LinuxWorld rundown on CNN, HP and IBM Highlighted

Mr.Intel writes: "CNN released a story reviewing LinuxWorld and Linux's progress since last year. They mention new hardware and market niches coming to light in 2001. Mike Balma, a Linux strategist at HP, said 'The move to an increased array of outsourcing, migration and porting services that have been traditionally available to Unix customers is part of the continued rollout of the operating system within HP's product line. Previously, HP had informally offered such integral service and support only to its best Linux customers. But as the operating system gains momentum, more customers are seeking more services.' I hope this means as installed customer base increases, companies like RedHat will start making real money." Archie Steel writes "Interesting news for the Linux Desktop: Open For Business have an article on the partnership by HP and MandrakeSoft announced at the current Linux World Expo." Update: 01/30 16:56 GMT by H : Just a quick note: Rob is gonna be in the Golden Penguin Bowl, while I'm going to be doing a presentation with the Boston Consulting Group about the demographics of open source developers - if you are interested, it's tomorrow (Thursday) from 4:00 - 5:15.

Comments

Those IBM Infrastructure Commercials

[PowerTroll 5000]

"Linux" is one of the players on the "good guy" Infrastructure team, among other players like "Unix", "Firewall", etc. Even though the terms aren't explained, many people are asking themselves "what are these things?". These commercials hopefully will bring the Linux name out into a more mainstream audience, and even if people don't use it, they'll be aware of its existence.

It's been a year of "spreading the word". We'll see if in the next year, people start using it.

Re:Those IBM Infrastructure Commercials

[Multiple Sanchez]

Undoubtedly the best of those IBM ads is the one that in plain Engish answers for a wide audience one of the biggest questions surrounding Linux: one of the execs is watching footage of the "Linux" player, while a second exec is explaining that he plays nearly for free. The first exec asks why on Earth he'd do that, and the second responds, staring at the screen: "Loves the game."

Great spot.

Good to see HP commit further.

[reaper20]

I guess the higher-ups at HP have been listening to Perens and Co. Good for them.

I hope that HP truly supports Mandrakesoft for a push on the desktop. It's one thing to sayt this at Linuxworld with all the Linux geeks in attendance, let's hope they follow through.

They can start by funding some open source fonts for X. Then they can take all those tons of highly experienced and smart HP-UX and Tru64 guys and dedicate them to kernel development and testing. Throwing a few people at Mozilla wouldn't hurt either. While they're at it, they can help fund KDE/GNOME and hire some people out of the community.

Am I asking for too much? :)

HP's utility pricing

[skinnymofo]

In the article it mentions that HP is going to begin using 'utility pricing', what you pay is determined by how much you use Linux.
My question is, how are they going to measure how much you 'use' Linux? Number of users, number of applications, number of machines?
It sounds a lot like Oracle's pricing plan whereby the charge per CPU power.

_

Support services

[Diabolical]

It seems like companies such as LinuxCare were too early offering the now needed services.. It's nice to see though that demand for Linux is increasing. This should give new companies a momentum that they need to gain a piece of the market.

Of course it's important to stay levelheaded and don't try to be too big too soon as was one of LC's problems...

"What we're seeing is the maturation of the market," Schescherareg said. "That's really nothing but good news."

This is a very important point. As linux evolves companies are begining to see a mature market where wannabee's and showoff's are a minority. They finally start taking Linux serious. In the Netherlands, where i happen to live, Linux is still mostly used by academia or enthousiasts. Few companies are available offering things like support and services. One of the most important ones over here, Stone IT, almost dissapeared from the market. So hopefully some of the companies working worldwide will start lookin at local services or help so that the market over here can have a boost as well.....

Questions raised about Debian commitment by HP

[leandrod]

Does HP's commitment to Debian mean that Debian will have the same (or similar) exposure as Mandrake in HP's desktop line?

Or does HP consider that Debian is (not yet) adequate to the desktop?

Bruce?

I'm surprised no one else mentioned this..

[Bowie J. Poag]

IBM officially switched over to its new CEO the other day, allowing Lou Gerstner to retire. The guy taking over for him, Sam Palmisano, is a big Linux advocate, and is largely responsible for pushing IBM's Linux initiative internally in the past year or so. Looks like there will be good times ahead for us..

The dot-com bubble burst took alot of the steam out of the movement..Glad to see Big Blue pick up the flag and keep marching, hm?