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Will Linux Win the Next Presidential Election?
i_like_spam writes "Douglas Karr has posted an interesting breakdown, complete with bar charts, of the operating systems and server software used by the websites for 23 declared and undeclared presidential candidates. The breakdown shows that there is nearly an equal split between Linux and Windows servers among the whole candidate pool. More interesting, all of the Democratic candidates except for Hillary favor Linux or FreeBSD. 69% of the Republican candidates, in contrast, prefer Windows. Is this preference for OSS or Microsoft a true reflection of differing political philosophies? And, more importantly, will Linux win the next election?"
Makes you think, doesn't it?
And don't even get me started on Hillary, there's solid proof that her servers resolve to the IP address 66.66.66.66 and that good packets go in but only packets with the evil flag flipped to '1' come out.
I suppose that's politicians for you, though. 'Does not compute' with them, can't pretend we're living in a society where everyone feels equally represented without them.
My work here is dung.
Lets me honest, it is VERY unlikely that these candidates even KNOW what operating system their web server is running. Furthermore, i would doubt that most of them know what an operating system, or a web server even are.
NewslilySocial News. No lolcats allowed.
What do they use? We have more than two parties you know.
One ring to bind them - should probably have more fiber and less rings in their diet.
Most, if not all, the candidates don't have a clue about what their website is running on, much less care about it. I really doubt that Hillary discussed Windows versus Linux versus BSD. Get real. It seems to me that most in Congress are technophobes, and have people do stuff for them.
Not as much the Party Ideals that choose the Operating System, But the more active supporters who choose the OS.
Democrats generally have a younger following then the republicans. More younger people know how to use Linux and know enough about it to use it properly. So Democrats will typically use Linux.
Republicans tend to have an older following and they will use what they know. If they don't know then they will use what most people seem to use. So that will be windows.
Also Open Source People tend to bereave in a more socialistic view that is more compatible with the democrats views so Linux and OSS People will be more likely to support Democrats.
Hillary Clinton is a more of a moderate candidate so bulk of the Linux supporters (who are typically more liberal) will not be as much encouraged to help her, while the general moderate population will be more willing to support her, so they will use what they know and the general population knows windows.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
If Linux distro's were women... http://geeks-have-feelings-too.net/if-linux-distri butions-were-women/
21st-Century-Citizen
Does anyone actually believe the candidates care about what they're running? If you look, almost all of them are using a hosting company which, to me, indicates that they just don't care what OS they're running. Like every other client in the world, they're just worried about having a web page up and running and they don't care if it's a kitten in a box typing out the html every time a request comes in. They just care if it works. While interesting, I can't for the life of me understand why people would think it's a political issue what OS their sites are running on.
These stories of a Finnish student designing Linux must be garbage. We all know that Linux is too complex to have evolved over time to its current state. It could only have been created by an Intelligent 'designer'
21st-Century-Citizen
But it's the last thing I care about in this election. With the Iraqi war, the illusion of "terrorism", Big Government Republicans(let's get rid of state rights AND build new, extraneous federal agencies like TSA and DOHS). I could care less if they thought apple iie was the newest type of computer on the market and urging everyone to upgrade to that that is fine. OSS needs to win on a technically better standpoint not a political motivation. It also needs to win because of an Open Government standpoint too, not just because it is OSS.
Plan 9, Minuette, SkyOS
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Used rubber runs BSD.
Vote Giant douche.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Even the more moderate Republican candidates such as Ron Paul and Rudy Guliani are running Linux whereas most of the true right wingers are running windows and most of the true left wingers are running linux or BSD.
Perhaps this can be construed as a statement of American corporatism seeing as the fundamentals of a Republican viewpoint involve making sure there are plenty of jobs by making sure the corporations do well. This would mean that "buying American" is the way to go. The Democratic viewpoint however, encourages the little man to do well so saving money and being a savvy consumer on an individual level are preferred along with "giving the little guy a chance" so various flavors of linux and BSD come into play there.
Definitely an interesting find!
Well, back to rejecting software patent applications.
No and No.
If you honestly believe that a candidate's webserver reflects their political leanings, you're sadly delusional.
If you're planning your vote based on the candidates choice of webserver OS, then you're really missing the bigger issues.
There is not a single thing done on any of the candidate sites that are platform specific. And I doubt any of them developed their sites "in-house" (within the campaign staff). I would bet that every single one of them found a developer and/or hosting company to design and build their site. And they probably went with whatever that developer/hosting provider recommended for a hosting plan.
While looking at the differences makes for an interesting exercise in alleviating boredom, it says nothing about the overall race or candidate's positions and abilities.
And I say this as a web developer who works on both Windows and *NIX servers and usually recommends Apache on Linux or FreeBSD.
I'm out of my mind right now, but feel free to leave a message.....
Interesting that in the short list you provided, you omitted the party that some people credit for causing Gore to lose the 2000 election. (I'm not making that claim, I'm just pointing out the claim.)
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
Given the pervalance of Diebold machines, I'd say just about anyone could win the next presidental election.
That's exactly the kind of uncertainty that Diebold's backers hope to eliminate.
Blank until
If Ron Paul wins, then Linux will too.
telnet www.ronpaul2008.com 80
Trying 74.205.85.10...
Connected to www.ronpaul2008.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
HEAD / HTTP/1.1
HTTP/1.1 400 Bad Request
Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 17:17:44 GMT
Server: Apache/2.0.52 (Red Hat)
Connection: close
Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1
Connection closed by foreign host.
When government fears the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. - Jefferson
The lack of a sufficient population precludes a Student test; any sample would be meaningless.
I never spellcheck and I freely admit it. Save your karma for more worthwhile "lol erorrs" replies
Actually, there is. It looks to basically be Ubuntu with some free Bible and other related software included. The link that the grandparent posted was a mock site.
I believe in de-evolution. God made the world perfect, man fell, and its been going downhill ever since!
This is also mirrored in funding. Dems (especially this cycle) will tend to get lots of smaller donations, while Republicans will get larger and fewer donations. Check the news stories.
You should check the news stories, because you've got the donation patterns backwards. The GOP gets smaller, but more, donations, and the Democrats get larger and fewer donations from Hollywood and George Soros types.
Republicans are rich and Democrats are not (except Hilliary)
...
Except Obama... and Edwards... and Gore...
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
True, that. (Thanks for the figures. I didn't have them handy.) We don't have a Democratic and a Republican party, we have a single Politician Party. One monster, two heads, that call each other names in order to distract us.
Constitutionally Correct
No we don't. We have Republicans and Democrats. Anyone from any other so called "party" is really just an enemy of one of the existing parties which would make them a member of the opposing party. Where the hell have you been? If you don't hate gay marriage, then you are a godless liberal Democrat. If you support the death penalty you are christian conservative Republican. All the people who don't agree with the whole party are flip-floppers or traitors to the other party.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
Don't tell me about the importance of elections; we've seen the results of uninformed and apathetic voters over the last 6 years. Even some of the most die-hard dittoheads are abandoning ship (you'll hear a lot more people calling themselves "Libertarian" rather than "Conservative" nowadays). But, you're telling me that you don't find it interesting that there's such a disparity in Linux preference and that it doesn't belong on Slashdot?
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Dude, (or dudette), read this and weep:y cle=2008
0 00286&cycle=2008
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/donordems.asp?c
For the under $200 donations, here's the breakdown:
Dems: 34,705
Reps: 27,710
From the graphs it looks like some other candidates get a larger portion of http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/geog.asp?id=N00
So please, don't trot out the usual suspects (Hollywood and George Soros) before doing some research.
Newsfollow.com
Link to article discussing the "soft-money" donations, and how the GOP is wiping the floor with the Dems.
Your OpenSecrets link is misleading and inaccurate, because politicians are not required to report the number of sub $200 donations. When you look at the $5 and $10 donations, etc, and do the math correctly, the GOP comes out way ahead of the Democrats right now.
Campaign Finance Reform helped the GOP, too. From that article: The Supreme Court's ruling on campaign finance gives the Republicans, who raise far more in small donations, a big advantage in next year's elections for the White House and Congress.
... and it was good.
I was surprised that Obama and Clinton had actually started putting videos on youtube [...]
I'm not. This is because 90+% of all staffers in most political campaigns are either current students or recent college graduates. When I volunteered in the 2006 election for a gubernatorial candidate that had been in office in the legislature for 20 years, we had a pretty solid YouTube presence. This is because every single staffer was internet savvy. I was the only volunteer for the campaign that didn't have a Facebook or Myspace account as far as I'm aware.
Social networking was primarily tapped by Democrats in 2004 thanks to the Dean campaign, but 2006 and on has shown that both sides are about equally savvy in this respect.
As long as politicians are mired in old thinking and do not understand current technology we will continue to have problems with the way technology is regulated and how it is being incentivised (or not).
Side note: This will ALWAYS be a problem because politicians don't really start getting into senior positions to affect things until they're in their 40's or later. Most of the cutting edge of technology is driven by people in their 20's. This generation gap does not look like it's going to change any time in the future.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").