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The Riches of Open Source
Daniel Dvorkin writes "This BusinessWeek article argues convincingly that Linus Torvalds has more resources at his disposal than Bill Gates. Not only is it a nice overview of Why Open Source Really Matters pitched to a non-technical audience, but it makes a solid argument in favor of OSS in general and Linux in particular, from a solidly capitalist perspective."
Linus Torvalds is not the only one with more resources because of the open source community. Everyone, including Bill Gates, has more resources at their disposal, because of the open source community. We have improved knowledge on all fronts, due to the hobbying of business, as seen from the Open Source community. Hobbies that become replacements for standards, cause positive growth, and better solutions. I think it's because of the love and passion that everyone puts into their hobbies, in hope that they can get somewhere other folks haven't been before. It's like a kind of space exploration, but with the benefit that you can do it in your own basement or home office, den, on a plane or anywhere for that matter. PHP is a great example of how good application of Open Source can make for a much easier and better tool than other, less loved products like ASP.
:)
How many people love ASP? I'm guessing not as many as those who really do love PHP or Perl.
You see that because we can all work together to make our products better, the global knowledge is shared and improved upon. Years ago, way before computers, we all had a similar thing to open source. It was called learning and we all did it together. Scholars spent their lives enriching the world with their findings, to better humanity.
Open source is in this same spirit, for mutual benefit based on recognition of participation, not branding, per se. Microsoft spends millions on branding, on marketing, packaging and distrobution. They could easily make loads more money if they focused instead on a model closer to the Open Source model. Who knows, maybe they are counting on it in the future, but likely they are not. Likely Microsoft is going to keep selling us the same regurgitated products they do every year, with new packaging and more "updates". I for one, will keep supporting Open Office.
I'm sure that Linus has more friends than Bill Gates anyway.
Bill Gates has to pay people to work for him. Linus does not. Advantage: Linus.
It's a commonly repeated manta that you can't understand something until you have broken it. The BusinessWeek article suggests that frequently being able to apply this principle to Linux is what moves it forwards.
I disagree. On that basis Outlook Express would be the best e-mail client on the planet. Hell, the thing's been broken for over a decade now.
Beep beep.
The open source community is, according to the article, "a vast flock of very creative, un-sheeplike sheep".
;-)
I have little to add to that... it's just a great line. Beware of getting fleeced by SCO.
Vanya's Law: "In any culture without irony, fart jokes will be the highest form of humor."
But there is a huge difference.
Linus can ASK the world to do something, but if they don't like the way he's thinking, they won't do it. Linus controls the world as long as the world likes the orders. So in a sense he's just a way to focus the desires of the majority of developers.
Gates on the other hand can ORDER everyone in his employ to jump around and shout "I'm a little idiot!" and they'll have to do it wether they like it or not. Thats a huge difference. Gates has the world as his playground.
Google Toolbar is SPYWARE!
...is that open source software, assuming it can weather legal and business challenges (**cough**SCO?**cough**), will always have an army of part time coders and testers that will work out holes, plug leaks and innovate products. However, I think the challenge for open source is that often times several different groups are writing competing code for competing projects will little consideration of the massive duplication (witness many distributions of Linux, many of which are functionally identical) in efforts. The successful projects in the open source world are projects that can agree on standards, organize factions of programmers, and distribute to a wide audience.
Interesting article (yes, I read it), but one thing I don't understand. The author states early on that "Both men must find ways to motivate people to work together so knowledge can spread and have maximum impact on improving software quality."
I don't see Linus doing that kind of thing. Does he, personally, motivate a damn thing? It's not like I studied the history of this "movement", but didn't he basically just toss the infant OS out there for whomever to use in whatever way?
Maybe I'm reading too much into it...
The community of Linux users and developers is held together by pride and the thrill of working toward a common goal of a universal (...) alternative to Windows Hmm... I thought that a lot of people were contributing to Linux simply because they like the idea of an open source OS, and believe that it is the best way to produce software... irrespective of wethere or not it's going to be an "alternative" to windows. Not everybody who uses/contributes to Linux does so out of a burning desire to compete with windows.
One example. Microsoft notepad. Ever try really use that for things ? Word wrapping INSERTS CARRIAGE RETURNS instead of making it simply looked wrapped like any other editor I have ever used. Change window shape -> gets messed up. Microsoft isnt that incompetent. Its by design. I BET this was to get people to use word .doc files for even the simplest things to lock people into word. Most people wont go search for another text editor. That is what the profit motive got us there.
If this is true then one must wonder why Linus doesn't utilize more of these available resources. Why does he instead have a relatively small group of hackers working on only a kernel? Why, with all his resources, is he not developing, embracing and extending a plethora of other operating system components and applications?
The fact is that while open source does offer the potential of having a very vast number of developers owrking on a project or multiple projects, the reality is that few developers actually participate. Combine this with the fact that they are driven to participate based on their interest or itch and we end up with a fine kernel, a few great apps and an abundance of mp3 players.
The potential is there for Linus to have more resources than Bill Gates but, the reality is that Linus has no where near the resources of Bill Gates.
The altruism of open source is very noble. What will put the fire in the belly of Linux's white knights if they win their crusade and Microsoft does crumble?
When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.
Our PC GOD Torvalds, which art in Transmeta^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H OSDL
Hallowed be thy skillz
Thy kernel comes, in the US and all the earth
Give us this day our daily updates.
And forgive us our holes, as we apply thine patch.
And lead us not into closed source, but deliver us from Microsoft.
For thine is the kernel, the skillz, and the leetness for ever and ever. Amen.
Things you think are in the Constitution, but are not.
Linus also has more ability to actually use his resources. He's not spending time with folks like Warren Buffet playing bridge-he's focused on technical issues. Linus may have a few "yes men" around distorting his perception, but nothing like Bill Gates.
The kind of extreme wealth Bill Gates has also brings some serious hassles. Gates can't travel anyplace without security measures--and even with those security measures, a suicide bomber in a station wagon full of fertilizer and diesel fuel could take him out at any time. Anyone that has to think about this sort of stuff-or hire people to think about this sort of stuff has a problem.
Gates, to his credit, at least seems to have some old friends(some prominent Silicon Valley executives don't). Still, I honestly suspect that if money were suddenly worthless (say due to a major economic collapse or EMP of the financial system), Linus would be in a much stronger position than Gates.
Though not necessarily intentionally.
Like Taoist philosophy.. a great leader leads without leading, a great ruler rules without ruling...
Linus does not necessarily view himself as a manager or leader, but he IS ONE, regardless, and a very highly successful one at that.
The OSS movement focuses on Linus as a centerpiece, a leader, whether he wants them to or not... When Linus speaks, people listen.. and very few actually disagree with him, at least openly.
Anti-Linux peple will say "Oh, you have this one guy who runs the kernel like a tyrant.. what if what he does doesn't match up with what big business wants?".. well, he's been doing alright for a decade, regardless of what his motives are, you can't argue that.
that's more than we can say for a great many guys with MBAs running billion dollar companies.
Linus coordinates more people in a really loose environment, and produces a heck of a product... go figure.
Yes, I realize it's not all his grand plan, but he is the focal point, the leader.
From the article: On the surface, Linus vs. Bill seems to be the ultimate David vs. Goliath contest.
I'm pretty sure that, by definition, the ultimate David vs. Goliath contest was in fact: David vs. Goliath.
Otherwise they'd be called "Linus vs. Bill" contests now wouldn't they?
Dewey, you fool! Your decimal system has played right into my hands!
Talking to students at university and meeting folks in technology in general, I've really started to notice a braindrain away from Microsoft products. I'm really not trying to flamebait, but it seems that people who are really into computer science and doing innovative things with computers are staying away from Microsoft products in droves.
.NET developers and those who were not (usually Java guys). The personality difference was startling. Has anyone else ever had to compare MS and non-MS people side by side? I'm serious, the non MS people seemed more creative, inventive and - well - smart. Meanwhile the MS .NET people seemed more like, I hate to say this,managers? If you are in a corporate environment and need to do everything the MS way - the whole "managerial" vibe is a positive trait. You need someone to impliment MS solutions, not create solutions. But the huge side-effect IMHO is that all the smart people doing cool stuff are running as fast as they can away from MS.
I also mention this because we were looking at hiring Jr. developers and kept observing a incredibly different mindset between those who were
I think this impacts MS future big-time. Has anyone else had this experience or read an article about this?
-_-
Linus has a worldwide army of voluteer and hobbyist developers, testers, etc. Bill has the employees at Microsoft.
But MS also has a worldwide army of volunteer and hobbyist developers, building tools and solutions with MS products. Some good, some not so good.
MS also has many, many manufacturers tripping all over themselves building and testing hardware drivers for their products.
Wrong. Torvalds is not counting on the marketplace's judegement of anything. In every interview he plainly states that he has no market-driven or competetive goals whatsoever. He simply wants to make Linux improve over time for whoever chooses to use it, whether that is ten people or a billion.
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
Do you honestly believe that? Look, I would LOVE to see MS adopt a more open model, but that is because I know how much it would benefit me, and the rest of the tech community, not because I believe for a minute that it would actually be better for Microsoft. Do you really think they would have 90% market share with open source products? Of course not. They got where they are by not sharing the pie with anyone. If they opened up, others would take what they have done and run with it. People would release 100% compatible versions of Windows, Office, IIS, etc that were more secure with less bug fixes, and Microsoft would have to work harder, spend more money in development and QA, and still end up with less of the market, thus less money. For that matter why would anyone buy XP if Windows NT 4 was still under active development by an open source community that made it just as modern and up to date? Would all this be good for the rest of the world? Yes. Would it make MS "loads more money"? Absolutely not.
SCO.com uses Linux
Good article overall, in fact pretty damn amazing coming from mainstream press. But I did notice one disturbing thing:
And while Torvalds and Linux have recently faced legal issues about whether Linux might have some proprietary code embedded in it, that distraction is dwarfed by the time and energy Gates has devoted to battling the U.S. Justice Dept.
Now, all of us here are aware that the 2 cases are pretty much polar opposites. The former is the little guy being picked on by a big, greedy coporation. The latter is the little guys (us, represented by the govenment) picking on the big, greedy coporation.
Most of the non-tech people I know are aware that MS's name had been dragged through the mud as a result of the DOJ case, and have a lot less respect for MS now that the law has found them guilty. Regardless of the merits of the case, or the result, the fact is the general public often thinks of MS as the bad guys simply because of a court decision.
I really, really hope this doesn't happen to Linux, but articles that even mention the 2 situations in the same paragraph (without explanation) blur the issue. How long until my Mom asks me about Linux, the "Operating System written by thieves"?
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
-The most obvious one: If Linux has so many more resources, than why doesn't it have all the features of Windows already? Flame me all you want, but it doesn't.
-Even though Linus has "the millions who use Linux and continue to tinker with it", in reality there are very few contributors (definitely not millions). Windows also has a larger installed base and thus a larger possible base of testers. How does that factor in?
-It neglects the fact that Linus's disadvantage solely as a gatekeeper, instead of director, is that unpopular, tedious, but necessary work might never get done. One advantage of motivating with money is that you can force people to do work they might not otherwise elect to do. I mean, how many MP3 players does Linux need?
-I don't think BillG has any trouble sleeping at night. Linux might be a threat to his company, but it's not going to make him a lowly multimillionaire any time soon.
What a bunch of cheerleading.
I know you're joking, but I have to give Bill Gates some credit. If I was obscenely wealthy like that, I don't think I would be ABLE to stop myself from buying a laser cannon.
It would be like you or me buying a Snickers.
You are such a tool
Why don't you open your eyes. Get a new perspective of what's really going on
After some comments a week or so ago about Stallman not being a good public speaker, I decided to listen to his speeches and hear for myself. I admit that I too have had a sort of "get over yourself" attitude about him - but I'm realizing as I listen to what he has to say, that I developed this by listening to others who have that attitude, rather than listening to RMS. I won't say I don't have any of that attitude left, but I will say that I think he raises some very provacative issues in his speeches. When he talks about the history of the project, I can also understand why he desires some credit for his and his group's efforts. He did afterall, quit a nice cushy job on principle - I've never done that, I think most people haven't. I respect that "put your money where your mouth is" level of conviction.
Anyway, I don't know that I concurr with all he says, but I do have a lot more respect for him after listening to his talks for a few hours. And incidently, while he may not sparkle like a movie star, his presentations are good. And that is how it should be - they are informative works rather than works of entertainment.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
That will be true when Bill is willing to GPL his software. Until then, Bill is relegated to software that is free (as in do whatever you want with it), as opposed to Free (as in RMS).
So I'd say that the bulk of what is referred to as Open Source is quite inaccessible to Bill. And as for benefits to Bill through competition, no way. Bill doesn't benefit by making windows better - he benefits by selling more copies of windows. If linux were not around, he could sell more copies of windows with less effort put into improvements.
I think Bill would be hard-pressed to find anything about the Open/Free/free software movement that he likes.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
You will have no reason not to switch to proprietary software when the proprietary software is low-cost. Despite what Open Source movement proponents say about making better code, many so-called Open Source programs are functionally inferior to their proprietary competitors. If all you value is saving money or the practical ends that the Open Source movement champions, you'll never miss the freedom to share and modify software. It's great to get someone interested in Free Software by demonstrating practical use, and it's true some people are uncomfortable talking about ethics and responsibility as well as convenience. But the Free Software community was not built by giving into whatever businesses want. The FSF wrote an interesting essay comparing the Free Software movement with the Open Source movement.
Crediting Linus Torvalds as an altrustic operator is simply incorrect. Torvalds' brand of pragmatism falls squarely into the problem I just described--his use of Bitkeeper is a perfect example. He is also not "Linux' guardian" (as the BusinessWeek article claims). If that title is accurate at all, it properly belongs to the GNU General Public License, the preeminent Free Software license written by the FSF: the organization whose ethical basis Torvalds dismisses.
Digital Citizen
The author pulls some sleight-of-word here, lumping two quite different groups together. There are certainly "millions who use Linux" but there are far fewer who "tinker with it", a claim supported by looking at the difference between the number of downloads or users with the number of patch submitters or CVS commit privilege holders. This disparity is a natural one; few people have the skill, time, or inclination to contribute, even to tools they find useful.
Doubtlessly people will reply that the number of users directly contributes to bug detection which is a valid point. However the utility of a bug-report and of a patch are certainly not equal. Furthermore, the same analysis can be done in this case by comparing the number of people who experience bugs to the number who file bug reports (not to mention the fact that Microsoft has millions of users to detect bugs as well. Why do you think they have automated bug reports these days?). I'm not discounting the value of many eyes on a product but the article is using an optimistic metric.
Linux's advantage isn't in the millions of users (since Windows has many more) but in the thousands of patch submitters. Indeed, this may be why creating linux-for-the-masses is a hard problem: Ease of use, polish, and intuitive design aren't something captured in twenty-line fixes; they need to be woven through entire user interface. It is certainly possible to make Unix "just work" but, so far, it's taken professional designers paid by Apple to do so.
In a way though, its all relative. Didn't Ted Turner give away a third of his wealth a few years back? Has Gates even given away 5% of his wealth? How about 1%?
When I hear about what a great philanthopist Gates is, it makes me think of the story in the bible about the poor woman who essentially gives her last cent to charity vs. the wealthy who give many times more. The question is, who really gives more? The person who gives out of their need, or the person who gives out of their excess?
And, BTW, from where did that excess come?
I guess it's okay then to monopolize an entire industry, stifle innovation, crush competitors, and enrich yourself through monopoly pricing as long as you give lots of money to charities.
Read the book: Big Blue - IBM's Use and Abuse of Power.
This trick of giving lots of money to charities is something IBM figured out in about 1918 or thereabout. That book is quite a lesson on monopoly behavior, and it is amazing how well it describes Microsoft's behavior.
Those who would give up liberty in exchange for security and DRM should switch to Microsoft Palladium!
The only way for the free market to function optimally is for the government to retract itself from the market entirely, and cease any tampering with the free market.
Tell that to people paying electric and water bills that have gone through the roof in deregulated markets. Or people who live downwind of hog farms. Or people who drink water tainted by rusting computer parts.
The free market doesn't always produce the optimal outcome.
Education is the silver bullet.
While Torvalds is a threat to Gates, Gates seems to be little or no threat to Torvalds. To hear Torvalds talk about it, he's having fun as Linux' guardian. His challenge is merely that of being an effective shepherd to a vast flock of very creative, un-sheeplike sheep.
A flock of sheep? Shouldn't that be a herd of cats?
AEIOU: open-source anonymous internet currency
If this is true, there may be many reasons, perhaps working in concert (different people may have different and multiple reasons, making the effect much stronger). For example, the fact that the developer can see the OS code may make him far more confident in working on code above it... because he can really understand what's going on underneath (and fix it if there's a problem). Having the entire OS's code means that he can experiment with anything... and even if today he doesn't want to experiment with something, using OSS/FS means that he'll be more prepared for that time when he does. From a security point-of-view, he can analyze and fix anything, and knowing that others can do that too might raise his confidence in the results. By improving OSS/FS, he gains respect in the technical community that he wouldn't get simply by writing closed code (even if they're both paid for, everyone can see EXACTLY what you did in the open code).
I'm sure there are others.
- David A. Wheeler (see my Secure Programming HOWTO)
Considering Gates is responsible for BILLIONS of dollars going toward schools, scholarships, charitible work, health care improvements, etc, ...
Except that, when you look past the first paragraph, you always seem to find the Bill Gates isn't actually giving anyone those dollars.
Most often, he is giving software, and the value is the "full retail price", i.e., it's a fake price. And he only gives out the first version; you have to pay for upgrades and transfers to new machines. So it's really just a dealer's first sample to get you hooked.
In the highly-publicised cases of "gifts" to Africa to fight diseases, the fine print informs us that these are actually loans a full market-price interest rates. And the money can only be spent for drugs from the companies that Bill has stock in.
When you read the details, it seems that Bill is mostly engaged in marketing, not philanthropy. His "gifts" lead to further profit going to his stock accounts.
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
And lets not forget the thousands of extra IT jobs Bill has created because people have to constantly repair damage caused by his broken software.
If I seem short sighted, it is because I stand on the shoulders of midgets
My paper More than a Gigabuck: Estimating GNU/Linux's Size measured Red Hat Linux 7.1. It found that this distribution had over 30 million physical source lines of code (SLOC), it would cost over $1 billion (a Gigabuck) to develop this Linux distribution by conventional proprietary means in the U.S. (in year 2000 U.S. dollars), and would have required about 8,000 person-years of development time. Over one year's time, it represented a 60% increase in size, effort, and traditional development costs.
Another study (inspired by mine) looked at Debian 2.2. The found that Debian 2.2 includes more than 55 million physical SLOC, and would have cost nearly $1.9 billion USD using over 14,000 person-years to develop using traditional proprietary techniques.
Linus, of course, doesn't have any sort of real control of GNU/Linux outside the kernel. But in the context of this article, the real issue seems to be a comparison of the open source / Free software community (as represented by GNU/Linux, the Linux kernel, and Linus Torvalds) versus Microsoft. And in that sense, this community has managed to acquire an absolutely astounding amount of resources, since it's managed to become competitive with Microsoft in spite of the many roadblocks it's had to handle (lack of hardware vendor support, perception that the approach can't work, etc.).
More quantitative data showing that there cases where open source software / free software is competitive is available in my paper "Why OSS/FS? Look at the Numbers!".
- David A. Wheeler (see my Secure Programming HOWTO)
If Linus Torvalds has more resources at his disposal than Bill Gates, then what when we add Richard Stallman, Larry Wall, Don Knuth, Damian Conway, Guido van Rossum, Norman Hardy, Bruce Schneier, Ian Murdock, Martin Michlmayr, Nicholas Weaver, Ken Thompson, Robert Thau, Theo de Raadt, Robert Malda, et cetera? Amazing. Truly amazing.
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
and how much of his wealth did he give away before the anti-trust trials, which dragged him kicking and screaming into the public spotlight?
he's gotten WAY more visibly "generous" since recognizing how politically important it is to be viewed as a nice guy by the rabble. i still can't stomach that picture of gates personally administering polio vaccine to an african child, with that big, fake goony smile spread across is face for the cameras.
And, BTW, from where did that excess come?
exactly - from predatory business practices that crush competition and extort huge sums of money from businesses - large, medium, and small - across the globe.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.