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Microsoft Fracturing the Open-Source Community
TechGeek sends us to eWeek, where Mark Shuttleworth is quoted to the effect that Microsoft has succeeded in fracturing the Linux and open-source community with its patent indemnity agreements. Quoting: "Microsoft's strategy was to drive a wedge into the open-source community and unsettle the marketplace, Shuttleworth said. He also took issue with the Redmond, Wash., software maker for not disclosing the 235 of its patents it claims are being violated by Linux and other open-source software. 'That's extortion and we should call it what it is,' he said." Shuttleworth added, "I don't think this will end well for the companies that slipped up and went down that road."
Ubuntu will go on. SuSE will go on. Redhat will go on. Microsoft will go on.
Dude, bravery is being unafraid when it's reasonable to feel that way, but stupidity is being unafraid when it's prudent to have fear.
I know which one you think you have, but I'm not sure if it's the same as what you're actually displaying.
Extortion. That's what I've been saying all along.
I think what the open source community needs is a patent troll. Hey, SCO's looking to get bought out about now, huh? Maybe with the help of our billionaire friend here and some help from IBM, we could buy SCO and then turn Microsoft's dog against it. That's right. Have SCO sue Microsoft for patent infringement. And, oh, yeah, didn't SCO make some little known Linux distro? Maybe we could taunt them into countersuing and they'd be forced to reveal at least some of those supposed '235 patents'.
Unless it's all complete BS, like I've been saying all along...
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I generally think that the open-source community does this fine without anyone's help. Microsoft saw the opportunity to use it's weakness and exploited it.
Welcome to capitolism.
All I know to say is that when Dr. Faust made his deal with the devil it didn't work out well for him either. Faust
load "$",8,1
One problem that the OSS community suffers from is that there are many licensing forms, and that some are in conflict with what's suitable for some end-users. It is also a challenge to make money from OSS solutions unless you have a good model available. And there are a large number of OSS projects that are sponsored in one way or another.
Anyway - one must recognize that the view of having source code as a valuable asset is about to decay. The source code is just a tool - like a hammer or a screwdriver - that allows users to manage their information. The code in itself is useful to some extent, but the knowledge of how to use it us far more important - and here it's possible to make money even in the future.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
yea? this is a "community" that argues over everything as it is, just look at all the "fractures" over KDE vs. Gnome...
Check out last year's comment I made on the subject. The whole thing was done just to make us have arguments. Can we learn from history, so as not to repeat it?
Divide and conquer is an age old tactic. Open Source is meant to help us divide and yet still cooperate to use our separate works together, but MS is trying to get us to divide and argue amongst each other so that we no longer cooperate but stand divided on what MS is trying to make into an issue. Come on guys, MS walks in, saying "OK, half you guys get over here, and half you guys get over there because we say so. Hey hey hey, ubuntu guys, check out the way those Novell guys are looking at you...." etc. And it's like we're falling for it.
It all boils down to the fact that the software is not "under" any kind of agreement except the GNU GPL. We all know the patents are crap otherwise they would be disclosed. We all know patents do not even matter, otherwise MS (and any others who would want to squeeze GNU/Linux for some cash) would have made their move by now. All they're doing is prodding us and watching which way we squirm. Why should we squirm? Just get back to using FLOSS, nothing's changed. Except that maybe we're a lot bigger now and they're more scared.
Twinstiq, game news
Yeah, that's all the people that are the most passionate about GNU/Linux so they're actually arguing that much because they care. What about all the people who just want to use the software, won't all that arguing put them off, and think of it as a negative reflection on the OSS development model? It's FUD to the outsiders, either way you look at it, and can't be brushed aside by everyone. Just because we know better doesn't mean everyone does. How do we show them what's right?
Twinstiq, game news
Psh. Please...
KDE v GNOME
vi v emacs
Linux v BSD
Qt v gtk v tcl/tk v Swing v raw X calls
O(1) scheduler v Completely Fair Scheduler
GPLv2 v GPLv3 v BSD license
stuffing v potatoes
Like the open-source world needs help in becoming fractured. We're perfectly good at doing that ourselves, thank you very much.
Microsoft are doing what they do best, divide and conquer, with FUD and money. The good news is that by attacking the open source community, they have shifted into "FIGHT" phase (ignore, mock, fight, lose, as Gandhi said). Microsoft will not win, for the simple reason that the open source community is unlike any business they have crushed before.
We can't be divided, we are already utterly fragmented and internecine. Our strength is that we can never be absorbed; once open (and especially if GPLd) the code can never be killed.
Microsoft will try, and try, and try to divide the FOSS community, and each time they'll just make it stronger. Eventually the attempts will change Microsoft; the only real way it can fight and beat FOSS is to become FOSS.
Nothing Microsoft can do, no amount of money, patent blackmail, FUD, ISO corruption and bribery, not even murder and assassination, can stop the Community, because FOSS is not a business, it is a better technology, and like MSN/1.0 in 1995, where Microsoft thought, "let's beat the Internet by making our own private network", you cannot fight better technology. You use it, or your competitors do, and either way it survives.
Of course, in the meantime, Microsoft can and will cause a lot of pain and damage and destroy many careers and corrupt many officials, and mis-educate millions of young people. It's very sad. But in the long term, makes no difference.
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The "petty schisms" are all silly and the free software world has gone from strength to strength anyway. Free software encourages people to fork and merge, so disagreements are really a strength because the good results are always picked back up.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
It's not like we weren't fractured along the lines of...
- Vi vs EMACS
- ((Linux Vs FreeBSD) Vs NetBSD) vs OpenBSD 'cause Theo's a dick
- RMS vs Linus
- GNOME vs KDE
- C programmers vs everybody
- PERL vs sanity
etc...
the only thing everybody allegedly had in common was it was everyone vs Microsoft and/or closed source software in general - but even that was never true. There seems to be some romanticizing about this alleged "community." To be fair, I felt it until about 2002... then things started bloating and it became all about "market share" and legal wrangling rather than enjoying ourselves and making computers do cool tricks for each other.
oh well.
Open Source is the community. As long as the game is on our field, Mr. Gates does not stand a chance. Let him pull the game on to his field, and he will have a chance at winning. Don't fall for it folks! Stand together, and we will defeat the evil empire.
"To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
Honestly, the blame is not Microsoft's. It is the community. OSS under GPL3 is fast approaching the stance of the Catholic Church as recently expounded by the Pope. In otherwords, "its all or nothing", "you're either with us, or against us", and so forth.
GPL2 was fine, the lessers are fine. But, brow beating projects into GPL3 is going to make the community rebel, and these people are all about rebellion.
The split is not happening because of MS, it is because of RMS, all holiness to his name.
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
Don't bother - that was such an obvious troll it's unreal.
Doesn't much matter what happens with the Linux kernel anyhow - much of the userland (including nice things like glibc and gcc) will be GPLv3 if they're not already. And they are major work to replace.
I sent them money for one of their lovely Desktops with pre-installed Ubuntu. I already had an older P-III running Ubuntu nicely, but wanted to vote with my wallet. That core2 Duo with 3 Gigs of RAM runs Ubuntu extra nicely. :D
"Do the Right Thing. It will gratify some people and astound the rest." - Mark Twain
It makes sense that Microsoft would try to turn the fractious and already divisive nature of at least the older elements of Linux's userbase against itself. It isn't as though such an activity would be terribly difficult, either.
This is another part of the reason why I view the Linux "community" as such a toxic, virulent sociological sickness. It's because things like this effort on Microsoft's part demonstrate that, while Linux advocates can talk about the community valuing unity to the degree that they do, that's all such talk is; talk. Linux users are a lot quicker to shun each other for imagined violations of Stallmanite philosophy than they are to genuinely stand together against a common enemy. This is easy for Microsoft to see, and in conflict, it is customary to attempt to capitalise on the enemy's weakness. Sun Tzu also wrote that one of the most important things in war is to divide the enemy wherever possible, and to prevent the enemy from forming alliances with anyone.
Microsoft signs one of these agreements with Novell or whoever else, and it wins in two ways. It wins by potentially driving said company out of business, because of said company no longer being able to sell its' distribution, and it also wins by making sure that members of the community are too busy fighting each other to be able to do anything else, because of splits between those who still want to keep using said companies' distros and those who think it is wrong to do so. So they can sign these agreements, and then merely stand back to observe the fireworks. You yourselves do the rest.
The only time I'm ever going to see the Linux community as being a good thing is when said community genuinely starts behaving like one. That means getting some basic maturity. It also means that if someone is doing what you believe is the wrong thing, that rather than shunning that person at the first sign of infraction, you instead at least initially attempt to talk to the person about what it is that they're doing, and also that in such situations you also check your own assumptions. Most importantly, the howling, red eyed zealotry needs to go.
Want to start beating Microsoft, Linux users? Stop thinking and acting like religious fanatics, and in general, grow the hell up. Right now, you're being played like a violin, and if you want that to continue, just keep doing more of the same.
Actually, kid, I don't have a problem understanding the licenses. In fact, I've helped businesses understand the differences between the major licenses and convinced quite a few that some open source software could indeed help them.
That said, as I stated before, some businesses are wary of using open source because of the license confusion and conflicts in the community between groups of zealots when the sane among us just make and use software.
I have to say that, as a troll, you suck.
Everything I need to know I learned by killing smart people and eating their brains.
There is nothing that I have seen that shows the community was fractured. In fact, just about the opposite. Redhat actually tried to take it in their own direction and has been forced back towards the central. Of course, like any innovative company, they try to push the edge, which is a good thing. If somebody else comes up with a good mod to it, then great. In fact, with 3 distro's controlling about 80% of the community, it is very hard to fracture. I do think that MS has figured out an interesting angle and novell took the hook, but that remains to be seen. But even if so, so what? If it truely fractures, then groups like debian, redhat and ubuntu will continue in one direction vs. novell, linsa, and others continuing in a different and the users will decide.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
How eWeek's Peter Galli managed to divine that "Microsoft has succeeded in fracturing the Linux... community" from Shuttleworth's clear refutation that "Microsoft is trying to unsettle the marketplace. It isn't working..." is beyond me.
This dubious claim of Galli's is one of the clearest cases of "white is black" reporting I've seen in a while. Shuttleworth clearly, from his own statements, does not agree with the concept that the community is "fractured." At best, he believes that a few insignificant vendors have been "drawn into [negotiations with MS and] have paid a significant price."
I would say, from his clear, concise statements, that he sees the whole, sordid event as "extortion," and a crucible that has purified the community, rather than "fractured."
Read Shuttleworth's statements (in TFA) and see if you don't agree that Peter Galli is either a) a poor reporter who made a gross mischaracterization or b) has a strong agenda and preconceptions and can't even tell white from black in his zeal to follow them.
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Toro
Maybe you've just been lucky to work in companies that actually have a clue. Most don't, especially about technology. Or perhaps I've just been unlucky. As far as I've seen most people - and businesses - pay about as much attention to software licenses and EULAs as they do to the terms they're agreeing to when they buy a toaster. Unless software is their core business, it's just seen as a necessary but uninteresting expense. Most EULAs you don't even see until you've bought the software, anyway; and if you've bought it, you've obviously deemed it to be required for your business, so it's pretty unlikely that anything in there is going to make you change your mind about using it.
Anyway, your whole point is that the GPL is easy to understand. Unquestionably. I'm not arguing that. My point is that most businesses don't want to read the GPL, because they don't want to change how they do things, and the FUD about "viral licenses" and how Free Software is going to make you have to divulge all your secrets to your competitors plays into that desire.
This is what I meant by people being comfortable with paying for software; it's simply easier than trying to think about it in a different way. Sure, if a business decides it would like to use open source software they can easily determine that it's safe to do so, but most of the decision makers want to keep the status quo. They may complain about licensing costs and all the bugs in Microsoft software or whatever, but if you suggest using free software instead they come up with all sorts of excuses, including misinformation about the repercussions of the license; as well issues like compatibility, staff training costs, and so on.
The funny thing is, free software isn't fundamentally different from commercial software. I guess more and more are realising that, but I think it's still very much perceived as a fringe, hobbiest thing that's not suitable for business use, and only hippies would suggest it.