However it's nice to have a bridge back to the desktop world from your phone, however awkward, provided you aren't forced to use that awkward bridge by default. That was Microsoft's mistake with prehistoric tablets.
I find that terminal emulators work just fine, to mention one app that doesn't break in translation.
Let's imagine a bunch of upset Qt devs get together and form a company to develop Qt outside Nokia.
What's their business plan?
Like Red Hat on a smaller scale? Which is to say, support subscriptions for that which can also be had for free. Corporate users love support.
The earlier dual license business model used by Trolltech will not be available after the fork, unless Nokia stops development of QT entirely triggering the license release provision negotiated by the Free QT foundation. Microsoft will never allow that to happen, so just forget it. Quick clean fork is the way to go. Red Hat proved you don't need a dual license model.
Law is the explanation. Elop had insider information involving both MS and Nokia which prevented him from selling his MS shares and buying Nokia. At least this was the reason given by Nokia to a finnish newspaper.
I had great hope that the new CEO would have shed - attachment to his former employer. Looks to me he's still in love with microsoft.
His actions are those of a Microsoft employee and apparently he is one of the largest owners of Microsoft stock. If this doesn't cause a shareholder lawsuit then Finnland might as well go back to making paper.
The only possible scenario for QT under Microsoft's control is gamesmanship to dilute it and undermine its usefulness to KDE and other open source projects. The only rational response is a quick and clean fork under a new name. In this way QT will develop better and faster than it ever has before, guided by the needs of a community and not handicapped by the vagaries of corporate politics. This has to be spearheaded by the KDE project, the largest participant in the QT ecosystem.
I'm sorry but all WebM has going for it is a bunch of FOSS users
That is far from true and even if it were, we FOSS users and creators are a very important constituency. After all, we run the internet, serve the web pages, provide the brains for a majority of intelligent consumer devices and are in the habit of standing up for freedom. Unlike you.
Stephen Elop is still the seventh biggest private owner of Microsoft, but he doesn't own any Nokia stock. Someone might consider a conflict of interest.
Really? That sounds like strong supporting evidence for breach of fiduciary duty if accurate. I believe that shareholder suits have succeeded under similar or even less blatant circumstances. More than 5 billion dollars of Nokia market value evaporated instantly as a direct result of announcing this deal. That is not chicken feed.
Why would they want to establish a royalty free codec if not to avoid losing users to someone else, i.e. to preempt another royalty free solution?
Looking for an evil interpretation, one could say that this might forestall adoption of Webm so that H.264 royalties could be collected in the interim. Then perhaps with Webm out of the way work on the free MPEG codec could be cancelled. Or perhaps network effects and install base would make it impossible to dislodge H.264 on any time frame, yielding a mountain of royalties. Looking for a non-evil interpretation, perhaps ISO/IEC wish to improve there relevancy as standard organizations. Or perhaps there is a splinter group within the organization that has the best interests of humanity in mind. Or perhaps pressure was applied from outside or funding was supplied.
Though I much prefer the latter interpretations I do not think there is any reason to change any Webm plans. Maybe when the new codec is fully defined, implemented, proved to be of superior quality and with no patent trolls in the wings. I think that such a happy day is a few years off and in the mean time, the net needs Webm, badly.
Mod parent up. WebM is barely better than Theora and nowhere near as good as H.264/AVC.
Mod parent down as a troll. Webm is the only video codec Chromium, Firefox and Opera and Konqueror will support natively. It is far better than H.264 because it offers similar quality while being open and free. With Webm nobody can control your video by controlling the codec.
And yet Elop was brought in because the shareholders wanted it.
That would not in any excuse breach of fiduciary duty. I have trouble believing the shareholders wanted Elop to drive the company straight over a cliff. They may have had the impression he intended to act in their interest, as is required by law.
I guess Google and Apple were both up today because the expectation is that they will divide Nokia's smartphone market share between them. Note: Microsoft is down, which gives the lie to those who gushed about what a great deal this is for Microsoft.
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Of the programmers and IT professionals I know personally, every single one owns at least one iOS device.
True, and most of the programmers and IP professionals have or are planning to have an Android device as their next phone.
Linux is NOT an operating system...
This operating system textbook here says it is. See anything there about user space libraries?
Calling the UI, desktop, base libraries and applications an "operating system" is revisionism.
However it's nice to have a bridge back to the desktop world from your phone, however awkward, provided you aren't forced to use that awkward bridge by default. That was Microsoft's mistake with prehistoric tablets.
I find that terminal emulators work just fine, to mention one app that doesn't break in translation.
I suggest a strong sedative, quick before you burst a vein.
Do you feel a little empty inside?
Notice how I got modded down for daring not to jump on the FOSSie "Boo MSFT!" groupthink wagon?
You need to get modded down some more because you're an astroturfer.
The Xbox.... Xbox.... Is that the device which cost Microsoft's entertainment division over a billion in losses?
I believe it's more like 8 billion.
I say the "poison pill" clause needs to be activated and either re-form Trolltech or create a foundation to manage the future of Qt.
As I read it, the poison pill only activates if Nokia ceases development. Easy enough to just pretend to develop.
The correct solution is a clean fork and rename to get away from the QT trademark. The end result will be a much improved code base.
Google is a services company. For them the whole reason of Android's existence is to push their services with it.
Wrong. The purpose of Android is to prevent various parties from charging toll on search advertising.
Let's imagine a bunch of upset Qt devs get together and form a company to develop Qt outside Nokia.
What's their business plan?
Like Red Hat on a smaller scale? Which is to say, support subscriptions for that which can also be had for free. Corporate users love support.
The earlier dual license business model used by Trolltech will not be available after the fork, unless Nokia stops development of QT entirely triggering the license release provision negotiated by the Free QT foundation. Microsoft will never allow that to happen, so just forget it. Quick clean fork is the way to go. Red Hat proved you don't need a dual license model.
Law is the explanation. Elop had insider information involving both MS and Nokia which prevented him from selling his MS shares and buying Nokia. At least this was the reason given by Nokia to a finnish newspaper.
I wonder if that explanation will fly in court?
Fortunately, Qt isn't needed for a modern Linux desktop
Speak for yourself. It's needed for mine.
I had great hope that the new CEO would have shed - attachment to his former employer.
Looks to me he's still in love with microsoft.
His actions are those of a Microsoft employee and apparently he is one of the largest owners of Microsoft stock. If this doesn't cause a shareholder lawsuit then Finnland might as well go back to making paper.
Fortunately Qt, being open source, can be forked, but that's only the second best alternative.
No, it's the best alternative. That way the development ends up being needs driven instead of agenda driven.
KDE's Qt developers should split off and form a separate company -- named Trolltech -- and continue work on a forked Qt.
Great idea!
Wish I'd thought of it :-)
The only possible scenario for QT under Microsoft's control is gamesmanship to dilute it and undermine its usefulness to KDE and other open source projects. The only rational response is a quick and clean fork under a new name. In this way QT will develop better and faster than it ever has before, guided by the needs of a community and not handicapped by the vagaries of corporate politics. This has to be spearheaded by the KDE project, the largest participant in the QT ecosystem.
You seem to have issues. I suggest a mild sedative.
I'm sorry but all WebM has going for it is a bunch of FOSS users
That is far from true and even if it were, we FOSS users and creators are a very important constituency. After all, we run the internet, serve the web pages, provide the brains for a majority of intelligent consumer devices and are in the habit of standing up for freedom. Unlike you.
Can the shareholders convinve a court that Nokia would have survived using Symbian and MeeGo?
That is not the issue, the issue is whether Elop's action harmed shareholders and whether a conflict of interest existed to motivate that action.
Stephen Elop is still the seventh biggest private owner of Microsoft, but he doesn't own any Nokia stock. Someone might consider a conflict of interest.
Really? That sounds like strong supporting evidence for breach of fiduciary duty if accurate. I believe that shareholder suits have succeeded under similar or even less blatant circumstances. More than 5 billion dollars of Nokia market value evaporated instantly as a direct result of announcing this deal. That is not chicken feed.
Why would they want to establish a royalty free codec if not to avoid losing users to someone else, i.e. to preempt another royalty free solution?
Looking for an evil interpretation, one could say that this might forestall adoption of Webm so that H.264 royalties could be collected in the interim. Then perhaps with Webm out of the way work on the free MPEG codec could be cancelled. Or perhaps network effects and install base would make it impossible to dislodge H.264 on any time frame, yielding a mountain of royalties. Looking for a non-evil interpretation, perhaps ISO/IEC wish to improve there relevancy as standard organizations. Or perhaps there is a splinter group within the organization that has the best interests of humanity in mind. Or perhaps pressure was applied from outside or funding was supplied.
Though I much prefer the latter interpretations I do not think there is any reason to change any Webm plans. Maybe when the new codec is fully defined, implemented, proved to be of superior quality and with no patent trolls in the wings. I think that such a happy day is a few years off and in the mean time, the net needs Webm, badly.
Mod parent up. WebM is barely better than Theora and nowhere near as good as H.264/AVC.
Mod parent down as a troll. Webm is the only video codec Chromium, Firefox and Opera and Konqueror will support natively. It is far better than H.264 because it offers similar quality while being open and free. With Webm nobody can control your video by controlling the codec.
And yet Elop was brought in because the shareholders wanted it.
That would not in any excuse breach of fiduciary duty. I have trouble believing the shareholders wanted Elop to drive the company straight over a cliff. They may have had the impression he intended to act in their interest, as is required by law.
I don't think this will be the end of Nokia
Sure, they can always go back to making paper.
It may hurt Android market share very briefly...
I guess Google and Apple were both up today because the expectation is that they will divide Nokia's smartphone market share between them. Note: Microsoft is down, which gives the lie to those who gushed about what a great deal this is for Microsoft.