Summary: Very poorly-put PR response from Novell, which fears Oracle's attempt to sell its own 'version' of Linux

ORACLE has just done something really sneaky. It bashes Linux (yes, the kernel) in order to sell its own 'improved' version of Linux and Red Hat's PR response is as follows:

• Leading With Red Hat Enterprise Linux

  With Red Hat Enterprise Linux, we continue to provide an industry-leading application platform, all based on open source technology, designed with the goal that end customers are and should continue to be the largest benefactors of Red Hat and our product offerings.

Novell's former manager for the OpenSUSE community (Zonker) has posted the most widely-cited response so far:

• Oracle's "new" kernel for RHEL clone: The real truth

Now, watch the tactless response from Michael Applebaum (Novell's director of Linux and Appliances), who decided to say that "we don't need a third Linux distro" (i.e. choice is bad and duopoly is good):

• Guest blog: Why we don't need a third Linux distro

  Ultimately, the market just isn't demanding a third Linux distro. The presence of two strong players – Novell and Red Hat – keeps the market extremely competitive, and our respective R&D teams along with the talent of the open source community drive exceptional innovation in areas like virtual appliances, cloud computing, high availability clustering and systems management. While it's certainly in Oracle's interests to play in the Linux space, its market uptake has lagged.

This is Novell's PR response. They try to tell companies to stay out of their way. If that's not arrogance, what is?

In any event, the bad company in this case is Oracle. What it's doing will in no way be beneficial to the Linux ecosystem. But Novell too has its own Linux kernel, so there is room for claims of hypocrisy. ⬆