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2006 Software War Map between FOSS and Microsoft
Ant writes "Neatorama mentions Steven Hilton's Software War Map that depicts "the epic struggle of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) against the Empire of Microsoft. It was updated in 2006."
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I love that this is presented as a serious piece of news!
This belongs on webcomic or something.
"I'm not religious, but at the same time I don't get why science always has to have something to prove."
Isn't it a bit early to feature this on Slashdot?
It seems to be missing some things. Surely some of the Companies shown fighting MS are also fighting each other? And who says it's a war anyway? Some things are just good ideas, and lots of folks are going to come up with variations. Does that always mean a battle? It seems silly to me, rather than informative.
Everything you know is wrong, Just forget the words and sing along.
It'll start shooting itself ... killing other MS Apps ... Awesome!
Is this supposed to be news? Funny? Interesting? Engaging? If I create one and put a picture of Stallman in saint drag humping a penguin will Slashdot publish it for me?
Web2.0: I love when people Flickr my cuil and digg my boingboing until my google is reddit and I start to yahoo
What happened to the in-fighting between KDE and GNOME? It was included in the old version.
I love how the /. crowd needs a Wikipedia link to remind us what Free and Open Source Software is. We'd all be in the dark without that!
Remember, open source is free as in speech, not free as in bear.
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
So why are they on that map?
...with pitting Windows XP against all of the UNIces and other Network Operating Systems. I mean, HPUX really isn't tailored to end users, and Windows XP isn't a server-grade OS. Windows Server 2003 is at least marketted to servers...
I was expecting something more like the Eric Levenez's UNIX Timeline.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
No - a Chapter 11 bankruptcy is explicitly for reorganization not for dissolution. Although it certainly isn't the best thing that can happen to a company, it can actually be a positive since it can allow them to shed some debt that would have otherwise forced the company to completely shut down.
... smells like victory."
(apologies to Robert Duvall & Francis Ford Coppela)
Java is encumbered by patents. The Linux kernel is violating patents. Openoffice and Mozilla is violating patents. Microsoft Windows XP is violating patents. OpenBSD is violating patents.
WTF do you think free software people are freaked out about it? BECAUSE YOU CAN NOT NOT AVOID PATENTS.
Mono is actually using patents legally, at least as far as known patent issues are involved.
Mono is definately on the side of Free software. It's Free software through and through.
It's a hell of a lot better then Java, which is patent encumbered AND is propriatory (well of course Sun has it's shitastic see-but-don't-use licensing BS).
I love that this is presented as a serious piece of news!
No... actually it was posted on Slashdot
Linux seems neat. Conventions like Penguincon support it. Those in the "Know" know it's better. Still, other OS's dominate. Until someone finally argues their point with the undeniable logic of guns and explosives (because guns and explosives trum everything. Duh). Now it's an OS battle in the street and Linux has a penguin's chance in Hell of surviving.
Until YOU arrive on the scene. Sure, you'd rather have the OS wars conducted peacefully via Blogs, one user at a time. But someone just took a shot at you from the iPod-controlled building across the street. And that nice bald guy in suspenders just handed you a loaded missile launcher. Screw logic. This thang is ON!
Taken from the Sluggy Freelance Grand Auto Theft Shirt
If this signature is witty enough, maybe somebody will like me.
It seems to be missing some things.
Yes, the war includes all kinds of media and it's creators. Programmers have been joined by all kinds of artists and creators. There's a free media revolution going on. The incumbents have shown their hand and it stinks.
And who says it's a war anyway?
Microsoft and big publishers say it's a war. The goal is TV and Radio broadcast style control of all media. They will sue you in your home (RIAA), at your business (SCO), and at your kid's school (BSA). They don't really care what you do, but they will try their best to have you do as they say.
The goal is to take your money without your consent for any information exchange. You will pay for a M$ license each time you buy a computer. You will pay per minute or byte of conversation on any electronic device, per play of your music, movies novels and textbooks. Your taxes will pay to encoded your information into secret formats and pay again to retrieve it. The new media, paradoxally, will be more expensive and restricted than it's analog and physical predecessors. All of these intentions have been openly declared and loudly demanded by all of the bad actors.
If that's not a declaration of war, I'm not sure what is. The less you know and care, the easier it will be for them to make the world as they wish.
The world does not have to be that way. People do not mind sharing if it cost them nothing and brings greater returns. Excellence thrives in competition and everyone prospers. Success stories are the whole free software movement, which has obliterated the need for non free, and free media: archive.org and creative commons instead of the big three music publishers; YouTube instead of TV; VOIP instead of Telco; Wikipedia instead of expensive paper publications. The economics of electronic data exchange doom the monopoly publishers unless they pass truly unAmerican laws. Fight the bastards by not giving your money to those who would enslave you.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
The good pragmatic folk of the real world will continue to use the tools best suited for the task at hand.
The rest find themselves at the end of the unemployment line.
Why no highlights on the war against Apple, Sun or IBM? They weren't always OSS "good guys", and IMHO, still aren't. Just corporations with their own particular strategies.
So go fight your imaginary "war". Convince yourself that the next version of KDE will totally "kill micro$oft w00t we so rock" and then get all angsty and whiny when it doesn't.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Pardon my ignorance, but isn't Mono on the wrong side of the fence? ... I mean, isn't Mono just an implementation of a MS technology that's already encumbered by many patents?
It's more of a damaged weapon than anything else. Use it if you can and fight to keep it. It might be loose, but you can't just surrender everything that's challenged. The whole point of free software is to be able to use your computer as you see fit. That includes running whatever code you want for whatever purpose you have. I don't have any use for Mono, but others might and I'm glad someone is working on interoperability.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Facts:
1.) Vista is an operating system.
2.) Vista fights ALL the time.
3.) The purpose of Vista is to flip out and kill people.
Vista can kill anyone it wants! Vista cuts off heads ALL the time and doesn't even think twice about it. This thing is so crazy and awesome that it flips out ALL the time. I heard that Vista was eating at a diner. And when some dude dropped a spoon Vista killed the whole town. My friend Mark said that he saw Vista totally uppercut some kid just because the kid opened a window.
"Sufferin' succotash."
Here in America, we have been gradually increasing the slavery quotient from a few percent at the turn of the century, to about 50% today. (Estimate based on middle class wage slave paying 50% taxes. Add 'em up - 15% SS [employee+employer], 15% federal, 5% state, 5% state sales tax, 5% real estate tax, 5% utilities+gasoline+medicare+whatever else they can get away with.)
Once you are used to someone making decisions for you, it is scary to go back to making your own decisions. For example, we just switched from HMO to HSA health insurance. Before, the HMO told us when we could and couldn't go to the doctor (and have them pay for it). We could do the same thing with HSA by maxing out the deductible, but now we have the option of saving the money instead. Seems like a no brainer, but is scary nonetheless.
No, he's pretty squarely in our reality, only it's our information that's in the process of being enslaved. If you were to take a good, hard look at the caliber of the people that run the media companies and their proxy organizations, you'd realize that what he is saying is precisely what they are trying to achieve. That they've not fully succeeded yet doesn't make their intentions any less of a concern. Actually, it makes them unenlightened capitalists, in my book, because they have absolutely no concern whatsoever for anyone or anything outside of the revenue stream. And, towards the end of maintaining that flow, they will do anything to anyone, buy any Congressperson they can lay bills on, pass any law that suits them, cause any degree of economic dislocation, as long as they own the distribution channels. Like all successful coups, it will happen because the majority are simply unaware of what is happening: all they'll notice is that "gee, it sure seems like I can't do as much with my computer and entertainment equipment as I used to, even though it's shiny and looks really high-tech and all" and will long for the good old days. Then, after some period of time, even that dim memory will fade and nobody will care because, so far as they can remember, it has always been that way. That's what these people want, total control over our media and usage habits, and total acceptance of that control. It'll take some time, but today's technology permits a level of remote authority that did not exist twenty-odd years ago when Sony was fighting the MPAA to keep the VCR legal.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Almost. The correct way it was said is as the following quote:
We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in courts, we shall fight on the Web and Usenet, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in cyberspace, we shall defend our Imperium, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the portable, we shall fight on the games boxes, we shall fight on the desktops and on the handhelds, we shall fight in the media; we shall never surrender, and even if, which I do not for a moment believe, this Imperium or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our bought senators, armed and guarded by the BSA would carry on the struggle, until, in God's good time, the New World Order, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue and the liberation of the old.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
I agree with you, this is stupid. But it was Microsoft who declared this a war. So if you're going to blame someone for being stupid, at least blame the right party.
I would love to continue to use the "tools best suited for the task at hand". Unfortunately, in many cases, Microsoft has, or is trying to, drive the "tools best suited" out of the market. No FLOSS developer has ever tried to prevent me from using MS tools (in fact, many bend over backwards to provide compatibility with MS), but MS is trying to deny me the option of using any other tools, FLOSS or not.
The real war is between Microsoft and the free market, and in that war, I am solidly on the side of the free market.
Maybe it's just my imagination or psyche doing this:
All the OS software has those friendly icons. Tux smiles, the GNU gnu smiles, the mozilla dragon smiles, heck even the SuSE animal smiles.
The Closed source software, doesn't want to have anything to do with animals. The Windows "flag" looks kinda like a torn battleflag, the SCO tree looks like you have been drinking for a while and then looked at the tree, passport looks like it wants to invade your wallet. That's just what I noticed...
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shouldn't iTunes be a fortress by now?