Hmmm...anyone else notice that lately the only apologists for M$ are M$
people? If there is someone else out there defending M$, where would I
find that kind of thing out?
Russell
____________________________________________________
Without the Internet, there would be no sharing
Without sharing, there would be no Internet
Share your code, share your source
-- Let's build something as great as the Internet!
----------
>From: Paul M Foster <paulf@quillandmouse.com>
>To: slug@nks.net
>Subject: Re: [SLUG] Some thoughts on "The Speech"
>Date: Thu, May 3, 2001, 23:50
>
> On Thu, May 03, 2001 at 10:56:26PM -0400, Russell Hires wrote:
>
>> I'm going through Craig Mundie's speech
>> (http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/exec/craig/05-03sharedsource.asp),
>> and I'm thinking okay, here's a scenario: What if MS wants their code to
>> get out, not officially, but they release it to certain companies
>> (partners, what-have-you), and someone in those companies leaks the
>> source to the outside world, either genuinely on accident, or
>> "accidentally on purpose", or on purpose, but it's not MS's direct
>> doing.
>>
>> What do you think would happen? I can hear the hackles now as many an
>> Open Source developer laughs at M$'s code. The shreiks of criticism
>> sound loudly. People say, "I can't believe they did that!" or "Why don't
>> they do this, instead?" Then M$ quietly incorporates this stuff. Very
>> subtle.
>>
>> I think they see the power of Open Source, but can't bring themselves to
>> admit it. Or their stockholders can't. One of the two. Maybe they're
>> realizing ESR's arguments from the book "The Cathedral and the Bazaar"
>> about the logical end of the proprietary software life-cycle vis a vis
>> the Open Source software life-cycle which is continually open to new
>> ideas. Maybe M$ is just hard up for ideas...
>>
>
> We are on Microsoft's radar in a bigger way than we realize because they
> fear us. We're actually convincing people that Linux is the way to go,
> because it's high quality software and it's more stable and secure than
> anything Microsoft puts out. Microsoft's had _no_ competition in the OS
> market for so long, and this scares them.
>
> Microsoft does not believe in, care for or like OSS, and their "shared
> source" hoohah is lip service. It's a way to try to co-opt people
> leaning toward OSS. The article is also a subtle warning to Microsoft's
> customers to stay away from OSS because of the "viral" nature of the
> GPL.
>
> As a university student, Bill Gates railed against other students who
> attempted to share code he'd written for a BASIC interpreter. His answer
> to them was a diatribe about intellectual property and business. That
> incident defines how Bill Gates thinks about software, and how the
> company he founded operates. To Gates and Microsoft, OSS is a 60's
> hippie idea that is nutty at best. People create software to make money,
> after all. Doing it for any other reason is just misguided or psychotic.
>
> OSS people are a lot like Apple people: iconoclastic, passionate and
> stubborn. Add to that that we're dedicated, talented and pragmatic. That
> combination scares Microsoft, just like our software does. It's not that
> they know we're right. They think we're wrong. The problem is that other
> people listen to us, which could mean less business for Microsoft.
>
> Microsoft could have done all right if they hadn't become arrogant. But
> rather than spend money building their software correctly in the first
> place, they got it out the door to feed the revenue stream, and coerced
> people and companies into buying it. People built up resentment, and the
> government finally caught up with them. Now people won't upgrade and
> they're looking for alternatives.
>
> And Microsoft's stuck. With millions of stockholders and a philosophy
> based on Bill Gates' university experiences, they have no choice but to
> continue on the road they've built for themselves. We represent an
> obstacle. So they're dusting off their rhetoric and propaganda, their
> new licensing schemes, their police (the BSA), their lobbying
> organizations, and their tried-and-true subversion tactics ("embrace and
> extend"), and going after us, hammer and tongs. It's gonna get bloody.
>
>
> I love the smell of silicon in the morning!
>
>
> Paul
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