GNOME Foundation Annual Report for 2007
,----[ Quote ]
| The GNOME Foundation has released an annual report as a rather
| slickly-produced PDF file. "We have completed our original goal. Ten years
| ago, GNU/Linux distributions did not include a free and usable web browser.
| Ten years ago, using only free software, you could not do graphic design and
| illustration, you could not balance your checkbook, you could not download
| pictures from your camera to the computer, you could not do phone calls over
| the Internet, you could not create a spreadsheet with pie charts, and you
| could not plug a USB drive into your computer and expect it to 'just work'.
| Okay, USB sticks didn't exist ten years ago, but you get the idea."
`----
http://lwn.net/Articles/272767/rss
GNU/Linux World Domination for the Wrong Reasons
,----[ Quote ]
| At its most basic, free software is about helping users gain control of their
| computers so that they can participate unhindered in the digital
| conversations of the networks and the Internet. It's about installing
| software freely, rather than being dictated to by the manufacturer. It's
| about using your computer the way that you want, instead of ceding control to
| lock-down devices installed by software vendors without permission on your
| machine.
`----
http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/article.php/3733286
That's what makes GNU/Linux so exceptionally successful, _even on the desktop_.
Related:
Feeling the heat at Microsoft
,----[ Quote ]
| A couple of years ago you reiterated that IBM was Microsoft's biggest
| competitor and you said not just on the business side, but overall. If I ask
| you who is Microsoft's biggest competitor now, who would it be?
|
| Ballmer: Open...Linux. I don't want to say open source. Linux, certainly have
| to go with that.
`----
http://www.news.com/Feeling-the-heat-at-Microsoft/2008-1012_3-6232458.html?tag=ne.fd.mnbc
Linux Has Won, Windows is Gone
,----[ Quote ]
| Sorry Windows you have already lost this battle. There is no way to reverse
| this and no amount of incentives that Microsoft can offer to convince people
| and governments that they will be safe if they switch back to Windows. Lets
| be honest here for a moment. Would your trust America's nuclear technologies
| to be run on Windows? What happens when it bluescreens, yeah you get my point
| don't you?
`----
http://linuxhow2.com/News/Linux_Has_Won_Windows_is_Gone.html
Microsoft says to borrow money for Yahoo deal
,----[ Quote ]
| Microsoft Corp said on Monday it may borrow money for the first time in its
| history to fund a portion of its $44.6 billion unsolicited offer for Yahoo
| Inc.
`----
http://www.reuters.com/article/companyNews/idUSN0455692920080205
P. Graham: Microsoft is Dead
,----[ Quote ]
| A few days ago I suddenly realized Microsoft was dead. I was talking
| to a young startup founder about how Google was different from Yahoo.
| I said that Yahoo had been warped from the start by their fear of
| Microsoft. That was why they'd positioned themselves as a "media
| company" instead of a technology company. Then I looked at his face
| and realized he didn't understand. It was as if I'd told him how much
| girls liked Barry Manilow in the mid 80s. Barry who?
|
| Microsoft? He didn't say anything, but I could tell he didn't quite
| believe anyone would be frightened of them.
`----
http://www.paulgraham.com/microsoft.html
Microsoft's DreamSpark – What a Giveaway
,----[ Quote ]
| The rest of the $44.6bn (£22.3bn) deal would be financed with an undisclosed
| amount of credit.
|
| What that means is that it must squeeze as much money as it can from its
| operations to fund that debt and still pay dividends to shareholders, who
| will be looking for some payback from the Yahoo takeover. Giving away
| software is the last thing it would want to do in these circumstances, and
| the DreamSpark announcement shows just how worried it is about the future.
`----
http://www.linuxjournal.com/content/microsofts-dreamspark-%E2%80%93-what-giveaway
Debt in Disguise
,----[ Quote ]
| The purpose of securitization is to make the credit rating of the company
| practically irrelevant in a financing, so that even in a bankruptcy the
| receivables cash flow will be protected....
|
| The rating agencies also rely greatly on legal constructs that say the
| payment stream to investors will not be hindered. For instance, the transfer
| of receivables to the SPE must be a "true sale." That is, the seller must not
| retain too much of the reward or the risk coming from the asset, says Robert
| Hahn, a partner with Hunton & Williams LLP. In addition, the SPE has to
| be "nonrecourse" — in other words, the company's creditors must not have
| claim to the assets of the SPE if the originating company goes bankrupt.
|
| "Securitization divorces the creditworthiness of the [company] from the
| credit of the pool," says Mark Spradling, a partner with Vinson & Elkings
| LLP. "True sale and nonconsolidation are part of that separation."
|
| But the opinion that legal control of receivables has passed to a third party
| has not been litigated in the bankruptcy courts....
|
| Tapping the capital markets without a lending bank in between means that even
| non-investment-grade companies can finance at near what triple-A companies
| pay.
`----
http://www.cfo.com/article.cfm/10013957/c_10203909?f=home_todayinfinance&x=1
|
|
