal making, and where it lacks in business strategy, it has good expertise. Where it has both, it is a winner...
"Do something man. Right now."
... it will be the best thing that ever happened to desktop linux (in recent years). First of all, AOL is well known supporter of open source (mozilla, aol server, etc), then they know how to take over company and dont ruin it (netscape ruined themselves before they sold out anyway), such as nullsoft...
Why would they do it? First of all, forget about switching users to Linux, etc, etc...they are not stupid, they wont force users to change OS, c'mn, dont get overboard with the idea... what they want is alternative if MS decides to scrap AOL from XP... and slowly build their alternative choice so when the time come they have more weapons to battle MS with.
Can you imagine AOL Linux + Office + AOL Internet dvd's in mail? sure not tomorrow, but in few years for sure...
maybe linux will finally have something to fight MS with, that actually works in desktop enviroment for all users...
But if you think that apple is going to force anyone to use linux, that wont happen... that would be suicide for any service company...especially if 90% potential users use MS.
They should develop a partnership first and prove to the world that AOL is good for Red Hat and Red Hat is good for AOL. From my current view, I don't think AOL is that serious about Linux. Just look at its Linux IM client. Secondly, will AOL/Red Hat be a threat to the open source community? If AOL embraces the open source community then I have no problem with the buyout. It would be a serious threat to Microsoft. It would even better if Apple could get in there and help out with defining the user's experience. AOL + Red Hat + Apple = the fall of windows. AOL would gain from the removal of Micosoft as being the common desktop os. Red Hat would gain from being the OS that put a crack in windows. Apple could easily gain more market share in the hardware world (Which it has always consider itself as)
AOL could make a bootable CD that booted Linux and then started AOL and stored all its data in your Windows partition (if you had one) or if you don't format any free space for use by AOL. The same CD could also be run by simply installing AOL the old fashion way (no need to piss of clients). But over time they could play with this AOL pure setup and see how many clients they could get to move over to this new setup. If it shows progress they could do a similar thing for other platforms (a CD for the Playstaytion 2, maybe even XBox, and either the same thing with MacOS but perferably a partnership with them to push AOL). Anyways something like that might be good for them. They could also use the same system to run their AOL TV.
Just a wild idea what do you all think?
Snoop Baron
How do you know AOL doesn't have all that stuff ready and waiting to trot out? Don't sell the in-house AOL programmers short - they wrote a pretty good web server, and for all the lameness, the whole AOL system works pretty damned well from a technical standpoint. They could very well have an AOLized Netscape browser for Linux running... it may never been seen by anyone except some MS execs, as leverage to insure AOL stays on the MS destop. The shock value of seeing it for real would beat the hell out of an empty threat of "Well, we could..." And spending all the programmer time would be cost-effective for AOL if they stay on the Windoze screen. If MS forces the issue and AOL gets the boot, they'd need a zillion CDs to send out *right now* - AOL would be nuts to not have something ready to go.
The way the stock game works, AOL could already have a big chunk of stock in Red Hat owned by several shell companies, they could get a controlling interest and nobody would know until it's too late. Talks could very well be just being polite about it all to keep from scaring the key employees away.
Along those lines why shouldn't this push IBM into thinking about buying out Red Hat. IBM has shown reasonable committment to Linux, even integrating some into AIX.
Personally I think an IBM buy of RH would be the best for the world, and I think they might do it to keep it out of AOL's hands.
But why this hostility to AOL as an investor? Their funding of Mozilla seems to have benefitted the open source community greatly. Without that, I doubt Netscape or Mozilla would still be around in any form.
If RedHat investors find it advantageous to sell the company, I don't blame them if they do. RedHat's business model never really impressed me, and it might well be better off as an AOL subsidiary, kept alive as a hedge against Microsoft. And given that Linux is GPL'ed and that AOL has been reasonably well-behaved in the past, I don't see a problem. Let's give these people a break.
This is Slashdot. Everything's either about linux, killing Windows and Microsoft, or the government taking away our rights.
The PC is a deadend. It is pretty much maxed out in the developed world. The future for companies like AOL and M$ is in appliances. AOL could use Redhat in an AOL internet appliance - as easy to use as a toaster. Turn it on and you are surfing AOL.
This wouldn't be a bad thing...what would be a bad thing is the RIAA, SSSCA, DRM, etc, etc, all being folded into a linux. The SSSCA, if passed, would then be used to turn AOL-Redhat Linux into the only LEGAL-TO-USE linux distro in the USA. When our European neighbors get bullied by the US into passing similar crapola laws, then the other distros will also have to include copy protection, etc, or Redhat will be the only LEGAL-TO-USE version of linux there too.
If AOL stuck/sticks with appliances, no problem, but if they stick their nasty RIAA fingers into the heart and soul of linux itself, then be afraid. Be very afraid.
By the by, AOL hasn't done jacksquat good for Netscape. It is still a non-player. It's not even their default frickin' AOL browser AND THEY OWN THE DAMN THING!
In Bushworld, they struggle to keep church and state separate in Iraq as they increasingly merge the two in America.
HanzoSan writes:
.Net, but I wouldn't get too friendly with them: they might just bite.
> Time Warner however, is dangerous, isnt Time Warner a part of the
> RIAA? Their influence in Linux is what would worry me.
They (the Warner part) are a member of that barrel of sharks called the MPAA (see http://www.mpaa.org/about/), and as such, are part of all the digital rights idiocy that has been going on. That puts them in the dangerous to evil category, as far as Slashdot is concerned. I'm not that fond of Red Hat personally, but as a major Linux distributor, I think that being bought out by a major content conglomerate would be a "bad" thing. AOL/TW has their uses as a foil to Microsoft's
Despite the silly incedent with a part of IBM supporting putting DRM into harddrives, overall I think they'd be a better choice for a buyer. IBM has already done the evil empire thing, to the point of playing footsie with Nazi Germany. They got slapped down hard for it, and have had a chance to learn from their experiences. While I wouldn't trust the new IBM 100%, they are by far a kinder, gentler, wiser company now. Having their own distribution would benefit them with the ability to take Linux to the point where they could use it for everything they do. Having the IBM brand on Linux would further legitimize it. Both could benefit.
"What do you think Mothra would do?" - Moll, "Mosura" 1996
While it's flattering to be quoted and I could care less about the credit, there is something sinister here. I imagine that someone has programed their robot accounts to post high scoring posts from similar threads. Devious flunkies never get up to any good. What do you think this clown wants to do with the points?
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
you gotta wonder why they'd select a GPL'd os instead of one they could controll more closely, like a BSD. Possibly 'cause redhat comes with a service orginazation? hmm...
Sitting Walrus Blog
You statethey pretty well fouled up Netscape by forgetting there are non-AOL users of the tool...
Posting from Mozilla on Debian, I have no idea what you people are talking about. Netscape makes fine browsers that are far from dead. There are enough people, such as the Nuclear Regulatory Commision, www.nrc.gov, using their server software with good results for me to not understand that either. While Netscape is far from the "asshole in the middle" that some people might want it to be, the rest of us are happier dealing with the one sphinkter they we own and don't think of immitating it. Did AOL fire everyone at Netscape? Is that what I'm missing? While that would be sad, the remaining people seem to be able to continue providing an excellent bunch of software to the world using Open standards and free software.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
Dear God, make me a bird, so I can fly faaah, faah faah away from heya.
Transgaming is a subscription service too. Add another 5 bucks a month to the subscribers of AOL.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Just the thought of AOL buying RedHat scares me. Imagine, thousands of AOLamers on Linux using AOL..... scary.
is WHY his fucking site crashes netscape 4.x on my ultra10?
The current Slashdot moderation system is made by gay communists!
I dont think the entire company is going to focus on saving the less profitable content department at the expense of the highly profitable services department.
Even Microsoft knows services are more profitable.
But it depends, if that one department of the HUGE services Company known as AOL TW has the most political influence internally, thats when theres a problem.
Consider the fact that they didnt fire the nullsoft team, the mozilla team, and start selling AOL software CDs in stores. It would be impossible for them to remain profitable by selling content.
Time Warner however, at least the media and entertainment division however (the ones who are MPAA) if they had control, wouldnt even allow AOL to buy Redhat, if somehow AOL buys redhat, Redhat would simply be sold after an internal war of "What do to with Redhat."
AOL the services ISP company divisions would want to compete with Microsoft and do whats profitable.
TW and the movie division would want to maintain their core business at all cost.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Someone tell me if I'm wrong, but didn't AOL choose to license the Linux AIM client under the LGPL? AOL will never make money off Linux software (VERY few companies ever have and then only by monopolizing some sort of large application), so why wouldn't AOL want to increase the penetration of whatever software it makes as much as possible?
Many people do use the term Linux, but where do you see it ever used in a context other than a Unix-like kernel published by Linus Torvalds?
Sitting around sifting all these details through my head, it occured to me that all this AOL/Redhat talk might end up being super cool for the linmodem folks.
To spell it out, an AOL/Redhat OS will obviously need to work with the innumerable makes and models of modems lying about on joe-ueser's box. Of course this will mean a pretty wide base of drivers. Last time I checked the linmodem folks were making a good start with some drivers, but still pretty far from complete support for the umpteen million software modem brands.
Pure (another step-along) speculation for now, but I guess we shall see.
with Red Hat than they did with Netscape. As a Netscape user since Version 2, (on Windows 3.11) I watched Netscape grow and get a little better with each release right up until the time that AOL took over. At that time they had approx 60%-70% of the market as I remember. The next few releases started having more and more unintended features (bugs) as IE was coming on strong. They used to have a really great support area, it's been trimmed to nothing, if you can find it. Every version I download I get AIM, AOL offers of a gajillion hours of free AOL service etc. As for the CDs, I wish they would go back to the floppies, at least I could reformat and use them, I already have enough coasters from my first CDR.
Based on what real retailers are offering now, the non-discounted price for a consumer Microsoft OS in a new system looks to be in the $95-$100 range. That is a lot less than your $200-$400 figure. I believe that number goes down quite a bit further for many large MS customers, so that the OS price can still be manageable in a $400 system.
Your points about ease of installation are more or less irrelevant; real world users don't install operating systems. They make do, or get someone else to do it, or get a new computer.
Smart move for AOL. I wonder if Microsoft has made an offer.
Very bad for RedHat users. I will no longer donate my dollars to RedHat if AOL buys them. I see enough advertising without AOL being on my desktop.
Everybody I know thinks that Red Hat is EVIL anyway. They use Debian. I use S.U.S.E.
Let them go!
I don't like big words..., does that make me anti-semantic?
How? Demonstrate to me how owning Sports Illustrated magazine will increase the number of peripherals supported in linux.
Can they make linux that easy? Yes. Because they have the source code.
Well "they" in the collective sense have "had the source code" for ten years now and it hasn't happened yet - why would it happen now?
Windows = Linux
IE = Netscape
Windows Media Player = Winamp [no video, yet]
MSN = AOL
MSNBC = CNN
Lets correct these -
Linux + four years development and application support == Windows
Netscape + 80% market share lost == IE
WMP != Winamp because Winamp does not own its protocol, and like it or lump it, WMA is taking off.
MSN is still inferior to AOL, you're right there.
As for MSNBS and CNN, neither makes money, so who cares.
In my reading of this thread, one thing I do not see is that an AOL takeover of Red Hat threatens not only Linux, but UNIX, in general.
If I see correctly, Red Hat people maintain such systems software as gcc, glibc, automake, autoconf, and a few others (whatever was once available from sourceware.cygnus.com, and now from sources.redhat.com). This software was not developed specifically for Linux, it was developed for a wide variety of UNIXes, of which, Linux happens to be one. This software is so basic that one simply does not have a functional system without it or a replacement for it.
Consider, now, an AOL takeover of Red Hat. They would have then positioned themselves to control the software upon which a very large number of UNIX systems depend by controling those who maintain it. Given AOLs track record in such matters (prime example: Netscape), this does not bode well for UNIX. AOL becomes master of the world by killing off anything that runs well.
"But", you say, "this is all open source. We start from the last good version and develop alternative software." To this, I must say: How many of us have the time, energy, resources, and skill to write an optimizing compiler or a system library? How many remain once AOL requires non-competition agreements of Red Hat personnel?
This merger must not be proceed. It threatens the entire network by attacking its foundation.
There is also an editorial on newsforge on the subject:
An AOL-owned Red Hat would be good for everyone -- except Microsoft
AOL-Time-Warner is still run by Steve Case. Gerald Levin, the former CEO of Time-Warner, is on his way out, as are many of the TW people. Note: AOL bought TW, therefore AOL is in charge, not the other way around.
Its more profitable to take Marketshare from Microsoft and Apple by releasing a general purpose OS which is compatible with the Windows and OSX internals.
Its also profitable to use TimeWarners cable company to give away free settop boxes (appliances) and then charge a monthly fee to pay for the box and the content, cable style.
It would be just like cable but a slightly more expensive bill.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Broadband, Cable TV, and Setop Boxes all have one thing in common. THEY NEED AN OS.
Imagine users watching TV, Running all their PC software, using the broadband aspects of cable to connect to the net.
IT all makes sense. The OS is the only peice missing from this.
They NEED an OS, they dont want to use Microsofts.
And of course all the enhancements they do for this settop box OS will also apply to the desktop because they also need to keep Microsoft from leveraging them with XP and
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
I think AOL care less about the RedHat distro, in fact they will leave it alone to look like a good guy and not a Microsoft clone. What AOL wants is RedHat's embedded tech. Imagine buying AOL embedded devices and being to control them anywhere in the world with your AOL account.
I saw some pictures of a Playstation 2 Linux box running AOL on it. Maybe they got an idea to develop a linux client. We know they are up to something.
I seem to recall reading IBM has sellected RedHat to provide support for all their linux related support contracts. If AOL did buy RedHat, would IBM restart doing their own support, or would they keep things as they are, and hope AOL doesn't mess with RedHat, while at the same time, hoping the corporate buyers do not think AOL is messing with RedHat, after all, would they want support of critical systems from AOL?
I'm wondering what difference AOL having its own operating system will make if Microsoft still has their exclusive arrangements with OEMs to force consumers to pay for Windows on their desktops. For instance, if I go out and pay for a Dell computer, and am forced to pay for Windows, what incentive will I have afterwards to use AOL's OS?
The software and the OS will have already been installed, and the only way to get AOL's OS on my system will be to reformat my harddrive and erase all the extra software that came with my system. Since I've already paid $100+ for the Windows license, I really have no incentive to install the AOL OS.
AOL is going to need a distribution mechanism for their new Linux operating system, otherwise, they'll be unable to capture even 1% of the market for desktop computers. They are going to HAVE to get a major OEM to agree to pre-install AOL Linux. I can't see anybody installing the CD just because they got it in the mail and it's free if they're already using Windows.
This space left intentionally blank.
#1. Microsoft has no interest in buying RedHat and likely never will.
:)
RedHat is simply not much of a threat, and MS's interests would be better served watching RedHat go bankrupt.
#2. Internet appliances are dead. You can't force consumer to buy something they don't want, and what most don't want is single function devices.
While I suspect you are right that is why AOL wants them... I can't see how this will work for them.
I actually suspect it's because they are going to take AOLs massive CD manufacturing and mailing house and send RedHat Linux CDs to everyone in the world!
Then they can get IDC to report that they have 3 billion copies of Linux in consumers hands and they therefore have 98% of worldwide marketshare in desktop operating systems!
a paragraph make.
http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=20020120
If you take a step back and really look at what and where the consumer market is going, then an investment in Linux becomes a natural. Face it, AOL doesn't want a desktop (they've pretty much admitted defeat on that to M$), they don't know what they want for a UI (witness the thrashing of Mozilla), and they don't really even want to go into the server OS market (witness the whole iPlanet thing with Sun).
I see them looking at looking to expand their penetration of content (face it, they PC market is pretty saturated now). This is an environ where new methods of content delivery need to match content providers. Is the future really Windows CE, er... Embedded XP (or whatever they're calling it today)? Not really.
Secondly, in a recent interview Mike Tiemann alluded to various telcos looking at Linux for telephony. Consider he fact that AOL-TW is also quietly realigning a *LOT* of resources into telephony (and derivatives, thereof). Thus, a Linux investment to enhance their telephony initiatives makes for quite an interesting prospect. Once again, this is NOT a M$ dominated market.
While I don't think AOL-TW would necessarily "kill off" the RH Linux distro, it would really be sidelight business.
What a pile of whiners.... Are you using your heads to think or is this the thought product of your tiny little dicks...
AOL allegedly is offering to buy Red Hat, not Linux. That cannot be done. It's the equivalent of buying a company that packages sand in nice little bags. The sand is still there for anyone to do as they please.
It's absolutely irrelevant to any of you what they do with it. On the other hand, if they do create a dumb version of Linux, more power to them. It's that many more people using something you know how to fix and program for. It's that many people away from Microsoft hurting them where they deserve the most. It will cause a very interesting market reaction and it has to be good. It will be the first time Microsoft actually encounters competition and they either do something better or go bust in that market. This is what competition is all about. This is what creates innovation.
Fucking grow up. Get out and see the sun (it's that bright light that shows up outside your rat hole every day).
It might actually be beneficial, depending what they decide to do with it. Going by AOL's history of buying companies, that's close to "naff all" so it's not necessarily bad.
How about if they actually decided to do something with it - such as help market it towards home users, give copies of it away in the same abundance as AOL disks (which we still get almost daily here) etc?
You have to admit, AOL are good at one thing - marketing (mainly through "shove it in your face until you give in" tactics, but hey). Enticing the clueless Joe Sixpack into using their software, and making it so easy that a monkey could use it.
This is an area that's growing well in Linux, but still its main weakness - ease of use for the average joe, a simpler install system than vanilla RPM, pretty interfaces, and Joanna Lumley telling you when you have mail.
Maybe, just maybe, it could be a good thing. AOL for many people was the first step onto the Internet (before moving onto better providers when they became independent of AOL's hand-holding). Perhaps they could do the same for Linux.
All in an ideal world of course, but hey.. it's always possible!
Robert Young has been UNLOADING RedHat stock.
Check it out at yahoo finance, look under RedHat and inside trading information.
Thousands of elitist programmers all using the same OS.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Remember that
1. Linux is fundamentally incorruptible, because it's open source.
2. The rest of the Linux community would not have to ape AOL's decisions about what to put in their distributions. However, all Linux users could presumably benefit from the software that AOL wrote for Linux.
3. Linux needs a big brother with iron fists and media clout. People have mentioned that Winmodems would suddenly get Linux drivers if AOL bought Red Hat. But also consider that graphics cards would suddenly get proper Linux drivers too, that many people would seriously consider writing games that run on Linux (game makers can't afford to ignore the rich and dumb, and those are exactly the people on AOL's crack!).
4. Userspace projects that need a kick in the butt before the average AOL user can feel comfortable with Linux would get a Mozilla-like infrastructure + paid programmers. I'm thinking specifically of WINE, which would have to work reasonably well if AOL has any hopes of transitioning its flock to Linux. I estimate that with a lot of work, it could be "good enough" in two years.
5. Nobody could come up with a plausible scenario in which Linux loses market share through this deal. If RedHat 9.0 sucks ass and is full of DRM, I'll use Mandrake or SuSE. If enough others do too, maybe one of these firms can be the next to play the Red Hat role. They can even hire staff away from AOL, or just train new people. Basically, Linux can't be embraced-and-smothered.
In summary, OSS was designed for exactly this moment. No form of attention can hurt it; only obscurity can. Every corporate takeover will have good and bad effects on the thing that's taken over. But if it's OSS, then we are free to keep the good while ditching the bad. This is true even if AOL's extensions to Linux are closed-source. Those closed-source additions will represent more options for every Linux user. I'm sure AOL will make bad things too, but by the nature of Linux, they will be optional. Linux really has nothing to lose, and so much to win... the more I think about it, the more I want this merger to happen.
No evidence for this.
But also consider that graphics cards would suddenly get proper Linux drivers too,
No evidence for this.
that many people would seriously consider writing games that run on Linux
No evidence for this.
Userspace projects that need a kick in the butt before the average AOL user can feel comfortable with Linux would get a Mozilla-like infrastructure + paid programmers
Given that Mozilla is one of the most hopeless, bloated, slow, and late projects in the world of software development, this is not a plus point.
I estimate that with a lot of work, it could be "good enough" in two years.
Ha ha ha. M$ will make sure it's not good enough by moving the goalposts. "Windows isn't done 'till Wine doesn't run".
Nobody could come up with a plausible scenario in which Linux loses market share through this deal.
Alright, here's one: AOL buy RH and threaten MS with it in order to make other deals with Gates and Co. Once the dust settles AOLinux is quietly dropped because AOL simply aren't interested in it other than as a weapon in their on-going fights with MS. At this point the biggest Linux distro is dead and has left a trail of users who will never touch Linux again.
Basically, Linux can't be embraced-and-smothered.
Linux the OS can't, Linux the brand can.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
...and that threat is for us poor people in tech support for OTHER ISPs who might have to suddenly deal with people who are
.tar.gz file or having to login as root.
A) using Linux, and yet
B) have no idea how to use a computer.
Isn't this a fundamental contradiction of the laws of nature? I can literally see an AOL user's mind seizing up and dying when you start talking about extracting a
Any Linux distribution that's going to be serious about the desktop will have to address Wine in a thorough manner.
Yes, it's on Powertools, but it's an afterthought.
Maybe AOL should buy Lindows. I wonder which one would make Gates squirm more?
These free CD's that AOL keeps littering the country with seem to want to provide a desktop/browser enviroment. Why they link it with IE when they own Netscape is beyond me.
But imagine them pulling off what Microsoft wants so badly to do.
You go to your mailbox and pick up the free AOL DVD which has just arrived. You pop it into your computer and it does a 100% automatic installation so that when you reboot you are offered your choice of your old system or AOL. AOL is the default.
If you boot into AOL you find that you have a total operating enviroment provided to you free of charge. It works more reliably than Windows. If you cared to look you would learn that it was powered by Red Hat Linux as the OS. Netscape would be your browser. AOL would be your pipeline to the net, free for the first 10,000 hours. Time/Warner would be responsible for content comeing down that pipeline. StarOffice or some such would give you the office tools you need.
You would instantly have no need to boot into the Windows/MSN/MSNBC side of things. So I imagine that a desktop icon could be provided to eliminate that crap from your hard drive to free up valuable disk space.
I don't know if this is where AOL is going with this, but they could.
Chances are they'll just let Red Hat gather dust like everything else they purchased.
Oh how I wish they would have developed to its potential.
. Quit playing Monopoly with Bill. Switch to one of many non-Microsoft products today.
I admit, it's very closed source, but did they have any choice?
The point is that RH is not so much about their software but about the people that work for RH. This is the reason why investing tons of money in companies that develop software that is merely a year ahead or even totaly open source is quite dangerous. Anyone can quickly catch up if they throw enough money at it. But even more dangerous is the fact that a bunch of employees leaving for whatever reason: starting their own company - this is usually done by your best employees so it hurts the most or better job opportunities - this can include better money or ethical reasons exactly those ethical reason could bite AOL if they do end up buying RH ... alot of the people will not want to work for AOL even if they are not directly working for them.
And at that point RH will just be their 1) software , 2) the brand name and 3) the established infrastructure.
1) is not worth all that much since their software is mostly open source
2) i doubt that AOL's audience knows much about the brand
3) that might be worth something ... but I don't think that this accounts for enough
I thought they took that out a long time ago.
Because of the GPL (not to mention pissing off the entire techie community) anything that runs on AOL/RH Linux would probably still run on Suse or Slackware or....
And Joe Sixpack who really believed that MS BS about being "good for the consumer" will see the truth.
AOL has been doing lots of bad moves that make little sense.
Purchasing Netscape, then killing it off...
Purchasing ICQ, then making it the bloated piece of crap it is today...
Purchasing Winamp,then freezing it's development.
All of those have some degree of threat to MS's desktop domination. Microsoft would love to see open-source go away, but they can't make this type of move on thier own because it would rise too many eyebrows in Washington. But if a silent partner went in and did their dirty work for them....
Hmmm, maybe I'm just watching too much X-Files.
As someone who is familiar with some of the inner workings of post-merger AOL/TW I don't see any honorable future for RedHat should they be bought.
So far, AOL/TW's pattern since the merger has been to cut spending and investment in their held companies, demand 10% growth from them, and should the small company fail to deliver they are mercilessly cut down until they can or they are gone.
Red Hat will not fit into this kind of mold. Red Hat will be forced out of their current businesses and cease to operate independently. They will turn into yet another AOL platform or yet another AOL lure. In a few years AOL/RH will be pushing content-control mechanisms on default installs of their distribution.
Perhaps RH should never have gone public and exposed themselves to something like this. An AOL-RH will not represent the current Linux community like RH does today. Most likely we'll have to find something else.
I don't understand why AOL/TW won't simply partner with redhat to get the services they want. I have a feeling that they're after the default install of a leading brand name distribution, and that just stinks.
I'm sure Bill is shaking in his boots -- just like he was when Novell bought Word Perfect.
If AOL is looking to fight MS they are on the wrong track -- each company that has attempted to broaden their product line to attack MS has LOST. Many times a narrow focus -- a well defined front with well defined goals and products that are the best is a much better approach than broadening your product line to dozens of leaders that become mediocre as you attempt to spin them together.
WHich means that by the time it ships it will run software that is 4 years old -- the window is past.
The Windows API is alive. To believe it will sit still for 2 to 4 years is a pipe dream. Part of that may be MS keeping their lead in the field -- a majority of it is making new product to make more money which is what MS is in business to do.
2 to 4 years ago state of the art was much different than it is today. 2 to 4 years from now state of the art will be drastically different than it is today.
They must deliver results within 6 months to have any chance at all. They must then be ready to keep in synch with any MS releases within a 3 to 6 month time frame. Their product must have fewer bugs than MS's, be cheaper, easier and more reliable. If it isn't, why bother?
Have you not noticed that on the download page for WinAmp in the table listing the 3 different versions, there is a column labeled: "Built in Ads". Although all three versions currently show NONE, I wouldn't count on it always being that way.
:P
Nullsoft does that to compare against other players that might have built in ads by saying EXPLICITLY that they do not have them. This in no way implies they are going to have ads in the future.
Keep your FUD to yourself.
----- rL
RedHat != Linux
And if the Mozilla project isn't any indication, then think about migrating to SuSE, Debian, Slackware so on and ad infinitum
Like you are so wrong.
RedHat != Linux
Linux != Brand
And losing those few Lusers that can't install anything else than RedHat won't hurt. For everybody else there is SuSE, Debian, Slackware and so on ad infinitum
People have mentioned that Winmodems would suddenly get Linux drivers if AOL bought Red Hat.
No evidence for this.
Evidence: AOL has very close working relationships with all modem manufacturers at both the developer and executive levels. Modems HAVE to work with AOL to be viable. That's a lot of influence.
I think today's userfriendly says it all:
2 0
http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=200201
Imagine the day after Red Hat were bought by AOL. You might enter into your favorite compusa;)P store and ask without any fear of being laughed at: does it also have linux drivers?
AOL wants Red Hat for the same reason they bought Netscape. AOL wanted to make sure Netscape was ALWAYS an alternative to IE, and they want to make sure Linux gets the recognition it deserves as an alternative to Windows, not just among geeks but among the common man. I think it's fairly simple to see that AOL hates Microsoft, and would buy the company if for no other reason than to piss MS off.
Never confuse volume with power.
would be if open-source programmers wrote something that was user-friendly and didn't require you to read a book in order to install the program, let alone run it!
X Windows and the various interfaces are not user-friendly enough for most people. We know the core of the system is always going to be there. We know the command line will always be accessible. Most likely, AOL will improve the dekstop and installers such that Linux can compete directly with Microsoft. Maybe they want to get into the OS game. Maybe they'll get us a decent Office package along the way.
I'm all for it.
Linux needs to be more user friendly to make Mom and Dad want to switch. And the price is right. So when the convience is there, Microsoft will have no choice but to admit there is more than one player in the home market.
From there, Linux could take over corporate workstations as well.
The Red Hat Logo pops up and says 'You've got Linux!'
All the RHCEs are now AOLCEs
Check out User Friendly's Cartoon for the Sunday the 20th.
As a rock-in-roll Physicist once said, No matter where you go, there you are.
"But since the linux userbase would have grown dramatically, we'd be seeing a lot more device drivers and other hardware support, which of course, is good. "
Would we? I've always seen this as an assumption.
Our marketshare is approximately the size of Apple, but we have nowere near the amount nor quality of drivers. Seems as a community we're basing alot of our decisions on what *might* happen instead of what would. Those types of gambles more times than not, bite one in the bum.
The purchasing of Red Hat will not destroy Linux (much to MS's chagrin), but Red Hat is more that just a distributor of Linux. Look at all the work that they've added to Linux. Look at the attention they've brought to Linux. Before it was even cool to use Linux. Besides no one has asked the question. What will Red Hat get out of it?
OK...Here are the exact prices off of ZDNet shopper: XP Home -upgrade: 94 XP Home -full: 194 XP Pro -upgrade: 184 XP Pro -full: 244 It's pretty much like I said, if you want a full edition, you will be paying $200.....That's more than my CPU, Motherboard, HD, video card or memory.
In 1997 was IE at the level of mozilla? IE was about 4 years old in 1997.
Mozilla is 4 years old, its surpassed IE in every area and its not at 1.0 yet.
IE is almost 7.0.
IF Mozilla 1.0 is better than IE 7.0 then IE just plain sucks.
Mozilla also is more secure, you dont have to worry about being hacked through your browser.
Mozilla is a good project, it took 4 years to build, IE took 6-7 years to build.
So hows Mozilla late, and IE on time? Oh yeah, IE started 4-5 years before Mozilla.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Linux is free. Linux will always be free.
Many vendors have built proprietary products that fit neatly on top of Linux and sold them successfully.
If AOL can build a Red Hat Linux to pull a new customer base into the Linux domain, it can only help things! If Linux is truly as good as we think it is, then let it ride. They can buy out every Linux related company, and we'll still have the core, free, well deveoloped Linux OS.
Lou
microsoft buys redhat. (and VA linux?)
If I poison your water, I get sent to jail for attempted murder. If Motorola or Intel poisons your water, they get whacked lightly over the wrist with limp noodles and told "Don't do that again" (I lived over a Motorola flume for 18 months so know that first-hand) Does anybody else see anything wrong here?
Send mail here if you want to reach me.
What the fuck?!
./!
I cam to this story and slashdot just gave me a FUCKING POPUP! GODAMNIT!
Fuck,
You might have heard of an agency called the SEC. They do bullshit detection for people like you.
Plenty of working capital, marketing strength, and doubtless some sort of financial award for the the people who built RedHat. What's wrong with that?
The only real downside potential is that AOL would be stupid enough to can RH... and that would be an abysmally dumb thing to do... which is not in there best interests.
Just my 2 cents worth. But I wish them well if they pull it off.
Mike
AOL buying Red Hat is probably a bad deal for the Linux community, but since no one actually owns Linux, it will survive. If I were Red Hat I'd take the money and feel guilty all the way to the bank. Other distributions will fill in the gap left by Red Hat's demise, er, ah, purchase. There is no telling when the economy is going to improve. I know what AOL did to Netscape and the same will happen to Red Hat. In spite of that, I say sell. Squeeze every penny you can out of AOL you possibly can.
"You'll get nothing, and you'll like it!"
You gotta admit anyone who promotes open software over profit driven patents can been seen by the mainstream public as a little left leaning, even if that does not reflect your political views.
.org sent out this to the AOL/Compuserve subscribers of Zmag supporter content.
Zmag is in fact a left leaning magazine and online journal. One from Zmags
I am aware this is a stretch, but I am relating it only to show where it *could* go.
http://www.zmag.org/ZNETTOPnoanimation.html
This letter went out to all members of the Z Sustainers Program who use America Online or Compuserve as their Internet Service Provider.
Dear Friends,
As most of you will have noticed by now, for the past two weeks or so, you haven't received email from ZNet or Z Magazine. This is because AOL/Compuserve has been blocking email from our servers. We are sorry it has taken so long to contact you, but an inability to reach you has been THE problem all along. (Hence I am writing from an address on another server altogether.)
AOL has admitted the problem is on their end (we have technical proof of this on our servers, as well). And a representative from AOL has admitted that the problem deserves to be resolved and is the fault of AOL. He has also admitted that there is no legitimate/technical reason for the ban. Yet he has been unable to remedy the situation technically, due to the AOL hierarchy/bureaucracy.
We aren't in the business of speculating as to why AOL has banned our services, though the resistance to what should be a very simple solution is admittedly mind-boggling. But please understand we are holding up our end of the Sustainers arrangement; every evening, we send the next day's commentaries to each of you who has requested them. (Even if you don't expect to receive the commentaries in your email as part of your sustainers membership, you are still affected as ZNet Updates and Sustainers account messages also don't reach you.)
America Online/Compuserve has prevented you from receiving two services you deserve: the daily commentaries, and your email itself.
We have tried and tried, as have several of you, to get AOL/Compuserve to fix this problem. Obviously, not enough pressure has been applied, yet. There has been some apparent progress, mostly resulting from threats of email bombardment from our subscribers (this "escalated" the complaint way up the chain of command -- "escalated" seems to be AOL-speak for "passing the buck").
We have been promised that the problem will be taken care of "quickly," but this has been promised over and over, with no results.
We urge you to make contact directly with AOL/Compuserve. It doesn't seem there's anything further we at ZNet can do about this problem, as we're simply being told to wait for corporate bureaucracy to take its course.
Just when we thought we were getting somewhere, it turns out the AOL postmaster's office gave us a fake phone number, after one final assurance the problem would be dealt with expediently. The person we spoke to at the postmaster's office is "Nick," but we can't reach him again because he gave us a made up telephone number. Good old Nick did, however, give us a "ticket number" to refer to regarding this problem, and it is 305-196.
The issue to explain if you reach any live human beings is quite simple. ZNet (www.zmag.org / mail server IP address: 64.85.14.46) is being blocked from sending email messages to any AOL email addresses. AOL is aware of the problem but has yet to act on it. Technically, they have us listed as senders of unsolicited email (spam), but they are well aware this is not the case, that all email sent from our server is requested.
You might further wish to reconsider your patronage of AOL/Compuserve in the future, since this is the second time ZNet email has been banned by AOL in the past two years.
Please do not call or write to us about this issue -- that would be backfiring, from our viewpoint. We're doing everything we can from our end, but we really cannot handle a large influx of email or phone traffic at this time.
We are sorry about this problem, but please accept our assurances it is not of our making. Hopefully we'll all be in touch again very soon... at the end of all this, your commentaries will resume, as will all other mail from ZNet.
In Solidarity,
Brian Dominick, ZNet
I sent the following email to Andy Oram.
Hi, Mr. Oram,
I wanted to say that I appreciated your article about AOL's potential buyout of Red Hat. I worked at Netscape and can definitely understand your opinions. I wanted to point something out, though.
You state, "I couldn't find anyone at the time of the AOL purchase that could find a good reason for [the Netscape buyout]. Apparently, AOL hoped to capitalize on the Netscape home page, which most Netscape users left as their default when starting up their browser."
It's quite true that AOL wanted the revenue generated by Netscape's home page. The revenue is non-negligible, and is basically what pays the Mozilla developers' paychecks. But they had another, very compelling reason to purchase Netscape. AOL is a content provider. Their entire business is to shove their content down as many customers' throats as possible. Not that that's a bad thing, it's just what the media does. But the AOL browser embeds Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser technology, as it's web rendering engine.
You can imagine how that would be a bad thing for AOL. First of all, if there are bugs in IE, AOL has to answer to those bugs, and pay for continuing support. The money AOL loses in running call-centers for customers, and in paying Microsoft to fix their bugs is significant. Second of all, bugs or no bugs, it's a plain fact that IE supports its own breed of de-facto web standards. AOL of course has to make its content presentable to customers, so they have to tailor their HTML and so forth to what IE supports. This is also costly, both in terms of money and strategy, because AOL is effectively at the whim of Microsoft.
So AOL bought Netscape and kept the Mozilla project alive for some pretty sound reasons. As you can see, they have a vested interest in the existence of a standards-compliant browser, and moreover a browser they can control. And they want to get rid of the IE technology embedded in the AOL client, and replace it with Netscape ("Gecko," "Komodo" or whatever other code names you may have heard of the Netscape embedding project by). Since the AOL and Compuserve clients (which are now the exact same codebase, only with different branding) have something on the order of 50% of the "browser share," embedding Netscape in them instead of IE will give them the control they need over how their content comes to their users.
I should say that working at Netscape didn't give me much confidence in AOL's strategy, so I think your warnings to Red Hat are far from unfounded, but you should know that there may well be a method to the madness after all.
Best regards,
Dan Rosen
Who cares about AOL eating RedHat. I think the most important thing to say is, "AOL CAN EAT _ME_!" Honestly though. AOL can eat me. I don't need them running every aspect of my life. I have CEREAL boxes with their ads on them. Did you know they actually package their CDs on boxes of General Mills' Cheerios? Sick, eh? I have to stare at that ad every morning when I eat breakfast. I walked into WalMart (don't we all love this store) one night and was bombared with AOL CRAP when I walked in the door. I say we make a move not to shop somewhere like that or buy products that have AOL attached to it in any way. We should start barbecuing their CDs and sending them back to AOL, but that would be pricey. Instead, check out www.nomoreaolcds.com and follow their lead.
-- Game Developers: Stop porting badly-textured games from crappy console systems!
Influence is of no value if not backed up by interest. I simply don't think AOL have any interest in doing a Linux; it would be a barganing chip, nothing more.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
In the danger of getting modded Offtopic, but IIRC is Mozilla based on the Netscape sources and therefore you cant really say it is only 4 years old since Netscape is far older. BTW Netscape is also older than IE.
And to compare version numbers of a M$-product with those of any other product is also not very informative since M$ simply increases the numbers to make the product look like it has greatly improved, like when they changed from Windows 95 to 98.
...and no room for the little guys. Don't you see what could happen? The problem isn't another MS, or even two MS corps controlling the market; the problem is that two extremely large corporations will hold control of everything we see. AOL/Time Warner is a media giant in and out of the computer world. Microsoft IS the computer world and has its own media platforms in and out of it as well. The problem with AOL/TW buying RedHat is that this giant will get bigger. Better press, better distribution, and a good face; Mozilla and RedHat Linux would be platform examples of good community efforts ... that take focus away from the giant's control of what we see on monitors and televisions.
Here's where the American Dream(TM) dies: with corporations controlling everything, the amount a small firm can change lessens. By letting these two companies get bigger and bigger, we let the smaller guys get pushed around.
RedHat has a huge influence on the Linux/Free Software community, like it or not. If AOL/TW buys it, I guarantee AOL/TW will influence RedHat and therefore the Linux/Free Software community.
If you're watching AOL, and your intentions really are true (ie, get into the Linux world for a complete CD distribution/coaster), buy Mandrake, the 'easy to use' distro. Or perhaps Lindows, or some distribution of your own. Wouldn't the announcement of AOLinux be enough without needing to own the most influential of Linux pushers? Look at what IBM is doing! Look, no buyout; hell, they don't even have an IBM-brand distro (AFAIK).
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
AOl's Enemy isn't Microsoft as a whole. It's MSN.
Aol would only lose users if they left Windows because, people like what they are used to. The average Windows user doesn't want to leave their dear MS Word and everything they thought they knew about computers. AOL going with linux would be a loss for both companies. The aquisition of RedHat is just another weapon that AOL can throw at MS. Perhaps AOL, instead of trying to throw down the worlds largest corporation might try to kill the actual competition, MSN.
The other problem is much bigger than that.
We only sided with Microsoft in the early 80s because we wanted them to kick IBM in the nutsack.
Now lets not give any one company too much power or AOL/Time Wanker/Redhat will become a bigger monster than IBM or Microsoft ever were.
Everytime you start X, you'll have to click a "No Thanks" button to get rid of the advertisment that pops up
AOL also acquired the Open Directory [dmoz.org] when they bought Netscape.
There were dire predictions from some Open Directory editors at the time. Up to now AOL has not interfered. Smart of them IMO.
Imagine, it will be just like Microsoft's MSN: the main reason it has so many customers (and soon to be more customers) is because they are integrating it into their OS. If AOL gets Red Hat: first of all we will all lose a wonderful powerful and stable OS; second of all, lots of AOL customers will be turned to LINUX which could be good for the OpenSource/LINUX/GNU revolution
I never really knew the general lack of clarity governing the vision by which so very many of the /. readers live. The single largest corporate communications monopoly on this planet is going to purchase one of the original strongholds of open source, copy-left code. The only reason the AOL/Time Warner merger did not come under the scrutiny of the Department of Justice during that current administration is because there was an astronomical amount of money 'given' to the Democratic Party and, as Fidel Castro himself put it, "the Clinton Mafia". At present the AOL browser is the most useless piece of garbage and yet enjoys a popularity reserved exclusively for the vast herds of mindless cattle that the Advertising World has created. "Give the people what they want", has zero meaning to these herdsmen. They very carefully decide what you will want and when you will want it. The, to date, unheard of power that the AOL/Time Warner monopoly wields evidences itself in the childlike observations made in this discussion. People are at the point where quite nearly all decisions are being made for them before birth and to think that the general attitude of the /. reader is anything less than outrage at the possibility of this proposed buy out is a terrible fright. Red Hat is the US Military's number one choice for the revamping of all interdepartmental communications, not to mention other agencies.
Federal Computer Week:
The Defense Department, intelligence agencies, the General Services Administration and other organizations are running pilot projects ...
These are primarily based on Red Hat. Do a quick search on 'Red Hat' at http://www.fcw.com and read of the presence and potential impact of AOL/Time Warner's latest planned conquest.
AOL is not the easiest to use, as advertised. The public (a.k.a. cattle) has simply heard this so many times now that they are bound by a sense of self-preservation to believe it lest the guilt of being branded either upstart or idiot consumes their sense of self worth. Take any person who might become a computer user and start them off on any of the current distributions of Linux you can readily find, for free, and then try to sell me on how it requires a great degree of technical proficiency to make it workstation feasible.
This isn't a free society for citizens who get all of their news, entertainment, and Information Technology from one corporate entity.
"Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread It." - Locke
Currently, 80 cents of every dollar is spent on what has been 'sold' to the consumer. The remaining 20 cents go to the actual goods or services. That is the AOL/Time Warner way and it is horrible to think of any Linux being in the same bed with these rapists.
I started working for AOL soon after they went public.
:: bleech ::
Besides the belief of many, AOL has incredibly smart technical people and even real vision.
But Steve Case, et al have bought so many companies and let them languish to die. Steve Case is extremely over-rated IMO.
The book "AOL.COM" is just so much crap, the real story (at least from a technical point of view) is the story of "aol.net" (the technology side) and for that one needs to look at four technical heavyweights, Barry Appelman (a man of incredible intelligence and TRUE VISION and a first-rate human being), David Lippke (super-sized Texan asshole and a complete prima dona but never the less a truly ** exceptional genuis **), Marc Serrif (who had the foresight and genuis to see the future of the Internet and to bring in the right people) and Matt Korn (a super-intelligent man of incredible strength and will).
Mike Connors also deserves much credit. He brought in several very talented people from IBM Research and was a great, decent man.
Many would have followed Mike or Barry through fire or the Gates of Hell. They are true leaders and even noble men.
Back in the old days, AOL was a pimple on Compuserve's behind and through the work of some incredible individuals (Barry Appelman, Mike Connors, David Lippke, Matt Korn, Marc Seriff, Jay Elinsky, Tom, Reid, Colin Steele and Steve Williams to name a few) built a huge TPM that could handled loads beyond the imagination of anyone.
But people like Ted Leonsis who came on fairly early (a complete waste of bio-matter, too bad no one fragged him in Vietnam. I have never met a more egotistical, sincerely evil person in my entire life) and the others I will not mention really IMO destroyed a lot of what was right with AOL.
As AOL grew it metamorphed into several different incarnations and has now become a Microborg-like monopoly with the inability to successively assimilate acquired technology.
Netscape was on the ropes when AOL bought them but what it has become is even worse. Netscape thought that AOL lacked technical smarts (if you ask me their code is junk and amateurish at best) and when March Andreessen was named CTO, it was obvious to many that he is and was a bozo and would not last.
Look at this list of some of the acquistions and tell me which one was good for AOL?
Redgate - The cancer begins here with Ted Leonsis.
WAIS - Dead on arrival, we bought it and never did squat with it.
Booklink - Oh, please!
GNN - We were terrified of Netcom!
PLS - The techies didn't even want the piece of crap.
Johnson-Grace - Art files
ANS - suck that money, suck that money!
Nullsoft - I can't say anything bad here because the founder is such a great guy.
Compuserve - just for spite.
These acquisitions on the whole caused the stock price to rise so what was not to like?
Well, we killed most of the technology and did squat with it.
Remember, Steve Case bought a browser company (a very lousy browser company) and then sold his soul to the Devil (no, not Ted Leonsis but Bill Gates) to get on the Windows 95 desktop. You should have seen the morale at AOL then!
Redhat and AOL makes as much sense as Microsoft and Apple.
Redhat will languish if AOL buys them.
None of these comments are intended to be libelous in nature. People that work for AOL know the truth. Many will dispute it. They are only the opinions of an anonymous coward.
For all I know, Ted Leonsis' dog may think he is a human being.
Steve Case may have been faithful to his wife until the divorce.
Dave Lippke may be a stand up human being.
In any case, these are my personal views and others do think differently.
Run, Redhat, Run!
That's all I need, another AOL CD in the mail,
but now it will also include Red Hat distro
of Linux.
Tracy Johnson
Old fashioned text games hosted below:
http://empire.openmpe.com/
BT
I want the gov to pass a law like that, Linux has 30% of the server market share. Having to remove all of that is going to be noticeable. The fallout from such an act should be noticeable enough for the gov to reverse such a stupid decsion and think twice about simply listening to the corps.
The Anti-Blog
...will you get a break on an AOL subscription?
"How many light bulbs does it take to change a person?" --BMcC-->
Remember the OS/2 windows compatibility layer? All MS did was tweak windows till applications woudn't run and OS/2 completely lost that benefit.
please god dont let then make a aol browser for redhat. god help us all if they do. this will start a f**king war.
Lizard "Never let them set limits on your mind!"
First of all, I was in error in my earlier post when I said that AOL/TW was only a member of the MPAA. http://www.riaa.org/About-Members-1.cfm shows several subsidiaries of AOL/TW that are members of the RIAA as well.
HanzoSan writes:
> I dont think the entire company is going to focus on saving the less
> profitable content department at the expense of the highly profitable
> services department.
>
> Even Microsoft knows services are more profitable.
Well that would make more sense, but that is not today's business philosophy: Content is king, and services exist only to wring more profit out of the content. That is why AOL/TW is primarily a conglomerate of content delivery services surrounding a core of content (http://www.aoltimewarner.com/about/index.html). That is why Microsoft is getting into services. That is why the MPAA and RIAA sharks and Microsoft go on and on about their stupid IP "rights". That is what is driving this whole, idiotic, "I have content, bow down and pay, pay, pay!" movement.
You'd think they could just generate content (say a movie), sell it, and then just generate more content. But no, the greedy sharks have to keep generating profit on the same content, every time you view it, for as long as you view it, every place you view it, etc. So they need Digital Rights Management to totally control when and how and where you view something, so that you can pay for it all. DRM is their tollbooth.
> AOL the services ISP company divisions [snip]
But the AOL division isn't about the ISP. AOL was always about selling access to their online content, long before the merger with TW.
The only interest AOL/TW would have in Red Hat would be producing their own tightly controlled OS to deliver their content with no dependence on Microsoft. There are two problems with that:
1) Open Source is not very conducive to tight control.
2) Microsoft now has a patent on a DRM OS. They'd still have to pay a license fee to MS to make their own DRM OS.
Oh, and if anybody thinks they are going to share their DRM technology with the rest of the Linux world: think again.
Come on, Tok Wira, these sharks have got to pay!
New Kirk calling Mothra, "We need you today!"
As for the idea that Linux or any other alternative OS is better or more important to the OpenSource community misses the point. An OS is nothing but a tool, and getting ones panties in a wad over them is like arguing whether 50 Hz or 60 Hz is is a "better" base frequency to be used in the power grid. Important tools will be insensitive to the carrier frequency (e.g., the PS on my computer is switchable so it is not stuck in a particular "OS"). The power for my AC probably is not (how often does one drag an AC with them on vacation?).
Why don't you ask the gaim people what the chances of them making it closed source are. They'll tell you all about how AOL keeps breaking their closed, proprietary oscar protocol in order to screw over gaim, and how they completely abandoned their open protocol, TOC. Yeah, AOL has a great history of supporting free software and open standards...
"Question with boldness even the existence of a god." - Thomas Jefferson