[ILUG] Is Linux Dying?

[Dermot McGahon]

On Wed, 7 Jul 2004 09:35:45 +0100, Proinnsias Breathnach  
<proinnsias at project-bob.org> wrote:

> I'll go with maturing in this case ...

So would I. With caveats.

> Um, not quite - this is just a problem with the english language !
> Remember the OSS maxim: Free as in speech, not as in beer.

Ta se saor.

Nil se saor in aisce.


> Obviously, by providing the source - *should* someone else want to
> redistribute it, you can't restrict how they do it (so others could give
> away the product you're selling),

Never mind give away. Other could sell what you're selling.


> no-one is going to give away
> what they paid €500 for ... therefore I'm reasonably safe knowing that
> my GPL'd software is not going to be put up on the web instantly !

They tend not to. But there are leaks and code is leveraged into
other projects. That's not necessarily a bad thing.

> They will pay reasonable prices for an office suite
> though. (Many people are not happy with "Free" (gratis) software,
> because of the old saw "you get what you pay for" ... )

This is it. For a reasonable cost, you're willing to pay for
a polished functional product.

It's obvious, furking obvious, that Microsoft software is
overpriced. You don't have spare cash to build spaceships unless
you are gouging your customers.

The only way it could be explained is that your product is
light-years ahead of the competition, but we know here that that
is not the case.

There are a lot of good things happening at the moment. The distros
are working hard, Sun is working hard. Macs seem to be getting
more popular. Wireless networking, VoIP, mesh networks, better
sound, graphics and video support are all here or on the way.

Whatever the distros have to do to make a buck is fine by me, as
long as they keep paying the salaries of the, sometimes
phenomenally talented, people that they have working for them.

A trend I'm seeing in R&D is that many projects are basically
big integration efforts. Even having all this open source
code to use still doesn't make it easy to put together a
polished cheap useful product.

What I'm getting at, is that it's what you do with all that
free software that counts.


Dermot.
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