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Microsoft's Open Source Guru Faces Tough Fight
coondoggie writes "Microsoft's Sam Ramji is like a turkey knocking on Thanksgiving's door. Ramji has the unenviable task of stretching his neck out into the open source world as Microsoft's representative. On top of it, his employer has preheated the oven with years of hubris, sleights of hand and broken promises.
Ramji's Sisyphean task was evident last week in Portland at the Open Source Conference (OSCon) and will likely be fuel for chatter at next week's LinuxWorld gathering in San Francisco."
Microsoft is good at winning the game when people are agressive towards them. Which I know its very easy to get hostile towards them. But they are somewhat lost when another group is their host and they are not in control. So we should be welcoming, give them a drink of the kool-aid and treat them like one of the gang. Its going to be hard and we'll have to keep an eye out for deception, but I think we should start playing nicer with them and hope that they do the same. Perhaps Microsoft would see the light and become friendlier to open source and open standards. Unlikely, but so was getting Excel working under Linux through Wine if you asked someone 10 years ago.
In the end, open source is simply a better model for software development and its a lot more impervious to threats than proprietary software is. Businesses just don't get that. In a business, the software focus is on making money. In open source, the software focus is on quality and empowering the end user. In the end, open source and the user will win. Heck, we're already winning, Microsoft is interested in open source (regardless of the reasons).
Don't throw arrows. Be diplomatic.
I'd like to know what it would take for Microsoft to actually back up those claims with proof in a public forum. But that's probably a question for Steve Ballmer, since he's the one who seems to flog the patent FUD.
OTOH, I have contracted at Microsoft (once as a dev doing an intranet site for a testing lab, once being the editor in charge of a couple of sections of the MSW homepage), and it's an interesting culture there. It's not the Death Star with Ballmer walking around, periodically strangling people with his mind just to show who's boss.
In a company that big you can't escape the control freaks and evidence of The Peter Principle, but you also have people there like my manager on the intranet site contract, who was the best manager I've had in the 23 years since I started having managers. For all the greed and arrogance people here like to claim go into Microsoft products, there are a lot of people who are there because they love what they do and Microsoft gives them the opportunity to get paid well for doing it. I met some awesome people at Microsoft, people I really respect.
I switched to Mac to avoid Vista. I use NeoOffice instead of MS Office. But I can say that despite some of the aura of badness Microsoft gives off as a company, there are people there who are truly dedicated to the company being a good citizen, putting out good products, and getting along with others. The people who give Ramji a hard time really haven't given him a chance.
Start a happiness pandemic
"Sucks to be you!"
Admit it. You post strawman arguments as AC so you get modded Insightful for refuting them, rather than Troll
Herculean, surely? Maybe even Gargantuan.
It still kills me how close his name is to Sam Gamgee.
We are open source, we accept all code but we are also a community. This community must be respected. Corporate entities will run all over us and then want to be friends. Must we lie down and take it or resist and be defiant because we are the movement? I know what I am saying is controversial but I say it with a reason. Bow once and bow a thousand more times. Microsoft is the main enemy, defeat him and we will conquer all. I may be in the few, but I say rise because the time is now and it is time to strike.
why can't we just ignore them? I mean seriously, if there is one thing we (oss guys) can agree on... SURELY this is it. For many years, hate for M$ has been the only thing that the free software community could agree on.
why can't the entire free software crowd just stand up and say "No thanks", we aren't interested in what you have to say.
if you think that M$ will ever help free software in any meaningful way, you obviously haven't been paying attention over the past couple decades.
there is good news in this though. M$ is obviously noticing that every day there are people installing linux who used to use window$. They know that linux on the desktop is closing the gap and many other companies stand to profit from it. After years of pretending OSS didn't exist, or worse yet, attacking it in underhanded ways, they don't have a piece of the action. This whole M$/oss thing, just means they are realizing there is a chance that maybe OSS really IS the next big thing.
My prediction is that a huge company with unlimited resources like google will package up a nice, distro, call it something flashy, advertise the hell out of it, and give it away for free. I am well aware of the options that already exist, but the average person is not. It takes flashy marketing to capture the market.
how can M$ possibly compete with other companies who come in at a price point nearly $0, with a better product, a good ad campaign, AND profit margins of nearly 100%? They can't. Someday the house of cards will fall. They know it, they think, they can adapt by getting involved with OSS. They will fail because we hate them.
Obama is a twitter sock puppet
Yeah. Apache, Firefox, MySQL, Asterisk, PHP, Wikipedia, BIND, Postfix: all COMPLETE FAILURES.
Utter crap that nobody ever uses, right?
Yeah, FOSS is *so* far behind that MS is desperately throwing money around trying to get a foot in the FOSS door. "Dear Know-Nothing", indeed!
Caveat Utilitor
I am not a Linux kind of guy, but if I were, I would want Microsoft to be as open, honest, and helpful as I can get them.
If video games influenced behavior the Pac Man generation would be eating pills and running away from their problems.
I think we should fight Microsoft, not Sam Ramji. We should just make it clear that Sam works for a company with a monopoly conviction and a long record of dirty fighting.
Microsoft's joining Apache, to a great extent, as an anti-Linux play. They still can't stand the GPL, it's too fair for them, but they think they can take some of the oxygen from Linux by being more of a platform for Apache-style software. And the Apache license lets them "embrace and enhance".
Don't give up now, folks. Only your vigilance and your willingness to point out when Microsoft plays dirty tricks will keep them from getting away with even more of that.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Poor, poor Ramji. I feel so sorry for him. Getting his head cut off and all. Boo Hoo. TFA is pure Microsoft FUD. Yeah, Microsoft is trying to get along with Open Source. Sure.
Microsoft wants to kill Open Source and don't ever forget that.
Hey Ramji, after all your employer has done to promote Open Source like backing SCO and buying off ISO, why don't you just crawl under a rock someplace and quit wasting our air. Just go cash that big check and live in some kind of peace and harmony with your bought-off ass.
"The ferrets, they're every where I tell you!"
It's not the Death Star with Ballmer walking around, periodically strangling people with his mind just to show who's boss.
That's what Apple is like.
I was there when he was being grilled at the final keynote. Honestly, O'Reily (the OSCON sponsor) had to ask people to *STOP* asking the MS representative tough questions... but he even gave the harder questions a go. Not everyone wass going to be happy with the answers, but... they won't ever be, right? It's coming from the Ebil Micro$oft, afterall.
MS is changing with the times, as any successful corporation really must. There are even some pretty compelling business reasons for this, I'll wager. For instance, MS can (I presume) distribute this "free" software without typical development costs (and I presume it wouldn't hurt them to distribute the source code for these free utilities). They can instead focus their developers on ensuring that FOSS interacts and is integrated well with their products and services. They even receive free bug fixes and are likely to contribute bug fixes themselves.
Evidence of this business practice is emerging even now: MS is a platinum sponsor for Apache, and contributed a MSSQL patch to ADOdb (BSD license, not MS). Of course, MS isn't the only large corporation doing this (Sun, HP, IBM, Google, etc).
Well, at least, that's my theory for the sudden about-face.
What would be so bad about Microsoft running the Government? Think of all the synergies!
: Blue screen of death penalty.
: Zune for Government: finally, a user base!
: Just announced for MS Government 2009: 10% tax breaks for everyone! (Details of software may vary from description, including variance in the tax cut by negative 50%.)
: President Emeritus Gates
: MS Government Home Edition (voting restricted to school board elections)
: All Mac and Linux users are welcome to participate in government. However, MS Government requires Windows Vista (plus 3GB RAM, 700GB HD, 2GB video card, and 36" monitor) of course.
: Click paperclip for assistance. "It looks like you are trying to complain to your Senator. Would you like to be arrested, be disappeared, compose a letter, erase your hard drive?"
: Balmer in charge of troop morale
: MS Government 2009 upgrade for only $349.95! (Additional $799.95 for Pro edition, which allows for basic network connection.) MS Government State Edition and Local Edition easily added on for only $299.95 each! Additional family licenses available at discounts of up to 5% for families with more than 10 children.
: Microsoft Bob Dole. Combining two compelling personalities!
: MS Government Justice Pack 2.0 - Allows for participation in the legal system (as plaintiff or defendant). Release expected soon, but you can buy now for only $949.95!
While filming Army of Darkness Sam Ramji defied conventional filmmaking, keeping costs to a minimum by utilizing a variety of improvised measures. Rather than invest a ton of money into a specialized dollie, for example, Mr. Ramji got a few extras to help carry his camera crew in scenes of the movie. It *totally* figures that he's an open source dude, you know? I didn't know he was working for Micro$oft now, though...
Harold
I know you will hate me but, in all seriousness, I had actually hoped Bill Gates would leave Microsoft and go into politics. I have my reasons and I'll keep them short.
A country is about a lot of things and one of the most important things is about keeping the majority of the people happy. Honestly? The vast majority of Windows users are quite happy. We, here, probably wish that they weren't but they are.
There comes a time when a government must do things that go against their normal routine. Bill would likely have done all sorts of unethical things to help return the United States of America to its former glory but it would have served us, the citizens, well.
His ability to make wise choices is not something we can really argue about if we look at reality. We might not *like* his choices but they accomplished what he'd intended which was to make the computer a personal device that anyone could have and make himself and his company filthy rich. He did that quite well.
I wouldn't want him as a more than a single term president. I'm hoping that the people who read this know the difference between Ballmer and Gates. I wouldn't want Ballmer running my local PTA honestly but I really think the business acumen demonstrated by Bill would do a great deal to getting our country to the point where it is stable again.
I can picture it now...
Bill: We're spending WHAT on WHAT???
Aide: Millions per day on the war that people don't like, sir.
Bill: No patch in sight?
Aide: None from the generals on the field sir.
Bill: Well, screw it. Bring the boys home, let 'em rest up, and tell the world to wait for SP1.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
just stop polluting my favourite projects with windows only perversions... Open source is supposed to be cross platform... I don't want any "improvements" made to projects so they run better on windows... in fact I'd prefer it it if people stopped porting things to run on windows... make all the best stuff available on Linux...
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
They are coming. Their are quite a few of them, but they are coming. Remember what I said about "Preventing the last year of open source and Linux?" While Linux is strong now, do realize that we got a break.
In Vista, I expected the Harbinger of Linux's Doom. I expected another Windows 2000. I was pleasantly surprised how bad Vista turned out.
We got a break, we got lucky, and Linux will survive to fight another day, but the monsters are still out there. At this point, Linux needs to focus on combating OSX. Apple is as lethal a threat as M$ is.
That's because you are a zealot. Unless you're saying that the cash had been dipped in radioactive goo before it was handed over, there is no reason for an organisation not to take a donation for a good cause just because it came from a company you personally don't like.
Not Meta-modding due to apathy.
I hear what you're saying, "If you can't beat 'em, join 'em!" But I really think we can beat 'em. Have you tried the latest Ubuntu?
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
I wish the North Koreans weren't so happy under a dictatorship either...
I think civil rights would suffer even worse under the likes of Bill Gates because he cares little about the wants of his users when they pay him in an open market. But when you go to the government, you have little choice in the matter. So he pretty much has a total monopoly from the get go, and less regulations thanks to the ever expanding powers of the executive branch thanks to the current administration. You would be a fool to think that he wouldn't use his political power to further Microsoft's profits by eliminating the use of Linux at all levels of government, thus putting our country at even more risk from China's electronic attacks. Not to mention what he would like to mandate for federal school funding. Granted there are checks and balances to the system, but I'd rather have inept politicians blunder through that, than having a sly business man like Bill Gates work the system in ways it was not meant to be.
We need Bill Gates about as much as we need Obama or McCain, which is to say not at all...
Money is the root of all evil?
Great analogy. I think MS is going to do EXACTLY what Japan did facing the atomic bomb:
Implode, be incinerated, be eviscerated, bleed to death, slowly fall apart from radiation, and gasp desperately for a few more breaths of air, ultimately surrendering. Have you tried Vista?
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
Linux.
And some others that I like:
Gimp
SumatraPDF
Pidgin
Open Office
Dscaler
Zsnes
VLC
Virtualdub
Audacity
Thunderbird
Virtualbox
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
Microsoft is a single entity in one sense, but it is also a community, or a political organisation, if you will, comprised of lots of people with differing agendas and varying levels of "evilness". Adhering to a militant stance as a stated policy and assuming defiance as a fixed position is not just very lazy, it is short sighted, counter-productive and stupid.
Sure, it makes everything easy now. You don't have to think about what your "enemy" is doing, just reject everything as bad because it comes from Redmond - just like how anything that Muslims do is terrorism and anything the Jews did in central Europe in the 1930s was evil and subhuman. It actually doesn't help anyone though.
Microsoft can make public gestures of reconciliation and receive public rejection. This gives the wider community the impression that Microsoft is fair minded and willing to cooperate with others while the FOSS community are is some bigoted group of crackpot zealots. So Microsoft wins the battle for hearts and minds while the FOSS community, through a conscious choice of ignorance, loses. Pressure on Microsoft to share protocols and adhere to genuine open standards is diminished while the world of FOSS remains an obscure backwater.
Yeah, I've come across this approach personally many times, and it's never been successful for the militants in the long term. It tends to be one of those behaviour patterns that intelligent teenagers grow out of. Sometimes it's just the militants who lose, mostly it's everyone.
Of course if everyone was determined to adhere to a militant approach, I suggest marching in the streets wearing brown shirts as a good start to impress the general population and win supporters. Worked for Adolf.
I don't therefore I'm not.
So, he's kinda like the Colin Powell in George Bush's administration?
.....And dominate the auto industry with reliable hybrids.
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
.... still be very bad drivers.
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
Just look at another M$ news today about some versions of Vista failing to dual-boot: http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/07/30/204241
So, what was that noise about Microsoft being more open?
http://revj.sourceforge.net
Look at the guy they hired to run their Linux Lab, Hilfe or something like that is his name. They made him up to be a friend to OSS but then he got put in charge of their anti-linux marketing or the likes.
20+ years of watching these guys tell me it is business as usual for MSFT. Windows is their baby and nothing is going to threaten it. Linux and OSS is too compelling for many of Microsofts customers so Microsoft must get its hands dirty and shove its way into that area enough to figure out how to pull those customers back to Windows.
Their business is Windows and maintaining that products position. Software which runs on Windows and some other platform is a threat. This is how it has always been so why would anyone think they are playing any other game? Twenty years folks, twenty years. Just look at ODF and MS-OOXML for proof of how far they'll go to protect their position.
this new guy should not be given the time of day IMO.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
you mean you've never noticed them joining competing industry committees before? They usually do this for a few reasons and all of them have to do with making sure they know how to fight the product.
They do it to get inside numbers on things like install base and download numbers. This lets them know how much they need to throttle up or down marketing funds to fight the product.
They do this to slow down the progress of the committee for obvious reasons. It's pretty easy to do when you've got billions of bucks and hundreds of developers taking orders from you.
They do it to learn the inner workings of the development process and other business-like mechanisms so they can feed valuable data to their sales force and help promote their product over the committees product.
I doubt they had to become a sponsor to contribute a MS-SQL patch to ADOdb. That was just a bone to throw out to make it look like they have changed from the 20+ years of fighting every cross platform product which threatens a Microsoft product. They lose billions annually doing this but with far more billions in profits from Windows, nobody seems to care.
There is no about-face and surely one, two, three or more press releases and cheap tricks isn't going to change 20 years of history. open source is a threat to their only money maker, Windows and they must stop it. That is the face of Microsoft. IMO.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
We should not trust Microsoft, no matter how nice their liaison to the FOSS community, until they drop their claims that Linux distros infringe their patents. Either they need to specify WHICH patents or withdraw the claim entirely.
If we give in to anything less, we're selling out and lending cred to M$, not to mention allowing them to make money off of FOSS through their "licensing" program.
Nitewing '98
Everything works...in theory.
Do these three words sound familiar? embrace extend extinguish
Until there are actions made by Microsoft that benefits open source in general everything Microsoft does in OSS should be taken with a large dose of skeptisism. Its all PR.
As long as their goal is to obliterate any competition, kill partners any time it gives a benefit and screw their customers over they shouldnt be allowed to be in our community. While we play nice they spend their time trying to come up with new ways of controlling or killing the open source movement.
HTTP/1.1 400
Idle curiousity, who would you propose instead?
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
The open source world is also ready to fight if necessary.
Stallman is waiting.
Just take a look at this video, in which he practically destroys arguments against microsoft's open-source positions.
A guillotine is much more humane (less chance of mishaps).
Teach cats synchronized swimming. I would rather teach helpdesk people to think. It's a tough row to hoe.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
Bill: Well, screw it. Bring the boys home, let 'em rest up, and tell the world to wait for SP1.
Which could render some hardware illegal. (GET IT?)
Your ad here.
Stallman!
Your ad here.
at the door.. you know what to do with it: it needs to be slaughtered first and then put in the oven at fairly high temperatures.
in any case, i would let a dog or a rat try it first, it might still be poisoned though.
...in an alternative universe, a "guru" (short for "Guru meditation number") was a system crash, like a BSOD. Except it wasn't blue, the background was black, and the text was red, inside a flashing red box that filled the top half of the screen.
microsoft is capitalist,they go where they think the money is.
if you give em hard proof of a more profitable future in OSS,they will run to it faster than a young puppy chasing a rubber ball.
They have broken the law, cheated on business partners, used underhanded tactics in the OS to stifle competition.
That has nothing to do with capitalism. Capitalism does not work without the respect and adherence to the rule of law, and needless to say, one is immoral because one chooses to, not because one is a capitalist.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Every time they would try to reach out, people like you would just tell them to fuck off even if they mean well
They DO NOT mean well. How many more times?!
Add an awesome future to Microsoft's LGPL version, and relicense it as GPL.
The community version will then become better than the official version, and everybody will start using it. BWAHAHAHA.
Unless we're working with libraries. I'm really not sure what would happen in that case. See, if you modify a library you're legally obligated to release the changes into the public. This is perfect for APIs and things that require interoperability.
Then, I'd suggest we go straight to the top of happiness, Steve Jobs.
We may not like the guy, but one thing we know for sure is that Apple users are much more colorful and happier on average than Windows users (and also much happier than most grumpy Linux users. Sorry guys, don't deny it, you Linux guys all know I'm speaking the truth).
Wish I could be there . . . I say be polite, don't play into their hands . . . but don't trust them at all, keep them at a distance.
And show them we are better than they are. Please get that point across.
SARAVA!
MS is changing with the times, as any successful corporation really must.
As far as I'm concerned, they haven't "changed with the times" as recently as the ISO debacle. They want to talk about being supportive of open source initiatives in between pulling crap like that? Thanks, but no thanks. I will personally never trust them.
I like to think of online DRM as something akin to a college -- you pay for lessons until you learn something.
Recently on a neighbours laptop when booting of a (linux) live cd, upon rebooting into windows the system started complaining that the system would possibly be severely damaged and that it had to be checked. This was on an acer, one of the better known microsoft cronies.
Microsoft may be evil, or not, but dont assume EVERYTHING they do is evil. the reason for THIS particular warning (and it is a warning) is because of one of 2 reasons:
1) When you install Linux, you are given an option to resize your windows partition to fit Linux. The rezise only moves the partition, but does not update any checksums or transient indexes. Therefore When windows next boots up, it has to do a checkdisk, to ensure that the partition is still valid (same as a linux fsck), and data integrity is maintained. There is usually nothing wrong with this, and in general is a "good thing"
2) if you mount a windows NTFS partition in Linux in read/write mode (not reccommended) it will also need to to a chkdsk, as checksums are not updated.
Have a nice day!
100% classic, real-deal bonafide /. article this- can't resist commenting! :D
MS would need to first (L)GPL at least XP/2000, Vista, VB/C#/.NET and Office to the fullest extent possible before the free software community will even listen to a word that they or any of their infiltrators may have to say. Until then we'll carry on using Linux, xorg, gcc, OOo etc. and tools that protect our freedom to compute as we like.
Simple!
Actually, most Apple users don't give two shits, just like most Windows users don't give two shits.
RTFA
Linux!=OSS
To think "Microsoft is supporting OSS" = "Microsoft is supporting Linux" is to commit a grievous logical error. OSS includes lots of applications and infrastructure that runs on Windows and MS Platforms.
Technology Marketing is what happens when people turn their hard work over to people paid to manipulate others.
The vast majority of Windows users are quite happy.
That's funny. Well, at least I think it is. My wife would probably claw your eyes out. Yours and Bill Gates.
I know very few people that are "happy" with Windows. They are more "resigned" to using it. (Queue 'Saturday Night Live' theme for 'Lowered Expectations')
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
Looks serious. HAVE you tried the latest Ubuntu, or even the second latest?
If Joe Sixpack knew his computer could be fast, dead reliable and simple to use while still doing everything his Windows box can do (this is Joe Sixpack and not Joe Gamer), all for the cost of:
- One blank CD
- Learning to click on the flaming fox instead of the blue E
- Learning to clock on the purple bird instead of the little green man
- Learning to click on the road cone instead of the colorful Play button
- Learning the names of the apps in the OpenOffice suite
he'd drop Windows like a hot potato and never look back. My whiny Paris Hilton wannabe sister bitched and moaned at first when I switched her to Ubuntu (after she stole one of my partly-patched XP gaming laptops and turned it into a spyware and virus-ridden BSODing mess within 36 hours) but after a while she learned how it works and now she doesn't complain, and the laptop hasn't hiccuped once.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
The danger with Microsoft is are they drinking the Open Source kool-aid or have we started to drink the Microsoft kool-aid?
vi +
they have a history of going after Windows ISV's with cross platform products. OSS is tied to Linux in that in over 90% of the projects, they run on Linux if they run on Windows.
While OSS does not equal Linux, it does enable it as a threat to Microsofts only money maker, Windows.
IMO, thinking that Microsoft is "supporting OSS" is a grave error. They support Windows and Microsoft software period. Anything else they do is designed to move customers to Windows and Microsoft software and not the cross platform software.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
At least PR-wise.
Anyone here who ever took part in a BBS knows how people react to the "new guy". It all depends on how he makes his entry and how he behaves himself. Especially in expert boards where the "regulars" have built a reputation. In comes a new guy, and he could be the expert for everything on this planet, when he comes off like this he'll be dismissed as an obnoxious know-it-all.
MS makes exactly the same mistake every time they want to "join" some expert group. OSS developers are such a group. Stallman, Raymond, even SUN as a corporation have build a reputation and their voices are usually heard when OSS is the topic. Even if they just farted, people would start discussing the smell. The reason is simply that they built a reputation and backed that reputation with hard work, so they are accepted as the auctors, the "wise men" of OSS. Their word isn't gospel, but they're usually regarded as being right in general.
Now MS comes in and usually one of the first things they do is that they want part of the spotlight, they want to talk, they want to present their POV, the problem is, nobody wants to hear that. Why should they speak on OSS? What have they done for OSS that "elevated" them to the airs where they may tell us something? It's like someone joining a board and starting pointing out how everything done there is "done wrong" and how much it would be better if everyone did it another way. Does anyone listen to such a person?
A more humble approach would be in order. I can only suggest spending some time learning. Yes, MS will most likely have people on their payroll who have developed OSS, who could actually speak on the matter, but they're from MS. What does the average OSS developer expect from MS? Backstabbing, embrace-extend-extinguish strategies and FUD. That's the sorry reputation MS has in OSS circles.
If they really want to becomes part of OSS, at least to some minor degree, they first of all have to prove themselves again. I usually give people and even companies a "second chance" (or even an n-th), but their usual approach of rushing in with bravado and flaunting will not work well in an OSS environment.
OSS doesn't care about money or style. That's not what makes you an important figure. What does is providing useful software. And so far, MS lacks in that area sorely.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
http://www.birdhouse.org/beos/byte/30-bootloader/h
Until such time as MS comes to the table with full support for Open Standars, such as Ogg Vorbis, Ogg Theora, OpenDocument (to name a few), or for that matter even DNS, there is no point in giving MS pud-pullers the spotlight. MS wants to play? Comply with EU law and banish WMA and WMV formats from the default Windows distros. Or MS can lay off subnotebooks like Asus and even OLPC and let them get back to distributing Linux as the market demands.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
There is an old saying - if you sup with the devil, use a long spoon. Do not invite him to sit at the top table and take part in decision making, and deciding the direction of future projects. I will believe in MS "commitment" to open-source when they release the code for their software, instead of trying to stop me using (my 100% legal version of) XP because I have reinstalled it 5 times.
Microsoft's Sam Ramji is like a turkey knocking on Thanksgiving's door.
He's welcomed?
Looking at Microsoft's current situation...
(1) FUD on open source has failed. (Get the Facts...What happened to the bloke who came up with that, didn't he get fired?)
(2) OOXML is in limbo. (Fast tracking process was inconsistent like no tomorrow...Stack the ballot!)
(3) Live Search solution is a flop. (Google is still dominant!)
(4) Xbox 360 has reliability issues. (RROD...What was initially an attempt to save a few million is now costing them a Billion!)
(5) Vista is suffering from poor adoption. (The reality is becoming more obvious when you see that they need to rejuvenate Vista's PR image with deception).
So what's a way to kill Linux? (while they're at it)
Simple, take away its applications! Make them work better with Windows!
LAMP => WAMP.
Do anything and everything you can to win the community over! Play nice, wear T-shirts, throw money at them, donate some code (to Windows benefit!), etc.
Notice how in that movie, "Pirates of Silicon Valley", the character playing Bill Gates wore a T-shirt offered by Apple. (Apple basically embraced them into their community)...Guess what happened? Gates screwed them over!
Point being?
Microsoft can be seen in two views: Character and Personality.
The Character is what everyone knows it has done. It will plunder, stab you in the back, etc to get its way. This is how they've always worked. Manipulate the situation to THEIR benefit. Get what you need NOW! Don't worry about the law, ethics, moral, etc...Leave that for later. (Hello anti-trust cases!)
Personality is its PR side. All that marketing spin, that olive branching to open source, playing nice...Nothing but lip service. Its a facade.
Seriously, wouldn't you be suspicious of the neighborhood bully suddenly playing nice?
Deep down, Sam Ramji is just another expendable employee of Microsoft playing "Liason" with open source. You can feel sympathy for him, but you don't have to feel sympathy for Microsoft. Then again, why would you feel sympathy for Sam? He joined MS on his own accord. His choice.
So the question really is (from a FOSS view): We've done well without Microsoft so far, why do we need them now?
As joked many years ago: Microsoft isn't the solution. Microsoft is the question...And the answer is: NO!
This is becoming even more true in the 21st Century.
Evidence of this business practice is emerging even now: MS is a platinum sponsor for Apache, and contributed a MSSQL patch to ADOdb (BSD license, not MS). Of course, MS isn't the only large corporation doing this (Sun, HP, IBM, Google, etc).
Microsoft also donated to GNU last year.
How's that for EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL!?
"You can either have software quality or you can have pointer arithmetic, but you cannot have both at the same time."
I will take as the main thrust of your argument the sentence, "Adhering to a militant stance as a stated policy and assuming defiance as a fixed position is not just very lazy, it is short sighted, counter-productive, and stupid." And I think you're as wrong as wrong can be.
That has indeed largely been the policy of "the movement." And it's been working, slowly slowly slowly, but undeniably working. We're beating their ass on quality, we're changing the public perception with projects like Firefox and Ubuntu, and it's starting to show up in market share. We're really starting to eat their lunch. Sure, right now it's just a bite of the yogurt, but by this time next year, maybe it's the whole cup. The year after, maybe it's the cookie too. This is because of the confrontational nature of the movement, not in spite of it. We're all up in people's faces with this shit. We're gonna have our say, we're gonna be heard. And we're gonna keep rolling out release after release that kick's the competition's ass, and then we're gonna talk a bunch of shit about it, and do it again. Stay tuned. The fun part's still coming.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
Actually, there is. It makes you dependent on them.
Let's say that you use Microsoft's $100,000 to hire a new employee or two (salaried, not contractual). You are now in a position where if Microsoft decides that they don't like what you're doing they can refuse to repeat their donation the next year, forcing you to lay off those two employees.
I can see Microsoft trying to use the threat of discontinued donations as leverage to steer the ASF into a vulnerable position, then refusing to make a donation at a critical time in order to take advantage of the disruption it would cause.
Argue all you want about excessive paranoia, accepting money makes you beholden to your donors. We call musicians with record contracts "sellouts", we consider politicians who have accepted large "campaign donations" from lobbyists to have been "bought", and the ASF is now in danger of falling into the same territory for the same reasons. There is already talk about the World Health Organization being steered by politics instead of sound science ever since accepting large donations from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Life would be simpler for the ASF if they had refused the money when it was offered.
Travel the Galaxy! Meet fascinating life forms...
I think civil rights would suffer even worse under the likes of Bill Gates because he cares little about the wants of his users when they pay him in an open market.
And you base this on...?
You can't extend the olive branch and shit on my pimentos at the same time... http://news.softpedia.com/news/Microsoft-Applauds-Victory-Over-Linux-and-Open-Source-91127.shtml
Rambus "played nice" when they got their dynamic RAM architecture designated the industry standard, but without disclosing their patent which they ultimately used to bully OEMs into royalty fees.
The industry does not forget these deceptive tactics so it is no surprise that the OS industry is apprehensive of M$, who holds a large patent portfolio. M$ is not going to be trusted very easily.
Eternity: will that be smoking, or non-smoking? I Corinthians 6:9-10
The OSS crowd will cooperate with your company if and only if they:
1. Abandon the software patent threat against OSS projects entirely, notably Wine and ReactOS,
2. Order its sales, marketing, legal, and executive departments to cease using its partners in "committee stuffing" as it very clearly did in the ISO approval process of Office OXML,
3. Disassociate any so-called "intellectual property rights" protections from its software and sell/license the code to the RIAA/MPAA member companies,
4. Cease using sales contracts with OEMs as leverage for excluding alternative operating systems and/or software, and
5. Make a public, visible commitment to upholding the above in every aspect of its business.
Although the serf-of-business Bush administration gave your company a slap on the wrist and marginal supervision, it is still a convicted monopolist and still engaging in business methods that are at least unconscionable. There are those in the OSS community who still remember how it undercut Netscape into oblivion, how it bullied companies like Dell and Gateway into excluding Linux, how it betrayed IBM re: OS/2, or how it toyed with WordPerfect. Just in the past few months there was evidence of committee-tampering by Microsoft partners, indicating that Microsoft has learned to end-run the system rather than follow the rules. So don't be surprised that there are those who hate you and do not trust you at all, because the likelihood that your management will ever listen to pro-OSS ideas is zero or less.
If you truly love open source, I strongly suggest you leave Microsoft and work for Red Hat, IBM, Google, Sun, or Canonical. Until then, you are either appallingly naive, or worse, a dangerous evangelist.
"We are Microsoft. You shall be assimilated. Competition is futile."
I had this problem recently.
Here is an easier fix for joe sixpack:
Go to System -> Preferences -> Encryption and Keyrings
Select login keyring -> Change unlock password
Set a blank password for that keyring
Its not the most secure solution, but is better than have your password in a script.
I don't share your faith in the infallibility of ASF administrators.
Furthermore, I think you should check out the sponsorship page at the ASF's website. Becoming a sponsor is a commitment to ongoing support, not simply a one-time payment. One-time donations to the ASF are handled through a separate mechanism, without the public fanfare associated with the sponsorship program.
It seems fairly clear that Microsoft's "sponsorship" is, in fact, supposed to be a revenue stream for the ASF.
So, what part of the management's actions here are retarded? Correctly categorizing a promise of ongoing financial support? Hiring new workers, purchasing new equipment, and purchasing bandwidth contracts that are appropriate for the new budget?
It seems to me that the poor decision was to accept sponsorship from an organization whose interests are so obviously not aligned with the ASF and Free software in general.
Travel the Galaxy! Meet fascinating life forms...
Vista...
Money is the root of all evil?
Out of all of the ones that ran this time around, I'd vote for Paul or Gravel. Out of the lager pot I'd pick Andrew Napolitano or Eben Moglen as long as we are talking about people who would respect the Constitution and the rule of law.
Money is the root of all evil?
Those are some fine answers. I am afraid that I'm going to have to hold my nose and vote for the least likely to to feel me up when I'm sleeping.
I'd love for something or someone to actually believe in. I voted for a Republican once. I'll be damned if I vote for Snowe again. At the time I voted she was doing good things for good people and though she mostly voted the party line she was okay but then she went batshit insane.
I have voted for the democrats most of my life but they have failed me at every turn.
I'm registered as an Independent (something you can do in my state) when I found out whackjobs ran my green party for cash.
I tried being a Libertarian but I eventually found out that they insisted I not have a gender while they maintained an agenda.
I guess that Thomas Jefferson would come back and kill us all if I were to say I'm a Jeffersonian/Federalist.
I realize that this starts to wander off topic but I'm not disheartened. I'm disfuckingcombobulated. I have never voted "against" someone or something. I have always voted for someone or something. How about a moderate runner who's not a nutjob?
The worst part is that I don't even like baseball. Make sense to you? Me either.
Anyhow, spell checking just went crazy as I checked this last. Let me say sorry ahead of time.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
I am not sure which distro you used, but I know later versions of Ubuntu DOES access the windows partition, and yes it can causes some craziness.
Have a nice day!