Slashdot Mirror
How IBM (and Open Source) Won eBay
DemonBrew wrote to us with a new article in Business2 how IBM beat MSFT, Sun, BEA Systems to win the contract for the new eBay. Cool part is that it's based on Websphere, which has major open source components.
What the hell are you talking about? Major open-source components? Which? Last I checked, (I have the Websphere Studio download sitting here, right from IBM's partner site - and I see nothing about open source anything. Is java open source? Or XML?
Open Standards and open-source are 2 different things, and hell - Java isn't an open standard, nor is it open source in the truest sense. What a bunch of bullshit propaganda. Go Microsoft.
WTF? It's all over, folks - it's not that the dot sold out, it's just that the old folks have won. Open source, ruled by Apple and IBM.
Why is this news? Answer: it isn't. What it is is lame. The buzz has worn off, and it's back to business as usual.
Hexayurt - open source refugee shelter,
They did the typical IBM thing of selling hardware at a massively low level (they loose money here), and even say that eBay can keep their old Sun hardware. Once they have the foot in the door, and run the support, they strip away hardware bit by bit, replace with IBM stuff, drain a company of money for high support costs, and end up with an all IBM shop in terms of hardware and support.
It's happened time and time again, and killed many a small company that went with IBM support. The total cost is just not worth it.
Funny thing is that music is for the most part subjective. Country music is by far the most popular form of music. At any rate, one could not even come close to objectively stating that country music is better than say rock (whereas one may be able to make an argue for classical music being better than either of the two).
On the other hand, I think one can make a very good objective argument as to why Java is a much worse language than say C++. So, while I'd be inclined to agree with your analogy (if you actually said it right, since I hate both Java and country music), it doesn't really work as an analogy.
Perhaps:
Java is to programming as N'Sync is to rock.
int func(int a);
func((b += 3, b));
I'm a professional web developer, and can tell you in absolute certainty that Websphere is -THE- worst app server. I'd rather be caught using old C-based CGIs, or better yet just go back to the BBS. Websphere may be open source, at the HTTP side (read: apache), and IBM likes to tell you what makes their stuff tick, sure.. But does all that really matter, if the software is slow, buggy, and far below the level of standards its FREEWARE competition lives up to (read: enhydra, resin). Open source can sometimes be blinding.