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Lindows' Heavy Hand Leads to Summit Dropouts
shawk writes "With Lindows becoming more popular the company's confidence seems to be growing. According to a news item on Desktoplinux.com Lindows unilaterally adjusted the agenda of a planned vendor-neutral summit in a way that is not tolerable for others supporting the conference.
A related article on CNET reports HP having withdrawn from the summit as well."
ZDNet claims that Sun is no longer on the participant list, but they are.
Any source code yet?
Yes, right here - all the source and all the modifications made to all the packages in Lindows.
Is Lindows stealing from open source programers?
Nope, one of my packages was included in Lindows, and the President even contacted me personally to ask if I could add a few features. They aren't stealing from open source "programers" - they're complying fully with the GPL.
-- Wibble
i think the question is "Who would admit to using Lindows?", but thats another point. Linux Counter reports that, out of 115,886 submitted values, there are 8 distros in use, none of which are Lindows, which must be in the "Others" department, which takes up 13.13% of the share. Those 8 (in order of usage): Red Hat, Mandrake, Debian, Slackware, SuSE, Conectiva, "diy", and Debian sid. Then again, would your average Lindows user even know or care about something like Linux Counter? -- While you're there, fill out a reg form.
Excuse me, but you should probably do your homework.
The original poster didn't claim that Lindows wasn't distributing source, only that people should look in to it. The idea is valid, as Lindows was known to previously break the GPL by not making source available. They claimed it was only for their "beta" period, but the GPL doesn't allow this in any form.
You, on the other hand, are making something up completely out of the blue. Even if he was stealing gasoline, this has no relevance to the point the oringal poster was trying to make. Lindows not distributing source code, on the other hand, is directly related to Lindows not being a team player, which is the point of the article the comment was made on.
Saying people are making logical falicies by making a logical falicy is rather hypocritical, in my mind -- and just bad form, too.
I asked a question. I made no accusations. However, if you'd like me to justify even posing question, Lindows has violated the GPL in the past: http://www.lindowsos.info/print.php?sid=16
If you use Galeon, you can block ads from Microsoft.
Maybe the next program I create will GPLL. Meaning it's GPL'ed less than Lindows. Lindows can't distribute my program or use any of my code.
Um, yeah...
6. Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein. You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to this License.
Uh, that's the GPL. It's not Free if you say that Lindows can't use it. What's the use in that?
put the what in the where?
I was scheduled to give a talk on "The Kernel and the Desktop" at the Desktop Linux Summit and I formally withdrew on Thursday after having a discussion with the involved parties due to the issues discussed in these news articles. The behavior shown - especially the treatment of Bruce - is not acceptable.
I, uh, bet there will be more dropouts over the next couple days - Lindows is not cool.
Back when lindows started I subscribed to the insiders program. I was wholly unimpressed with Lindows as a whole. Then the big lawsuit from Microsoft came down and Robertson had a reply 'CEO to CEO' to Bill Gates. The reply from Robertson basically stated that he was going to sell Lindows to a discriminated market, and that it would be impossible for people to confuse Windows with Lindows. However, not six months later was Lindows being sold at Wal-Mart, which in my personal and professional opinion is most certainly _not_ an outlet that sells to a discriminated audience. Not to mention later on WinE was removed from the distribution. That's a whole other story however. It just comes as no big shock that Robertson is playing games again later on.
I am a Lindows.com Insider. I have cut and pasted the post the President of Lindows.com made on our forums. Here it is:
We had contracted with one of the employees of Desktoplinux.org (they only have a couple) to pay them to help out with organizing A FEW PARTS of the summit. Without going into great detail, let's just say this relationship ended up being unworkable. Due, perhaps from some bad communication on our part, this person became upset with some of the decisions being made about the summit. (We wanted a consumer, media-friendly event, not a technical, developer's conference.) Based on early misunderstandings, this person unfortunately had made promises to vendors without our final approval and had promised speaking slots. When the agenda came up for final approval (the first time Michael or I even saw it), we made changes to make it have more of a mass-market slant. The changes we made put this person in an awkward position with some people. We told this person that we would take full responsibility for the misunderstandings and to blame us if anyone was disappointed.
In the end, it was simply a bad fit and this person was simply not the appropriate ambassador for the summit as we envisioned it. (It's hard to sell something you yourself don't believe in.) Therefore, we stopped contracting with this individual and used other people who LOVED the summit as we had planned it.
As for this notion of "vendor neutrality," Lindows.com was NOT in anyway trying to turn the Summit into a "Lindows.com Show." Anyone who attended Wineconf or an MP3 Summit (both events also sponsored by Michael) know he's not like that. One look at the agenda and it's pretty obvious this is a show about how COOL LINUX IS ON THE DESKTOP, not about Lindows.com. Besides, Linux is so much more than distros. It's about office suites (Sun), applications (Kompany), printers (HP), tablets (StepUp), Games (Transgaming), hardware (Microtel), and on and on... Lindows.com doesn't even compete with 95% of the vendors at the show. We DO plead guilty that we VERY MUCH were making sure the summit stayed a show with MASS MARKET appeal, but the notion that we wanted to turn it into a Lindows.com show is simply ridiculous. (Go view the wineconf or 4 years of mp3 summit videos to see for yourself.)
This is the sort of wacky "drama" that has plagued Linux for far too long and makes Microsoft laugh at Linux. Fortunately we, as we always do, will remain above this. The only reason I'm even making this post is because this thread asked for a response.
We'll have a packed house and it's going to be a great show. If you look at the agenda, you'll see it's the interesting, consumer-focused type of show Linux needs to start moving into the mainstream markets.
Kevin
I am a Lindows Member too... and here is some more information that was given after the post above:
r berianc ke s
Here's an update on the latest with the Summit...
As of this evening, the following changes have been confirmed to the Summit's sponsor/exhibitor list:
Deletions:
- HP
- Questnet
- the Kompany
Additions:
-Epson
-Earthlink
-Bitstream
-Ce
-CentralCommand
-Hancom
-GridIQ
-Brobe
-SpeakEasy
-MP3.com
-Photogenics
-GarageGam
As for the issue with the Keynote. Michael was ALWAYS slated to be the Keynote. It was this person from desktoplinux.org who promised it to Bruce Perens. (Michael and I had no idea about this!) It was NOT Michael who insisted HE be the Keynote speaker. That was ME! I have heard Michael speak on several occasions and I have also heard Bruce Perens. No offense to Bruce, but he's just not a very dynamic public speaker, ESPECIALLY for a consumer-type conference. As I have said, this summit is about the ability for Linux to move to the mass markets. I think everyone will agree, that is Michael Robertson's area of expertise, not Bruce's. I can't think of anyone who has championed the ideal of taking Linux to the masses more than Michael. He has the arrows in his back from the traditional Linux crowd to prove it! Bruce fired a few more in this week. =)
For the record, we offered Bruce the prime spot of closing the summit, but he said he didn't want to speak at all. That was his choice.
Michael Robertson was always the Keynote speaker at the annual MP3 Summit's, and did a great job. These summits were always very successful and no one ever accused MP3.com of not being fair to the many other vendors who attended the MP3 Summits.
Finally, of the 25 speakers suggested to us by the "panel," (Michael and I didn't even know there WAS such a panel!) we included 19.
As is obvious from the above changes, the show is only growing in status and support, not dwindling.
Kevin
Here is even more info from the thread listed above (from the Member's forum at Lindows):
Without naming names...two of the companies that pulled out sited the reason as being "We don't want to be on the same stage as our competitors."
Here was my response back to them (in italics)"
"I must say I don't understand the notion of not wanting to be in the same room with a 'competitor.' If I was given the opportunity to be on a panel with Microsoft, I'd jump at the chance. I certainly wouldn't turn my back and leave the spotlight all to them.
News Flash...you only have ONE competitor that matters...Microsoft. There are no spoils of war for beating anyone else."
The notion of not going to a trade show, say COMDEX for example, because you're competitors will be there is nonsense, and no way to run a business. The few companies that are pulling out are being replaced by companies who fully understand that to fight the largest corporation in the world, you better act like a professional business and not get caught up in petty, personal politics.
We have lots of exhibitors who WANT to be at this show. Who proactively are trying to make this show a success. I'm happy to see the ones pull out who were the same ones sitting back and saying, "What's this show going to do for me?" It's like when I use to book bands to play live. There were two kinds of bands. One kind would say, "How many people will be there waiting for me?" The other type would ask, "How big is the venue, because I have a lot of fans that I'll be bring along." Which band do you think I liked booking, and which do you think made for a better show?
Earthlink, Bitstream, Epson, etc. are EXCITED to be there. I'd rather they get more time and let those who don't get it pull out. Do you think Espon minds if HP pulls out? Epson gets it. If others don't, more power to those who do. We're not dragging anyone to this prom kicking and screaming. Fortunately, there are plenty of businesses who believe Linux is ready for the masses and are willingly coming to the dance.
Kevin
That only tells you who is going to go there and do that, and its a rather slow indication of the popularity of a distro because of how popularity takes hold. Also, some distros are going to have more zealots than others ("Everybody! Go to linuxcounter and prove to the world that our distro is the most popular!").
A faster indication is from distrowatch. The difference here is that the number of people INTERESTED in the distro determine the popularity.
Here's their actual stats (and though I hate to admit it, Lindows is holding strong at #9).
Mod me down and I will become more powerful than you can possibly imagine!
This is very interesting. Just yesterday Ira Flatow had both Bruce Perens and Michael Robertson on his show, Science Friday . Bruce is actually a pretty cool guy, I expected him to be more militant and opinionated for some reason. He kind of reminds me of Emo Phillips.
_ 011703.html
Bruce made a very artful dodge when asked whether Lindows was any good. He basically acknowledged that it was good to have another group working on making Linux better but he diplomatically avoided saying anything good about Lindows.
You can listen to the show in Real format here: http://www.sciencefriday.com/pages/2003/Jan/hour1
The ISO is not completely GPL. There are several non-GPL apps used in the base LindowsOS system. The installer is not GPL. Click-N-Run is not GPL. Some things were licensed from Xandros and future versions will include Bitstream fonts and other non-GPL items.
BTW, you can still purchase the download only version for $99 dollars. If you order the Lindows.com Full Click-N-Run Membership you can register using any computer and then download the ISO as part of the CNR membership.
Wrong answer, Mike. Politics be damned, this is all about philosophy.
This statement from Roberston is very revealing. It says (to me) that beancounters are beginning to invade the GNU/Linux movement. Props to Bruce Perens and HP for refusing to support the philosophy that equates GNU/Linux users to mindless consumers in the name of winning the desktop war.
Am I alone in my belief that the problem is uneducated, uninformed, apathetic computer users?
--K.
Sig: Bad people happen. Try to avoid being one of them.
The originals for those postings are here on Lindows.com's bulletin board. They come from Kevin Carmody, Lindows.com's president. That he wrote this stuff boggles my mind, but he wrote it.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.