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Talk With Michael Robertson
Lindows CEO Michael Robertson is vilified by many Linux advocates. At the same time, he is probably drawing more attention to desktop Linux than anyone else in the world. Is he evil? Or is he just a typical American businessman trying to make it big (for the second time; before Lindows, he founded -- and later sold -- MP3.com)? One thing is for sure: Unlike many CEOs, he'll give a plain-talk answer to a straight question. We'll send 10 of the highest-moderated questions submitted here by Slashdot readers to Robertson tomorrow, and run his answers, unedited, as soon as he gets them back to us.
This outta be fun.
Why not fork?
about first posts.
In you opinion, is the future of the linux Desktop based on KDE or Gnome? Any reason why Lindows chose KDE? What improvements in KDE would you like to see?
The war with islam is a war on the beast
The war on terror is a war for peace
If lindows takes over microsoft (hope they do) will you lock down Lindows like M$?
Mr. Robertson: your campaign seems to have the momentum of a runaway freight train. Why are you so unpopular?
Now that Linux can be run on an unmodified XBox, are you going to cough up the cash you promised?
Or are you going to wait until you can find a way to exploit the communities work for your own profit?
Questions:
Q. The main reason someone would buy LindowsOS is to run Click N Run. However, browsing through its aisles, we see some very old versions of the software presented there. Gnumeric and other apps haven't been updated for a year or so. Additionally, lately we don't see much new software on CnR. Any insight on that?
Q. Is work being done to unify the looks of KDE and Gnome? Also, the last time I checked, Lindows was only coming by default with Gnome/GTK+ of the 1.4 era. Any plans to upgrade?
so tell me why I should be interested in it rather than just making a dual boot Linux/Windows machine.
This Space Intentionally Left Blank
how can an OS completely dedicated to emulating another OS would ever be popular?
if copying Windows is your focus, isn't your OS already second-rate by design?
(-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
Love him or hate him, he's putting Linux in the news. Thats a Good Thing (tm).
I was able to install Redhat 9 on my parents computer this weekend because they started with conversation with "What's this Lindows thing?"
Unlike many CEOs, he'll give a plain-talk answer to a straight question.
Who wants to take bets that he'll give self-affirming, buzzword-laden, market-speak answers?
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Lindows has made many inroads to desktop acceptance, despite the gripes the open source community has had with the concept.
That said, where do you see a break even point for Lindows financially?
Also, what is the reasoning in not allowing binary downloads? I would never consider shelling our cash for a GPL based product I had never test driven.
What one thing do you think can happen to make Linux a more desirable desktop over microsoft right now? Is there one feature or item or event that would 'convince' everyone to give Linux a try (minus 'bomb Redmond')?
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
What package managing system do you feel is best for mass consumers? We all have issues with rpm, but it is fast. And source code (the livelyhood of Linux) is ideal, but slow to compile and it can be scary for people who never want to see a command line. Just curious.
- gentoo user
Hes done more for the community than IBM has. He personally funds alot of the Linux on the Desktop movement, while IBM is busy focused on business.
Honestly, I'd like to thank Michael Robertson for doing what hes doing, most people wouldnt give their own money to make Linux a success.
I dont see anyone else doing this. Millions of dollars to KDE, hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Xbox project, and many other things.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
So, this guy accomplishes what a lot of people have been talking about - the emphasis here is on TALKING - putting Linux on the desktop in a real way - it's selling at WAL-MART for God's Sake - this guy is BRILLIANT, and he is doing a lot for your cause. So don't sit back and impotently complain just because you're jealous.
my.mp3 was a great idea, and it should have survived in its earlier form
now it's just not the same to pay for everything, or to have most albums locked out
and it can't be grouped together with other p2p services like napster, kazaa, etc, because it wasn't really a useful tool for piracy
I remember a report that documented many of the security features that really helped to prevent piracy in the my.mp3 system
we know you aren't necessarily in the mp3 business currently, but do you have any plans or ideas to build a system like the old my.mp3?
I saw your article about Slashdot in Design News Magazine! Nice writup, buddy! They should've made a full article out of it instead of just the one small column, (although it DID even garner a mention on the front cover!)
(Design News, Volumn 58, 04/21/03)
What on earth convinced you to do this interview?
Not having viruses is one of the upsides of Linux. Why do you sell a virus scanner for linux. Shouldn't you be presenting the lack of viruses as one of the reasons to switch?
The war with islam is a war on the beast
The war on terror is a war for peace
Mr. Robertson,
What are your plans (if any) for helping support the rest of the linux community. If more contributions were made back to the OSS community, then I think people would come to respect Lindows much more. Of course, as a corporation, you are totally entitled to do what you want to do. But this is an area where many feel the best strategy is to not get ahead at the expense of others, but to extend a helping hand back to the community that gave you life.
Is this how Lindows is going to continue to work in the future? I think this is one "feature" of Win9x that would really be better to leave in the past.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
Why the hell could you not hold out on selling mp3.com another couple years and multiply your profit by God only knows how much?
What do you think of the situation going on in the Xfree86 development community? Will Lindows be able to compete with OSX anytime soon in terms of quality.
Lindows is good right now, but the quality is behind and that extra quality which OSX has, is exactly what Linux is missing. When Linux gets quality, eye candy, or whatever you call it, the masses will come along.
Games mostly work, Alot of the important applications work. All Lindows needs is to simply be better at first glance than Windows.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
How can a question like this be entered into rational discourse? You people have been playing too many computer role playing games. Here in real life the bar for "evil" lies a little higher: Charlie Manson, Tim McVeigh.
Get a grip.
If guns kill people, then CmdrTaco's keyboard misspells words.
How much thought and time did you put into the name "Lindows"? Seriously. Power to you and all that you're doing, but the lack of creativity in the name is blinding.
Marketing Linux to the mass market is a good thing. However it seems to me that the name you have chosen for the product is awkward at best and will only slow down potential adoption. Naming products is an important part of effective marketing, especially in the consumer market. Lindows sounds cheesy and is no longer relevant to the product since you switched emphasis from being a Linux/Windows combination. Have you considered changing the name?
Sailing over the event horizon
The best way to get anything to the public at large is to sell it at Walmart. Does Walmart have any plans to sell Lindows machines in stores, or will it stay on the website?
Is he evil? Or is he just a typical American businessman trying to make it big (for the second time; before Lindows, he founded -- and later sold -- MP3.com)?
I thought the typical American businessman trying to make it big was evil...?
Will Lindows be an open company? When can we buy stocks? and how are they doing?
These are some good questions, it would also be nice to have a clue on where they are going with this. Redhat has some projections on what their roadmap is. I know Michael Robertson has alot of money, but he doesnt have infinite money.
Also what about a cheaper subscription service for college students? Lindows college edition which instead of $99, is alot cheaper or maybe even free.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
> Or is he just a typical American businessman
> trying to make it big
Paranoia
will destroy ya
"We don't want to make money here or anything..."
Any suorce code yet? Is Lindows stealing from open source programers?
A virus is not necessarily something that gets into your system through an executable or through your email. Many rootkits are detectable through a good scanning application. Call it a virus-scanner if you will...
I would probably like having such an application in the hands of a newbie so that if his system gets rooted, it gets fixed eventually instead of becoming a permanent spam gateway.
Do you really hope to compete with Microsoft, or are you more interested in making money with pre-loaded systems sold via retail?
Personally, I cannot see how you could convince someone to forgo the next Windows release in favor of Lindows.
The early pitch for Lindows was it was the Linux distribution that would run the major Windows applications. Later you stopped marketing it this way and instead decided to emphasise Click'n'Run and ease of use.
Why the change? Were the technical problems associated with Wine too great to overcome? Was it fear of legal action from Microsoft?
I would have thought there was a large potential market for Lindows as originally conceived. Why move away from that vision to something much less clearly differentiated from other Linux distributions?
Sailing over the event horizon
Yeah file sharing within Lindows would be great if its built in, or even an mp3.com style setup.
Or maybe a Media warehouse, where you can have an mp3.com type setup.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
Dear Mr. Robertson,
Could you please update me on your efforts to patent your once-click-software-update solution?
If you are granted such a patent, do you plan on allowing the open source community free (beer/speech/both?) licensing?
"God is dead." - Frederik Nietzsche
How much would Bill have to pay you to get you to sell Lindows to him? I don't expect you to answer this question, but I am intriguied to know if offers have been made...
"If you're thinking what I'm thinking, you're right." -
Lindows is based off of the Debian code and uses apt-get to install software from the Click-n-Run repository.
What is in place to keep people from changing the apt-get sources from CnR to the Debian sources and install something like Synaptic (and getting newer, updated packages for free) instead of paying the $99/year (with a few execeptions)?
"Some things have to be believed to be seen." - Ralph Hodgson
Well, you probably shouldn't give an interview on slashdot, since it's "News for nerds" you know.
As far as I can see, Lindows is desgined
- for the people using windows right now, but can't afford the time to "learn linux".
- for those who haven't used a computer yet.
And not for people working within the shell all day, and just have X running because of the higher resolution in combination with eg. ratpoison or fluxbox.
The thing I hear over and over as to why people stick with Win-- is the relative lack of first run games. They're not talking about the free OSS games but rather major titles from the likes of EA and others. Is there anything you have up your sleeves to help convince these guys to port more games to Linux and I'm talking native ports, not WINE / WineX compatible ports. It seems that with the SDL toolkit, a lot of these DirectX games could be ported to Linux without a herculean effort. The world has changed significantly since Loki's stumble.
Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws-Plato
Lindows was statred with hopes to get big and blast in to the Lunix community with open arms.. for the majoirty of the first year or more not many give tehm any credit. Now Lidnows is signing contracts here or there, putting copies on cheap walmart PC's, and to themselves they are on top of the world right now. Lindows shuold be careful about stressing things when they are still "so new", as it could seriously proove bad later on.
Well I asked this question before but I think if you want to market Lindows, you need to give it away to college students who cannot afford to buy it anyway. How about you go on a sorta tour, where you go to college campuses, you show Lindows, and you give out free CDs. Go from College to College for about a year, get students using Lindows on their laptops instead of Windows, Apple does this kinda thing with their Ibooks.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/12/05/194223 6&mode=thread
They've been selling well for a while.
Is it a personality defect, or just skills you've never developed? If you don't have time to learn (e.g. read "Getting to Yes"), couldn't you hire somebody with those skills to help keep you from pissing off everybody who's ever tried to help you?
How wold you describe Windows emulation in Lindows today? What do you expect for it in a year or two? Do you still expect Windows support to be an important distinguishing feature for Lindows?
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Do you consider yourself the Ron Popeil of the computing world?
It seems to me that many Linux community members dislike you, but explaining why is difficult. I know it is not because of your success, albiet from the outside it may appear that way. Actually, we should like you. You have setup the prize money for hacking the x-box, you've allowed apt-get to work on lindows, and you have put Linux all over the headlines.
Unfortunately, people resent you for not providing a free download, and some hate the fact that your website is crawling with pictures of you.
Well, I went around my elbow to ask if you realize the linux community's distaste for you, and what you plan on doing to open up our hearts, minds, and wallets/purses?
In early marketing efforts Lindows focused on the ability to seamlessly run Windows application. Post launch product claims in this area are much more conservatively. When, if ever, will the majority of Windows applications run on Lindows?
How bitter were you that Jerry Seinfeld decided to not continue the show? Also, if I can ask a second question...Have you thought about bringing the Kramer character to Broadway?
I took down pictures of my kids when I got my litho of "The Kramer", but it was worth it.
Are there any stats on how many of the Lindows machines sold actually continue running Lindows? There must be quite a few people out there who wipe the drives cleans and either install Windows or another distribution.
Do you think the hostility toward Lindows that characterizes some members of the Linux "community" can be attributed to their desire that Linux remain a "geeks only" cult object?
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Are you evil?
Unlike mp3.com where you took over the domain of a new buzzword to cash in, with Lindows, you are trying to cash in the open source community without really following the rules of open source. Do you have a conscience at all? Do you feel that you are justified in exploiting hard-working people to make yourself money?
Linux is great, but nothing is perfect... what do you feel is linux's SINGLE greatest weakness at the present? (And no, I won't believe you if you answer "the fact that everybody isn't running Lindows").
While I commend your effort in providing a low-cost Windows alternative, I am dismayed by the fact that you seem to be using Linux as the base of your operating system, and yet fail to offer it open-source. Every time I read in the news about Lindows, I see that it is a "linux" operating system. Don't you think that you are manipulating the open-source popularity of the operating system so that you can sell your OS, but fail to offer it open-source?
Have you examined at all the possibility of porting Lindows to alternative hardware(ppc, m68k, x86-64) or are you very focused on the Windows market? Do you see any advantages to either staying focused on one platform or branching out?
You should use AdiumX on your Mac.
Hindsight being 20/20 and all, what would you have changed at MP3.com while you were there to have kept the balance between musicians and listeners while keeping the music industry lawyers off your back? Additionally, now that you've moved on and can see the game from the outside, what advice would you give MP3.com and companies of its ilk in the current climate?
Error: PANTS NOT FOUND. Press <F1> to continue.
You have been accused of ignoring the Linux "community." Is it that you ignore them, or do you just find that too often getting involved with the "community" results in silly debates, in-fighting, and isn't productive?
Mark
1) 99% of Microsoft's goodness is in its usability & design. What percentage of Lindows development budget goes toward usability? How high is usability on Lindows list of priorities?
2) 99% of teens' love the internet for 2 reasons, the first being free music, and the second being instant messaging. Is Lindows doing anything to ensure that it is a forerunner in this emergent mega-niche? (Microsoft is beta-testing 3Degrees, are you testing anything?)
3) A hefty percentage of computers enter households due to teen demands, and then the adults don't know how to use them. Plug N Play has helped this dramatically, but that's largely in the MS-world. For example, when I installed Lindows, my NIC was not identified, and I STILL can't get online without booting to WindowsXP. Does Lindows have plans to significantly increase it's Plug N Playability?
4) A huge Killer App on Windows is Outlook (even with all its bugs/base). Does Lindows plan to integrate the opensource Chandler into its package?
5) PVRs are increasingly popular. Has Lindows thought about selling a "Media Centre" version of its Wal-Mart Machines?
geeks are cats who dig a certain kind of cool
If I am a corporation wanting to standardize on a Linux desktop then I will want to make a bet on a company that has staying power. You abandoned mp3.com when it was clearly not going to make any money, what reason do I have for believing you will not to the same again?
Many commercial Linux distrobutions have tried to bridge the gap between Windows and Linux on the desktop. Several of those have had difficulties in creating a large user base and continuing support in the commercial world. What makes Lindows different from any distrobutions that have come before it (i.e. Mandrake), and how is Lindows able to make a transition from Windows to Linux for a user? The usage of the "Click-N-Run" system seems key, but is this _the_ key feature to bring users into the Linux world?
take off every sig for great justice
why use apt-get or clickNrun? What about using P2P instead?
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
.. And, if not, how on earth do you expect to be accepted into the Linux community?
Dude, I have no idea what you are talking about, but a virus could easily be written to hurt a linux box. The security feature is that users can't hurt other users, but say a virus got in roots acount, like a command "albiet not a virus" rm -rf / ...
Yeah virus or not it would screw up some serious stuff. Remember virus scanners are broad anyway, they check for back doors, worms,
What do you think?
Have the folks at Lindows taken any interest in selling its Wal-Mart machines with native Linux game ports, such as those from LGP and sold by TuxGames?
How then do you see lindows competing with windows. Is it purely going to be on price or do you feel other things might be used to win the non-linux fans over to youre distro?
Are there any results available on customer satisfaction? MS has reasoned that computers sold without one their OSes preinstalled would instead be loaded with pirated versions. Have you got any figures available that could help to dispute this?
Good luck in court, hope you succeed where most others have failed.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Thank you for that display of geek bigotry.
Stick to machines, OK?
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
I remember Lindows being heralded as a Linux distribution that could run Windows applications out of the box. Since then, I believe any attempts at doing this have been removed. Perhaps I am incorrect, but I imagine this is a widely held misconception. Is the commercial version of Lindows bundled with CodeWeavers CrossOver Office/Plugin? If not, what's the point of the Lindows moniker? I've definitely found RedHat 9 to be a much more up-to-date/mature desktop distro, so where is the Lindows edge? Why not make some licensing deals so that out of the box, users can at least runs some of the basics?
Join Tor today!
If Lindows is cheaper and of better quality, people will use it.
If Lindows is higher quality and cheaper than Windows2003, people will choose Lindows.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
If you could take one of these beautiful ladies home
- Trinity
- Sculley
- Persephone
- Mary Jane
Who would it be? How would you go about introducing yourself, and more importantly, would you show them your collection of "miniatures" ?
heh heh... that's funny.
That's Michael Richards, of course.
je ne suis pas un fou
When you started, you put a lot of effort into Wine, sponsoring things like WineConf. That didn't work out, but Wine improves constantly, as the latest releases of CrossOver and WineX show. Do you think you'll ever return to it someday, or are you disillusioned with the whole thing?
It's official the parent poster is dying. Yet another crippling bombshell hit the parent poster today when it was announced that he/she was dying. Goodbye
Microtel and Lindows have put togther some great deals for Wal-mart.com; How are slaes going? Will the Microtel + Lindows PCs ever make it to Wal-Mart store shelves?
Karma: The shiznight, mostly because I am the Drizzle.
I'm a geek and I use LindowsOS every day as my desktop OS. I find it to be a fantastic product (anytime I show it to my fellow geeks, they are always amazed at how good it is). My queston is, why do you think that the majority of the traditional Linux community has never even tried LindowsOS? I know your market is more the non-geek crowd, but I'm a geek and I love it too!
Dean Franks
I'd love to see him have to answer this one. :-)
Norris/Palin 2012
Fact: We deserve leaders who can kick your ass and field dress your carcass.
Since the Lindows PCs have been selling for a while, your marketing and customer service folks must have gotten some kind of feedback from current or prospective users.
What are the things people ask for? What are some things general users would like to see in Lindows or Linux-based desktop distributions that aren't there yet?
After you sell Lindows.com, what's your next idea?
According to my understanding, the source code to anything that's liscensed under the GPL must be available to the general public somehow (even if there is a fee for transferring it). Even though it is possible to gain access to Lindows binaries at this time, there is no way to gain access to the source of Lindows, at any price. How do you justify this?
Karma: Excellent (fuck, even in the future moderation doesn't work!)
There are three main ways to emulate another OS. The first (which is also the purest and the slowest) is to copy, function-for-function, the entire system.
The second method (which I believe WINE and Dosemu use, in part, as does freeVMS) is to map the functions to be emulated as directly as possible onto the underlying system.
The third method is used by some real-time versions of Linux, and involves running the emulator/OS as a user-level operation, rather than as a Kernel wrapper.
The first method guarantees every application, feature-for-feature, bug-for-bug, will run exactly as expected. The second method doesn't guarantee that undocumented or seriously abused system calls will work as expected. The third method has the potential for allowing really nasty things to happen to the user-layer OS, via other code running at the lower OS level.
On top of this, there is another choice that needed to be made. Vanilla Linux, Linux enhanced by a patchset, L4Linux (a microkernel), or one of the Real-Time Linux kernels. Yes, it makes a difference. Especially as to what functions Linux is providing and how closely Windows behaviour can be forced.
Finally, there's one other decision. What to do with all the system calls Linux provides and Windows doesn't/can't use? Leave them enabled, and have an "extended Windows" environment, or disable them in the hope of accelerating the Linux kernel?
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Why does XFree86 run default as root. Wouldn't it be more prudent to run it as a user account sudo'ing everything as necessary much as OSX does?
How do you feel when hearing about the behavior of companies like Mandrake begging for money and Can you rule out the possibility to act the same when your business might go the same way?
In case this question gets moderated high enough, I'd like to see an answer which covers the differences of software developlemnt models like debian or microsoft compared to this in-between thing of Mandrake.
- You approached Wal-Mart and convinced them to make business with you
- Wal-Mart contacted you because of...
- A third option, somewhere in the middle.
Of course, if you would be so kind as to mention some of the more (geekwise, of course) interesting arguments used in the deal, I think some of us could pay attentionFrom a totally different point of view, what is the most frequentype of problem asked to the lindows help desk ?
Does it reflects thet targeted user base, or are you only selling to geeks in search of a cheap secondary system ?
[Pruneau
What ever possesed you to put up the bounty on the Xbox Linux project?
You say things that offend me and I can deal with it. Can you?
I once worked at a doomed dotcom in London. Shortly before it went titsup, we had a visit from someone calling himself Delon Dotson. He claimed to have be co-founder of mp3.com and to have a patent on SSL. In fact, he claimed he received a royalty for every SSL transaction, to which we smiled superciliously and said we doubted it, as we used OpenSSL ;)
Cut a long story short, we sent him packing. So, was this bloke for real? Or just a figment of our fevered boom-era brains?
For a while, Lindows was only available preinstalled on some WAL*MART computers. Why did you use this distribution strategy? Were you afraid of hardware compatibility issues, or did you think that preinstalled Lindows would be easier to sell?
Karma: Excellent (fuck, even in the future moderation doesn't work!)
Won't you please come back and fix Mp3.com? It is badly broken.
Q: What changes would you like to see the Linux / Gnu community make to their source base? What changes would benefit the home desktop user the most? What changes would make your job as a suppiler of those home systems easier? (Actually, make that any Free Open Source Software organization, not just Gnu or the kernel folks.)
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
Score: 5
Original score: 1
Calling non-geeks "sheep": +1
Accusing users of ignorance of anything other than Windows: +1
Libertarian rant against government: +1
Completely unprovoked attack on SUV owners: +1
Good job!
A few years ago, I sent you a personal email. I had never provided that email address to your company in any other way except for in my email to you (which you answered). Immediately I started receiving daily mp3.com spams.
Do you think that with PressPlay, MusicNet et al. the digital music business is at the point where it should be? Is it heading in the right direction? Is that what you planned to eventually achieve with MP3.com?
Buy up the ogg.com domain, get into online music again,grab all the artists that left mp3.com, tie it in with Lindows and start a revolution.
On your web site, there's a recent "Michael's Minute" about Intel's failure to provide Linux drivers. This was picked up by everyone's favorite tech tabloid, and a few days later, Intel spokesman Scott McLaughlin was telling CNET that we expect complete Linux driver support for the Intel Centrino mobile technology.
E-mail to Intel support proved unhelpful -- they didn't seem to know anything about Scott McLaughlin's statements. Can you shed some light on this? Is the wireless chipset the primary concern here, or is even getting support for chipset features like DMA for IDE a problem? Have you (or anyone) asked Intel for specs so an open source driver can be written, or is the complaint a lack of drivers just given to us?
Also, is the binary vs. source issue important to you? Of course, it'd be nicest if Intel would produce good open source drivers, but failing that, would you prefer for Intel to release technical information and allow drivers to be written, or do you just want binaries that "go"?
I assume many people in your target audience are just looking to get on the web and write emails.
Many websites assume that people have internet explorer, and will not allow other browsers to enter the site. Also, there are many websites that try to use ActiveX and Windows Media Player.
Do you see this incompatibility as a significant problem facing the adoption of Lindows?
Regarding the original idea behind MP3.com versus todays announcement by Apple of their new 99cent per song service? Do you think this is a viable product in todays online environment?
All of the business world revolves around ideas, people generally build businesses around one or two of them. There are companies with good ideas that fail, there are companies with bad ideas that manage to survive. You have a fairly good success record with startups (MP3.com, now Lindows). What advice would you give to someone trying to start-up a company, in this post 9-11 economy? What, in your opinion, makes the difference between a sucessful and an unsucessful company? Any stories about investors that you can share? What do you think the biggest hurdle to starting a company is? Thanks!
We'll send 10 of the highest-moderated questions submitted here by Slashdot readers to Robertson tomorrow, and run his answers, unedited, as soon as he gets them back to us.
Umm... It may just me, but I never see any posts get rated higher than 5. Presumably, there will be more than ten questions rated at 5. How will you determine which ten of these you will send?
"I'm not impatient. I just hate waiting." - My Dad
In Cringeley's series Triumph of the Nerds, it was often shown that it was never the inventor of the technology, but the best exploiter, who was successful. As an artist on mp3.com, it felt as though that site was an attempt to exploit the mp3 phenomena, while Lindows now appears to be an attempt to exploit Linux.
In each case, do you feel you brought anything very new to the table, other than a centralized brand?
In light of the overall negative reception you and Lindows have had amongst the /. community to date would you take this opportunity to pledge your intent to be a reasonably good citizen of the open source community? Please elaborate to the extent and/or limit you view this responsibility.
When the king heard the words of the Book of the Law he tore his robes.2Kings22:11
Bzzt. Wrong. Nobody has ever given "millions of dollars to KDE". In fact IBM has certainly had more tangible contributions to the project.
I'm not anti-Lindows or anti-Michael, but this is a gross overstatement. To the best of my knowledge a few thousand dollars were given to the KDE League; this is a far cry from "millions". We of course appreciate the contribution, but it's important to keep things in perspective. KDE has never had a donation of anywhere close to a million dollars from any party.
(And yes, I am a KDE developer.)
Your question suggests an attitude of Linux is impervious to viruses. This thought is VERY common amongst Linux enthusiasts. However this thinking, that Linux is impervious to viruses, could very well be the biggest problem that Linux has ever seen.
The fact is that viruses come in many forms. The more common ones today are of the worm variety and they usually target Outlook because it is the most pervasive mail client out there. But, because Linux has not yet seen a powerful worm or virus does NOT mean that it is impervious to them.
As more and more functionality is added to Linux mail clients the risk of a worm increases. Further, the Linux community is starting to standardize on fewer clients. Right now it is likely that 90% of the Linux users are using one of three mail clients Kmail, Evolution, or Mozilla Mail. This means that there is an increasing number of users for each/any of these clients and as the number grows it increases the likelyhood that one will be targeted for a worm.
Another misconception is that Linux users are restricted to user space, meaning that a virus or worm would not have systemwide access(theoretically). But, plenty of damage could be done from user space alone.
Here is a worm concept that could do great damage to Linux: The worm would spread via email. It could be a complex ELF or a java script or even a BASH script. The subject would be something like "Hey I can't get this script to work, can you help me? What Linux junkie could pass that up? You know full well that most are likely to open it. Once opened it then runs mailing itself to all your Linux friends. It then deletes all your files; rm -rf * Sure this wouldn't hurt the system as a whole but, you would certainly be inconvenienced if you were to lose all your files, no? And all this from user space, no root required.
Now, I'm sure that there will be many responses to this post explaining why this couldn't possibly happen but, the fact is that it is only a matter of time before it does. Now think of how devastating it would be to Linux if the equivalent of Melissa or Slammer were to be unleased on all those systems NOT running antivirus software.
My point is that Linux users need to get beyond the thought that Linux is impervious to viruses and worms and they need to start using antivirus software. There are numerous ones available for Linux including packages from the big Windows antivirus vendors.
I must have posted the fact that a virus scanner is well nigh useless in Linux at least 10 times before they introduced it. It was still the most requested new app (beating out requests for a good html composer to compete with FrontPage or an easy to use GUI database front end like Access--my personal vote).
Also, if you read the page to which you link, you will notice that they spend as much time on talking about keeping from forwarding viruses (presumably bundled in with another email) as they do about protecting LindowsOS itself. I think that the phrase "to make sure your computer is ready for anything" pretty much sums up the Lindows.com attitude towards virus protection...
It's hard to educate people who don't want to be educated. It's easier to just sell them the product they want. Vexira works (it will happily scan your Fat32 drives for viruses as well). It's a real product, albeit unneeded for most. Also, the kind of people who don't understand why Linux is not as vulnerable as MS to viruses are the most likely to do something that will get past natural security precautions; in other words, launch an application they downloaded from a warez site as root. Maybe they do need an antivirus after all.
The competing commercial distributions, Xandros and Lycoris, are offering their products at a lower price and their systems rival Lindows in many ways. For example, Xandros' partnership with CodeWeavers allows them to fullful the promise of running Windows applications out-of-the-box for the same price as Lindows without the ability to run Windows applications. Lycoris' open development community, their software gallery, their comparable deal with WalMart, and rebranding of OpenOffice position them squarely against Lindows, but again at a lesser price. What are you doing to compete with these distributions? What types of partnerships are you leveraging to sustain or enhance your revenue model beyond unit sales and recurring Click-n-Run sales?
Mod parent down. This is a very very dumb question. "Linux is unhackable. Why not market this as an advantage instead of developing security tools?" Brilliant.
Where is WineX? Everyone knows that one of the big reasons people have to have Windows is because of gaming.
I think the slight licensing based costs would be covered up by the mass amount of users that would potentially switch because now their games work...
Don't really want to see it turn into the William Shatner interview, now, do we?
I've been swashdotted -- Elmer Fudd
He's from South Africa.
I very much welcome the promotion of Linux-preinstalled hardware by Linux Distros. This is vital, since most users don't want to install an OS (even when it has gotten incredibly easy to install Linux). They actually prefer a simpler solution: open the box, power on, surf the net. In particular, there is a great niche for affordable, Linux Laptops with no MS tax. Your Mobile PC looks promising, but it received some criticism for the use of a VIA processor, a low-power processor that is therefore considerably slower than an Intel/AMD processor of comparable clock speed. This is a valid option for people interested in long battery life. Nonetheless, there is a market for people who need more computing power. Are you working on a deal to sell a similar solution but with a more powerfull CPU ? Any other news in the hardware related arena that you could share with us ?
"Linux: Can't break it. Can't break in."
Oh wait. That didn't work out for Ellision either.
Note that he sold MP3.com and ran with the money while the workers got zilch for their years of hard work because their stock was below water. His "music locker" service (known internally as "da bomb") lost them half the companies value in lawsuits. He had no choice but to sell because the company was on the edge of bankruptcy and needed a cash infusion which nobody was going to give him unless they could get a real sweetheart deal. He took the rest of the cash with him to fund Lindows. I doubt he'll fare much better at Lindows.I kinda hope he proves me wrong, for Linux's sake.
Note that this is all first-hand information from personal experience. I used to work with Michael at MP3.com on the business side of things.
It might be /usr/share/lindowsagent instead of /usr/share/clicknrun.
Why did you choose to use Lindows instead of a more creative, catchy name? Was the name purely for attention? Everyone know that getting sued by Microsoft generates a lot of press...was this intentional, knowing that the case wouldn't hold up in a court?
"Some things have to be believed to be seen." - Ralph Hodgson
This is just wrong. Please don't waste a question on this. Do your research.
You don't understand the GPL, which says nothing about using the internet to distribute source code. Lindows.com is perfectly within the GPL - they distribute the source code to those that pay for the compiled binaries and choose to download it, which satisfies all the GPL requires. You just can't hold your source for ransom.
We don't need to bother Robertson with this crap, you can get the answers yourself at http://www.fsf.org/copyleft/copyleft.html or http://www.lindows.com.
What's a virii?
Come on, who would win the fight?
(highest modded is highest modded, right?)
This wasn't just plain terrible, this was fancy terrible. This was terrible with raisins in it. - Dorothy Parker
That's the only decent and honest question I've seen thus-far, why is it modded as flamebait? It's a genuine question that reflects robertson's standing in the community and I'd love to hear his answer. He's a grown man who's doing the interview of his own free-will, he's well aware of some of the reservations people have about him - so what's the need for kid-gloves here?
I keep hearing this issue over and over... It seems to me that the answer is obvious: at home, where all these lindows computers are running there is no administrator. What??? Crazy!!! No administrator... who would run as root to do crazy special things...? No folks there is not! Now I hear some /.ers streaming in the background Well I run Linux at home and I don't run as root, when I need to perform special voodoo magic I log into my box as root and then and only then do I run as root, so there HA! Well guess what you all too smart /.er you are an administrator! Yes that's right... Most folks have absolutely no idea what root is or what it does, and they don't want to know. They just want to click on install and as if by magic things start working. Now if you are smarter than the average snail you can create accounts on your Lindows box and only use root when you need to, but as we all know most computer users when enchanted by the glowing throb of a 60Hz screen loose all but the thinnest shred of intelligence and revert to a primal mix of fear and conquest. So the sad fact is that most of the world would simply run as root even if you set it to default to something else because then the computer would "work". I think to do things any other way would be to try and fit the user to the interface rather then the interface to the user which always turns out in a tangled mess.
If changing our world is playing God, it is just one more way in which God made us in His image. -Aubrey de Grey
What is your take on the whole Sco Unix lawsuit and how will it affect Lindows?
Why is it that a user can only buy Lindows for $119, yet it is much easier and cheaper to buy or download Linux and dual boot it with Windows? It seems that it is much quicker and easier (and so some whould say better) to just dual boot.
Also because of the closed nature of the distribution, many are now choosing to pirate Linodws in ways they do with Windows. For example just search around on P2P programs such as Kazaa, several links for Lindows appear? Surely the closed distribution nature is bound to lead to this?
Murphy's Law of Research: Enough research will tend to support your theory.
Why did Lindows choose to just tack .lindows and .cnr on the end of standard libraries names instead of just coming up with a whole seperate library for cnr and lindows and giving us legitimate versions of the libraries in question?
As a developer who doesn't want to pay for CNR it makes getting a -dev package really inconvenient.
Also, why did Lindows choose not to ship gcc as a standard component of the OS? Its the first Linux distro I've ever seen that didn't.
What happened to the Clicky developer competition? The page was last updated early last year, saying that winners will be announced in October. October 2002 has come and gone, and still there's been no news.
As a developer of one of the nominated applications (KFireSaver3D), I'd be interested to know what's going on, and why you havn't given any more information.
-- Wibble
The best bridge between brick and mortar and online I have ever seen was when mp3.com had partnered with online music sites that allowed you to purchase a CD and then listen to/download the MP3's from mp3.com while you were waiting for your purchase to arrive.
I thought it was a Win/Win situation -- the customer got the mp3's and the record company got a confirmed sale. Plus it was huge to me because I tend to be really impatient when I make a purchase, I want to enjoy in real time; rather than waiting for the UPS man or USPS. However, I don't think the RIAA was to keen on the idea and they (and their lawyers) made it go away. At least for me, that killed many future purchases.
My question is this: At the point of this service dying (the RIAA putting the stranglehold on a value added service that actually improved the movement of product) -- was there some sort of revelation that if this did not fly, then what would?
(+1 Funny) only if I laugh out loud.
In your opinion, why is it that the Linux hordes consider you the anti-Christ of Linux evangelism, and why do you think that we/they are wrong?
--FatTony
I've seen the machines at WalMartDotCom and I'm curious about how Lindows has approached the task of accumulating, testing, supplying and updating device drivers for users. Windows makes this comparatively easy for the novice user. What is the Lindows perspective on native driver support for the endless array of hardware (& peripheral) configurations upon which it could be run? Thank you, -- ninjagin
.. pa-ra-bo-la, pa-ra-bo-la, 2 pi R, 2 pi R, where's your latus rectum, where's your latus rectum, 2 pi R
MP3 was a great concept; and brilliantly carried out. However, the endgame (selling, or selling out, depending upon your point of view) is not what folks are hoping for with Lindows .
My question is this: Is Lindows a repeat of MP3.com, a hot button concept to be developed and 'flipped' through a sale to corporate America? Or, is it different this time? Are you taking this one to the mat, with your convictions strengthened by your experience and wealth?
Put another way; Do you have a number (that you would sell for)?
Any sleight-of-hand, sufficiently advanced, is indistinguishable from technology.
Lindows.com returns all its source code modifications now. They never get credit for this. The biggest area was the WINE project, but they also hire open source developers to make improvements they require in other packages as well (e.g. Everaldo did a new set of icons that will appear in LindowsOS 4.0).
It is impossible to "get ahead at the expense of others" with GPLed software (at least within the law). At worst, a company could bundle and sell a bunch of GPLed binaries without contributing improvements. However, they would have to make the source code available to those buyers who want it; plus, if they do make changes, they have to GPL the changes to the source code as well. That's the great strength of the GPL in the OSS movement, once something is in the GPL, no one can take derived work out (except an agreement among *all* the contributors to that work).
The other thing that a lot of people miss is that Lindows.com is providing what the Linux community has lacked: marketing and sales savvy. Traditionally, the Gnu/Linux community has been very developer/techie oriented. This is good; it is why I like Linux. However, developers and techies will always be only a small portion of the population.
I would like to be able to run Linux 100% of the time, but I can't. Why not? Because some of the games^H^H^H^H^Happlications that I run require MS. Why? Because MS has over 95% of the desktop consumer market. Would many of that 95% be perfectly content running a linux distro? Probably. Why don't they? Because Gnu/Linux is lacking some critical features that desktop consumers want.
What features do deskop consumers want that Gnu/Linux does not have? The most prominent is niceness. MS applications are nice to the point of being cloying (e.g. Office assistant--Hi, I'm a staple; look at me; aren't I cute? Ask me a question, so I can tell you ten things you don't want to know; maybe the eleventh will be what you want). LindowsOs is working on these kinds of features.
It all begins with the OS installer. LindowsOS asks a few simple questions and a few minutes later it's installed. I spent over an hour just configuring a Red Hat install last week (yes, I'm picky). Plus, LindowsOS comes with a nice limited default install. Basically, the only apps that come with the base install are the web browser, email, and networking.
Want additional apps? That's what their flagship product, Click-N-Run does. One can use a web interface to find the application desired and click the Install button. CNR downloads and installs the application without further intervention from the user. No compile from source worries.
Is this appropriate for everyone? No. The existing market for Gnu/Linux distros is primarily aimed at people who want to be able to compile from source (which one can still do in LindowsOS). However, the consumer desktop market does not want to know as much about their computer as one needs to know to compile from source. They want it to work like a VCR. Press the power button and it turns on. Press the internet button and you're browsing the web. Press the email button and you're reading email. That's the direction LindowsOS is going.
The problem is that this kind of intuitive simplicity is not really supported by OS developers. Why? Two reasons: one, they don't need it--if you know enough to write the app, you know enough not to need training wheels to run it; two, it's better for developers if the users have to learn how the app works well enough to add their own bug fixes--that's how open source works--one writes, many improve. Expecting the 95% of users who are not professional or amateur programmers to learn how to program just to run apps is unrealistic. It's easier for them to just pay MS or Lindows.com to do their thinking for them.
This is just the same as someone hiring a doctor to diagnose their illness or a lawyer to write their will. They train for ten years. We pay for one hour (at rates high enough to justi
This guy brought us the GLH hair spray/paint and the Pocket Fisherman among other gadgets. He's considered something of a snake oil salesman except that some of his products can be useful. In the 70's and 80's, his ads were everywhere and RONCO was somewhat a household name.
Lindows lacks euphony. I just don't like to here it. What do you say?
There has been a question about Lindows that has been nagging me for quite some time (other than: how did you get microsoft to piss off about the obvious Windows rip):
In your own opinion, what makes Lindows a superior linux distribution for the desktop over, say, RedHat, Debian, or SuSE?
-Kp2Sushi
Take the white suppository, and I'll show you how deep the rabbit hole goes...
Non of the free software / open source licences enforce a "payback" in any way to the software community, although it is the basis of our success. Specifically, what contributions have lindows made to make a _progress_ in the free software? What can we expect from a group that does only what is mandatory?
what is this etc. format?
nosig today
What feedback have you received from members of the general public who use Lindows? I would be interested to hear what the average person who bought a Lindows-loaded PC at Wal-mart and used it for a while had to say about it.
Does your company use Lindows for day-to-day (including non-technical) tasks?
OK, quick refresher on the GPL / SuSE / Lindows...
If you take software that is licensed under the GPL (such as the Linux kernel), and do anything to it that is not allowed under standard copyright law (such as modifying, redistributing, etc.), you MUST license the resulting code under the GPL as well.
The GPL requires that whoever you give binaries to (either through gift or sale), must also receive a written offer to procure the source from you for no more than the reasonable cost of distribution.
You do NOT have to make ISOs or binaries available for free to anyone off of the street, although many vendors choose to do this. SuSE is a notable exception. As a service to customers, and not because the GPL requires it, SuSE does allow people to download a "Live-ISO" that boots your computer and lets you run the SuSE distribution for that session.
I have purchased two SuSE cd-sets, one boxed at retail and another a set of burned discs from a reseller. In the second case the reseller purchased a boxed retail set, and then "invoked" the GPL to burn out and distribute a copy to me.
The GPL allows an exemption of sorts if you write code that merely links to GPL'd code, as opposed to being an integral part of the code itself. For example, YaST (Yet another Setup Tool) is what SuSE uses to handle package dependencies, hardware, etc. YaST is not GPL'd, although SuSE has made it free as in beer.
I believe Lindows links much of their code, as opposed to mingling it with the GPL'd base, which allows them to be a bit more proprietary than we would prefer.
Hope this makes some things a little clearer...
My legal education, in nifty podcast format
Will you hire me?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I am intrigued by the fact that you are pretty much the first company to attain any volume selling a desktop Linux distribution. My question is threefold:
:^)
1. What was the main reason for switching your marketing strategy from "Windows compatibility" to that of "click-n-run"? (It would seem consumers are more interested in a system that e.g. will run MS-Word than a system that offers Star/OpenOffice as an alternative).
2. Your company is pouring money into the open source community; do you spend less on development costs in this manner than, for example, the (presumably) in-house development of MP3.com?
3. In lieu of the above questions, do you see Lindows focusing on development of REAL Windows compatibility in the future? Is it a financially (and technically) viable option for Lindows?
On another note, I personally don't think that you're evil. You had nothing to do with Linuxgruven!! LOL
Why would Bill want to buy Lindows? He won't be able to stop desktop Linux by buying one company. There's also Xandros and Lycoris, and to a lesser extent Mandrake and Red Hat. He'd have to buy all those and more to stop even the existing players from selling desktop Linux.
Then there's ArkLinux, which is probably where the *real* future of Linux on the desktop lies. And it's an open source community project, so it can't be bought!
When Lindows started being bundled with cheap computers I was optimistic that this might happen -- but the reviews seem to agree that the hardware is underpowered and not very good quality.
Do you have any plans on offering higher-end computers (particularly higher quality), branded specifically for Lindows? Plans for branded peripherals that work seemlessly with that hardware? Computers that are aesthetically pleasing?
Lindows has often made me curious when browsing over the shelves of OS's, especially Click'n Run seems very nice, however I do not believe the click'n run advantage justifies the significantly higher price.
Q: Are you considering offering click'n run support for other Distributions, either as baseline supported RedHat packages or as a Lindows'ified packages in line with e.g. Ximian and Gnome.
A great thank you for your contribution so far
S. Nielsen
Many argue that Lindows has no real market. For example, Lindows hasn't caught up to Windows in terms of ease of use, wizards, and hardware support -- in addition to not supporting all Windows applications yet. Thus a Windows user has no use switching to Lindows. Furthermore, many Linux users choose Linux since they do not desire many properties of Windows -- many of which are being implemented into Lindows. How do you address this point? Do you really have a solid market?
Pankaj Arora
www.pankajarora.info
Linux has lacked support from the online merchants with regards to music download;s. Is Lindows pushing Ogg Vorbis to these merchants as a viable alternative to MP3's? And is Lindows supporting any decent player for Linux that can use online merchants such as e-music or others?
Thanks,
StarTux
One of the main desktop adoption barriers to Linux is gaming. Would it be harder to develop a openDX standard to rival DirectX or lobby MS to release the sourcecode so it can be ported to Linux/Mac.
Do you think MS would be against it or would they see the light at the end of the tunnel for MSGameStudios getting greater market penetration when their games can be ported to any PC or Console platform?
Wow. This is a really important tough question. Mod it up!
Do you realize that if Lindows is even semi-successful then is hit by massive exploits due to not being designed for security that it will give Linux a bad reputation? Secondly since you were sued by Microsoft for using part of the word 'windows' in your name (which of course should never have been granted trademark status) and the other half of the name is based on 'Linux' which is trademarked and is not a generic word, do you think Linus Torvalds might someday try to force you to change the name?
As you probably already know, many slashdot readers absolutely despise RedHat (sometimes referred to as 'AssHat') linux, due to its ethics, dominance of the market, et cetera. What's your stance on RedHat's behavoir?
Karma: Excellent (fuck, even in the future moderation doesn't work!)
I have been very frustrated because all of the music subscription services (listen.com, etc.) only support Windows. Do you think there will be a music subscription service that will work on Linux? With Real just having bought listen.com and since there is a RealPlayer for Linux, do you think they will get listen.com to work on Linux?
Also, I was in the office supply store a couple of days ago looking at all of the different forms (business cards, cd lables, bumper stickers, etc.) which come with Windows/Mac? software. I don't know if Star/OpenOffice has templates for any/some of these. But I was thinking how nice it would be if Linux software was also included on the Windows/Mac CD. Do you see a day when Avery et. al. will include Linux software as well?
Mod This Brotha Up!!!
Hello Michael,
Is there any chance that Lindows will join the Destop Linux Consortium? Has there been any contact between Lindows and this group at all?
I realize that part of the reason the group formed was some due to dissatisfaction over how the Desktop Linux Summit was managed by Lindows, but I do hope that the group would be willing to accept Lindows as a member. Your Desktop Linux Summit really did spark interest in Linux on the Desktop - enough so that these compaines felt that it was time to form a group to take advantage of this interest. I think that it was really great that Lindows took the initiative and put some money into a conference like this, and I really hope that you can work with other vendors to help spur interest in Linux on the Desktop even further (without having to fund most of it by yourselves!).
Oh, by the way, thanks for sponsoring www.kde-look.org.
Financial software seems to be a weak link in the Linux native application chain. What is your plan for home financial management, individual income tax (i.e. http://www.linuxtax.com/ Practical Tax) and ultimately business accounting software?
Linux is much more than an alternative...
What's the long term and short term forecast for your company?
-- $G
What is in place to keep people from changing the apt-get sources from CnR to the Debian sources
Some Debianers investigated this, and the answer is: absolutely nothing. Nor (last we heard) were there any plans to implement anything to prevent this. Use of the Click-n-Run is entirely voluntary; the assumption seems to be that most (or at least, enough) people will be willing to pay for professional support, rather than take their chances with the often newbie-hostile volunteer army that is Debian. Speaking as a Debian developer myself, that seems like a reasonable bet.
I know a number of people that have bootstrapped themselves into running Debian by starting with Lindows. It is (or was) even easier than bootstrapping yourself into Debian from Knoppix. For those who want to try Debian, but are intimidated by the installer, Lindows seems to be a perfectly reasonable starting place.
On "Ask Michael" you say:
However the most recent Lindows patch dates back to about a year ago (2002/05/07) and only 5 patches were ever submitted by Lindows (the MS Office work was submitted to Wine independently from Lindows).
So what areas are you working on, and when do you plan to contribute that work back to the Wine/Rewind community? How many people do you have working on it? Is your work based on Wine or Rewind? If you sub-contracted that work to another company, do they have your authorisation to return their work to the Wine/Rewind community? If yes, what are their recent contributions?
Very few of them actually linux viruses (or even understand ELF). They are designed to find windows or mac viruses in files, assuming the server houses a hosted file system, database blobs, mail spool, ftp site w/upload, etc.
This is why you can get McAfee for Sun Solaris, you use the same virus signature files you do for the PC version as you would for the Sun installation.
I guess if Linux viruses started popping up more frequently (or Solaris viruses) then those signatures might start appearing in the dats. But right now, that's fringe stuff. (Supposedly the DATs will flag files on unix system that match a few known unix virus/worms, but I'm not sure about that)
Fuck Beta. Fuck Dice
In the past year, lindows has seemed to lost its support from developers and advocates because of its business practices (taking over the desktop linux summit) and technical practices (running the desktop as root i believe was an issue). Although Xbox Linux Project was hugely popular and successful, it only seemed to put the spotlight on you, not your projects. Besides cash prizes, what kind of incentives or strategies are you planning to regain the, in my opinion, much needed OSS developers and their talents.
Do you believe that Lindows may regain some respect by hiring top linux kernel developers, like Redhat has? (One could state that this has allowed them to dodge heat for their business practices)
forget it.
Lindows' $99 could be a barrier for Windows users wanting to experiment with Linux. Also, from what i've read, out of the box Lindows comes with very few programs making Click and Run sign-up practically a necessity for the novice user.
My question is: Have you ever considered selling the product very cheaply (say, $20) and making the profit off Click and Run subscriptions?
Do people ask you this question often? Please note, I didn't ask "Are you are AN American"...a few of your actions make us think otherwise:
1. You are one of the very few, if not the only one, to actually take on Microsoft, in their own game. Surprisingly, you have enjoyed a lot of success.
2. You have exposed Intel and their designs (pun intended) with the Centrino. OSF, EFF or FSF just kept quiet about this.
3. You built MP3.com, and quite successully - and MP3 is not an officially blessed standard.
In short, most of us think about you as a non-conformist, and indeed, a revolutionary. My more serious question to you is this:
Of late, no one in the computing industry is willing to champion the cause of Open Source, or even Linux. Even IBM is quite ambivalent, what with their alliance with the Trustworthy Computing Group. HP, despite taking over Compaq, is losing out to Dell - probably due to Dell's closer equations with MS. Intel has recently squared off with Via, who will stop making pin-compatible CPUs - vital for Linux and low-cost chips. AMD's Linux efforts are nothing big to speak of. Even Mr.Linus Torvalds seems unsure what his stance towards DRM should be.
This being the scenario, would you:
1. Expand your operations to the global markets (Europe, China, India for instance) rather than be just US-centric? 'Cos of the image you've built up, you could be quite successful if you did.
2. Help build an Intel PIII equivalent CPU (and open-source the design,as well)! - this could be more crucial than Lindows, for the desktop.
3. Tie up with big name vendors - presently HP gives us RedHat and Mandrake, no Lindows. Can you simplify the whole desktop market and standardize with about 3 models, like Apple - standard, professional and premium say.
Thanks for your time.
If you keep throwing chairs, one day you'll break windows....
Lindows.com keeps a database of all the Debian GNU/Linux software packages that I have installed using their proprietary installer, Click-N-Run. This database includes my email address, street address, real name and credit card number. Will Lindows.com 'share' this information with their business partners or will it remain private? For many years I have used Microsoft Windows 95/98/Me and choosen not to register any software. Therefore, Microsoft has no database on me. Would Lindows.com consider offering a method of purchasing and using their software anonymously? Tomy
I believe RedHat came close, but it's Linux is marketed as a Business (e.g NT) distro
Mandrake might of tried doing the same thing, but when it supposedly did, some of them didn't have successors
SuSE came close
Of course, you can build the same thing yourself, but it's true that customers don't want to recompile their kernels. I.E for a "Pro" workstation, you can leave all the PAM_* modules, but for the "Home" one, you only have PAM_Unix.
You can't really stop people from recompiling their kernels and whatever, but you don't really want to compile a distro with stuff that a novice with never seem to use. E.g, you would want to put WineX in a novice/home distro, since there is a big amount of games that would be played.
What is your take on this issue. Will any Linux company ever try this approach?
Are you concerned that a lot of these are going to be treated as inexpensive "naked PCs", i.e. they'll be reformatted the moment they're plugged in, and loaded with a pirate version of Windows?
When I am king, you will be first against the wall.
There is a lot of effort in LindowsOS to make things just work, but how much effort is being made to make problems easier to work around when things don't go according to plan?
Later, Seeker
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
Fuck you moderators. Keep wasting your points, I'm going to keep calling attention to this important post because the people need to know. So just fuck off.
How many copies of the packaged Lindows software have been sold at Fry's Electronics?
How many paid subscribers does Lindows have to date?
What is the run rate for subscribers on a month by month basis?
When will Lindows be profitable?
You say your main goal (after you gave up on WINE) was to be an operating system for beginners. As a beginner Linux and Lindows user, I find Lindows fairly difficult to use. Your opperating system only supports Debian packages and the command line must be used for many things. Lindows is even missing many file associations, so I was unable to use many file formats until I figured out how to change that. Since KDE was used (unchanged), I have to go into the console for some of the most mundane tasks. You don't have any click-n-run apps for things like switching to GNOME (which I've been trying for a long time to do) yet you have some aplications that are dependant on gnome (like a Google search tool for GNOME only). How do you explain all of this?
I think Lindows Has A Chance, but this issue needs to be addressed.
Q: When Lindows was first advertised, it was billed as being fully Windows compatible, or close to it. Yet, fast forward to today and we find no more mention of Windows compatibility, nor does Lindows have higher Windows compatibility than Wine. What happened?
While evaluating a version of Lindows I was shocked to learn that the user runs as root. This fact alone was so egregious that I opted immediately to discontinue further evaluation. Are you developing any plausable scenarios where this could be circumvented? Don't you feel that this particular decision (to allow the default user to run as root) was/is copying the worst possible facets of implementation?
What is the reasoning behind setting up Lindows to operate only under the 'root' account. Since this is highly discouraged due to a much increased security risk, isn't Lindows kind of falling into the same security trap MS fell into when trying to create an OS that was user friendly? I am not a Linux guru, but I know not to run it in 'root'!
The other name you had in mind for it was "Windux", right?
"GNU's not Unix....it's Linux" / Kami "kokamomi" Petersen
First and foremost is price, which Lindows has already mastered and Apple failed so badly it hurts to watch. Second is games. You're Joe Average, if you had as much money as you needed to buy any desktop system you wanted what separates a PC from a Mac from a Linux desktop? This being a guy who doesn't know the difference between a Compaq and a real computer, available games are the only thing a guy shopping for a computer at Best Buy (shiver) is going to notice a difference in. Apple lost this race as well because they've established themselves in a non-gamer market (read: uppity Mac users who think that Photoshop performance is the ultimate benchmark of a desktop machine). What are you going to do to get real games on Lindows (like Splinter Cell or Grand Theft Auto 3, not some crappy tetris clone)?
I've got Lindows on one of my systems here at home. Being sheltered in the shadow of Redmond for most of my life, I grew up on Windows machines and the feel of Lindows allowed me to move into a Linux based system without much effort. I watched as a friend pulled his hair out for three days while trying to get his Linux install working. His wife wanted to email her mom, the kid was fussing about not being able to play his games (6 years old) He was determined to make it work, but being a Windows person for years he was in the same boat as I, some things just didn't make sense. When I told him I did the whole install of Lindows in 17 minutes and was surfing the net on it, that was all it took to get him to go for it. It took longer to download than it did to install.
The way I describe it, Lindows is Linux for Windows users.
Q) Michael, have you thought of putting together a new Lindows distro to replace Windows NT4/2K/XP/2003 web/database servers?
It would need to have the bare essentials (no need to run Windows programs). Kernel, boot loader, Apache, PHP, MySQL and a minimalistic X-Windows to consume as little memory as possible. A MySQL GUI program and an HTML/PHP editor like Quanta, Bluefish or Screem would be a good idea too.
Businesses are paying far too much for Windows and the client licences, and the same for SQL server. In an IT industry where budgets are low, would such a web server be viable, considering all the business needs to pay for is the hardware, and a nominal $X for Lindows WebSQL Edition? Do you think that Lindows could take on this untouched market and win?
Mike