Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> espoused:
> ____/ Mark Kent on Wednesday 23 April 2008 11:39 : \____
>
>> Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> espoused:
>>> Quoted indirectly to highlight a response:
>>>
>>> ,----[ Quote ]
>>>| [Carmoney [sic]:] "Many disagreed with the MS partnership, but it brought
>>>| [us
>>>| millions in new sources of revenue, all without having any of the negative
>>>| effects on the desktop Linux space that some predicted the MS/Linux deals
>>>| would. I reduced our losses by millions in my first year as CEO, and made
>>>| millions in profits my second year."
>>>|
>>>| He made millions in profit in the short term, by destroying a GNU/Linux
>>>| company's reputation. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to sell out to
>>>| Microsoft. Any GNU/Linux distro which has a significant community could
>>>| pull millions or more by selling out to Microsoft.
>>> `----
>>>
>>>
> http://www.fsdaily.com/Business/Truth_is_Treason_in_the_Empire_of_Lies_Linspire_Fact_Sheet_Coming_Soon
>>>
>>> Antitrust regulators hopefully watch how Microsoft bribes its competitors to
>>> stop competing and join the Trust.
>>>
>>
>> I'm sure that, because of the millions in "profits" he made, he was able
>> to give himself a fantastic bonus that year...
>
> Yes, there are always the possible motives nobody will tell you about (no
> disclosure either). Did you know (or remember) that Hovsepian received very
> generous bonuses just shortly after signing the deal with Microsoft. Shane, my
> co-editor at BN, noticed this incidentally in the Yahoo Finance forms (dull
> financial obligatory stuff is mirrored there).
>
> By the way, I wonder why MySQL didn't go ahead with the IPO. I had long E-mail
> exchanges with MySQL's CEO over the night and he insists on justifying what he
> did (getting devoured by Sun and its patent policy, ambition of closing some
> source code).
>
> These things are complex...
>
Sun remains a proprietary technology company, although it's certainly
embraced the open-source environment far more positively than some
companies I can think of.
My concern with Sun is that they are nervous about moving to a services
company, and want to hold onto enough collateral in order to jump back
to a lock-in model if the services model doesn't deliver as expected.
My advice to /any/ customer and/or user out there would be to avoid
dependency on any single technology, vendor, device or application,
unless it's clearly demonstrable that there is no lock-in possibility.
For example, having a linux kernel is no use at all if you're using
a proprietary chassis with a closed-source device driver in there -
you'll never be able to exit that particular combination if there are
applications /above/ the kernel that excerise particular driver functions.
If you /must/ have such devices, then make sure that you have at least
two from different vendors, so that the exit barrier is halved.
This, incidentally, is the most significant argument for GPLv3 for the
Linux kernel. Going GPLv3 would prevent such lock-in from occuring at
the kernel/driver level, which means that separating application from
hardware or hardware from application would be far more economically
accessible. Not free, necessarily, but the exit barrier would be much
lowered.
--
| mark at ellandroad dot demon dot co dot uk |
| Cola faq: http://www.faqs.org/faqs/linux/advocacy/faq-and-primer/ |
| Cola trolls: http://colatrolls.blogspot.com/ |
| Open platforms prevent vendor lock-in. Own your Own services! |
|
|
