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BSDForums Interviews Scott Long
Dan writes that BSDForums is featuring and interview with FreeBSD's Scott Long. Scott fills us in on some of the new things in FreeBSD 6.0 including Apple G4 PowerMac, AMD64, and wireless compatibility. In addition to specifics Scott also abstracts on the overall snapshot of BSD development with respect to OpenBSD, NetBSD and the ongoing debate between BSD vs. Linux.
It's an exciting era in the Berkeley Software Distribution world; indeed, things started off with a litigious bang over a decade ago, but now BSD solutions are more varied than ever before and offer the user heretofore unprecedented choice and power. So many are the options today that it's time for a roll call from the various distributions. Each of the four major BSD projects are pushing forward with development and experiencing growth, diversifying the Open Source playing field's offerings Let's take a look at what each project is up to these days.
FreeBSD
FreeBSD is in a precarious state. While it's almost hit critical mass in the corporate world, their latest growing pains have left potential adopters confused. The new FreeBSD 5 branch offers some exciting technology, generally regarded as comparable with or superior to what is offered in Linux. The FreeBSD foundation is still upgrading its FreeBSD 4.x line and suggesting its use for production environments over FreeBSD 5. The reasons for this are very simple FreeBSD 5 won't be ready for prime time until FreeBSD 5.4 or 5.5 but users are left confused and timid.
FreeBSD's last major release, which now sits highly optimized at version 4.10, works just as well as always. For systems already running with FreeBSD 4.x that see no need to adopt the new technology in FreeBSD 5 or jump to Linux, this operating system is a godsend in stability and continued support. FreeBSD 4.11 is scheduled for a February '05 release, while plans for FreeBSD 4.12 are on the backburner should FreeBSD 5 not achieve -STABLE status by the fourth quarter of 2005. But what if you need the technology available in FreeBSD 5 and don't want to jump to Linux?
FreeBSD 5, currently available at FreeBSD 5.2.1 with FreeBSD 5.3 in late beta, tantalizes the BSD world with the culmination of several year's hard work and narrow escapes. Back in the late Nineties, when WindRiver bought BSD/OS (a closed-source BSD operating system owned by the now-defunct BSDI), FreeBSD users were promised a next-generation BSD made possible by crossing the ultra-robust corporate OS with its Open Source counterpart. While WindRiver let go of its plans leaving the future of FreeBSD in peril, the realization of its goal is almost here thanks to the FreeBSD community and Apple Computer, Inc.'s contribution of FreeBSD code.
That almost is a killer, though, in that it now causes potential users to look elsewhere for modern operating system features elsewhere until FreeBSD 5 is blessed as stable. Given FreeBSD's track record and the corporate sponsors now behind its operating system, however, it has a bright future ahead of it despite these stumbling blocks. Sadly, the same can't be said for its two little brothers, NetBSD and OpenBSD.
NetBSD
NetBSD's claims to fame aren't its optimization or secure code it's instead known for running on a wider variety of platforms than any other operating system out there, including Linux. NetBSD's binary releases include support for an amazing 40 platforms and an additional 12 platforms in the source code. In other words, it runs on everything but the kitchen sink. NetBSD forked from the 386BSD/4.4 BSD merger in 1993 and continued on its own in parallel to FreeBSD since then, albeit at a slower pace. It's currently at version 2.6.1, with aggressive testing on the new NetBSD 2.0 promising fruition by the first half of 2005.
Those familiar with NetBSD swear by it, though its use in serious environments is limited. It is not secure and device driver support is paltry at best. NetBSD's true usefulness comes in providing developers of other operating systems such as FreeBSD, OpenBSD, and Linux with hardware support to base their own new ports off of. For instance, much of the code for the PowerPC FreeBSD port comes from NetBSD. OpenBSD implemented support for AMD64 by means of hefty imports from the NetBSD source tree, and Linux runs on Motorola's ColdFire processor family thanks to the work previously for NetBSD
Do you have the same problem? DNS slashdotted?! :O wohoooo!!
There's a debate between Linux and BSD? Hmm, I must have missed it.
Finance tutorials and more! Understandfinance
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DragonFlyBSD is already better FreeBSD 5 and FreeBSD 6 in performance on publically posted benchmark results. Why bother developing FreeBSD 6 any more. Just run DragonFlyBSD.
Scott Long is dying!!!
Speaking of which, whatever happened to all the "FreeBSD is Dying!" drumbeats in the last year or two? I haven't kept up with FreeBSD/NetBSD news, but it would seem some series of events has really turned people around, even though it doesn't seem BSD use is necessarily skyrocketing.
Scott LONG... long as in the length of time it is going to be until 6.0 is released. It was June... then August... now they are saying the August deadline has slipped *yawn*.
LINUX ONLINE POKER: Linux Poker
I'm happy to report that the R&D arm of GPL: BSD is getting along just fine.
... that eating donkey shit is better than eating pig shit.
Mmm... tasty.
FreeBSD seemed to have some issues around the 5.0 release because of the major features that release brought (and the ensuing nervousness about upgrading). Hopefully 6.0 won't be plagued by these kinds of issues and should be taken up rapidly. I've had nothing but good experiences of FreeBSD in server environments, and the fact that increasing out of the box hardware support is being included for desktop platforms is great.
Business Voyeur
Very few things regarding computers die quickly (with exceptions for the HST standard and some other things that were 'hot' for awhile but disappeared) ... another example, Netware has been passing away slowly for years... if FreeBSD is going to be dying as well, it just takes time.
... [depending on your meanings on those two words]... ;)
Hell, COBOL is still "alive" and "well"
MoM++ - A Classic Expanded - [Master of Magic 1.5]
http://mompp.sourceforge.net/
The main thing I've noticed is just better 'out of the box' support for hardware in 6.0. I don't have massive requirements, as I'm running FreeBSD 6.0 for my primary server (mail, web, chat, database, file) at home. I didn't need to rebuilt the kernel as I did with 5.2 - but that was to support an older NIC. Basically it 'just works' and I've stuck with GENERIC for the kernel with no issues. I use Ports like they're going out of style, and I haven't had anything break (that I couldn't fix ;))
Anyway, better 'out of the box' support, which would manifest mostly for folks installing 6.0 for a desktop, or someone who has some new(er) RAID or 1G NIC to support. I couldn't be happier, not using Linux for a server anymore, but it's still my Desktop of choice.
fak3r.com
From a TI-99/4A to years of wintel boxes, then Linux, I've now made the move to AMD 64 and freeBSD. I've moved onto freeBSD because somewhere I saw a quip that went...Linux is for people who hate windows; *BSD is for people who love Unix. I see Unix is an OS written by scientist for scientist and, as much as possible, I'd to discover that idea.
Long promised significant new wireless functionality will be available with FreeBSD 6.0. The wireless section of the FreeBSD Handbook should be updated to describe how to connect to networks with WPA keys, setup host access points, etc. A howto in progress is available. Is it included? -acidjazz http://www.litebay.org/
They seem to talk more about Linux than an interview about Linux talks about MS
Anyone else find it ironic that Long points to BSD's academic roots as a good reason to become involved with it?
One of the greatest strengths of Linux is that it works practically rather than theoretically.
Destination FreeBSD: Interview with Release Engineer Scott Long
This is a bsdforums.org first! BSDForums interviews FreeBSD Release Engineering Team's Scott Long relating to various aspects of FreeBSD. Topics discussed include FreeBSD general issues, its academic roots, how FreeBSD compares to other BSDs - OpenBSD, NetBSD, and the ongoing debate on FreeBSD vs. Linux.
Scott gives us his perspective on the corporate adoption and popularity of FreeBSD. He brings us up to speed on FreeBSD 6.0, its new features and enhancements, including Apple G4 PowerMac, AMD64 and wireless compatibility. Scott also discusses FreeBSD 6.0's upgrade path and release timetable.
[Read more]
======================
Destination FreeBSD: Interview with Release Engineer Scott Long
BSDForums interviews FreeBSD Release Engineering Team's Scott Long relating to various aspects of FreeBSD. Topics discussed include FreeBSD general issues, its academic roots, how FreeBSD compares to other BSDs - OpenBSD, NetBSD, and the ongoing debate on FreeBSD vs. Linux.
Scott gives us his perspective on the corporate adoption and popularity of FreeBSD. He also brings us up to speed on FreeBSD 6.0, its new features and enhancements, including Apple G4 PowerMac, AMD64 and wireless compatibility. Scott also discusses FreeBSD 6.0's upgrade path and release timetable.
1. Could you tell us a little bit about yourself, your background, your first encounter with FreeBSD and what motivated you to use it ? How has FreeBSD evolved since the time you have been involved with it?
I'm 31 and live near Boulder, Colorado, with my wife, 2 kids, and 3 cats. Before I moved out here 6 years ago, I was in the US Navy for 6 years. My other day jobs have included a 4/5 year stint with Adaptec and my current job with SPARTA, Inc, doing work related to TrustedBSD and TrustedDarwin.
My first experience with BSD came when I discovered the Sun and HP labs at the University of Michigan in 1992. I decided that I absolutely had to replace my Windows 3.1 machine with Unix+X. That led to me discover 386BSD 0.1 and X386. So asking how it evolved in the time I've known it is like asking how a Model T evolved into a Mustang. Well, that's a bad analogy for those who don't like Ford. Anyways, it's come a long way =-) For a short while I toyed with the idea of using Linux, but the lack of a working network stack combined with the limitations of the minix filesystem made it pretty unattractive. I guess I was either oblivious to the legal battles with USL at the time, or I cared more about the technology and less about the politics.
In all, my involvement with FreeBSD has been very good for me in terms of exposing me to excellent engineering and extremely gifted people, as well as opening job opportunities for me.
2. Specifically what has been your role in Release Engineering relative to the entire release process, from a technical, authoritative and responsibility perspective?
I joined the release engineering team in Nov 2002. When I started, my only motivation was to increase the communication between the team and the rest of the developers. But, I quickly slipped in to doing the 5.0 release, and from there I took on the lead role in the team.
The job of the release engineering team is not only to do the mechanical work of producing a release, but also to ensure that the release is high quality. In order to do that, tools like code freezes, commit reviews and approvals, and bug status reports are used. So, a certain amount of authority and responsibility is implied there, but we also work very hard to make the process as open to others as possible, both inside and outside of the developer community.
And, this coordination and leadership of development is absolutely essential. Between having to coordinate the development and debugging activities of 220 developers and handle building and verifying releases for 5 hardware architectures, the old days of a single person freezing the tree for a few days and cuttin
First 3 questions said nothing about Linux.
First 3 answers did.
muahahahahhahaha
Anyways my take on the debate: Multiple times I've written some simple software without even CONSIDERING portability, written on my (Linux/BSD/OS-X) box, and when the time came to make it run on a new platform (Linux/BSD/OS-X), it did, with barely any modifications. So who cares, target any UNIX, they all rock, and you probably wont end up permanently stuck to one of them.
Why stick up for big business?
From the interview:
4. Some critics claim that FreeBSD has not been as popular among corporations as Linux, not even close. Microsoft acknowledges Linux as a viable threat but FreeBSD is not even on their radar screen.
Wasn't FreeBSD the only other operating system Microsoft ported C# to? Didn't Hotmail run for a LONG time on FreeBSD? Doesn't Microsoft use BSD code in their operating system?
There's your debate.
People will wonder why this is great. Darwin is not FreeBSD... there are too many things going on with the Mach Kernel. Yes, Fink or DarwinPorts solves some problems but still. I'm a happy fella.
...have left me cold. I'm only posting this AC because I can't afford the direct karma hit right now. But, I've tried OpenBSD as my desktop several times now because I want the most secure desktop I can get. Why bother with NetBSD or FreeBSD when they aren't geared towards security since that's what one of BSD's primary features is supposed to be. So here's what I've found and what I have to gripe about:
1. Partitioning. Why in the fucking hell do you have to partition TWICE? Why do you need a standard partition that can be seen by other OSes and then those weird ass partitions within that partition that only BSD can see? How is that useful? Here's the answer: IT ISN'T. Get into the 21st century and realize that your stupid partitioning scheme should have disappeared with the 'ed' line editor.
2. Lack of LVM support. Who in their right mind would use an OS that doesn't support Logical Volume Manager? Do you really like starting all over again when you want to move to a bigger drive and then restoring your data from tape instead of just adding more space onto the original filesystem and just growing it? If you do, then you need help. Go see a shrink and... get into the 21st century! LVM + Unix is a marriage made in heaven. Your data is no longer constricted by your storage hardware.
3. Serious instability. I installed OpenBSD from the internet using the boot floppy which is about the only cool thing I've found about BSD, but it's still old fashioned. After installing on a known good system under all other OSes, my system would just lock up randomly. I was in the middle of a compile and BAM! it just stops. I can still pping the system, so the TCP/IP stack survived, but my X terminal wasn't responding. So I go down to the living room to look at the server on the console. I can switch through virtual terminals OK, but I can't log in pas the user name. I couldn't ssh in. That is... I could and my client would just sit there never timing out or anything. And this happened with every time over the past three years that I've tried to use BSD. Two installs back, X window system wouldn't launch xdm without a coredump and the process dying. Fucking tragic.
4. The use of a non-standard make. When I was trying to build part of GNOME manually, it complained that the version of make was GNU make. So I had to build and install GNU make and rename the crap make that comes with BSD. Just use the goddamn standards you munchers!!!
5. No Bash by default? Please. Ksh is a sad imitation of Bash which has far more functionality and admin friendliness when compared to ksh. And sh? Who the fuck in their right mind uses sh as their default shell? sh sucks. There is no up arrow history so you always have to retype every command or use the stupid history command. Sorry, I'll keep my Ctrl-R to cycle through commands in a search.
All your bullshit about how Linux was made by people who hate Windows and BSD was made by people who love Unix is probably true since most commercial Unices SUCK ASS in the usability area. This is where Linux is cleaning your cocks.
When challenged with the notion that Linux is more popular that FreeBSD, Scott answered:
``There is no denying that Linux is gaining popularity, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the BSD family is not. A great example is Mac OSX. Under the hood it is very much a BSD operating system. That means that BSD is now the second most popular desktop OS, far more popular and widespread than Linux.''
That's utter crap. First of all, the question was about FreeBSD vs. Linux, not *BSD vs. Linux. Secondly, Darwin isn't very much like the other BSDs. Based on a Mach kernel, with lots of GNU and Apple stuff thrown in, and with some dynamic linking weirdness, it differs significantly from other open source Unix-like systems at every level. Darwin is at best the bastard child of BSD, and using its popularity to support the notion that FreeBSD is popular makes it look like FreeBSD isn't popular in its own right, which is far from the case. So why resort to deception?
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
I have a love for operating systems (and programming languages, but that's for another time), and I've tried most of the open source operating systems that I'm aware of. These days, I have three favorites: OpenBSD, for being the only OS _really_ serious about security; NetBSD, because I love the portability, minimalist feel, and pkgsrc; and GNU/Linux for generally being up to date (in features and hardware support) and easy to maintain (apt-get is the best). FreeBSD seems to have fallen by the wayside; it's a great system, but to me it seems it doesn't really stand out. Are there any great features unique to FreeBSD that I'm overlooking?
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
he said long.....
It has generally been my experience that the people who argue "BSD versus linux" fall into one of two categories.
1) BSD people who have no in-depth knowledge of linux, and therefore speak from a position of ignorance
2) Linux people who know very little about any particular BSD, and therefore speak from a position of ignorance
The people with truly deep knowledge of both systems always say "use the right tool for the right task" and typically have no time for OS religious wars.
I had used FreeBSD excusively in the 4.x's on both my desktop and servers up until about a year ago. I really liked ports and found that everything just seemed like it fit together like one seamless product instead of the hodge-podge that my previous experiences with RedHat and Slackware had been. Subjectively I also found that it felt faster than the Linux at the time of my switch. I stuck with FreeBSD but also with the 4.x tree because I was a bit put off by the whole stable vs development nature they kept putting forward for 5.
That changed when Novell bought SUSE and started offering their certifications. I was asked to evauluate it by some people at work who had fond memories of Novell and wanted to see what they did with Linux and I was given the opportunity to sit for the Novell CLP (Certified Linux Professional) practicum exam if I wanted as a carrot for doing it. I decided that the only way to get comfortable enough with it for the test was to dive in and install it on my primary desktop OS and force myself to use it.
What I found was surprising. There, obviously, were some growing pains when it came to various BSD vs SYSV things and directory layout and ports vs RPM etc. What I was surprised by was that everything worked out of the box. I am used to, and almost looked forward to, having to roll up my sleeves and figure out the config files and recompile the kernel and go through newsgroups and mailing lists for fixes. This has been especially true since my primary machine is a laptop (Dell Inspiron 8600). What also surprised me was that Yast configures, with either a console or X-Win GUI, just about eveything that I wanted to configure and every setting that I wanted to change. I kept waiting to run into a gotcha so I could swear it off and convince myself I had to do it all by hand but it hasn't come yet. The whole magic-black-box aspect of it scares me a little but I am amazed how little I have had to get my hands dirty. It almost feels like Windows Server 2003 -- in a good way. Also, while I was put off by the 6 CD thing at first (I have always had a pretty streamlined and small FreeBSD install for my desktop) I find that having pretty much any piece of software that you might want in RPMs you can trust (and don't suffer from the dependency hell I remember) right on the CDs is actually pretty nice.
After I take my practicum in the next few weeks I am going to try Novell's desktop offering. If it is as slick as SLES then Novell, especially when you figure in NDS and ZenWorks, is going to make huge inroads versus the other distros and FreeBSD. And, strange as it sounds to me who missed the Novell hayday, there are alot of people in the industry who seem to remember their interaction with Novell fondly for whom their name and support seems to be a big plus.
Which text editors are being used for the debate between Linux and FreeBSD? Vi or Emacs?
http://saveie6.com/
I use Linux. I like it. It's plenty "good enough" for reliable, production use. Any area that BSD is better than Linux, it's not "better enough" to justify the expense and time to port over all our apps and data to it.
Linux has supported SMP for longer, and is thus more likely to be mature and stable on it. More hardware is supported by Linux than BSD. At numerous things it's faster than BSD, and at others, it's not much slower.
Linux has more mindshare - nobody talks about "Windows vs BSD", but "Win v. Lin" is a common theme.
So, I certainly don't mind BSD, and I might make the switch at some point the indeterminate future, but I spend my time getting stuff done, and for now, that getting done works wonderfully on RedHat/Whitebox Linux.
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
I use both so I'm more practical than a fanboy of either OS.
Currently, I use FreeBSD for servers and Linux (Ubuntu) for desktops--I find this combination perfect for my needs. I also still use Windows 2000 because of all the software that isn't available on other OS.
I think FreeBSD 6.x will be very compelling for servers, but I think the new FreeBSD-derived desktop distros will lag far behind more polished Linux desktop distros for many years.
---
OS: FreeBSD (servers), Ubuntu (desktop), Windows 2000sp4 (desktop)
Browser: Opera 8.5
"Scott, I thought you used Linux? Anyway, I never knew you were so important!"
DAMMIT, here we go again!
It is now official. Netcraft confirms: *BSD is dying
One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered *BSD community when IDC confirmed that *BSD market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all servers. Coming on the heels of a recent Netcraft survey which plainly states that *BSD has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. *BSD is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last in the recent Sys Admin comprehensive networking test.
You don't need to be the Amazing Kreskin to predict *BSD's future. The hand writing is on the wall: *BSD faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for *BSD because *BSD is dying. Things are looking very bad for *BSD. As many of us are already aware, *BSD continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood.
FreeBSD is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its core developers. The sudden and unpleasant departures of long time FreeBSD developers Jordan Hubbard and Mike Smith only serve to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: FreeBSD is dying.
Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.
OpenBSD leader Theo states that there are 7000 users of OpenBSD. How many users of NetBSD are there? Let's see. The number of OpenBSD versus NetBSD posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 NetBSD users. BSD/OS posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of NetBSD posts. Therefore there are about 700 users of BSD/OS. A recent article put FreeBSD at about 80 percent of the *BSD market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 FreeBSD users. This is consistent with the number of FreeBSD Usenet posts.
Due to the troubles of Walnut Creek, abysmal sales and so on, FreeBSD went out of business and was taken over by BSDI who sell another troubled OS. Now BSDI is also dead, its corpse turned over to yet another charnel house.
All major surveys show that *BSD has steadily declined in market share. *BSD is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If *BSD is to survive at all it will be among OS dilettante dabblers. *BSD continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical purposes, *BSD is dead.
Fact: NetBSD is dying
[ed. note: in the following text, former FreeBSD developer Mike Smith gives his reasons for abandoning FreeBSD]
When I stood for election to the FreeBSD core team nearly two years ago, many of you will recall that it was after a long series of debates during which I maintained that too much organisation, too many rules and too much formality would be a bad thing for the project.
Today, as I read the latest discussions on the future of the FreeBSD project, I see the same problem; a few new faces and many of the old going over the same tired arguments and suggesting variations on the same worthless schemes. Frankly I'm sick of it.
FreeBSD used to be fun. It used to be about doing things the right way. It used to be something that you could sink your teeth into when the mundane chores of programming for a living got you down. It was something cool and exciting; a way to spend your spare time on an endeavour you loved that was at the same time wholesome and worthwhile.
It's not anymore. It's about bylaws and committees and reports and milestones, telling others what to do and doing what you're told. It's about who can rant the longest or shout the loudest or mislead the most people into a bloc in order to legitimise doing what they think is best. Individuals notwithstanding, the project as a whole has lost track of where it's going, and has instead become obsessed with process and mechanics.
So I'm leaving core. I don't want to feel like I should be "doing something" about a project that has lost interest in having something done for it. I don't have the energy to fight what has clearly become a losing battle; I have a life to live and a job to keep, and I won't achieve any of the goals I personally consider worthwhile if I remain obligated to care for the project.
Discussion
I'm sure that I've offended some people already; I'm sure that by the time I'm done here, I'll have offended more. If you feel a need to play to the crowd in your replies rather than make a sincere effort to address the problems I'm discussing here, please do us the courtesy of playing your politics openly.
From a technical perspective, the project faces a set of challenges that significantly outstrips our ability to deliver. Some of the resources that we need to address these challenges are tied up in the fruitless metadiscussions that have raged since we made the mistake of electing officers. Others have left in disgust, or been driven out by the culture of abuse and distraction that has grown up since then. More may well remain available to recruitment, but while the project is busy infighting our chances for successful outreach are sorely diminished.
There's no simple solution to this. For the project to move forward, one or the other of the warring philosophies must win out; either the project returns to its laid-back roots and gets on with the work, or it transforms into a super-organised engineering project and executes a brilliant plan to deliver what, ultimately, we all know we want.
Whatever path is chosen, whatever balance is struck, the choosing and the striking are the important parts. The current indecision and endless conflict are incompatible with any sort of progress.
Trying to dissect the above is far beyond the scope of any parting shot, no matter how distended. All I can really ask of you all is to let go of the minutiae for a moment and take a look at the big picture. What is the ultimate goal here? How can we get there with as little overhead as possible? How would you like to be treated by your fellow travellers?
Shouts
To the Slashdot "BSD is dying" crowd - big deal. Death is part of the cycle; take a look at your soft, pallid bodies and consider that right this very moment, parts of you are dying. See? It's not so bad.
To the bulk of the FreeBSD committerbase and the developer community at large - keep your eyes on the real goals. I
Boy we have a lot in common... I too was in the Navy, got started with BSD in the mid 90's after I got out, and live in/near Denver as well.. and now we have the TI-99/4a in common too... You didn't by any chance own a Apple II clone called a Franklin Ace did you?
In response to one of the questions in the interview, Scott Long mentioned FreeBSD 7-CURRENT as the next development branch. Does this mean that FreeBSD 6 is the new STABLE branch, bypassing FreeBSD 5? The fact that FreeBSD plans to create a 5.5 release of the OS does not answer the question. Will we have three STABLE branches now (4, 5, 6) and one CURRENT branch (7), or two STABLE branches (4, 5) and two CURRENT ones (6, 7)? This is confusing.
"so don't let ./ trolls convince you otherwise (or journalists, who like this kind of x vs. y stuff because, like all controversies, they make better headlines)."
RIAA/MPAA versus P2P
Corporations versus workers.
Government versus citizens.
IP versus free.
China versus Taiwan.
Boxers versus briefs.