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Cringely's 2004 Predictions
somethinghollow writes "Cringely's 2004 Predictions are out, and he makes a very interesting claim concerning Linux: 'The SCO debacle has created a crisis within the Linux community. They pretend that it hasn't, but it has. This will come to a head in 2004 with either the development of a new organizational structure for Linux or the start of its demise. Linux has to grow or die, and the direction it takes will be determined in 2004.' With a claimed 70% successful prediction rate, you at least have to listen..."
Apple have come up with some innovative products, but their market share remains tiny. Sadly, though, many buyers have been mislead by the marketing and eye-candy, and desperately try to justify their overpriced purchases to themselves on forums around the Net. Let's see what they really mean...
"MacOS X is everything Linux wants to be."
"Despite the fact that Linux is just code and can't WANT to be anything, I truly believe that it'd love to be a single-vendor, single-platform, sluggish half-proprietary OS with dwindling market share. Linux would love to throw away its impressively growing corporate takeup for that."
"Apple hardware is for real computer lovers."
"It's no hassle to use a plethora of keyboard combos to make up for the patronising one-button mouse. Despite the fact that my hands have FIVE fingers, and multiple-buttons make Web browsing so much more pleasant, I prefer my computer to be treat me like a special-needs child."
"Aqua makes me so much more productive!"
"My non-techie friends drool over the transparency and scaling effects, even though UI research has shown that they add practically nothing to getting real work done. It feels like KDE 2 on a Pentium 200, and I can't change to a light and fast WM, but those drop-shadows must make me work so quickly!"
"OSX shows that Apple is committed to open source."
"OpenDarwin.org and its community of about 27 is surely not just a token gesture by Apple. Pretty much nobody uses pure Darwin, and all the crucial components of the system are closed and require me to spend money just to get major OS updates, but they're really helping the community somehow."
"You get what you pay for with Apple hardware."
"My iBook was made by in Taiwan by AlphaTop and has design and build quality flaws (needing foam sheets jammed in to stop the common problem of the keyboard scratching the screen). But it's silvery and cost far more than an x86 laptop of better spec, so it must be much higher quality!"
"...blah blah MHz myth blah..."
"Although there's truth in PPC being more elegant than x86, it's crushing that the top-of-the-range 1.5 GHz chip is slaughtered by the equivalent 3 GHz Pentium 4. However, Steve Jobs showed some vague Photoshop filter benchmarks at the last MacWorld, so being a leprotard, I'm convinced."
I can say that I'm not worried about SCO. Think about it like this. If Linux becomes "illegal" it will be illegal just like all the warez and pr0n on kazaa. And God knows that nobody makes or downloads those.
In other words, nothing will change because nothing CAN change. As long as people want to work on Linux, they will. The Internet and the minds of its members are not property of SCO. So too bad for them.
My other car is first.
"Linux has to grow or die"
Erm, why? Linux isn't a company. If Linux stopped growing, there'd still be thousands of developers and testers working on it. Cringely evidently doesn't understand the whole ethos behind the free software world; his comment is ridiculous.
I predicted that Microsoft's Palladium security plan, now called Trustworthy Computing, would be distrusted and stall. That looks right to me.
Predicting that a microsoft security product isn't reliable? Predicting that a microsoft product is late?
Cringley is THE ORACLE!!
"They like to pretend that it hasn't, but it has."
Yeah, just like I pretend that Cringley doesn't matter, but he does.
Bowie J. Poag
The problem with a prediction like that is that it's largely content-free. Changing organizational structure of Linux, how, exactly? When he says "Linux", does he mean kernel development or the whole OSS community? What, exactly, is wrong, and how (and why) does it need to be changed?
As fluffy as that prediction is, we can have Andrew Morton take over maintainership of 2.6 from Linus Torvalds this year and Cringeley can claim another success at the end of 2004.
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
but I dont think linux needs to be reorganised.. Currently many companies are employing the open source system, and it has been proven that it works.. At any time anyone who wants could fork the kernel and do it their way. But I personally don't see the system changing, or any reason for it to... "As for SCO, they'll continue to make noise until the middle of the year, at which point the legal case will implode and the company will give up.".. As for that, I think quite the opposite, that the SCO executives have gotten so used to annoying everyone, that they need to keep the badboy attitude, and will keep having to keep that reputation, or they would be exterminated. I think a few of the predictions are pretty obvious though, not really sure if they are worth getting slashdotted
This is a myth from people who think like a company. The only thing linux really needs to survive is users who like it or want to change linux into something they like.
If linux becomes oh so unpopular what is it to say that no one just takes the codebase and make something new and better? I think the cat is out of the bag now and thanks to OSS the applications barrier to entry is officially dead or atleast very small compared to how things looked a couple of years ago.
Without the applications barrier MS has no real advantage over anything else.
HTTP/1.1 400
I think he's wrong about Sun. If I'm not mistaken, these guys are going to earn some really big $$$ in China.
It used to fit on one cd, now it's 3 or more.
We are the people our parents warned us about.
I mean, isn't this like saying that the temperature tomorrow will either be lower of higher than today?
If all Cringely's predictions are this vague I'm embarrassed for him that he only gets 70% of them near enough to count as a success.
Besides which, linux has coped fine with SCO. Even if there were any infringing code (which, after all the contradictory, facile BS SCO has been spouting, I somehow doubt) it would be a very easy matter within the current kernel development framework to either rewrite the code or dike it out -- if SCO would say what, exactly, the code was. The problem isn't one of the linux development model, it's a problem with SCO and their blatant disregard for honesty, the truth or any kind of propriety. If there was some (unspecified) "other" development model used, we would still rely on SCO telling us what the infringing code was so that it could be fixed or removed.
Believe me, if there was a problem with the linux kernel development system that meant the whole thing could be brought down using lawyers, Microsoft would have torn us apart years ago. In terms of unpleasantness (and certainly in terms of competence) SCO has nothing on MS Legal.
"'I pass the test,' she said. 'I will diminish, and go into the West, and remain Galadriel.'"
- JRR Tolkien.
Woohoo, i've been waiting for these! Did he do 2003 predictions? I think it was 2002 that he said the Amiga will still be vapourware, damn him being right. I bet you (and i havnt read it yet) he wont be saying that this year :)
Giving IE users a taste of their own medicine since 2005 - http://pods.-is-a-geek.net/
Come back in 365 more days and see how I did.
As 2004 is a leap year with 366 days, I'm guessing Cringely will get this prediction wrong...
"I said that Sun would decline further, generally because of the success of Linux. There is no doubt that this was correct."
"The U.S. IT industry will see some real growth except for Hewlett- Packard and Sun, which will continue their declines."
This guy must be on crack. Sun shipped the most copies of UNIX last year, have lower prices than Dell on the x86 side, supports Linux, created OpenOffice and supported it commercially, and is doing some of the most innovating development of any company (including the open source community, though they aren't a company).
"2) We still won't see a big example of cyber-terrorism simply because nobody has figured out how to actually kill people that way."
What's the fun in killing people? Costing billions of dollars in damage multiple times a year, even a month, seems like a much better option if I was a terrorist. But I'm not a terrorist, I fear caves.
"12) Wal-Mart's entry into the music download business changes everything, and will undoubtedly take the leadership away from Apple."
I think that's a bold statement. Time will tell.
My look at the future of Linux is based on moving from near silicon valley to a hick town in California. Basically, looking at young people in this hick town, I see very little real interest in Linux among the geeks. Yes, there is the "Linux is cool" factor, but I only know a handful of people in the CS department who actually can do anything more with Linux than install it.
The problem with Linux, at this point, is that it is still essentially a free UNIX. Today's geeks do not seem to have the patience to learn the UNIX command line; they are more insterested in the trendy video game of the week and hooking up their new digital camera to their computer (and, yes, Linux has a big problem with USB devices; especially the ones that are really cheap at Fry's). Again, this may be different at better universities than the one I am going to in the hick town I am going to, but UNIX mastery requires both a social group where there is pressure to learn UNIX, and a group of mentors in that group to teach the secrets of the UNIX command line to newbies.
Yes, Linux is making progress to not be a UNIX, by having a much easier to learn GUI for people who do not want to learn UNIX, but the lack of unity (a natural consequence of Linux's open-source nature) and the continuing slow economy that lowers the funds available to help support open source development (a lot of open source development is only possible because the programmers are paid to make the software) both leave Linux behind Microsoft and Apple in terms of GUI quality.
RedHat's decision to no longer make their flagship distribution freely downloadable does not bode well for the future of Linux; I have seen geeks interested in Linux who look at the number of distributions available, can't decide which one to use, and then decide to be interested in the latest video game or whatever instead.
Prediction 1: So no-one knows how to write games with the Cell processor? He could have made the same claim for the PS2's VU units yet I see no lack of PS2 games. There wasn't even a noticeable delay while games programmers learnt to use it!
The rest of (1) is hardly a prediction, unless 'Microsoft will carry on as normal' is an earth shattering revelation.
3) Despite new anti-spam laws, we'll still be plagued with unsolicited commercial messages, especially using Internet Messaging protocols.
Sorry, anyone with an Inbox and a clue could tell you this. Vast amounts of spam come from outside the US boarders, where spam laws in the US mean squat. I think he's right on the money with this one though:
The more vague the predictions, the more likely they are to not be wrong, you know.
"Powers. I have them."
Check #3, for example, we _know_ MSR is working on this (there was a story here recently). Or #4, which is simply general trend. #7 is a BS: "Someone is going to come out of this a big winner. I just don't know who it is." Most of the rest are the same, including #15. Gee, tell me more, old toad ;-P
My other Beowulf cluster is... er...
Of course it caused a crisis! Most webservers linked to on slashdot are running linux! The more posts about SCO, the more strain on linux machines across the globe! Gosh, what a prediction!
"Reader-Response" Index for Q4...engendering more feedback from the Linux comunity than any other individual in the entire technology space, much of it articulate, admittedly some not-so.
Don't mistake these people for fortune tellers and remember this factoid about statistics:
According to the latest official figures, 43% of all statistics are totally worthless.
So much for the prediction success rate. I guess that's also pretty much a question of interpretation. That aside, I consider the underlying assumption to be fundamentally flawed because it practically assumes that SCO has a point.
If a train station is a place where a train stops, what's a workstation?
I think this could have been predicted for 2003.We've already seen examples of cyber-extortion here (the medical transcriptionist in Pakistan), and I've seen lots of other reports of cyber-extortion attempts here and there, especially in the last 6 or so months. And this is the stuff that is actually reported in the news! I wonder how much of it goes unreported...
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
Here's the link. Sorry about that.
...and you are the target, dear ;-)
My other Beowulf cluster is... er...
1. The PS2's VU was pretty hard to write software for, but who is winning the market right now?
2. Nintendo have not announced what proecssor they are using, so how can it be the Cell processor? Who said that Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft were releasing now consoles this year? At this time, they are all gunning for 2005.
3. Apple are not going to release flash iPod's, instead they are going to release HD based iPod's with 2 or 4gb capacity. This is a solid rumor.
4. Apple have made no announcement of how many G5's they want to sell, so anything is not what they are hoping.
5. Chances are the G6 will be released next year as the Power5 is being released next year.
6. Linux die? How? It's not a company, its a conglomerate of programmers. It's marketshare is rising, not falling. Case in point, OSS such as Apache is only growing in popularity.
7. How is Microsoft continuing on their normal ways a prediction? It's a fact.
8. Walmart are going to have some serious issues with their online music store simply because its not easy to use. I agree that Apple at this rate will not be in the lead though.
9. The Burst case is interesting, but I can't see Apple and Real being punished if Microsoft loses/or buys Burst.
All up a rather silly set of predictions that is all too vague or missing facts. I can see why he gets 70-80% success.
Are about what he is going to have for lunch?
As for the touchscreen voting scandal, nothing will be resolved or improved.
Resolved? Probably not. But we've *already* seen improvements made, namely that various state pols have already expressed their dissatisfaction and complete distrust of electronic voting systems. I think this will continue, and will become an issue in Congress soon - and possibly even a presidential election issue.
... that just ignoring SCO works best for me. No reason for high blood pressure, no crisis anywhere, just a bunch of idiots.
Just as most 'analysts' the predictions he makes are just so damn global they can mean anything or they're extremely obvious...
;)
just giving the numbers here and my comment:
1) Ofcourse MS will. That's what they already wanted to do with the Xbox and failed (IMO) and they still are doing this... Geeez what a prediction...
2) Do I really need to say anything about this... It's pure bullshit...
3) Geez don't we already know this...
4) Geez, all these companies already told this to everybody who wanted to hear this... My my what a prediction...
5) Rubbish...
6) I predicted this at the start of the SCO case and everybody knew this from the start...
7) Nonsense...
8) Can't comment on this because I don't live in the USA.
9) I expect HP to grow, Sun will stabilize and Dell will indeed start to compete in new markets as they have done every year the last 2 or 3 years...
10) Can't comment on this one as I don't know the situation.
11) Geez, ofcourse WiFi will grow... and ofcourse progress and service will be spotty... and ofcourse a new business model won't work...
12) Can't comment on Wall-Mart as I can't buy there etc and I'm not living in the USA...
13) Can't comment on this as I don't know anything about Apple.
14) Geez... how surprising. But the strange thing is: all the candidates will be against outsourcing because it's bad for the number of jobs in the USA... So don't expect to be able to pick the winner on this point...
15) That's something they already do for the last 4 years... Nothing new here And ofcource Bill Gates won't get the Nobel Peace Prize... Which idiot would expect that...
Come back in 363 more days and see how I did
He's just like the gypsy at the local fair... obvious things and then claiming he thought it up...
Comment removed based on user account deletion
> Apart from Ximian's desktop, there is no major product using GTK.
Vmware
TSG hasn't created a crisis. WTF? A crisis is when your house is on fire. Watching and cheering on the demise of a stock-scam in action isn't a crisis. It's a research opportunity.
That said, the 'aging debacle has created a crisis in Cringley. He pretends that it hasn't, but it has.'
Wow, that was amazingly simple!
Belief is the currency of delusion.
I predict 2004 will be different than 2003. I also predict that my prediction will be right. Now why don't I get coverage when my predictions are more accurate?
The Linux kernel development already has a tried and true tested organization. Linus Torvalls and crew operating as benevolent dictators, totally open to public scrutiny, with no abolute power to dictate what additional patches the distributions and developers end up using. It has worked and continues to work very well.
All the contributions and development are traceable though both the Bit-tracker/CVS logs and the mailing lists, which makes everything available to public scrutiny for everyone, include those who are publicly defending Linux.
Throughout 2003, the SCO Group's so-called evidence and legal theories have fallen into disrepute though the rediscovery of the combination of the terms of the GNU General Public License and the open development process of both the Linux Kernel and even UNIX itself.
The weight of the historical evidence, including the active participation of both old SCO and Caldera executives and employees in the development and promotion of Linux, tips the scales of justice heavily in favor of IBM, RedHat and Linux end users. In fact the weight of evidence effectively chucks SCO legal position off the scales, out the window and over the cliff like a cartoon catapult.
While each new Darl McBrides threat and new David Boies partners legal theory look impressive at first glance, in practice they are about effective as attaching a giant anvil to a biplane to catch a pigeon.
See http://www.tibonia.com/Dmeg1.htm
The McBride and Bois Show to stop the Penquin is becoming a joke ...
I thought this prediction was really weird... Didn't MS recent made a statement that it's going to use IBM technology for the X-Box 2? I thought it was pretty much widely speculated (and accepted) that the pact was to use an IBM chip as its CPU... So isn't MS in the same boat as Nintendo and Sony? Also, I don't think IBM nor Nintendo ever stated that the next console will be using the Cell.
This prediction just seems to be random observations and "facts" jumbled together.
-B
What else does he predict? The stock market will either rise or fall? The Republican candidate or the Democrat candidate will win the Presidential election? We'll be damned if we do, and damned if we don't?
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
No one's talked about it yet, but I find his most interesting comment to be the one about how Wal-Mart's new online music effort will displace the iTunes Music Store as the number one retailer of online music files.
I disagree with this, for a few reasons. One, they're under tremendous pressure from their conservative customer base (lower-income white America) to adhere to a "moral standard". Have you ever bought a CD from Wal-Mart? They only sell "clean" versions of much of the type of music that would be bought online by the younger Internet demographic. If I was going to buy an electronic version of "Straight Outta Comptom", I sure as hell wouldn't buy it from Wal-Mart's online music store.
Second, online music is not an area that plays to Wal-Mart's competitive strength. Not many people think of Wal-Mart as a successful "clicks and mortar" e-commerce company. Wal-Mart makes its money by selling cheap consumer goods at rock-bottom prices. So rock-bottom, that their smaller competitiors can't compete, and are forced out of the market. But digital music is a much more level playing field. Apple can work with its label partners to lower its prices to match Wal-Mart's. But honestly, I don't think they have to. The integration with iTunes, the iTunes product on both Windows and OS X, and the huge mindshare that Apple enjoys make for an ability to sell their music at an 11 cent premium over Wal-Mart if they want to.
Third (and last, I'm getting tired of typing) - can Wal-Mart sustain their price advantage? Or is it like buymusic.com, where the few tracks that were actually available for their advertised 79 cent price were obscure tracks that you wouldn't want, and as some artists complained, weren't legal anyway? Unfortunately for the consumer, I think 99 cents a track is where the industry wants the price for most songs to be.
I guess that my main point is that I just don't believe Wal-Mart is going to steamroll over the music industry with a business plan of "We do what they do, just a bit cheaper." Too many other companies have already established beachheads, and they're actually innovating. My predicition is that Wal-Mart abandons digital music within 18 months.
Blogging Weight Loss, Distance Education, and more at verlin.com
For example: 1. A year ago, I wrote that HP/Compaq would continue its long slide to oblivion, and if you look underneath the corporate numbers, you'll see I was correct.
:).
SO the corporate numbers are OK then, their stock is up over the year (reference) so I'd say so corporate numbers sure are decent, then what basis is there for saying they are performing badly? Perhaps if I refer to an unspecified quantity I can make up a story about it too. Like, er, Dell will start slide into oblivion, which if you look below the corporate numbers (that is below profits, penetration, users, sales, turnover, employment, etc) you will see I am correct. What was I correct about? Well, ask me in a year and I'll tell you.
2. I predicted that Dell would continue to grow at the expense of its competitors
The home/business PC market is getting mature, so if any company grows it is largely at the expense of its competitors. Dell were growing market share, one doesn't have to be a genius to see that a lagged deterministic trend will continue, it is more insightful to look at the rate of change that growth is having, but he didn't do that.
3. I wrote that Linux would continue to give Microsoft fits (that's true) and that Microsoft would be forced to compete on quality. Pick a low quality (costly) product. It comes under pressure from a free high quality product. The low quality (costly) product comes under pressure. A 3rd grade kid could draw that line of reasoning.
4. I said that Sun would decline further, generally because of the success of Linux.
(Fastidious comment, which of these Suns did you mean?) I can give a little credit to this since unlike the other 'predictions' it was not already written mud, though perhaps it was written in mud ready to be fossilised. Though looking back to financial numbers, Sun Microsystems doesn't seem to have done too bad.
5. Here is one I got wrong. I predicted that China would standardize on Linux running on MIPS hardware.
OK, so he stopped predicting the sun would rise tomorrow and got on with some original thinking. And failed, though it was a nice idea.
6. I was wrong, too, in my prediction that Microsoft would force Intel to adopt AMD's 64-bit Opteron instructions.
Hard to see this happening at the time, but again an interesting idea.
7. I correctly predicted the Mac G5 computer line
This had been announced by Apple already.
8. correctly predicted that V.92 modem development would stall, but that nobody would care Or perhaps saw nobody cared about V.92 (DSL+ is where the action has been for the past 3 years), so predicted it would stall. Nice insight.
9. I predicted that Microsoft's Palladium security plan, now called Trustworthy Computing, would be distrusted and stall.
It was already distructed. Well done on the stalling part, it was just wishful thinking for me
10. I wrote that Hollywood would come up with new digital rights management schemes that would be promptly broken
An encrypted system where many have the same key is a system that has a key for anyone. Always been like that, always will
OK, so I could go on, but his 'predictions' are a combination of the obvious (with a little critical thought) and the failures (when he gets beyond stating the obvious he usually gets it wrong). I do not trust this person's predictions.
karma karma karma karma karma chameleon, you come and go, you come and go.
Wow, let's see if I can get a good success rate with MY predictions for 2004. - Apple products will stay overpriced. Mac activists will claim you get what you pay for. - The linux community will continue to hate SCO. - SCO's website will suffer at least 4 months worths of downtime from DDOS attacks due to the above prediction. - Bill Gates will remain wealther than Steve Jobs. - Whether from spam or elsewhere, I will be told I am not big enough. - Linus Torvald will recive Bill Gates nobel peace prize for donating $0 dollars worth or software to millions of needy people/corperations. Well, I'd say I am pretty close to 70 percent.
"As for old fashioned spam, it will continue to cram our inboxes, making a good business for third-party anti-spam products and services while making e-mail pretty much useless for reliable communication. Microsoft will see opportunity here and propose new protocols to replace SMTP and POP3."
Why replace POP3 (and IMAP)? These work fine and are completely separate of the SMTP delivery engine. The smart thing to do would be to replace SMTP MTAs with something that does server-to-server authentication, and leave POP3 and IMAP for the MUAs.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
All we have to fear is fear itself, AFAIK SCO has produced nothing worthwhile to back up it's claims.
I wish the SCO would just die as it deserves, a quiet death without rousing the entire roost with it's antics. It's like believing the boy who cried 'Wolf!' after the fiftieth time..........
I don't get this karma thingie...what's the big deal...
:)
Here... I'm spelling MS with a dollar sign: M$
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Seeking the meaning of life... @slashdot of all places
If Linux wasn't growing, it could only be said to be growing if there weren't thousands of developers and users (I find it funny that you say testers).
He's right, he just chose to make a vague statement that could be easily said to be true next year. Compare: BSD must grow or die -- they must release new BSD kernels with new bugfixes and features, or it is dead (ala VMS). True? Yea, but only because it's vague.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
grow or die? that makes sense, particularly when there's a small (noisy/nosey) armIE of fauxking felonious ?pr? ?firm? hypenosys payper liesense stock markup FraUD softwar gangster corepirate nazi execrable, plotting/requiring yOUR demise, with robbIE's help?
no problem.
consult with/trust in yOUR creators.... that won's on us?
As has been observed, directing geeks is like herding cats (yes I know, the original was about programmers but I think it works just as well as a generalisation).
No bunch of geeks is going to be told what to vote by anyone, they're too proud of being "Free Thinkers" to stand for that.
Of course the number that actually are Free Thinkers is substantially less ;)
hahaha
a bit off topic, but i'll bite...
i do hope you are joking...
if not (as i suspect) you are a sad, sad, person. personally, i have many, many muslim friends. a lot of which would give me the shirt off their backs... as far as murder and genocide, don't tell me that Christians and Jews are better than any other religion...
do some real research before opening your mouth and don't talk out of your ass...
damn. people like you just piss me off.
it could mean the end for Real and Apple, both of which also are infringing Burst patents.
Prediction that Apple will go out of business! Film at 11!
and will undoubtedly take the leadership away from Apple.
Ah, yes. The winners are always losers. Makes everyone really want to win. Why don't we all just sell everything to Wal-Mart and let them rename themselves "Everything Inc.?"
No Apple G6 in 2004, and the company won't sell nearly as many G5s as it hopes.
What is this? The results of success? Why the fuck would Apple want to develop a G6? What's wrong with the G5? Nobody's even COMPILED anything on it yet.
By the way, Apple sells an assload of G5s, because those are the coolest fucking computers ever invented. Period. The Cinema Display? Nothing should ever look that good, and iTunes freezes nitrogen.
Apple has earned some respect and a well-deserved rest. If you want to find failure, this ain't it. Find something else to hype.
Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
A bad sign for 2004?
A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
Yeah, karma comes, karma goes.
I remember PC mags wrote 'Micro$oft' 10 years ago (mainstream DOS/Windows based mags like PCW or PC Magazine) when they were being less than complimentary about 'M$'. It is not a Linux thing, or a UNIX thing, it is a MSFT.O thing.
karma karma karma karma karma chameleon, you come and go, you come and go.
Linux development may indeed change, regardless of SCO. Or, to put it more accurately, "free" software development must change from a pure technocracy if it is to wrest control of the consumer space from Microsoft. Now, I realize (and respect) Linus's lack of concern about market share and other trappings of competition; I use Linux precisely because I like the technology associated with it. I am also a technoscenti, which means that my needs are quite different from those of most people.
Technical excellence can be attained in conjunction with meeting the needs of mundane users. "Free" software has created its own hierarchy of haves and have nots, based on technical prowess; the lords of free software turn up their noses and snort when confronted with needs of the commoners. Able to exist on a purely philosophical level, the technogensia fail to see that free software has reached the edge of its current potential. Apple, Sun, and Red Hat will take "free" software to the next level, where it accomplishes solid, practical tasks for real people.
So in a sense, Cringley is correct: free software (which he erroneously lumps under "Linux") will change, or it will be replaced in the greater world by something more attuned to the needs of the commons.
All about me
There's nothing like taking current news and claiming it as your own. I have not read this guys predictions before but I can see why he claims a relatively high accuracy rating. At least two of his predictions for this year were already common knowledge at the end of 03 - everyone in the tech field already knows that MS is droping support for everyting prior to win2k soon (4) and there is already wide discussion about spam becoming a problem for IM protocols (3). 11 is just a "finger on the pulse" type of claim that is plain to see and is happening already.
What I don't really understand is 5 and 6, which seem to almost be mutually exclusive. We all know it's a stock scam, therefor I think 5 will fail to come to pass. 6 I think is very likely though.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
My friend future events such as these will affect you in the future. Criswell.
It's tough to find anything when you don't know what your are looking for.
Can you prove it did not happen? Criswell.
I would rather suggest that SCO might be subject of criminal investitagtion. Financial fraud is criminal. Sco almot infringed every possible business rule. Spreading wrong news about "claims" is anti-competitive and sending FUD letters to customers is dirty policy.
:-)
so it depends on the strength of US law and jurisdiction what SCO and its CEO fill face.
Everybody knows that they are nuts, except the capital market and mainstream journalists. I don't see any reason to worry.
-- Now Saddam could tell where his WMD are hidden
NT
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Seeking the meaning of life... @slashdot of all places
It's not hard to make 70% successful predictions if they're as simple, obvious and obtuse as Cringely's. Oh, and I'd've thought that such a luminary would know that it's Instant Messaging, not "Internet Messaging".
adam
I'm not impressed. Predicting the next 12 months on the basis of "more of the same" is not a skill. The skill lies in understanding the underlying trends and extrapolating these.
SCO impacting Linux? Has Cringely even looked at the market? SCO's attacks on Linux have simply turned up the volume on the debate, they have not actually changed the fundamentals.
As far as I can see, the fundamentals of IT are:
1. Ever cheaper technology, including and especially software technology. Software drops in price just like hardware does, but it's starting to be a significant driver.
2. Ever worse infestation by parasitical software - trojans, spyware, worms, viruses - and the use of this by spammers. This is no longer a sideshow, it is one of the main drivers.
3. Global competition to lower costs, especially IT costs. Few firms can avoid competition, one way or another, by companies halfway around the globe.
It all adds up to a big problem for Microsoft and a significant advantage for free/open software, especially Linux.
Microsoft has tried to sabotage Linux through a variety of strategies, and each time they have failed. 2004 will see the start of serious competition, or serious defeat.
I predict that Microsoft will produce a "Windows Classic" package in 2004 that combines a cheap Windows OS and Office, for $49.95, or less. This is about the only way it can compete with offerings like Xandros Desktop, which provide a very smooth and complete package for around this price.
Price, security, simplicity. C'mon, it's so obvious that it hurts to have to say this.
Ceci n'est pas une signature
... from someone who says "Come back in 365 more days and see how I did" meaning come back in one year and be wrong? 2004 is a leap year.
...
Seriously, there are a few predictions there that are simply ludicrous, and others are nothing more than simple set up for saying nothing. The linux prediction that everyone here is most interested in is a hollow, say nothing prediction.
It is best summed up by the last sentence "Linux has to grow or die, and the direction it takes will be determined in 2004." Talk about hollow predications. Linux is an active project, so it must do something. At any moment in time, and with every decision, Linux will take a positive or negative direction simply because it is active. Since Cringely's prediction contains both outcomes, he can come back next year and claim success. That is, of course, unless Linux stagnates, which isn't about to happen.
Shoddy journalism. No more or less. Ignore the article and save time, unless you believe in that sort of thing. If you do, send me all your money and I'll sell you this great bridge connecting Brooklyn and Manhattan
The more vague the predictions, the more likely they are to not be wrong, you know.
In particular, the prediction that heads this post was very vague:
The SCO debacle has created a crisis within the Linux community. They pretend that it hasn't, but it has.
Quite the opposite here. The rest of the world seems to be ignoring this (increased adoption of Linux in major companies and countries, etc.), while the Linux community (particularly Slashdot) has been all too concerned about it.
Not that I disagree with him. This is a crisis, although Cringely isn't too specific about what that crisis is. This was an attack on the very legitimacy of Linux with the obvious corollary that legitimate software can only be proprietary and protected by IP. I don't think it will succeed because they have to prove that portions of Linux were stolen from them and they have steadfastly refused to provide proof of this.
No, the real crisis is what he brought up later in his predictions:
The clever part is how they used a legal case to make public claims that would have caused serious regulatory problems in any other context. We'll see more of this ploy in the future.
Indeed we will. Whether they started this or not (please, no more flaming about this), Microsoft has certainly not been blind to the effects of this case, they have a war chest of billions to pursue many such frivolous lawsuits and I expect to see this become a part of MS's future "innovations" to "compete" with others in the marketplace. It's a crisis, all right, but a crisis for America's legal system, not for Linux.
This will come to a head in 2004 with either the development of a new organizational structure for Linux or the start of its demise.
Now, how would a new organizational structure protect against any future idiocies of the SCO kind? The SCO case (in its broader, public case, not in the specific legal case against IBM) is groundless and nobody thinks it will succeed, not even Cringley.
No, the real problem lies with America's current legal system. As long as companies can launch groundless lawsuits and profit from them without going to trial for years and years, then any company or organization is at risk from them, no matter what their organizational structure is!
In fact you can make a real case that Linux's organizational structure is exactly what will cause the SCO suit to eventually fail. Were it not for the very public and well-documented structure of logged submissions by individuals to the Linux code-base, SCO might be able to create some doubt about the exact source of the contributions of disputed portions of the code. As it is, they cannot!
Linux has to grow or die, and the direction it takes will be determined in 2004.
I hear this a lot lately. Not just in reference to Linux, but in reference to business and social structures too. Where the hell did anyone get the idea that continued survival is based on growth? Does the mere matter of size guarantee your survival? if it did, the earth would still be ruled by dinosaurs!
And, frankly, that Linux is growing right now. I have seen a termendous amount of progress in just the last year.
Wansu, th' chinese sailor
Since I'm unemployed :( I post a ton of messages. It is not uncommon for me to hit the max posts per day :) So karma is next to useless to me. Unless a ton of my posts get flamed or modded down (always possible with my anti-capitalist messages), my karma probably isn't impacted...
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Seeking the meaning of life... @slashdot of all places
...that spam will stay for the rest of time.
Even if SCO is found to be correct in this train wreck, it doesn't really matter. IBM would likely buy the company and properly release Linux from all commercial licenses. IBM has way to much invested into open source development and deployment to let anything else happen. End of story. They don't want another company with another monopoly over an OS.
Well, Northern Ireland obviously springs to mind...
... and Madster, and Friendster. And 50 Cent for his song "Wankster". Hey if Microsoft can sue Lindows, why cant Napster sue the "sters"?
---------
There is inferior bacteria on the interior of your posterior.
From what I read, it seems that any vague set of facts can be sufficient for him to validate a past prediction. I suppose if Linus left Transmeta for OSDL this year rather than last, he would be able to have claimed his 'prediction' on Linux kernel development reorganization in 2004 had been met!
My only prediction is that at the start of next year he will again claim to be at least 70% correct. But there are some useful trends suggested that are worth considering. I now see why the start of the new year is always such a low moment in readership.
Half the predictions he made, I could have made. And I know hardly anything about technology. Anyone who reads or watches the news regularly could have made these predictions.
Sophie
This sentence imply that SCO has a case and IP is not taken seriously in the Linux development methods. Get Real. Their is no fearce IP defenders thant the OSS/GNU developpers, and Linux is a prime example of that fact. And by the way which crisis ? Can you be more specific? Or can't you? This is a bold statement.
And now, he states that SCO has no CLAIMS. How can you contradict yourself in the same breath and be proud of your wrintings. This one wasn't so hard to predict and nullify the No 5 prediction.
To take with a grain of salt.
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assert(expired(knowldege)); core dump
Only Bill Gates knows for sure if the next Windoze "update" will turn M$ messaging back on so that it can't be turned off. Still, it's easy to predict a flood of IM "services" that are trojans offered as "free" downloads in banner ads. Pop goes the advert.
Ugh, the clueless world of non free. It only gets worse.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
actually, there was one very recent case I studied in Sociology about a Jewish father claming to be a "better Jew than Abraham" because he did not stop, as abraham did, to kill his two children after his wife recieved full custody when remarrying a christian...
..namely what is the connection, if any, between Cringely and Microsoft and Cringely and SCO?
I am sooooo paranoid.....
A recruiter for the Tsar was passing thru a town and noticed a a large number of targets painted on the side of a barn, with a hole thru the center of each one. He asked a villager, who is this fantastic shot ? The villager replied, oh thats joe, but you don't want him for your army. What do you mean - the center of the bulls eye is hit in every target!! This man is a great shot!! Oh said the villager, you see, joe shoots first and then paints the target....
I mean, predicting that sun will go down aint' batting in a tough league !! All the McNealyey crap is short term flash that has never amounted to much - guy is the biggest con artist int he biz, after decastro
In the Linux 2.6.0 kernel, under the "drivers" directory, there are currently 2218 ".c" files :
/usr/src/sys/kernel/linux-2.6.0/drivers
.c source files. Using that assumption, that calculates out to 1109 open source drivers in the current Linux kernel. That is a lot !
.c file, and in a number of cases, multiple devices from different vendors may be supported by a single .c file, as the they have used underlying chipsets from the same third party. So the current Linux kernel would support say 3/4 of that 2218 figure, or 1663 devices, which all have fully open source drivers. The figure is probably significantly higher, possibly even greater than the 2218, but we'll stick to 1663 for this example.
--
> pwd
> find . -name "*.c" | wc -l
2218
>
--
Being very conservative, let's say each hardware device supported by Linux requires two
Of course, most drivers are only contained within one
Let's divide that 1663 devices by 10 to get the number of manufacturing vendors. Of course, the figure is likely to be much lower than 10 devices per vendor, probably 5 or less, maybe with an average of 2. However, let's assume 10. That indicates that 166 vendors have 'got' the open source idea, and published their programming specs, or even contributed GPL licensed drivers.
Linux driver support may appear to be broken because the two major graphics card vendors don't publish programming specifications. However, 2 vendors holding out, compared at least 150 or more who get open source, doesn't make Linux driver support broken.
The Linux development model has succeeded, as has the Linux philosophy on driver development. It is only the few, high-profile "bad apples" that make it appear to have not been successful.
The Internet's nature is peer to peer - 20050301_cs_profs.pdf
As part of the predicted re-org, maybe an audit committee would be a good idea. Supposedly, there have been some instances where BSD code (some of which really did have a genisis in AT&T ancient unix) has been placed in the Linux Kernal (which is allowed under the BSD license) but had the BSD/AT&T copyrights stripped/unattributed (which in not legal under the BSD licence). Now might be the opportunity to formally audit the entire code base and make sure that all the BSD/AT&T code is properly attributed. I know there have been some informal efforts at this, but I'm not aware of any official Kernel.org effort. Not only will it make the Linux community look better, but it would undercut SCO, plus its the right thing to do.
I predict that next year, Linux will be as dead as BSD and apple.
If that's death, do you want to live?
SCO employee? Check out the bounty
I like Cringely too - I think his "Accidental Empires" book is an excellent read.
My only suggestion is that if you are going to say his predictions are vague, you need to provide a few more examples than just one. That tends to suggest that is other 14 aren't !
The Internet's nature is peer to peer - 20050301_cs_profs.pdf
What planet do you live on? On my plannet there's a guy named Knopper who made a CD that runs and self configures on just about any computer without taking any hard drive space. Knoppix has two sets of replacements for the world's most popular software. It sets up with a KDE 3 desktop that has proved itself just as easy to learn and use as Windoze XP, but it also has Window Maker and other choices. Networking is autoconfigured and it comes with two browsers that block popups and have tabbed browsing. It also has a choice of superior email clients that are not liable to root your machine and come with spell checkers. If that's not enough for the average user then comercial software vendors, such as Microsoft have failed misserably. Because there's so much space on a CD, Mr. Knopper decided to put two office productivity suits in. The Open Office suite not only reads Microsoft's file formats, it comes with a database replacement for access. Microsoft charges lots of money for it's little productivity suite and charges even more for the "pro" version that has the database. Because users like choice, Knoppix also has KOffice, yet another productivity suite that's easy to use. Oh sure, Knoppix comes with power toys, like a compiler, GUI IDEs, disk and network management tools and other geeky things. All of this on one no cost CD that configures itself. Is that meeting the needs of "mundane users"?
I dare you to compare that with commercial offerings. Show me a "mundane user" who can wade through the multiple CD, floppy and reboot process that is a Windoze install. How much did that cost, $150? Oh sure, "the computer comes configured." That works great until Bill turns the upgrade crank two years later. Then the crap breaks and the user is stuck. Tell me a happy story about restore disks and I'll tell you a sad one about broken hard disks that screw it up. I don't even want to mention user data that gets lost in the process, unless said "mundane user" goes down to the computer store and spends about as much money as a working used computer costs. Hey, did that restore CD have an office suite? Nope, all your fave software is gone, sorry.
Let's sum up the differences for the works:
Free
Non-Free
Who's meeting the needs of users again? Is it those nice people at Gator?
Free software will always be a meritocracy because everyone is free and invited to participate. The best of breed will always rise and users will always be served. When someone makes a cool toy or tool, everyone wins. The non-free world will always have powerful haves, who hoard their tricks, and helpless have-nots who beg for software. Always, that is, until it's apparent to everyone that free software fills every need beter than any marketroid wet dream of sales. You and Cringerly will get it soon enough. Until then, I wish you would shut up.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
dumbshit... cringley didn't even post the story... someone else did.
5) The SCO debacle has created a crisis within the Linux community. They pretend that it hasn't, but it has. This will come to a head in 2004 with either the development of a new organizational structure for Linux or the start of its demise. Linux has to grow or die, and the direction it takes will be determined in 2004.
6) As for SCO, they'll continue to make noise until the middle of the year, at which point the legal case will implode and the company will give up. By that time, the company executives, insiders, and major investors will have all sold their positions at a handsome profit. This was never more than a stock scam, pushing the price of SCO shares up by more than 15 times. The clever part is how they used a legal case to make public claims that would have caused serious regulatory problems in any other context. We'll see more of this ploy in the future.
The above two predictions are inconsistent. If the second of the two is true, then there would be no reason for the first to be true.
Pretty much all of his observations are pretty obvious, except where he gets things wrong (i.e. nintendo using Cell).
But I suppose looking only a year into the future, you can't be too grandiose.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
You can play iTMS songs on either Macs or PCs. So relative market share of the two computer systems is irrelevant.
The only place where market share is relevant is in MP3 players, because iPods are the only one that plays AAC with Fairplay DRM. However, in that area, Apple with its iPods have a commanding part of the market.
Based on market share, I would argue that on-line stores should embrace AAC with Fairplay. Note, Apple doesn't own Fairplay, Veridisc does (http://64.244.235.240/)
....corporate numbers sure are decent, then what basis is there for saying they are performing badly?
Did you RTFA? He claims that HP/Compaq did not make as much money as it would have if they had they remained separate.
Pick a low quality (costly) product. It comes under pressure from a free high quality product. The low quality (costly) product comes under pressure. A 3rd grade kid could draw that line of reasoning.
Only a 3rd grade kid WOULD draw that line of reasoning! It's a frighteningly all to common situation where inferior products dominate the market despite availability of superior alternatives.
With all due respect I think some people have a tendency to assume that since Sco's claim is likely to be false that is the end of the issue - its not.
As a thought experiment assume that suddenly Sco do come up with some code. So we can just rip it out and replace it and everythings back to normal right? Of course not. Imagine I break into your house and steal your stereo. Six months down the line you come round my house and find it, so I give you it back and go and buy a new one. Would that make everything alright - of course not.
The one argument of Sco's that I do not see being fully addressed concerns the lack of oversight. Sco argue that open source development is fundamentally flawed because of a lack of it, or a least a formal structure to deal with it - and this may well be the point Cringely is pushing at. It would only take I line of code for there to be a argument to answer to, and even if there isn't that argument might still have validity.
So to continue the experiment, what if they do come up with goods? what if they don't but companies start to feel the chill? The stage is set for somebody to come along and say Linux is a great thing, but its a little too anarchic, what it needs is a formal structure. (Guess what? someone might just have said it). At this point the stage is set for large vested interests to come in and say we've got the money, we've got the people, the most efficient thing to do is set up a top down structure(that just happens to have us in control).
At this point the free and open nature of the process is under threat - it isn't *just* about the code - it never is - in this field or any other. In the worse case scenario Linux could effectively become just another coporate product - but one backed up by unpaid labour - and how long would it last. The GPL does provide a good gurantee - you can always fork (as long as the GPL holds) - but this could just translate to death by a thousand cuts.
Don't think that popular open movements can't be taken over by self-interest masquerading as efficiency - outside computing it has happened time, and time again.People need to start thinking seriously about these issues. We need to consider how we can create structures that can answer these issues without compromising the open nature of the free software process. Don't think of this as a dumb prediction, think of it as a wake up call
Paul M
"There are no innocent bystanders. What where they doing there in the first place"
William S Burroughs
Cringely wrote:
"I was wrong in my mysterious prediction of a new electronic way to foment social change. I just never got around to doing it myself (that was the plan), so I'll have to accept that I was wrong."
I don't see his email, or I'd email him directly...but he *did* get that one right: consider Howard Dean and Meetup.
mark "did I mention ?"
1. Terrorism is NOT just about body counts, it is about the ability to get a group to accede to your wishes by force or threat of force. Killing people is an effective way to do this but it is not the only way. In a highly wired country like the USA, a single cyberterrorist act that cripples the nation's infrastructure and/or economy is just as effective in producing terror as threatening to crash a plane into a building.
2. Cyberterrorism need not be separate from other acts of terrorism. A cyber attack could well be a component of a large, complex attack. So even if a large cyberterror attack were improbable, it doesn't rule out small ones that are done as one piece of a much larger attack. (For example, using electronic means to extort or steal money, as Cringley admits is likely, could finance another 9/11 attack.)
However, not until China, India or some other place starts directly ripping off software and rereleasing it for sale.
... it's pretty scary stuff. Many foreign governments (Germany, for example) have some rather stiff penalties applied to anyone (domestic or otherwise) attempting to unduly influence a member of their government. Its considered treasonous, actually. Perhaps we should look into a similar application of the law here in the U.S.
... where have you BEEN? The people "represented" by those whores have been on the losing end of that particular stick since their respective organizations were established. No thank you ... I'd rather write my Congressman on the issues I find important and encourage others to do the same than trust some unelected "trade organization" or union to represent my interests. One could easily argue that unions have done more damage to the American worker, his employers, and the economy than good, and I, for one, will never be joining one. Ask the starving artists "represented" by Hilary Rosen and her crew just how much that representation (and I use term loosely) has cost them. Your point that political power is more effective when focused is valid, but your choice of examples does not help your case.
Where have you BEEN? China has been outright stealing technology for years and getting away with it. How do you think they industrialized so quickly? Magic? Space aliens? The only difference between the way China bootstrapped themselves and the way Japan did it is that we rebuilt Japan's industry in the post WWII era and essentially made them a gift of our then-current industrial technology. On the other hand, China is a thinly-veiled potential enemy who has shown no compunction whatsoever against taking whatever they need from us, by any means, including espionage and outright theft of military and industrial secrets. What will it take for corporate America to wake up and learn that China does not view "business" and competition the same way that Western cultures do. They will do whatever it takes to win, with no regard to matters of legality or business ethics as we understand them. That does not mean that we can't successfully do business with China, but it does mean that we had better take the maxim "know thine enemy" to heart, and make some real efforts to understand their business culture. Right now we're simply giving away everything that our own corporations and taxpayers invested trillions to develop, for no other reason than the personal greed of our politicians and corporate leaders.
It hasn't helped matters one bit that members of our Federal Government, both elected and unelected, are so accessible to foreign powers. It's bad enough when our own major corporation and special interest groups buy favorable law, but it is much worse when foreign powers do it. Read up on a some of the back-room trade deals made with China
And that end run happens far more quickly if you have a Jack Valenti or Hillary Rosen. You need clear and distinct leaders to illustrate these points backed by a large slate of either developers (union) or small businesses...
And I'm sorry, but what I absolutely do NOT need as a software developer is representation by a Jack Valenti or a Hilary Rosen. Once again
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
By being completely stupid? How does free software "grow"? How does it "die"? These are comercial software concepts that have no meaning in the free software world.
Today, as it was before there was commercial software, free software grows when someone scratches an itch. Someone takes code and makes it do what they want. The result is more free code. Comercial code, on the other hand, grows when a marketing department convinces a user that thier particular program meets the user's needs better than anything else available. It's a cancer that chokes and kills healthy growth. The ultimate expression of comercial software growth is Bill Gates insane "one computer one OS", dreams of world domination and advertising that claims Microsoft Office will make you superman. Comercial software grows at the expense of real user needs. Free software grows by meeting needs.
Free software never really dies. I've never heard of a program that met one person's needs that was not useful to another person, if for nothing other than a starting point to meet their own needs. As long as a single copy of any free software exists, it will be used. Chances are, that anyone using any free software will make it available and it will grow if something better does not exist. It's easy to share source code. Comercial software, on the other hand, dies all the time for reasons that have nothing to do with merit or need. Any comercial software company that does not have enough money to pay it's bills is finished. The source code is then hoarded as a valuable asset and generally bought for pennies on the dollar of it's development cost by a competitor who locks it up or destroys it.
Indeed, it can be said that the ultimate fate of comercial software is to conquer or die. This is Cringerly's mind set and it has nothing to do with free software.
The easy prediction for free software is that it will grow.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
How can Cringley miss on his SCO/Linux Prediction? He's effectively stated that the SCO case will blow up, and Linux will either change something or go away. In what scenario is he wrong about this. I think its a given that sooner or later SCO will explode, but what else does Linux know how to do, other than adapt to the current environment? Linux version 0.01 isn't the 2.4 kernel, nor is the 2.4 kernel the same as the 2.6 kernel. Its always changing and adapting to current technology needs. If some of those happen to be legal, so be it (although I think this will all result in sharper teeth for the GPL in the end). Anywho, Cringley will claim he's spot on next january, but theres no way he really can't be, as he's predicted the only possible outcomes.
They had announced it would come during 2003. You are mixing the announcement date and the announcement.
I usually enjoy Cringley's columns, but this one annoyed me to the point of posting a response to each of his "predictions". For the most part, they're so incredibly vague as to be worthless.
1) It will happen late in the year, but Microsoft will make a bold run for video game leadership...
Didn't Microsoft already do this, with the XBox? And let's just say MS decides to -announce- the next console - can we have some predicted specs? No? Then all this prediction says is "Microsoft will announce their next console." Fine, this one actually has a bit of substance, actually puts Cringley in the position of being distinctly right or wrong. Of course, the XBox is now almost 2 years old (launched in Nov of 2001), so it's not unreasonable to assume the announcement of a new console, particularly given how early the XBox itself was announced.
2) We still won't see a big example of cyber-terrorism simply because nobody has figured out how to actually kill people that way...
This seems like fluff to me. Did anyone ever predict "cyber-terrorism"? I know it's not something I'm worried about. If al qaeda (or whoever) stop my email for a week, hey, that's less work for me. It doesn't inspire terror. In fact, little that could be done online has the potential to cause terror, save for the goatse.cx man, and possibly this.
To paraphrase, "I was right last year, so let me try again this year." Watch, I can do it too, with a high probability of success - "We again won't see the launch of nuclear weapons". And hey, if I'm wrong, you probably won't be able to hold me to it anyway.
3) Despite new anti-spam laws, we'll still be plagued with unsolicited commercial messages, especially using Internet Messaging protocols.
Oh my god, what a bold prediction! Surely this Cringley is possessed of a preternatural ability for soothsaying. Spam will still be a problem! Perhaps I can pay this man for tomorrow's lottery numbers, or for a Super Bowl pick. Then it's off to the bookie...
Sorry, my sarcasm got the best of me. To be fair, he does predict possible new email protocols, but he doesn't address whether they will be accepted, or even considered.
4) Continuing the security theme, look for lots of software companies to abandon support for old products and platforms.
Microsoft JUST announced they were dropping Windows 98 support. And companies do this all the time. Is he predicting a rise in this type of decision?
"Companies will abandon old products to get you to upgrade." Once again I am shocked!
5) The SCO debacle has created a crisis within the Linux community. They pretend that it hasn't, but it has.
This one has everyone here talking, but what does it really say? Linux will either continue to grow or start to die in 2004. Well, I mean, yeah. Obviously. Linux has BEEN growing for years now, so if it continues to grow, well look, he was right. Oh, and if in 5, 10 years, it's dead? Well, look, he was probably right, it probably started in 2004, or at least it may have. This is a non-prediction. Something will happen, or it won't. All this rules out is Linux stagnating, and who can judge that? What are the odds that every flavor of Linux will stop making major updates, but continue to make minor updates (and thus, not grow, but not die?).
6) As for SCO, they'll continue to make noise until the middle of the year, at which point the legal case will implode and the company will give up...
SCO will finally crumble under the weight of their legal lies, you say? I'm sure I speak for much of the Slashdot community, and Cringely's largely geek audience in general, when I say "Yes, we know".
7) 2004 will be a crucial year for streaming media... At first, this doesn't sound like much of a prediction. Then, he says MS will settle, which
I love Cringe, but I can do that too. It's just too easy. Just say 10 obvious things out of 14 and you can easily get to be right 70% of the time...
1 thru 4 are all obvious.
5- For better or worse, Linux has already grown. For instance, Red Hat can do whatever they want with their Enterprise line, which already includes a non-standard Kernel. Fragmentation is possible, but it will not lead to Linux's demise, since such thing is impossible. Linux will never become abandonware, unless it's replaced by something much better and just as free (as in speech). Not sure Hurd would be it, though.
6, 7, and 8 are all obvious.
9 - the Apple TV claim is not so obvious, but iPod and other small devices are very likely
10 is a good one. Not obvious to me. Alas, storage IS the big problem for 2004. Clusters are solving the processing power issue quite nicely. On the storage side, we have the capacity, but what about throughtput? I don't know anyone working in IT that's happy with speed they can haul data around.
11 is obvious.
12 - I don't know if Wal-mart will be so successful with WMA. Too many MP3 players can't play them files. So it's not so obvious. Good one and I hope Wal-mart will come around and use some other format. DRM is stupid stupid stupid. Better to trust people, because the pirates will get their way regardless.
13 - Who cares what's in a name? If they continue to sell only G5, what's wrong with that? This would be as relevant as saying that Intel won't bring any Pentium V chips to market. That doesn't mean the Pentium IV line won't advance...
14 and 15 are obvious and in fact have been happening for the last few years. This can't even be called a prediction.
Last year:
-Snip-
A year ago, I wrote that HP/Compaq would continue its long slide to oblivion, and if you look underneath the corporate numbers, you'll see I was correct. The promised synergies have been minimal, growth nonexistent, and the companies are several billion dollars behind where they would have been had they remained separate.
-Snip-
A lot of people made that prediction inside HP when the merger was first brought up. It was more than obvious to most people in the busisness. Remember unisys (Sperry and Burroughs) a few years ago?
-Snip-
I wrote that Linux would continue to give Microsoft fits (that's true) and that Microsoft would be forced to compete on quality. This latter part is hard to call because Microsoft CLAIMS to be competing on quality, but I think that's still more marketing than reality. Overall though, I think I got this one correct.
-Snip-
You predicted this? You must be a genius. Along with everyone else in IT and hundreds of "market analysts". At least most of them didn't make the "quality" prediction - they predict, correctly, it would continue with the same strategy: a lot of marketing and FUD.
-Snip-
I was wrong, too, in my prediction that Microsoft would force Intel to adopt AMD's 64-bit Opteron instructions. I'll point out, however, that Microsoft and AMD continue to work more closely on 64-bit development than do Microsoft and Intel.
-Snip-
Maybe you were not so wrong on this one, give it a year and see what happens...
-Snip-
correctly predicted that V.92 modem development would stall, but that nobody would care.
-Snip-
Damn! You must have some weird superpower (like time travel or the abillity to talk to the dead - 'cause they can predict the future) to be able to know this.
-Snip-
I predicted that Microsoft's Palladium security plan, now called Trustworthy Computing, would be distrusted and stall. That looks right to me.
-Snip-
Does anyone _trust_ microsoft? And on top of that, the security industry is full of paranoid people - it has to be. Here's a small list of what is not sought after in the security biz (IT or not): "trusting", "gullible" and "relaxed".
-Snip-
that 802.11a wireless networking would be overtaken by 802.11g.
-Snip-
You do make some BOLD predictions...
-Snip-
And finally, I correctly predicted a rise of web log aggregators and search engines.
-Snip-
I'm glad you were right, I love my slashdot feed.
Now, this year's predictions:
-Snip-
Microsoft will make a bold run for video game leadership. Sony and Nintendo have both chosen IBM's Cell Processor for their next-generation game consoles. This is a processor that does not yet exist and for which nobody can fathom how to write games. While the two Japanese companies scratch their heads, Microsoft will be trying to make inroads with game developers and introduce its own next-generation machine. In the long run, though, Microsoft won't succeed in taking the gaming lead.
-Snip-
Microsoft already made a "bold run for video game leadership". It failed and will never succeed. Anyone can tell you that.
-Snip-
We will, however, see dramatic growth in cyber-extortion and plain old theft.
-Snip-
Dramatic? No. It will simply continue to grow. It has been growing for a while now...
-Snip-
Despite new anti-spam laws, we'll still be plagued with unsolicited commercial messages, especially using Internet Messaging protocols. Look for new and unenforceable laws in this area, too. As for old fashioned spam, it will continue to cram our inboxes, making a good business for third-party anti-spam products and services while making e-mail pretty much useless for reliable communication. Microsoft will see opportunity here and propose new protocols to replace SMTP and POP3. They may even offer those protocols as Open Source, but there will be a catch. With Microsoft there always is.
-Snip-
Offcourse spam will continu
Most significant Linux development is outside of the US anyways, where the SCO pissing contest is but a source of entertainment as it demonstrates the terminal stupidity of americans.
But who'll care??? After Saudi Arabia and Venezuela (despite the violent destabilization campaign waged there by the USA) start selling their petroleum in Euros, the US dollar won't be worth the paper it's printed on, and no one will care about the 'mericans any more.
I know I'm just stating the obvious here, but it seems worth mentioning, in case people really believe Cringely's "the sky is falling" claim regarding SCO and Linux.
First, there is Linux the kernel, and there is Linux the full featured operating system. The only thing in any danger is Linux the kernel, which is just a part of Linux the operating system. So, right off the bat, the potential danger is localized.
Second, once SCO is compelled by the courts to reveal the allegedly infringing code - if there is any - the Linux community will quickly replace it, and Linux will be back on track.
If, for some reason, replacing the allegedly infringing code is not possible, there are other kernels to turn to, including but not limited to the excellent BSD kernel (Free, Net, Open).
This SCO nonsense is just good entertainment for us, and a foolish money sink for companies like IBM that have to put up with SCO's obnoxiousness.
There's nothing to see here. Move on.
-Teckla
Hitchkiker's Guide to /. Linux Users: Don't Panic!
There's no reason to panic(9), should the current Linux implementation be declared illegal in a US court:
But this is only theoretical. It is most likely that a judge will require that some code be purged from the Linux kernel; code that can be really easily hacked up in a few hours or days.
DONT'T PANIC! (The Hitchhiker's Guide to /. Linux-Users)
cpghost at Cordula's Web.
First - use (very)weak encryption on the source code and distributed binary kernel, and make the decryption of both dependent on the fact that you're not SCO or any other baddies, and then use the DMCA to pound them into submission when they circumvent our protection devices.
I think I'm on to something. The DMCA is evil, but it is simply an evil tool. Used in chaotic neutral hands, it can spell doom for the wicked.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
..some time in the next year you're going to have conflict with someone you care about very much. The future of Linux is no longer in doubt, it's past the tipping point and rolling downhill. At this point it would be like trying to stop the wind. Even if my some miracle of purchased justice or legislation it was stalled here, US actions are not going to stop it from spreading in the rest of the world. But I don't think that's going to happen, either. The GPL is actually pretty good and based on US copyright law. Telling people they can't donate their time and code to a community project would raise 1rst amendment issues, not that Bush and his thugs care about that but legally it would be a tough sell. And almost every company is benefiting from OSS in some way by this time, so every day the political landscape is changing, too. I think the proprietary software industry is doing all it can. Attacking any OSS project politically, spinning an aura of fear, discounting to hang on to customers. If there were other legal avenues, they'd be using them already, SCO notwithstanding. But Cringley may be right in one aspect, it is getting near the point when Linux needs to be more unified and this year may be it. Either way it's still the best show in town. All the really fun stuff in IT is happening around Linux and OSS.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
How could linux be declared illegal, even in the US, the land of strange patent laws? There is no lawsuit that is going to declare linux illegal.
Also, copyright infringements and legality are two very separate issues, in fact the current case (SCO vs IBM) is not even a copyright lawsuit, it is about SCO alleging that IBM has broken their contract with SCO. It has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with legality of Linux.
My quality social news site.com.
This is exactly what I thought when I read this. Dean was a long shot candidate like Kucinich at the start of the race, now he's the front runner for the nomination for leader of the free world.
Joe Trippi is a Jedi. Cringely is smarter than he realizes.
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
I couldn't help but notice prediction Number 14. "IT outsourcing, as covered ad nauseum in this column, will become a political issue in the 2004 U.S. Presidential campaign. Whichever candidate comes out in opposition to outsourcing will have the advantage. And they'll be correct, though the extent of real damage to the U.S. economy and IT industry won't be apparent to those bozos for several more years." He goes into details about his own percieved dangers of this practice here.(scoll down)
Sun had a bit of a lock-in with Solaris. The thing is that since Linux has become popular, the binary lock-in doesn't really count for a lot. It is to Sun's advantage if they decide that the high-end hardware business is what they want, then they can move away from Solaris and benefit from lower costs. To lever there high-end hardware, they would need to get some features into the kernel that may be beneficial to others (like domains), but on the whole, it would be an improvement.
Either they get it, or they lose out. They have already lost at the lower end (desktops).
See my journal, I write things there
2) We still won't see a big example of cyber-terrorism simply because nobody has figured out how to actually kill people that way. When it comes to terrorism, all that matters are body counts.
All that matters in terrorism is how bad it looks on TV. The severity of damage is sabotage - actual terrorism,, the spread of terror, is a media phenomenon derived from the sabotage. Broken computers don't look bad on TV. Even if the 2003 Blackout was due to viruses taking down warning systems during peak demand, and lots of people died, the 20 million affected went without TV, so were immune to the terror that might have ensued. If only we can learn to distinguish sabotage from terrorism, we can vaccinate our minds, turn off the TV, and win the Terror War.
--
make install -not war
That's it? That's the best you can come up with as a counter to the massive improvements to ease of use, user costs, stability and ease of upkeep of free software? Rudamentary graphing is available in both of those packages. If the pace of free software development of the past is a guide to the future, gnumeric will soon have every graph tool M$ has but they will all work they way they are supposed to. The average user, who you insultingly call "mundane", could care less anyway.
As you point out, Microsoft is equally guilty of indifference to users
I've yet to see a convincing display of free software indifference. It's hard to attach the word "guilt" to people who share their work without charge to the rest of the world. People who use free software are NOT getting screwed, they are running software the commercial world fails to deliver at any cost.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Sorry, wrong. This one's a no-brainer. It's a presidential election year, and the Democrats desperately need an economic issue. No one's ever made a go of the deficit issue -- not enough people get excited that their children may suffer 20 years from now. You can only go so far with arguing that the tax cuts for the wealthy should be repealed -- too many people aspire to be wealthy themselves. None of the Democratic candidates seem to be willing to discuss tax cuts for the working poor -- because that would mean cutting Social Security taxes and admitting that SS accounting is a farce. Which leaves jobs.
The media are already getting behind this -- every major paper and news magazine has already run stories about unemployed IT professionals. It's a natural for the liberal parts of the press -- heartless corporations putting people out of work for the sake of profits. A handful of states have introduced laws barring companies that provide call centers for state services from moving them offshore. There's been at least one scandal -- a San Francisco hospital outsourced some activity involving medical records, it got subcontracted at least twice, and ended up in India where a woman attempted to blackmail one of the subcontractors by threatening to post the private medical records on the Web. Almost everyone knows someone who has been affected, and the Democrats will attempt to play on that general fear.
To be honest, no one has any idea whether moving these jobs offshore is bad for the economy or not. At the present time, which do you think is having more effect on IT hiring -- offshoring, or the combination of a general recession, the dot-com bust, and the telecom industry meltdown? Certainly there are individuals who are hurt in the short term by such actions. The longer-term effect will depend on what kinds of jobs we create to offset the losses. If you know what the growth industries are for the next ten years, you can get rich. The disaster only happens if there are no growth industries...
Cringley makes one of the classic tech-punditry blunders, which is to confuse Linux with an operating system while simultaneously confusing it with a religious movment and/or trade association.
It's none of the above, of course. It's a free software kernal, rolled into many operating systems like Red Hat and Debian, but still just a kernel. Pretty much useless by itself, unlike Free, Net and OpenBSD, which are top-to-bottom OS projects, with a central organizational structure that takes care of everything a user could want or need in their Unix system.
Free Software/Open Source has not one, but two religious movment/trade associations, complete with Famous and Glamorous grand high pooh-bah charismatic heads. Richard Stallman on the one side, and Bruce Perens on the other. Both men and their organizations are pretty much ignored by everyone involved with Linux, save to incorporate their software into the Linux-based OS projects or to toss obscene amounts of cash at them to help them kick Microsoft out of the datacenter. Overall, they're mostly just good for really entertaining flame wars.
Linux will continue to grow unchecked because there is no organizational structure. People are free to take and use the kernel however they see fit, so long as they share the source code to any modifications, so it will wind up in spacecraft microcontrollers and kilo-processor supercomputers, wrapped in the software needed to get the job done.
Linux-based desktop operating systems will put in more effort to be interoperable with each other, though it's unlikely they'll all get together and decide to have someone be their collective boss. That's not neccesarily a bad thing, and coprorate customers will be more comfortable knowing that the organizational structure in charge of their Linux-based OS is "IBM" or "Red Hat" rather than a nebulous organization of hippies and geeks... gives 'em someone to sue if it all goes wrong.
SoupIsGood Food
It seems that Linux has reached the top of its current evolutionary model. ;-), X-less GUI, less old-times Unix, etc.
With the-year-of-Linux-desktop-that-never-comes and all these talks about kernel code showing age and becoming crafty
there is a feeling that overall development under the current conditions cannot continue forever.
I mentioned this countless times before: I beleive that there will be new OS/environment emerging from someone's proverbial garage that will learn on Linux, use Linux device drivers and pick up the torch of the OSS community.
The attributes of such new OS would be: object oriented, built-in DRM and crypto/authentication, SCO-free
so,cringely claims that the ridiculous SCO claims over snippets of Linux code may destruct the organisational structure that sustains free/open source software development. it is the same claim as saying that the free/open source world is dependent upon the commercial sphere to prolong its stay in the software world. unfortunately for cringely, this sounds very silly and non-pragmatic. for although money, adoption by the masses, corporates, and governments of the world is critical for f/oss to gain momentum, the organisational structure behind such undertakings is not sustained by neither legal nor commercial influences. and although i dunno if others are terrified by sco, i personally dont give a damn. sco may eke out a profit out of their fantasies turned legal argument, yet in the longer term such a sco-policy cannot pay. and this also weird since cringely, in the very same installment, says that all sco is after is making a quick buck and then dropping their case before it even gets to courts. so how could sco undermine f/oss development structures?
As a member of the Linux community...
Ever noticed that those who have to say it, aren't?
Pros: "I know a little about computers."
Also-rans: "I'm a computer expert."
Pros: "We'll do our best."
Also-rans: "We deliver quality."
Pros: "I'm OS neutral." (though would probably recommend specific OS for specific job)
Also-rans: "Linux is like a god."
Pros: "Life always picks up and goes on..."
Also-rans: "Linux could be threatened! Everybody should worry about it!"
I'll bet that:
90% or more of what we worry about, in life, doesn't happen.
90% or more of what we hope or dream about, and really work at, happens.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
WTF?
Here's another factor you did not mention - who uses Wal-Mart's web site?
Sure, lots and lots of people of all bands visit the stores. But that's not going to help online music sales much. I think there are very few people actually shopping around online for music stores, and almost no-one going to the Wal-Mart web site the same way people go to the stores. So Wal-Mart's service in reality has a pretty low visibility.
Now add in the 900 pound gorilla - the Pepsi promotion. All sorts of Wal-Mart customers are going to go to ITMS for a free song or two, in the process downloading iTunes and after that other services are a non-starter since iTunes makes it so much easier to shop for music than web-based sites.
Wal-Mart seems like a huge competitor. But the on-line presence is weak, and I doubt Wal-Mart has a desire to loose a bundle in support of this service.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
You've never seen Wal-mart's IT capabilities. They are quite extensive and is surely part of the reason of their success. The perfected cross-docking and inventory management -- and THAT is the reason for their success.
Yea, they drove some people out of business for sure. But at the same time, they are a VERY capable company. They very well could succeed at this.
I don't think that crigley realizes how crisis management in the linux community works.
When the Debian servers were compromised things went like this:
1. Announce the the problem
2. Research the problem
3. Find the fix
4. Announce the fix, the cause and any errata
(Over-simplified, I know)
With SCO things went like this
1. SCO anounced their lawsuit
2. Groklaw was created.
3. IBM and others worked on the legal front
4. News is getting out and code has been analized
This would be over if not for the lack of speed in the US legal system.
While noone would disagree that getting verbally kicked in the pants is not a crisis when done often enough, lives where not on the line so there was no reason to panic. Thats where Cringely got it wrong. Crisis != panic in in the FOSS Comunity
Bleep
Dear Grammar Nazi,
I liked your letter very much but it is too confusing for wide consumption and understanding. Instead, try this rule:
When you want to use "its" or "it's", try putting in "it is" first - if it sounds funny, use "its", if it looks good, use "it's".
Now everyone can write!
Sincerely,
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Although in theory you are correct in the technical definition, the real terrorists that we have at the moment are only interested in dead bodies, and what makes the most of them. Even if some cyber attacks are more interesting and could affect many more people, I doubt the terrorist leadership can really grasp that they would actually be more "terrifying" to a lot of people than an attack that kills a bunch of people. Kind of like how managers now don't get technology either and make all sorts of missteps.
Probably in about ten years we'll see real cyber-terrorism tried as younger leadership takes hold.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
4. Driver contains code bought from several different companies. Getting permission to open source is inconvinient and expensive.
5. The driver itself is innovative, like for ATI and NVidia and the company doesn't want to give away its secrets.
6. The driver is open sourced, but not popular enough to be included in the kernel. The company wants to provide one pre-compiled binary that works on all Linux distributions.
Since the court case, against IBM, won't be heard by the courts until 2005, 2004 will be a year of FUD by SCO, and growth in the GNU/Linux community.
Greg
Apple would like to sell 2 billion G5s this year. See, I was right!
I had posted the same link That Cringely has on his site that talls the story how Bush used the capture of Saddam as a front to sign the Patriot Act II into law. STILL the /. folks seemed to ignore it and even Cringely's comments on it in this article. I guess SCO is more important than your rights as US citizens (for those of you who are).
Cisco will not only maintain its leadership in networking, they'll make big inroads into managed storage against companies like EMC."
I work on EMC and Cisco products in SAN/storage areas, EMC doesn't make SAN switches (well, it OEM's from brocade, mcdata, cisco)..so am not really sure what he is babling about managed storage and overtaking EMC..Cisco is not in the bussiness of making "Storage Systems/UNITS" like EMC..
Looks like Cringley crossed his wires here!!
...only outlaws will use open source.
Yeah, I think Steve would be a better
bullshitter than Sam. Because Sam
Walton has been dead for a few years
now.
No elaboration, explanation, discussion of what 'grow or die' means. How trivial.
As for SCO, they'll continue to make noise until the middle of the year, at which point the legal case will implode and the company will give up...This was never more than a stock scam,
This much at least seems true.
We'll see more of this ploy in the future.
This seems unlikely. Once SCO self-destructs and all non-insiders are left hoding shares at 100% loss, this pattern will become evident even to financial analysts (who, with few exceptions, have been amazingly dense sofar). Even Didio and Enderle will be able to see it then, though they'll never have the decency to say so.
"that's not encryption - it's a new perl script that I'm working on..." - from some Matrix parody
Linux is BETTER organized than closed source shops.
The whole notion that Linux is somehow disorganized is a subtle knock that says: "oh, it has to be centralized to be organized", in other words, only big companies are capable of organization. Yet, big companies are often just as disorganized as the internet blob that is Linux.
We often note how corporate will can accomplish great things, but, we also live in a world where we disregard all of the dishonesty and infighting that plagues many IT departments and companies. Even MS is not immune to this - with the rumored infighting between the Office team and the
By contrast, Linux projects are out in the open. You can check the status of any via the web, you can see the differing philosophies of the different camps of different systems easily, you can choose to decide which technology to invest in by a transparent and open decision making process. Of course, you could always look at the source yourself, and you may, but for the most part, the process of fundraising in the open source environment is a lot more transparent and accountable than the same process in a closed source company.
This is my sig.
. . . that a programmer was accused of "stealing" software. As /. readers know, in 1976, Gates attacked those who "stole" BASIC from him and the whole idea of sharing source code. Gates made the following claim in his 2/3/76 open letter to hobbyists:
"[By stealing software you] prevent good software from being written. Who can afford to do professional work for nothing? What hobbyist can put 3-man years into programming, finding all bugs, documenting his product and distribute for free?"
I'm laughing at clouds.
He's a bit psycho, as far as I can tell.
But, quality of service is an issue. I just tried to order prints from Wal-mart and have them delivered locally - the delivery date is mid January! My local photo store has a similar online service and if I order twenty prints I can get them the same day (same deal, pickup at the store), for no extra fee... No way would I use Wal-Mart. And after using ITMS no way would I use them for music either (it doesn't hurt I have an iPod of course).
I think Wal-Mart is trying to do do much and loosing some focus here.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
So you're Cringely with a year end predictions column to write.
You have two or three provocative theories that you would llke to push. You know they're unlikely to prove true. Plus they wouldn't fill a column all by themselves.
So you combine them with seven weak predictions that are sure to be found correct.
So if anyone questions your provocative predictions you smugly say that you're right 70% of the time year after year.
So you're respected by the media (who rarely do their homework) as this all knowing and seeing prognasticator even if your actual "real" predictions are rarely correct.
But your "record of predictions" ensures they're taken seriously and sponsor much debate.
Cringely, I'm on to your tricks pal.
Man Holmes
"Never underestimate the power of a Pentium-90 with a grudge to settle."
:)
Nice.
Well, then, I rest my case.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
...from the standpoint of John Q. Computerbuyer. Even though *we* all pretty much know that SCO's bullshit claims will never come to fruition, if anything regarding the kernal's lineage _were_ seen as infringing, the average person (i.e. the 90% of the world's computer users who DON'T frequent /.) will only understand the message that Linux has been "outlawed". Regardless of the underlying clarification that needs to be done to show them exactly how wrong that assumption is, the only message they'll come away with is "this cannot be used as-is legally." Their minds will not be able to pass this over, and they will begin to think of alternatives that can. This includes many top-level execs and Pointy-Haired Bosses (note the differentiation) who will read two words on the front page of the Times and make the decision to switch. This it seems would cause much more detriment to Linux's market share than any of us can currently explain away.
Never underestimate the power of an underinformed decision.
Sure Bill Gates' hair is fugly, but give his barber some credit! At least he managed to cover the horns on his forehead.
What about instead of turning the Linux kernel team into some sort of formal organization to protect against IP claims, we get some sort of revision to the GPL? Perhaps something that sets up a system of introducing new code with a fixed period in which IP claims can be made. Obviously, copyright law will ultimately take precedent over anything written into the GPL, but perhaps if we had a system in place to handle IP claims it would lend more credibility to the FOSS development process in court.
... did I miss anything?
While I was correct that there wouldn't be a significant act of high-tech terrorism in 2003 I was wrong in my mysterious prediction of a new electronic way to foment social change. I just never got around to doing it myself (that was the plan), so I'll have to accept that I was wrong.
What about Dean's takeover of the Democratic party via internet?
Uh oh, we're not argue Beta vs. VHS again, are we?
How interesting. How appropriate.
Chr0m0Dr0m!C
Consider this: Israel is considered a "homeland" for Jews, Christians (eg, Bethlehem), and Muslims.
But it's not the Jews or Christians that are strapping bombs to themselves so they can have a "homeland".
How many "Jewish" countries are there? 1. How many "Christian" countries are there? 0. How many "Muslim" countries are thene? Quite a few. But just try to live in one while being some other religion. It could be dangerous to your health.
I make it 5 out of 15. That's 33%. > 1. HP/Compaq will continue its long slide to oblivion. Well, they're still fairly strong companies. > 2. Dell gets bigger and bigger. While this is a no-brainer, Whatever. You get a point. > 3. At the same time, we'll see Microsoft's leadership further influenced by > Linux. Remember Steve Ballmer said Microsoft couldn't compete with Linux on > price, so they'd have to fight on quality. Linux has made NO difference to the quality of Microsoft's software. They're working harder to make everything more proprietary. See various court cases for details. > 4. If Linux is giving Microsoft fits, it is doing far worse to Sun Microsystems, > which I predict will have a very bad 2003. Sun had a bad 2003. You get a point. > 5. Meanwhile, China, which will eventually be the largest computer market on > earth, will standardize on MIPS processors and Linux, much to the dismay of both > Sun and Intel. No sign of the MIPS thing. You don't get a point. > 6. And as I said last week, Microsoft will force Intel to Adopt AMD's Opteron > 64-bit extensions. Hasn't happened yet. > 7. In the meantime, Apple will announce a line of computers using IBM's > incredible Power 4 processor, but of course, they won't actually be delivered > until 2004. Facts that count. You lose! > 8. The V.92 modem standard still won't work, but nobody will care. Seems to be working fine in Europe. People do care, because broadband isn't global. > 9. Microsoft's Palladium security initiative will become even less popular as > people realize that Palladium is too intrusive and it doesn't really work. Palladium hasn't arrived yet. It's facts that count, you lose. > 10. Still, security will be a bigger thing than ever, though you'll see a subtle > shift from people being worried about viruses to them being furious about spam. SPAM legislation is suddenly a big deal. A point to you. > 11. I wish it wasn't so, but by the end of 2003, I am sure we'll see at least > four new laws giving corporations the right to invade our privacy, with most of > those laws passed in the name of "patriotism." Can't be bothered to check. Have a point. > 12. Hollywood will come up with another new copy protection scheme for music and > it will be defeated within two months. ? Don't think so. > 13. 802.11a loses out to 802.11g. Have a point, for that obvious one, Mystic Bob. A newer standard beats an older one, surely not. > 14. I'm sorry to be mysterious about this one, but I seriously doubt that there > will be a significant act of high-tech terrorism in 2003, yet I think there will > emerge an entirely new way to use the Internet to effect social change. Be mysterious, by all means. You've said nothing new, no points. > 15. And finally, with the continued (and to me totally inexplicable) rise of web > logs, someone--maybe Google--will come up with an effective blog search engine to > read all that junk for us and extract what we really care about. There is no such web log extractor I can see.
... who gives a rat's ass what cringely thinks. the guy has zero credentials. all he does is bitch and whine all the fucking time in his "i, cringely, pulpit" columns.
Extraordinary Vacations. Exceptional Prices
like so much Cringley writes, is ignorant, egotistical, and, in his tepid way, "inflammatory," carelessly crafted for the single purpose of generating hype and controversy about... Cringley.
Seldom is such a "well regarded" technology journalist as consistently irrelevant as Cringley. He's a blowhard. Try reading his column on a regular basis - I know, it's painful, but try. You will see what I mean quickly.
Here's my prediction:
SCO is embarrased legally, although the perpetrators of the fraud (the SCO executive corps) stand a good chance of being protected from criminal prosecution by their large allies (who might find it awkward if their complicity came out). The aggrieved parties' (IBM, Redhat, many OS developers, etc) civil actions, however, have far more merit, and they sue the remnants of the company into a smoking crater. SCO executives will quickly declare bankruptcy when they see the end coming and attempt to shield their assets (their "personal" gains from the scheme), and it will be entertaining to see what lengths they will go to to do it (will the cash, or the people, leave the country?), and whether they will get away with it. I guarantee you Gates doesn't care if Darl McBride ends up broke or in prison - in fact, he would probably get a kick out of it.
Some will claim it's only a matter of time until "the next SCO." Others will rightly note that such IP and legal shenanigans can and do happen to everybody sufficiently threatening to their wealthy and unscrupulous competitors, and are far more likely to happen, let alone succeed, at a closed-source shop than an open source project. In fact, all it has demonstrated is that, contrary to some people's theories, a large open source project is surprisingly resillient and well equipped to defend itself against this kind of threat.
Haters will happily declare that a cloud has been cast over Linux and Open Source regardless, meanwhile, back in the real world, it will continue its inevitable treadmilling over products and companies that can't or won't outperform hobbyists.
In the very long haul, I suspect that the inevitable momentum of success will force more and more people to realize that collaborative software engineering, of many different kinds but loosely described as "Open Source," is the most productive and reliable method we have for doing many kinds of development, and this recognition will solidify in academic theory and accepted conventional wisdom. We will see more and more acceptance of sharing and openness in engineering in the mainstream, for infrastructure tasks like operating systems and compilers, for major applications, commodity code, middleware, and anywhere else we have problems with specific solutions sufficiently amenable to collective, decentralized effort.
Many more large organizations, especially foreign, and/or governmental, educational, and military, will continue the trend of consciously adopting open source for both political, economic, and practical reasons. There will be dissatisfaction, growing pains, and struggle, but also massive new contributions and growing credibility. In the end, journalists who made a living by obfuscating and belittling collaboration in engineering are going to look dated, and then silly, well within our lifetimes.
I'm guessing the continued growth of open source will ultimately help, rather than hurt, "proprietary" software as a whole, by making smarter engineers, giving them better tools and platforms, and clarifying the problems that are better solved in a proprietary way.
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
I've never liked Robert Cringley's style or manner, which basic can be summed up as observing the obvious, then claiming all the credit or screaming "SCANDAL" where there really is none. But what made me really dislike him forever is his total lack of journalistic ethics a.k.a. MAKING SHIT UP.
He has a history of INVENTING stories that simply do not exist. IMHO he should meet the same fate as Jayson Blair. I do not know why PBS hasn't caught on.
A prime example is his incredible story of bouncing a Wi-Fi signal over a mountain, which can be found at http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20020207. html.
Most of his Wi-Fi tall tales are at least physically possible, but this one crosses the line.
See Rob Flickenger's Response.
I'm trying to figure out what this "crisis" is that Cringely speaks of. What are we pretending isn't there? Is he just arbritrarily deciding there is a crisis just because he thinks there is? There has been no crisis, SCO has been laughed at all along, and 2.6 came out as Linus plunged forward.
:)
The "SCO debacle" has always been viewed as a bothersome joke that will soon pass. Where is the crisis in the Linux community? The only one I know of is the trend of bad SCO jokes we get now and then.
"Sufferin' succotash."
"'I pass the test,' she said. 'I will diminish, and go into the West, and remain Galadriel.'"
- JRR Tolkien.
Just today, I was listening to tape 11 of the audiobook version of The Fellowship of the Ring, which contains this line. First time I've gone back to 'read' this in about 25 years. Just today, for the first time in over a week, I decide to read Slashdot, and run across this in a sig...
Predictions are a bit like that. Something may happen several times beneath one's notice, then you attention gets called to it for some reason, after which it suddenly pops into your notice. Then you wonder...
Concealed Handgun License Courses in Plano, Texas
I see lots of arguments to the contrary, and they've all been modded up to 5. But let's look at this issue in a calmer fashion, okay?
Linux is technically solid. This is no surprise, as it essentially borrowed its technical solidity from UNIX, which had been around for 20 years when Linux first appeared. This is good.
But beyond the kernel and server-type applications and developer utilities, Linux has less focus. Some people like using bare window managers. Some people want X Windows replaced with something saner. Then there are the KDE/Gnome desktop environment battles. Lets not even get into the various GUI creation libraries.
One side will say "Choice is good!", and I agree. But all the arguing and general muddling has made Linux much less appealing as an alternative to more focused operating systems. Apple forces a GUI down your throat, but at the same time they've succeeded in making desktop UNIX appealing and a target for well-known applications. So Linux needs to grow in the sense that there should be more focus to what the desktop Linux experience *is* exactly, and with that is going to come wider curiosity and adoption. UserLinux may pull this off...or not.
But please just don't blow off the comment, okay? Personally, I see OS X as a much brighter alternative to Linux, simply because decisions have been made and there's strong leadership.
Cringley's statement is stupid because Linux is already growing and will continue to grow. It's effectively an organic process that won't stop unless somebody makes a concious decision to stop it. Even then it probably wouldn't die because too many people have become dependent on it.
Now, having said that, let's go over his predictions:
Microsoft will make a bold run for video game leadership
Haven't they been doing this for a few years now? Precisely what's being predicted?
We still won't see a big example of cyber-terrorism simply because nobody has figured out how to actually kill people that way
Well great, so he can predict this every year and be right until somebody finally figures it out. Probably going to be a while before somebody does this and the powers that be admit that somebody did it.
we'll still be plagued with unsolicited commercial messages
Duh. Welcome to the tragedy of the commons! The tour begins at the top of the hour.
look for lots of software companies to abandon support for old products and platforms
And this is new how?
The SCO debacle has created a crisis within the Linux community. They pretend that it hasn't, but it has. This will come to a head in 2004 with either the development of a new organizational structure for Linux or the start of its demise. Linux has to grow or die, and the direction it takes will be determined in 2004.
To continue on cringley's statements, this is rather a vague prognostication. I mean there's always reoganizations of the Linux structure, choosing of mainainers, etc. SCO doesn't change anything because SCO is full of it. It's only changed the value of SCO stock for a short time.
As for SCO, they'll continue to make noise until the middle of the year, at which point the legal case will implode and the company will give up.
Totally agreed here, but if this is true, why would Linux have to change in any substantial way?
2004 will be a crucial year for streaming media
No really significant prediction here. Something will happen. Great. Thank you for your insight.
In the U.S., 2004 will see the start of the very digital convergence predicted by Al Gore back in 1996
Ummmm, didn't this start happening a few years ago. I seem to recall cable companies offering phone service for a while. DSL Internet has been provided by my phone company for years. It will continue in 2004, but that's not really a prediction if it's already happening.
The U.S. IT industry will see some real growth except for Hewlett- Packard and Sun
Hope he's right on that one.
Cisco will not only maintain its leadership in networking, they'll make big inroads into managed storage against companies like EMC
Okay, a useful prediction. 800 lb Gorilla puts on some weight. Got it.
WiFi will be bigger than ever, of course, but progress and service will both be spotty. What's needed is a new business model for WiFi aggregation
More wifi will come. Duh. Wifi will be spotty. You know why they call them "hotspots". Because they are "spots" that are "hot", which would suggest that there are spots that are lukewarm or even cold. So yes, it will be spotty.
If he thinks he has something new on wifi aggregation, he's really delluding himself. There are only three models that will make money:
1) Giving away wifi as an incentive to visit a store (make money selling more Mochas, or at least not losing those Mochas to somebody else who has wireless)
2) Selling people wifi as an add on to an existing wireless package. Down the road I could see integrating 802.11 into a cell phone with VoIP support. Make calls for free when at a hot spot and get Internet access for a modest additional monthly fee.
3) Selling people wifi at places where they are a captive audience. Airports, cruise ships, etc
Whis is what I think is up with this prediction. Drive traffic, live off of FUD Oh yeah, what's a better discussion-fueler than Fear Uncertainty Doubt?!
Does anybody think that M$/Apple will allow the use of its format indefinately without licencing fees?
Not gonna happen.
gewg_
I thought I was the only one who noticed that
as more boxes use Windoze, the price of Windoze keeps going UP.
WTF? They've never heard of economies of scale?
If ever there was a sign of a monopoly abusing its market position, that's it.
gewg_
If you look at the monetary impact of the Ohio/NY blackout,
it should be obvious that these people (who hate us because we are successful and they aren't*)
were equally gleeful at the people/businesses who lost money / were inconvienced.
gewg_
*Well, at least the poor ones.
The wealthy ones hate us for our free and open society (!FUDamentalist theocracy--pun intended)
whose ideas they can't prevent from crossing their borders.
In most circles any moron spouting this kind of nonsense wouldn't be taken seriously, but in the business world the hackneyd old "grow or die" mantra keeps getting trotted out. It is obviously specious and is often the cause of disaster at companies when they try too hard to grow and wind up dying as a result. Linux doesn't have to grow or die. Only a moron would make such a claim. As for crisis, the "they" they keep talking about is us, and frankly, Red Hat's abandonment of the desktop is a bigger crisis than SCO's insanity will ever be.
SCO will dry up and blow away in the wind one day and in the mean time everyone seems to be ignoring them except Linux's biggest competitors who fund them and take every opportunity to boost their case.
That all said, Linux will grow, no thanks to idiotic proclamations.
>that can't be re-invented.
Interesting that you should say that in this meta-thread.
It reminds me of Cringely explaining in "Triumph of the Nerds",
the "Chinese wall" and how Compaq reverse-engineered the IBM-PC BIOS.
gewg_
Why would I listen to someone who has no idea what they're talking about? My time is more important than that.
Who moved my sig?
What kind of crap is that? "act like an adult"? What's that supposed to mean. Free software meets my needs far better than comercial crap.
I can get anything I need to done at home with free software but work sucks. There I was handed a nice machine cloged with Windoze 2000 pro and nothing else. Mozilla and Open Office came to my rescue there, without me or my company having to shell out hundreds of dollars for Office and software that can print to pdf. Unfortuneately, they use some kind of Microshit email server that refuses to talk to anything but Lookout Express. The only way I get spell checking in my email is to cut and paste from OO or a Putty to my 486 gateway at home. Putty, perversly enough is faster. They use Windoze because they don't know any better and because of two legacy apps that could be replaced by one good database. The Windows experience is so poor it's not even funny. I can't believe people use this shit and pay money for it.
Free software rocks. If Abiword does not work for you, simply use Kword or OO which both work as well or better than Word. If I really ever have to type set something, I can always fall back to Word Perfect 8, Linux native that I've made work on Woody. People who typeset for a living simply use anything from the TeX family. There's always something else out there. Free software has general software for everyone that's good enough for most purposes and specialty software for any purpose that kicks comercial software over.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Most of them seem fairly reasonable but number five is bunk. It hasn't really shaken the community simply angered it, untill they substantiate anything all they are doing is biting the blue ear in the derrier. I wish folks would stop making these sink or swim claims with the gnu/linux community. It may be anarchy but its anarchy that works quite well. Personally even if they could trash linux the variouse companies/projects would simply move to a new kernel, maybe GNU HURD if they ever get the fsckin thing working, or one of the BSD's.
er blue bear not ear.
And as always, they will compete best in the one place Apple's marketing savvy can't match -- price. Convienience may be a factor, but many can't resist the urge to "shop" prices. Witness the people like my dear old mother, who always peruse the coupon ads section of the newspaper, cut them out and sort them away in her box. And few geeks don't recognize the pricing thermometer pricewatch.com.
As the old saying goes, there are some things money can't buy, and respect is one of them.
Yes Wal-Mart can offer a slightly lower price (in some cases, it remains to see if that's the general case). But since when has music ever been about price? I go into tower records and think "Who the hell pays these prices?" But people do - and lots of them - all despite Best Buy and Wal-Mart combined.
Music is more about emotion and image than most things, and those are areas where Apple excels and Wal-Mart does not. Heck, most people I know prefer to go to Target first and then Wal-Mart as a last resort - and so it will be for music, only there will be no need for the Wal-Mart trip.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
While everyone else was on topic, I was checking the President's Year-End Honors. One of the first was the "Metal of Freedom" presented to "Linux" for his "many years of service to the funny-paper readers of this geat country as a member of the 'Peanuts Gang'". The President also congratulated "Linux" on his "second career developing software" for the computer users of this great land."....
at least as a end-user desktop OS. I mean, don't get me wrong. It's probably the bees knees on servers and what not, but just face it: as a desktop environment, it sucks. No support (for all intents and purposes) for latest greatest anything, crappy interface for many routine functions, and isntallation isn't exactly a breeze (especially when it comes to hardware support). Yes, I know Linux has made big strides in usability and functionality, and I'm not ripping on anyone who likes/uses/supports it. But I get kinda tired of people pushing it as the Windows successor. Face it. It's NOT! We may never see a successor to Windows in our lifetimes. 90% (or somewhere around there) of the world is Windows based. You can't change over from Windows and everything that is exclusively or best-supported on it to an OS that most people will never be comfortable using, whether or not they are "computer savvy". I have been working on PCs for 10 years now. I build em, upgrade em, network em, etc. The only thing I don't do is programming/engineering. I have used several incarnations of Linux, and have just been thouroughly dissatisfied with it. Windows is NOT perfect, by far. BUT, it does have ease of use, well thought out and researched interfaces (mostly), and has the MAJOR advantage of familiarity. Take a person who has only ever driven a Ford Explorer and put them in a Chevy Blazer. They both do the same basic thing, and mostly they ARE the same. But there are subtle differences that are actually not subtle. And those differences deter people from using something different than what they like and are comfortable with. If Linux had been first, Microsoft would still be trying to make their first $1 billion. The point is, if Linux wants to truly be the NEXT OS, they need to redo their entire interface, hardware interface, underlying code, etc. FACE FACTS, LINUX CULTISTS: Linux will NEVER be used by the average user in it's current state.
Just for the record, I would love to see Linux brought to the level required for average users to be able and willing to use and support it.
P.S. this is NOT flamebait, nor is it a troll. Just my 2 cents. Like I stated above, I support Linux as a business OS, just not as a consumer OS, IN IT'S CURRENT STATE. So please do not start the old Linux/Windows is better debate. It's all about Linux/Windows is more accepted/trusted/familiar/easier.
Dude. Dude. Dude. Dude. DUDE!!!! Duuuudde. Yeah, I guess you have a point there. (Baseketball)
Open Source is like automobiles 100 years ago. Approximately a century ago, the horse-and-buggy industry saw that automobiles were being adopted by a much wider segment than merely a handful of hobbyists. The horse-and-buggy industry tried its best to pay legislators to pass restrictive laws, and used all sorts of FUD to scare people away from that thar new-fangled horseless carriage. Sound familiar ?
Open Source is no longer the province of a bunch of hobbyist geeks. It is becoming a commercial success. That has made it enemies, because it is a "disruptive technology" that is depriving established companies of profits. Indeed, it is threatening to destroy some old-line companies altogether. With their backs to the wall, those companies have no choice but to save themselves in the only way possible, i.e. by destroying Open Source.
The natural enemies of Open Source software are proprietary software companies. SCO's expensive Unix is being wiped off the map by linux. Microsoft is having relatively minor problems with Open Source competition at present, but the potential for disaster is there. They are losing not only OS profits to linux, but Office sales to Open Office. Look at Netcraft and note what's happened to their share of the web-server market since March 2002. Repeat that trend for Windows and Office, and MS is toast.
Open Source needs allies that are just as big and powerful as its enemies. The natural allies of Open Source are non-software companies, whose core products aren't threatened by free software, indeed, benefit from it.
Those of you old enough to remember IBM's anti-trust problems will find it amusing that one of the charges against IBM was that it gave away allegedly free software with their computers, and the proprietary software companies complained that they couldn't compete. IBM prospered in that environment before, and they can prosper in it again. IBM's hardware side sees Open Source as a chance to boost profits by not paying "Microsoft Tax" on every PC they sell. And as far as IBM's consulting arm is concerned, they don't care if they get paid to manage Windows, linux, OS/2, heck they'd even manage Commodore Vic-20's if you could make it worth their while.
Other potential allies are small/medium/large businesses that are now saving money thanks to Open Source, and face the prospect of those savings being legislated away from them.
This isn't merely a question of whether or not your city hall will give Open Source a fair chance. It's also a question of whether your national legislators will outlaw Open Source altogether. "Turn the other cheek" doesn't defend you against the schoolyard bully. You must get involved in the political process in your respective countries. Like it or not, Open Source supporters will have to get involved in politics in your respective countries. You will have to identify candidates who will allow Open Source to survive, and work for their election.
I'm not repeating myself
I'm an X window user; I'm an ex-Windows user
That of accountability.
Either MTAs need a central authority which could yank rights to send mail, or MTAs need to have the capability to learn webs of trust. TLS, which just lets you encrypt stuff and does only hostname matching on a cert doesn't help.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
Linux has been in this "grow or die" place many times, and to some extent, it's entire existence. This may be the most powerful resistance it has encountered, but it is also more deeply entrenched than ever before. Also, if SCO loses, which is highly likely, this issue will be significantly less serious than must be prepared for at this time.
"Grow or die?" Considering that this is practically the basis of Open Source, that statement sounds a bit cheesy.
What got chopped from the budget were programmers -- they cost 2-3 times more than scientists because you didn't need to support the scientists 100 percent because the scientists could hold faculty jobs and teach courses. We couldn't upgrade to SPARC because we could afford the boxes, but we couldn't afford the people who knew how to recompile the sources. Our data visualization/analysis stuff all went over to PCs and Windows.
There is this other lab on campus doing physics experiments. Here are all these high-power magnets people, EM fields people, plasmas people. When they power up their experiment, it is like Mission Control -- they have a whole bunch of computer stations tended by grad students: each grad student is monitoring some separate variable or measurement.
The experiment is pulsed, so every time they do a "shot", they collect a burst of data with multi-channel A/D's, and what are these work stations running? They are all PCs running Windows running Matlab, and each grad student has written their own Matlab scripts to visualize the data burst they are responsible for. Just like Mission Control, the grad students are polled about how the run went, and the fire the next shot and collect another data burst.
Yeah, yeah, you can get Matlab for various Unix systems, but the point of this is the big success of PCs and later Windows is that they are binary standards running binary-distributed commercial software, and the cost of the commercial licenses is peanuts compared to the cost of paying people who would know how to compile stuff from source let enough roll your own software these days.
Oh, and back at our lab, our engineer guys (yeah, we laid off the programmers, and the engineers are just as costly, but the engineer guys keep the experiment hardware running and configure PC systems and write VB software on the side -- they do multiple jobs while the software guys seem to have some kind of union about what they can do), anyway, our engineer guys thought they would bring up Linux on a spare PC. The idea was that if the grant melted down, the engineer guys could put Linux on their resumes in looking for jobs.
Remember, we were once a Unix shop that went to PCs in pursuit of the commercial software packages. The Linux experience didn't go anywhere over, yup, the driver issue. We sent two of our guys to a Linux short course, they got Linux up alright, but they never got it connected to the network. Oh, and the engineer guys had all this other stuff they were supposed to be doing and never got back to this Linux business.
I am responding positively to your post -- you don't need convincing, but I don't have my flame-resistant suit if I responded negatively to one of your critics. I mean, here we are discussing whether the market penetration of Linux is stalled, you say it is because of driver API's, and a bunch of guys pile on with this business of Open Source purity.
A person can have Open Source purity up to here, but even if you had the source, a lot of your customers don't want to deal with building from source, and your critics would call the guys who don't know their way past Windows to a Unix command line lusers (around here we call them Professor and these are the guys who write the proposals that bring in the funding), and the fact that you got jumped on for suggesting something as basic as a stable API for binary distribution of drivers suggest that Cringely and other crystal ball gazers are spot on about the Linux revolution being stalled.
I'm not necessarily saying you are wrong about the IP claim, but it always comes up, and I'm yet to see any authoritive statement that it is actually true.
I also think there is confusion about what "the open source community" are asking for. They are not asking for the IP that is embedded in the driver to be revealed. This seems to be a common assumption. That IP would be revealed if Nvidia open sourced their driver code. The open source community like vendors who open their driver code, because it saves time, but that certainly isn't what is being asked for.
What the open source community are asking for is how to ask the hardware to perform a particular task, where the steps to perform that task is already embedded in the hardware ie. open hardware programming specifications. They feel that it is their right to be able to have that information, as they own, rather than license, the equipment. As an analogy, if you buy a car, would you be happy if the vendor then told you where you could or couldn't drive, or how you were to drive. You would turn around and say "Its my car, I'll do with it what I like!". Just like Nvidia shouldn't care if you buy one of their video cards, and then use it to stir paint in a can. They have already made their profit, as they sold it to you. They won't get any more revenue from you if you use it to display graphics, or use it to stir paint.
You could say that how to get the card to perform a task is where the IP is. That may be the case, although consider this; the PCI / AGP bus is an open specification, with commands going across it in clear text ie. there is no encryption. Anybody who can afford a PCI / AGP bus analyser ($100K maybe?) could easily reverse engineer what the Nvidia drivers are doing.
Of course, you typical individual can't afford a PCI / AGP bus analyser, so your IP is protected from them. But is that who you need to protect your IP from ? Shouldn't you be more worried about protecting your IP from your competitors eg NVidia need to protect it from ATi ? Wouldn't a company like ATi easily be able to afford a PCI/AGP analyser, easily be able to pay engineers who know how to use one. In summary, the openness of the PCI/AGP bus doesn't protect the programming techniques very well, if at all, from the people you may most want to protect it from.
BTW, you don't necessarily need an PCI/AGP bus analyser to reverse engineer a driver. Recently, a GPL driver was developed for the NVidia ethernet network cards, for which NVidia only published a binary driver. What did NVidia achieve by only releasing a binary driver ? The only thing they achieved was to possibly reduce the number of people who might buy their hardware. forcedeth: A new driver for the ethernet interface of the NVIDIA nForce chipset, licensed under GPL.
That is why I can't see any sense in the IP claim, unless people (and Nvidia themselves) are confused between a request for open hardware programming specs, and a request for open sourcing the proprietory driver source code.
The Internet's nature is peer to peer - 20050301_cs_profs.pdf
Linux itself is only the kernel of a Unix-like operating system. It can be easily replaced with a clean-room implementation, that is absolutely unencumbered
That reminds me, what is the current status of the HURD?
*** Where are we going? And what's with this handbasket?