Posted by
Hemos
on from the poking-the-pundits dept.
Several readers have written in with a great
rebuttal at ZDNet, adddressing the recent Metcalfe articles attacking Linux. Calling this change the Post-FUD Era, it does a great job of dissecting the new attacks on Linux.
How to counter this? I hate to say it, but logos-based counter-FUD probably won't work here anymore. It's like trying to fight a rapidly spreading forest fire with a garden hose. We could watch with helplessness as the flames start igniting, or we can bring out the big guns...
Marketting, marketting, marketting. Expos (we got those already), Local User Groups (got those, too), and small to medium sized businesses (three for three) are key here. Organization is key here. Linux is already well-equipped to handle the flames with a few sparks of its own.
Lets add one more to the list. Linux now has some giants in its corner, whose marketing machines are just about to kick into gear with regards to marketing Linux. IBM, SGI, HP, Sun, Oracle. Pretty potent forces in marketing in their own right.
In the past, M$ has been able to fight them off by presenting a unified solution against the infighting of the giants. Now the giants have a unified front that they can present to combat M$. The message can vary slightly, as each giant has their own agenda, but it will still have the same core arguement: the logos that Linux already has established.
This not to say that we no longer have to be vigilant, but rather that the emotional-based FUD will soon find it's own competition, provided by large corporations that have an interest in seeing Linux succeed to break M$ down.
-- --sugarman--
Re:Is anyone else sick of _hearing_ about Linux?
by
nmx
·
· Score: 2
This may be a little offtopic, but I raise my hand. I think all the hype is to be expected though... Linux is now coming into the public eye. I'm a fairly recent convert myself; I had never even heard of Linux until the Wired feature. I admit, I downloaded a distribution right away just because it was "cool" and something other than Windows. But after the "coolness" wore off I began to appreciate that Linux wasn't about hype, and it wasn't about being "anti-Microsoft" or anti-anything, for that matter. It's not even about the Open Source movement. Linux is about serving the user's needs. It's an operating system. Plain and simple. I have grown to love it because, in most cases, it does serve my needs much better than Windows can. There's no need for hype - Linux survived for years without it, didn't it? The Internet used to be the "big thing" that supposed gurus would talk about, even if they had no clue WHAT they were talking about. The Internet itself has been ridiculously overhyped, even today. Now that everyone* is on the Net, we have people claiming to be journalists and simply latching on to the latest "big thing." This whole series of Linux-bashing and Linux-bashing-bashing could hardly be called journalism, although Evan's rebuttal makes more sense than anything I've ever read by Metcalfe (plus, I think he's right.) But the hype will die eventually. And no matter what they may say, Linux is not a fad or Y2K hype - it will go on.
*although i use the word "everyone" to illustrate a point, i realize that the majority of the world has yet to even place a phone call.
-- "Well kids, you tried your best, and you failed. The lesson is, never try."
In the non-linux computing world (all stuff I have done with face-to-face for the most part) people seem to fear what they do not know or are unfamiliar with. This may be old hat however when it really comes down to it what they are doing is taking the path of least resistance. During my high-school days my school tended to use netware for it's server environment. I believe that this decistion was made in large part due to the path of least resistance in computer technolody. Also it is a reflection about what people expect to happen. Most people think that in 100 years that some sort of microsoft type product will emerge because they supposedly cater to the masses. This man would have to really take an uphill battle with this subject to get a good reading with most people so instead he takes an easier road to get better results. What I have found in my experience is that a difficult senaria for anything in life is one that tends to have a lot of choices at first. They as you get more aquainted with things it gets easier. You can probably do the same things with win9x/Nt products as you can with linux it just takes drastically more time than linux does and the results may not be as good because those choices did not exist already.
-- The death of one man is a tragedy; the death of a million is a statistic --Joseph Stalin
This Metcalfe guy should know better. I think he just loves stirring up slashdotters and attracting more people to his column. Controversy sells papers, who cares whether you are on the right side or not? His prediction of the internet stock market bubbl collapsing on Nov. 8, '99 proves he doesn't care about being right, only about attracting attention.
The tactics he describes are vaguely familiar...
by
Sun+Tzu
·
· Score: 2
In the past few years I've heard a similar style in arguments against Unix in general from mainframe proponents in our big data center. It never gets to the point of objective comparisons and never includes a balanced view of trends. Those "arguments" seem to have died as Unix has continued to grow in our town -- where we now have about as many large-scale Unix machines as mainframes.
But now the new-fud mongers have a new hope: Win2K will crush Linux on the low end and the big Unix vendors at the high end. If this is all their advance fud spewers have to offer I'll just have to wait for the real battle, thank you. That is, if we don't all die of boredom waiting for Win2k to finally be released!;)
Zdnet, meta(whatever) and the post-fud era.
by
sporty
·
· Score: 2
Don't you love it how people love to classify things? You realize it's all political BS. Do you realize that the population keeps growing, the age people start using computers is getting younger and the percentage of population on the net, no less on a computer is going up? ZDNet, MetaGuy(tm) and Post-Fud are just big icons for little things.
With all the noise of alternative OS's showing more than their heads and showing their power, it can be expected. The differences between 98 and 95 is only glamor. Free *nix is great. It allows the user ('administrator') to do a lot and have more fun with the OS than some games. Anyone remember Commander Keen?
So great, linux usage inched up from x% to (x+y)% where y is not as great as x, but is significant. So where does that leave us? It leaves us with GAP and Old Navy clothing. It leaves us Saturn and Ford. No longer is the best looking OS Windows, now its *nix. (Linux more than *bsd; aren't these asterics wonderful?) No one to promote the sedan or bell bottoms! We want a new look, something "better" and that's what *nix is doing now with all of its improvements! So now ZDNet, just like the GAP, changed its style to attract people. It s all a popularity contest. Big surprise, no one likes the outsider.
Unfortunately, some people can't stand the thought of male piercing or interracial relationships. That's what this MetaGuy (I swear I can't get his name to mind) is. He stands for the old way of doing things on a computer. He stands for the people who won't change thier ways.
What's post-fud? It's like the post-gay-bashing period. Some goof had to put a label on the fact that people aren't listening to the days of old. Its not like the post-war era's, or the new FreeBSD 3.3 kernel. It's a statistic being reworded. Its another way of saying people are using NT less. It s another way of saying MS isn't doing as great as it could without another OS threat. Its saying we are out of recession. We've heard it before. I bet you a nickel that we hear more about post-fud, anti-ms, civil suit news. We've gone through InfoWorld, ZDNet.. I wonder if the Enquirer will do something next.
I hope Slashdot doesn't post a pro-anti-fud link next time;> maybe anti-anti-pro-anti-fud will now appear.
No, it isn't a joke. Gerald Holmes should be congratulated for exposing the international Communist conspiracy to subvert our computers and contaminate our precious bodily fluids.
Don't believe me? Then why does Linux have a cccp command? The manual page says that it is a compiler preprocessor. That is what Linus and his fellow travellers would like you to think.
Take a look at the intro man page for plan 9. What computer do they use for editing, login and remote file access? kremvax!!!
Bill Gates makes sure that no commies can corrupt our children by enhancing Windows. Ask him for the source code, he will say "What are you, some sort of Communist?". Bill knows that "open source" is just a code word for the international Communist conspiracy.
If someone actually presented a well-reasoned, accurate, and unbiased opinion as to why X is better than Linux, I really don't think it will be called FUD. Fact of the matter is though, X probably isn't going to be MS Windows and it probably isn't going to be anything from Apple either.
You really need to start reading the articles attached to the discussion. They, as a rule, have been based on lies or ignorance: linux doesn't have a GUI, linux is 70's technology, linux is a communist plot, linux threatens the purity of our precious bodily fluids, linux has cooties, et cetera. It's exactly them same as smear campaigns from bad politicians. You tear you opponent down so much that you are the only option left. It doesn't matter if you are just as bad or even worse. You got everyone to have fear, uncertainty, and doubt about your opponent. That is the nature of FUD.
I'll tell you why Linux, hell any UNIXish OS even VMS, wins over Windows for me. One word: telnet. Even before you consider ANY other issue, telnet puts Windows out of the running. The Reason: I'm not a sysadmin but I am working for my school's sysadmin this summer; we are doing the y2k updates for the whole school. We have a large number of Win NT machines(350+) that we have to go _on_site_ to fix. If we used ANY UNIX we wouldn't have to worry about y2k in the first place but even if it did I could just open a telnet sesson and run a shell script. Windows has NO remote administration capabilities. As to Windows remote management software like PC anywhere and MS SMS server, one is a security hazard and the other is incredibly expensive. I should never have to pay extra for such a simple feature anyway.
We have daemons, so we might as well have ethos &cetera.
Sometimes you need to reply to crap
by
evan_leibovitch
·
· Score: 4
Not all the readers out there are smart enough to understand the message intended by ignoring someone who spews. If someone has an audience that buys his arguments, and no rebuttal comes, this silence could be interpreted as an inability to rationally rebut the original spew.
I stand behind my decision to confront this stuff rather than pretend it didn't exist. Yes, it draws more attention to the original spew, but that attention comes in the context of ridicule rather than authoritative opinion. And it was important (to me, at least) to call attention to the kind of spew that people will start encountering when recommending Linux to their employers or clients.
There are times when you let a ranter flail away in silence. Other times -- especially when the speaker has an audience -- that it's necessary to sound the BS alarm before anyone gets sucked in by sophomric namecalling masquerading as cleverness.
PS: This is not a pissing match between ZD and IDG, it's me alone calling attention to something that happened to come from InfoWorld. I have a lot of respect for Petreley and other writers at IDG.
After reading Metcalfe's most recent article, and thinking back to his previous 2, I began to wonder.. Is perhaps "from the ether" not a reference to his creation of ethernet, but instead a reference to Metcalfe's substance abuse problems?
Ever seen Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas? I believe some of his rants could have come from an ether-induced haze...;)
Justin
-- "Short, tall, fat, skinny, from the highest king to the lowest man, everyone uses the potty." - Brak
Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt, FUD, is a method of marketing and method of writing pre-digested press releases for journalists to spread around as news. Used by companies who wish to gain an economic edge over competitors usually when technology is not favorable. Its designed to bring critical thinking into the consumer's minds, but FUD is terrible with bringing a complete argument into discussion. Its simply a marketing tool.
Gerald Holmes has shown us the way: Mock the FUD-meisters unceasingly. There is no better answer to Metcalfe's blathering name-calling and subtle accusations than Holmes' blatant stupidity.
Let us expose this new round of FUD for what it is -- utter BS.
When Metcalfe calls Linux "communistic," let's chime in and agree that all Linux users are communistic satanists with long hair, people who disregard technology for the sake of destroying capitalism. Anyone who cannot immediately see the lunacy in such claims once made is beyond salvation and will remain a Microsoft drone no matter what the argument. The rest will plainly see that this new FUD is just bologne.
Re:Is anyone else sick of _hearing_ about Linux?
by
deity
·
· Score: 3
How about:
"And what is good, Phaedrus, And what is not good--Need we ask anyone to tell us these things?"
Every once in a while, someone out there in the Real World tells me "Oh Linux is great, but the corporations and the masses aren't buying into it." I can talk until I'm blue in the face, and I usually do a pretty good job of showing why Linux really can take the server/desktop space, but recently I realized that what we should focus on, more than anything else, is actually doing the work. Not talking about doing the work, but actually doing it--writing the code, providing the support and documentation, and helping others install and use Linux.
Linux has gotten damn far on these principles, and as long as millions of people are using Linux and developing Linux, it will continue to surprise the naysayers.
Oh boy this Metcalfe now he makes a lots of senses finally someone who knows what he talks about he must of read my web sites pages I am quite convincing but I dont know if Metcalfe is quite as smart as I am I am very smart not as smart as Bill Gates but no one is that smart Bill Gates is really smart.
I think it's quite an accomplishment that Evan Leibovitch even understood what Bob Metcalfe was talking about. Usually I don't even get that far. Most of the time Bob Metcalfe makes as much sense to me as Jerry Pournelle.
Now THAT is a frightening thought: get Bob Metcalfe and Jerry Pournelle debating each other on any subject. The winner will be the one who is the first to bore the other guy to sleep. --
... That *anyone* could think W2k could "crush" linux (or the *BSD's). If they do, they simply do not have even the most basic grasp of what's going on here. Of the philosophical choices that keep may people from using GUIs even under Linux.
Having tested W2k as a workstation for the last few months I admit it to be decent as a development platform, esp. with MSVC++, but as a Server? Forget it. It's horrid.
"Journalists" on the internet tend to repeat themselves, go around in circles, or produce articles that are fourth-hand rehashes of articles that appeared two week earlier in another forum. Furthermore, credibility of a "journalist" is not always based on what they say, but is sometimes based on who they were. This latter aspect is becoming more/will predominate as people realized that they can make big bucks off their good name.
The fundamental question is what should one do. For instance, one could attempt to discredit them via flame wars (that doesn't work) or by insightful responses (doesn't work when dealing with the clueless or money-grabbing scum). Or one could simply ignore them. Given the nature of the internet, one could also polute the various newsnet groups with mindless comments.
To me, the best way to respond is to ignore them in most cases. These people want lots of hits on their web site. The are used to being in the limelight; ignoring them is a way of saying that what they say doesn't even rate an response. Sorry, but if you are a pseudo-nerd, you know what silence means. OTOH, a good nerd would be oblivious to such an insult.
Don't publicize the pathetic meanderings of a bunch of old farts or clueless newbies. Discipline is the key. Attack where you want to, don't respond to meaningless counterattacks. It is the disadvantage of youth (and an advantage of youth) to respond to a threat with an equally potent response. Okay, but do you want to be the agressor or the resondee? Most of you might heard of Sun Tzu. I also recommend that you read the Five Rings by Miyamato Mushashi.
Remember: Discipline. Kick them in the nuts while you smile at them.
There are three aspect of any public discourse that are worth consideration:
ethos: The personality of the speaker, although this could be extended to mean his/her reptation and so forth. Bob here has a reputation of being aa blowhard among geeks, but who knows about the "suits"? After all, he *is* the inventor of ethernet. His opinion carries weight because of that fact.
logos: The logic of the argument. It used to be argued that logos was the most important aspect of any public discourse, but not so much any longer (one has only to look at advertisements one sees on TV and their effectiveness on their viewer to see this). After all, it's widely known among technical folk that a homogenous NT network environment is only asking for trouble (viruses, cost of ownership, security, and so on). But that doesn't stop the army of MSCE's out there from convincing CTO's nationwide to deploy them. Bob's logos is weak here. We know it, but not many others do. This is a problem
pathos: The emotional appeal of an argument. This is the ringer here. Bob is appealing to the emotional tug strings of its readers (his use of the words "communist", "anti-American", and other examples are strong indicators of Bob's emotional appeal... he knows what buttons to push). This is why Bob's arguments against Linux are far more dangerous than the FUD from days past we've seen. Emotional arguments carry far more weight than logical ones.
In the past the Linux community has been very good at fighting logos-based FUD. We've fought back with logos-based counter-FUD. It worked. Linux is pretty popular now, and the technical arguments against it are starting to look weak. Now the emotional arguments are starting to rear their ugly heads.
How to counter this? I hate to say it, but logos-based counter-FUD probably won't work here anymore. It's like trying to fight a rapidly spreading forest fire with a garden hose. We could watch with helplessness as the flames start igniting, or we can bring out the big guns...
Marketting, marketting, marketting. Expos (we got those already), Local User Groups (got those, too), and small to medium sized businesses (three for three) are key here. Organization is key here. Linux is already well-equipped to handle the flames with a few sparks of its own.
And ignore Bob. Inventor of the stuff I use in my home network he may be, but his reputation has soured with me. I don't care about his opinions anymore, since they've long left the pasture and headed to the hills once he started shooting his mouth off. Though that won't stop me from spouting off on him every once in a while.;^)
While the Greeks did not have computers, the terms ethos, logos, and pathos have come a long way. However, the meaning of the words are still intact and are still studied because they still have some relevance. Take the word ethos. Woops, no relevance within the framework of modern day US politics. Logos: woops, no relevance as Congress obviously does not use logic. Ahhhh, Pathos still remains (maybe). Woops: maybe not.
Question: does ethos, logos, and pathos have to be confined to the study of Greek cutlure, or do the have some relevance today? This response was not that bad in raising these ideals. The application of a philosophy should not be oonfined to the "trite" application.
Is anyone else sick of _hearing_ about Linux?
by
Victor+Ng
·
· Score: 4
Raise your hand if you're sick to death of hearing how Linux will : a) kill Windows 2000 b) be killed by Windows 2000 c) change the computing industry d) remembered as y2k hype Doesn't anybody just use Linux without the pressing need for telling everyone how the experience went?
Use Linux, don't use it. I don't care. It works great for me, so I'll keep using it.
There's nothing surprising about seeing an increase in negative coverage of Linux in the media. This is a standard sequence of events that seems to take place repeatedly: 1) press discovers brand new "next great thing"--years after the clueful first learned of it; 2) press waxes enthusiastic and explains the "new thing" (incorrectly) to the hoi polloi; 3) writers realize they're practicing pack journalism and start to print negative articles about the no-longer-new thing.
This is all aided by the staff curmudgeon. Most every sizeable publication has one, a columnist whose job it is to stir up controversy. (Not that the editors would put it that way. He's just "opinionated.") The first one of these I recall seeing in the computer press was Dvorak, back in the early 80s. Metcalfe seems cut from similar cloth.
So you don't need to assume a vast right wing, er, M$ conspiracy to explain what we're seeing in the press. It's the norm. Expect to see more negative coverage of Linux from the muckraking side of the media in the next few months. Them it'll die down as they move on to goring someone else's ox.
Slashdot Mirror
How to counter this? I hate to say it, but logos-based counter-FUD probably won't work here anymore. It's like trying to fight a rapidly spreading forest fire with a garden hose. We could watch with helplessness as the flames start igniting, or we can bring out the big guns...
Marketting, marketting, marketting. Expos (we got those already), Local User Groups (got those, too), and small to medium sized businesses (three for three) are key here. Organization is key here.
Linux is already well-equipped to handle the flames with a few sparks of its own.
Lets add one more to the list. Linux now has some giants in its corner, whose marketing machines are just about to kick into gear with regards to marketing Linux. IBM, SGI, HP, Sun, Oracle. Pretty potent forces in marketing in their own right.
In the past, M$ has been able to fight them off by presenting a unified solution against the infighting of the giants. Now the giants have a unified front that they can present to combat M$. The message can vary slightly, as each giant has their own agenda, but it will still have the same core arguement: the logos that Linux already has established.
This not to say that we no longer have to be vigilant, but rather that the emotional-based FUD will soon find it's own competition, provided by large corporations that have an interest in seeing Linux succeed to break M$ down.
--sugarman--
*although i use the word "everyone" to illustrate a point, i realize that the majority of the world has yet to even place a phone call.
"Well kids, you tried your best, and you failed. The lesson is, never try."
In the non-linux computing world (all stuff I have done with face-to-face for the most part) people seem to fear what they do not know or are unfamiliar with.
This may be old hat however when it really comes down to it what they are doing is taking the path of least resistance.
During my high-school days my school tended to use netware for it's server environment.
I believe that this decistion was made in large part due to the path of least resistance in computer technolody. Also it is a reflection about what people expect to happen. Most people think that in 100 years that some sort of microsoft type product will emerge because they supposedly cater to the masses.
This man would have to really take an uphill battle with this subject to get a good reading with most people so instead he takes an easier road to get better results.
What I have found in my experience is that a difficult senaria for anything in life is one that tends to have a lot of choices at first. They as you get more aquainted with things it gets easier. You can probably do the same things with win9x/Nt products as you can with linux it just takes drastically more time than linux does and the results may not be as good because those choices did not exist already.
The death of one man is a tragedy; the death of a million is a statistic --Joseph Stalin
Richard-Stallman-as-Marx. Richard Marx!
Wherever you go
Whatever you do
I will be right here
waiting for GNU
This Metcalfe guy should know better. I think he just loves stirring up slashdotters and attracting more people to his column. Controversy sells papers, who cares whether you are on the right side or not? His prediction of the internet stock market bubbl collapsing on Nov. 8, '99 proves he doesn't care about being right, only about attracting attention.
In the past few years I've heard a similar style in arguments against Unix in general from mainframe proponents in our big data center. It never gets to the point of objective comparisons and never includes a balanced view of trends. Those "arguments" seem to have died as Unix has continued to grow in our town -- where we now have about as many large-scale Unix machines as mainframes.
;)
But now the new-fud mongers have a new hope: Win2K will crush Linux on the low end and the big Unix vendors at the high end. If this is all their advance fud spewers have to offer I'll just have to wait for the real battle, thank you. That is, if we don't all die of boredom waiting for Win2k to finally be released!
Geeky modern art T-shirts
With all the noise of alternative OS's showing more than their heads and showing their power, it can be expected. The differences between 98 and 95 is only glamor. Free *nix is great. It allows the user ('administrator') to do a lot and have more fun with the OS than some games. Anyone remember Commander Keen?
So great, linux usage inched up from x% to (x+y)% where y is not as great as x, but is significant. So where does that leave us? It leaves us with GAP and Old Navy clothing. It leaves us Saturn and Ford. No longer is the best looking OS Windows, now its *nix. (Linux more than *bsd; aren't these asterics wonderful?) No one to promote the sedan or bell bottoms! We want a new look, something "better" and that's what *nix is doing now with all of its improvements! So now ZDNet, just like the GAP, changed its style to attract people. It s all a popularity contest. Big surprise, no one likes the outsider.
Unfortunately, some people can't stand the thought of male piercing or interracial relationships. That's what this MetaGuy (I swear I can't get his name to mind) is. He stands for the old way of doing things on a computer. He stands for the people who won't change thier ways.
What's post-fud? It's like the post-gay-bashing period. Some goof had to put a label on the fact that people aren't listening to the days of old. Its not like the post-war era's, or the new FreeBSD 3.3 kernel. It's a statistic being reworded. Its another way of saying people are using NT less. It s another way of saying MS isn't doing as great as it could without another OS threat. Its saying we are out of recession. We've heard it before. I bet you a nickel that we hear more about post-fud, anti-ms, civil suit news. We've gone through InfoWorld, ZDNet.. I wonder if the Enquirer will do something next.
I hope Slashdot doesn't post a pro-anti-fud link next time ;> maybe anti-anti-pro-anti-fud will now appear.
---
FreeBSD user
-
ping -f 255.255.255.255 # if only
Don't believe me? Then why does Linux have a cccp command? The manual page says that it is a compiler preprocessor. That is what Linus and his fellow travellers would like you to think.
Take a look at the intro man page for plan 9. What computer do they use for editing, login and remote file access? kremvax!!!
Bill Gates makes sure that no commies can corrupt our children by enhancing Windows. Ask him for the source code, he will say "What are you, some sort of Communist?". Bill knows that "open source" is just a code word for the international Communist conspiracy.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
It wasn't very difficult to make the transition from SCO to Linux -- it started for me mid-November, 1995.
I haven't been around the biz.* newsgroups (heck, newsgroups at all) for many years.
As for ZDNet, that's a longer story...
- Evan
If someone actually presented a well-reasoned, accurate, and unbiased opinion as to why X is better than Linux, I really don't think it will be called FUD. Fact of the matter is though, X probably isn't going to be MS Windows and it probably isn't going to be anything from Apple either.
You really need to start reading the articles attached to the discussion. They, as a rule, have been based on lies or ignorance: linux doesn't have a GUI, linux is 70's technology, linux is a communist plot, linux threatens the purity of our precious bodily fluids, linux has cooties, et cetera. It's exactly them same as smear campaigns from bad politicians. You tear you opponent down so much that you are the only option left. It doesn't matter if you are just as bad or even worse. You got everyone to have fear, uncertainty, and doubt about your opponent. That is the nature of FUD.
I'll tell you why Linux, hell any UNIXish OS even VMS, wins over Windows for me. One word: telnet. Even before you consider ANY other issue, telnet puts Windows out of the running. The Reason: I'm not a sysadmin but I am working for my school's sysadmin this summer; we are doing the y2k updates for the whole school. We have a large number of Win NT machines(350+) that we have to go _on_site_ to fix. If we used ANY UNIX we wouldn't have to worry about y2k in the first place but even if it did I could just open a telnet sesson and run a shell script. Windows has NO remote administration capabilities. As to Windows remote management software like PC anywhere and MS SMS server, one is a security hazard and the other is incredibly expensive. I should never have to pay extra for such a simple feature anyway.
We have daemons, so we might as well have ethos &cetera.
Not all the readers out there are smart enough to understand the message intended by ignoring someone who spews. If someone has an audience that buys his arguments, and no rebuttal comes, this silence could be interpreted as an inability to rationally rebut the original spew.
I stand behind my decision to confront this stuff rather than pretend it didn't exist. Yes, it draws more attention to the original spew, but that attention comes in the context of ridicule rather than authoritative opinion. And it was important (to me, at least) to call attention to the kind of spew that people will start encountering when recommending Linux to their employers or clients.
There are times when you let a ranter flail away in silence. Other times -- especially when the speaker has an audience -- that it's necessary to sound the BS alarm before anyone gets sucked in by sophomric namecalling masquerading as cleverness.
PS: This is not a pissing match between ZD and IDG, it's me alone calling attention to something that happened to come from InfoWorld. I have a lot of respect for Petreley and other writers at IDG.
Evan
- Evan
After reading Metcalfe's most recent article, and thinking back to his previous 2, I began to wonder.. Is perhaps "from the ether" not a reference to his creation of ethernet, but instead a reference to Metcalfe's substance abuse problems?
;)
Ever seen Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas?
I believe some of his rants could have come from an ether-induced haze...
Justin
"Short, tall, fat, skinny, from the highest king to the lowest man, everyone uses the potty." - Brak
NT: Not There (never will be)
CE: Caveat Emptor (buyer beware)
It all boils down to:
Closed Source: Tyranny
Open Source: Democracy
EULA: Fascism
GNU: Bill of Rights
Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt, FUD, is a method of marketing and method of writing pre-digested press releases for journalists to spread around as news. Used by companies who wish to gain an economic edge over competitors usually when technology is not favorable. Its designed to bring critical thinking into the consumer's minds, but FUD is terrible with bringing a complete argument into discussion. Its simply a marketing tool.
Let us expose this new round of FUD for what it is -- utter BS.
When Metcalfe calls Linux "communistic," let's chime in and agree that all Linux users are communistic satanists with long hair, people who disregard technology for the sake of destroying capitalism. Anyone who cannot immediately see the lunacy in such claims once made is beyond salvation and will remain a Microsoft drone no matter what the argument. The rest will plainly see that this new FUD is just bologne.
How about:
Every once in a while, someone out there in the Real World tells me "Oh Linux is great, but the corporations and the masses aren't buying into it." I can talk until I'm blue in the face, and I usually do a pretty good job of showing why Linux really can take the server/desktop space, but recently I realized that what we should focus on, more than anything else, is actually doing the work. Not talking about doing the work, but actually doing it--writing the code, providing the support and documentation, and helping others install and use Linux.
Linux has gotten damn far on these principles, and as long as millions of people are using Linux and developing Linux, it will continue to surprise the naysayers.
-k
http://www.freeyellow.com/members7 /geraldholmes/ <- this proves the commie red nazi socialist pinko stuff.
I think it's quite an accomplishment that Evan Leibovitch even understood what Bob Metcalfe was talking about. Usually I don't even get that far. Most of the time Bob Metcalfe makes as much sense to me as Jerry Pournelle.
Now THAT is a frightening thought: get Bob Metcalfe and Jerry Pournelle debating each other on any subject. The winner will be the one who is the first to bore the other guy to sleep.
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... That *anyone* could think W2k could "crush" linux (or the *BSD's). If they do, they simply do not have even the most basic grasp of what's going on here. Of the philosophical choices that keep may people from using GUIs even under Linux.
Having tested W2k as a workstation for the last few months I admit it to be decent as a development platform, esp. with MSVC++, but as a Server? Forget it. It's horrid.
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Joseph Foley
InCert Software Corp.
"Journalists" on the internet tend to repeat themselves, go around in circles, or produce articles that are fourth-hand rehashes of articles that appeared two week earlier in another forum. Furthermore, credibility of a "journalist" is not always based on what they say, but is sometimes based on who they were. This latter aspect is becoming more /will predominate as people realized that they can make big bucks off their good name.
The fundamental question is what should one do. For instance, one could attempt to discredit them via flame wars (that doesn't work) or by insightful responses (doesn't work when dealing with the clueless or money-grabbing scum). Or one could simply ignore them. Given the nature of the internet, one could also polute the various newsnet groups with mindless comments.
To me, the best way to respond is to ignore them in most cases. These people want lots of hits on their web site. The are used to being in the limelight; ignoring them is a way of saying that what they say doesn't even rate an response. Sorry, but if you are a pseudo-nerd, you know what silence means. OTOH, a good nerd would be oblivious to such an insult.
Don't publicize the pathetic meanderings of a bunch of old farts or clueless newbies. Discipline is the key. Attack where you want to, don't respond to meaningless counterattacks. It is the disadvantage of youth (and an advantage of youth) to respond to a threat with an equally potent response. Okay, but do you want to be the agressor or the resondee? Most of you might heard of Sun Tzu. I also recommend that you read the Five Rings by Miyamato Mushashi.
Remember: Discipline. Kick them in the nuts while you smile at them.
There are three aspect of any public discourse that are worth consideration:
ethos: The personality of the speaker, although this could be extended to mean his/her reptation and so forth. Bob here has a reputation of being aa blowhard among geeks, but who knows about the "suits"? After all, he *is* the inventor of ethernet. His opinion carries weight because of that fact.
logos: The logic of the argument. It used to be argued that logos was the most important aspect of any public discourse, but not so much any longer (one has only to look at advertisements one sees on TV and their effectiveness on their viewer to see this). After all, it's widely known among technical folk that a homogenous NT network environment is only asking for trouble (viruses, cost of ownership, security, and so on). But that doesn't stop the army of MSCE's out there from convincing CTO's nationwide to deploy them. Bob's logos is weak here. We know it, but not many others do. This is a problem
pathos: The emotional appeal of an argument. This is the ringer here. Bob is appealing to the emotional tug strings of its readers (his use of the words "communist", "anti-American", and other examples are strong indicators of Bob's emotional appeal... he knows what buttons to push). This is why Bob's arguments against Linux are far more dangerous than the FUD from days past we've seen. Emotional arguments carry far more weight than logical ones.
In the past the Linux community has been very good at fighting logos-based FUD. We've fought back with logos-based counter-FUD. It worked. Linux is pretty popular now, and the technical arguments against it are starting to look weak. Now the emotional arguments are starting to rear their ugly heads.
How to counter this? I hate to say it, but logos-based counter-FUD probably won't work here anymore. It's like trying to fight a rapidly spreading forest fire with a garden hose. We could watch with helplessness as the flames start igniting, or we can bring out the big guns...
Marketting, marketting, marketting. Expos (we got those already), Local User Groups (got those, too), and small to medium sized businesses (three for three) are key here. Organization is key here. Linux is already well-equipped to handle the flames with a few sparks of its own.
And ignore Bob. Inventor of the stuff I use in my home network he may be, but his reputation has soured with me. I don't care about his opinions anymore, since they've long left the pasture and headed to the hills once he started shooting his mouth off. Though that won't stop me from spouting off on him every once in a while. ;^)
He's only as controversial as we make him.
--- Journals are boring; Go to my web page instead
Raise your hand if you're sick to death of hearing how Linux will :
a) kill Windows 2000
b) be killed by Windows 2000
c) change the computing industry
d) remembered as y2k hype
Doesn't anybody just use Linux without the pressing need for telling everyone how the experience went?
Use Linux, don't use it. I don't care. It works great for me, so I'll keep using it.
Pragmatic Man
I feel a song coming on....
Pragmatic Man, Pragmatic Man
Doing the things a pragmatist can
What's he like? It's not important.
Pragmatic Man
Is he a suit or is he a geek?
Does he reboot NT every week?
Or does his server run at its peak?
Nobody knows. Pragmatic Man.
With apologies to They Might Be Giants.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
This is all aided by the staff curmudgeon. Most every sizeable publication has one, a columnist whose job it is to stir up controversy. (Not that the editors would put it that way. He's just "opinionated.") The first one of these I recall seeing in the computer press was Dvorak, back in the early 80s. Metcalfe seems cut from similar cloth.
So you don't need to assume a vast right wing, er, M$ conspiracy to explain what we're seeing in the press. It's the norm. Expect to see more negative coverage of Linux from the muckraking side of the media in the next few months. Them it'll die down as they move on to goring someone else's ox.
Even you use it. And told. Kinda tricky not to do so. ;)
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rickf@transpect.SPAM-B-GONE.net (remove the SPAM-B-GONE bit)
"People will pay big bucks for the luxury of ignorance."