[discuss] irrelevancy

[Dave Edwards]

On Mon. 2004-01-19, 14:15, Shad Young wrote:
> On Mon, 19 Jan 2004 13:47:44 -0500 (EST)
> you wrote:
> 
> > Where is the hotbed of Linux community discussion in Canada?  Or has
> > Linux sunk into irrelevancy, or succumbed to a corporate agenda that
> > we're all completely satisfied with?
> > 
> > Rod.
> 
> I can not in good conscience say that its succumbed to a corporate
> agenda that I am satisfied with. :) In fact the exact opposite is the
> case. I have found Linux has succumbed to an agenda that I am wholly
> dissatisfied with. Right now I use Linux simply because its what I
> have installed and am to lazy/busy to change it. I find I am spending
> more and more time in Windows. At least MS is honest in its intent to
> be closed and proprietary. I know where I stand with it. 

Exactly how has Linux "succumbed"?  The fact of involvement of
corporations does not by definition imply or create a kind of corporate
takeover -- there must be evidence and cases.

> Linux has become an odd entity that is no longer a community OS. It
> claims to be one thing but is in reality another. It has left the
> model it was built with in favor of a traditional one and has IMO
> relegated itself to "Just another OS" and not a particularly good one
> when compared to the competition (WinXP and OSX). I could forgive its
> faults when it was a community driven "people oriented" vision of
> freedom, but the Frankenstein it is now I have a hard time accepting.
> 
> I guess we have IBM, Novel and SCO to thank for that. "The future is
> open" my ass. The future is patents and corporate strangle holds.
> 

The only symptom I see that could be attributed to the prominence of
corporations in the scene, is the relative paucity of volunteers taking
on projects.  /Perhaps/ that is because newer users believe that the
power lies with the corps.  I'm not sure.  However, on a related note,
I have observed that the "Linux has gone corporate, is not
community-driven" tune seems to be one sung by those with little
involvement in its communities.  They would say that, wouldn't they?

Citing SCO as an example of the power of corporations in Linux is just
backward -- for all the reasons that SCO themselves provide almost
daily, and for the fact of the enormous community response to the "SCO
crisis".  To take the obvious example, Groklaw began as one person's
response to it, and is now a community-based resource of real
importance.

As for the future, what do you /want/ it to be?  The more there
are pessimists who allow themselves the luxury of inactivity, the
greater the chance they will be proved right.

Dave.
-- 
Dave Edwards <dleSympaticoCa>
Freelance and Technical Writer,
With Special Interest in Open Source Software
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