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Why Microsoft Can't Afford To Let Novell Die
geek4 sends in an analysis indicating that Microsoft may have the most to lose if hedge-fund operator Elliot buys Novell. (The eWeekEurope piece is based on a longer and geekier writeup by Andy Updegrove on how the mechanics of unsolicited tender offers can play out in the tech world.) To avoid meltdown or asset-stripping, Novell can try and find a preferred bidder — a company with some interest in running Novell as a business, and preferrably a tech company. Or another company may make a move independently. But who might that be? A couple of analysts have suggested IBM, Oracle, or SAP. These all have problems... Microsoft is in a similar category, with one added problem. ... Microsoft has staked any open source credibility that it has on Novell's SUSE distribution. If Novell falls to bits, then Microsoft's efforts to gain open source cred pretty much disappear with it. It's something that would have been impossible to imagine a few years back, but if we're looking for someone to prop Novell up, Microsoft would now be a prime candidate."
Once you start with MS your paths close up until the only remaining one is: they own you. Maybe if Novell had stayed away from Microsoft they'd be doing better now. Red Hat is doing really very well.
Bruce Perens.
Except that it's not a patent minefield.
It's a blowhard's way of stanching competition with bogus citations. Ubuntu doesn't have the enterprise penetration of any of the community versions of SUSE or Red Hat. Novell's stupid, and hampered by the FOSS community's perception that they're a Microsoft sell-out because of their license agreement with Microsoft.
Still, the openSUSE community thrives. It's Novell's legacy problems (hello Eric Schmidt!) and their incapability of appealing to enterprise systems designers that they're in the undervalued column. Microsoft won't buy them. They'll get broken into pieces, and sold off that way. My guess: to Oracle, whose Linux version languishes. At least Oracle knows how to excite developers.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
Microsoft is perfectly happy to leave Novell's rotting corpse on the trash heap of computing. It served its purpose of getting the message out to the commercial world that Linux is a Patent Minefield.
Everyone's going to have a different take on this of course, depending on their personal views regarding Microsoft and Linux. Me, I think the main point is it's no longer the 1990's. Microsoft has very short coattails, and anyone planning to ride them to success nowadays is in for a rude awakening.
But I really don't get your "patent minefield" comment at all. That's what Microsoft was HOPING to accomplish, but frankly it seems obvious they failed miserably - that's why for the past couple years they've made significant moves towards coexistence and interoperability with Linux. It's not like they managed to even slow down Red Hat, let alone turn the corporate world against them.
#DeleteChrome
Why would MS even care?
In fact if Novell fails, along with what recently happened with MySQL and Open Solaris, MS can brag about how proprietary software is the way to go.
Call my cynical, but any inroads into open source software by MS have been either because they had to, or because they had a direct benefit from the public image attained by playing nice with open source software.
At the end of the day, the fact remains. MS would like everyone to use their proprietary software. MS would like everyone to forget about open source.
The only way this will ever change is if open source becomes more profitable to them than proprietary software.
Then MS would transform into the #1 proponent of open source.
Think of the shareholders!
Trying to pretend this is some giant strategic cat-fight is a waste of time. I can only assume the author of the article is trying to gin up his importance and earn a few thou in consulting fees.
The big companies have already figured out that Linux works just fine in datacenters. Most managers don't know or care if they are running Redhat, Ubuntu, Suse, or a home-roll. They do know that Linux isn't going to vanish just cos some random firm gets bought out.
Novell still has the copyrights to Unix.
If Microsoft were to buy them we could see a re-run of IBM vs. SCO, with Microsoft playing SCO but, having learned from SCO where the land mines are and having the REAL copyright ownership, going after any places where they might win and winning. They might be able to collect a "Microsoft Tax" on any remaining Unix vendors that are still running under ongoing licenses. They might find places where other vendors weren't covered by previous licenses. They might find some code leakage from Unix to open source projects and go after them, beating them into submission or bankruptcy, maybe winning on the merits, maybe winning by just having big pockets while open-sourcerers live on a shoestring. This could be a disaster for IBM, open source, any remaining proprietary Unix vendors, etc.
If IBM buys Novell they are protected from this sort of attack on their current business model from now on. They have the option of releasing the Unix code base under open-source licenses. I could go on.
IBM has the bux, the incentive, and the smarts. So I'm not just hoping, but betting, on them.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
All software is a patent minefield. You can't write any significant software without infringing upon a granted patent. If existing patents were enforced at all well, there would be no software industry.
MS continues to make gains in licensing its "Linux patents", and there's nothing that says they won't decide it's time to enforce them against you and me tomorrow.
The worst part is that we have no credibility in fighting this at the government level any longer. When Open Source was people doing good for other people, we had the credibility to kill a proposal for uniform enforcement of software patents across the EU. Today, Open Source is big business, and there is no such credibility if it's Microsoft vs. Red Hat rather than Microsoft vs. do-gooders and non-profits. So, this means that our commercial success is likely to kill us through software patents eventually.
Bruce Perens.