Microsoft Proclaims Death of Free Software Model

geoff313 writes " As previously mentioned here, Microsoft's new wave of FUD has begun to arrive. This time it is courtesy of Bradley Tipp, Microsoft's UK national systems engineer, who spoke at the Microsoft IT Forum in Copenhagen. In this article from ZDNet UK, he is quoted as saying that 'Linux is great' and 'there are a lot of things we should learn from open source' but then is quick to point out that 'We haven't talked to a single user who has said they're using [open source] because it's better.' Another Microsoft employee was quoted as saying 'At least if Linux takes off, their viruses will propagate and we won't be seen as the bad guys any more.' I for one am happy to see that they are taking their new interest in security seriously, and I'm sure you all are too. Most interesting is the assertion that the decision by Red Hat to end support for its free distribution and Novell's aquisition of SUSE marks not only the death of free software, but actually is a validation of Microsoft's business model. Does anyone besides Microsoft see these events as the end of Free software?" I use Free software because it's better; they just didn't ask.

Comments

Re:Bull.

[Christianfreak]

You can always tell the average age of people on Slashdot when the concern is wheither or not Linux is better than XP and has a bunch of games. For the record I think that Linux is much simplier to use after you learn it and many of the distros have the same nifty little configuration tools that you can find in Windows. And don't get me started on the number of times I've tried to do some simple thing in Windows XP only to get lost in config "wizard" hell. Win2k isn't nearly as bad about it. XP is a step backward.

More on Topic: What MS is most worried about is servers. They aren't gaining much ground in that area and Linux is poised to become the dominent player in that area. So MS does what they do best, the spread FUD, in hopes that some PHBs will get scared and stop considering Linux for deployment.

MS also knows that Corporate embracement of Linux is good for it (and thus bad for them). RedHat is focusing large companies who want top-level support. There isn't anything at all wrong with that as so go the bigger companies the smaller ones follow, until eventually you start seeing it on people's desktops.

FUD isn't making Linux or free software go away anytime soon.