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Fedora 9 Would Cost $10.8B To Build From Scratch
ruphus13 writes "The Linux Foundation's recently released report claims, '... it would take approximately $10.8 billion to build the Linux community distribution Fedora 9 in today's dollars with today's software development costs.' The article states why this might actually understate the value of the distros, though, since it doesn't include the power of the brand and the goodwill value. 'There were several approaches that the Linux Foundation employed to reach the $10.8 billion dollar figure, including calculating the number of lines of code in Fedora 9 (204,500,946), and using an average programmer's salary of $75,662.08 — as determined by the US Department of Labor — to measure development costs ... On the balance sheets of Coca Cola and many other huge corporations, you find goodwill listed as a major asset.'"
Goodwill only shows up on the balance sheet when an acquisition or some similar event occurs which creates a discrepancy between the purchase amount and the balance sheet of the acquisition.
You don't just make up a number and add it onto your balance sheet.
...is like paying airplane manufacturers by weight.
[...]to build the Linux community distribution Fedora 9 in today's dollars[...]
I'd rather build it in C with a modest compiler.
I wonder if I can spend some of my karma down at Taco Bell for a burrito?
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
Perhaps you should consider working on something other than an open source project :)
RTFA. It said $1.4b for the kernel alone.
I bet if you put the specs on eLance, there'd be a company in Romania somewhere bidding to do it for about $427.33, give or take a few dollars :)
Thats not a fair comparisons of cost.
Especially since you are comparing lines of code in OSS to lines of code in CSS, Its like comparing 2 fruits, they are close, but not the same.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Sure you would have "re-written" things.
Windows has/had 3 major competiting brands of office
productivity software.
Perhaps it wouldn't have all be developed by the same
company, but the products themselves would have been
developed. This just highlights the fact that a Linux
distro is no so much just an analog for a copy of
Windows but it also includes a freeware/commercial
equivalent of a Simtel or Tucows archive DVD.
This also exposes the real problem of competing with
Windows or MS-DOS if you are an alternative OS. You
not only have to compete with the core OS you also
have to compete with all of the 3rd party apps.
I'd be curious what the proposed dollar value of the
entire Ubuntu software repository "multiverse" would
be.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
I'm not in the military, so I'm speaking out of my ass here.
The last time I checked, you couldn't stop a suicide bomber by throwing a copy of Fedora 9 at them.
Uh, Goodwill is the correct term.
Has GP looked at GE's balance sheet?
GE claims $4.5 billion in "Licenses, Patents, and Trademarks". While the GP is correct that these values primarily arise as a function of acquisitions or sale of assets, the only time that corporate evaluations really matter is during acquisitions, sale of assets, and other forms of stock/ownership valuations.
Let me put it the way GE puts it (and GE is the *gold standard* when it comes to Goodwill, except for perhaps the Federal Reserve, who has a totally invented balance sheet.) There are 9 companies with triple A credit ratings, and GE's ability to manage accurately manage goodwill is one of the reasons it is a triple A rated company.
Upon closing an acquisition, we estimate the fair values of assets and liabilities acquired and consolidate the acquisition as quickly as possible. Given the time it takes to obtain pertinent information to finalize the acquired companyâ(TM)s balance sheet, then to adjust the acquired companyâ(TM)s accounting policies, procedures, books and records to our standards, it is often several quarters before we are able to finalize those initial fair value estimates. Accordingly, it is not uncommon for our initial estimates to be subsequently revised.
Emphasis added for the benefit of readers.
You *do* just stick those things on your balance sheet; the issue is being able to justify them. If I put my good name on a financial statement to a bank, the bank probably won't take me seriously, unless my name is something like "Warren Buffet". If my name is "GE", and I "give" that name to some business effort, it is a very serious transaction with serious financial consequences, and I can potentially use that to either buy or sell assets, as well as finance offers, and issue debt.
The credibility of the "good will", and the managers who evaluate the relevant values is what determines the financial values of those intangibles. They're only intangible in that they are intellectual concepts, and in many ways are just as "real" as stock or other corporate paper holdings.
WhiteWolf666 an exBush supporter. All you new-school,compassionate,save the children Republicans can rot in hell
Actually, I tried this last week, turns out he turned into a communist and dropped the religion thing. So, you, sir, are incorrect.
-- Lattyware (www.lattyware.co.uk)
In America, homeownership, like college, is a capitalist trap designed to force you into lifelong slavery. Fuck the house, own your life.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!