Reluctantly enough, several months ago we included an embedded video where Xandros products get shot (yes, literally). The days of SCO are numbered and it now turns out that a similar type of video exists for SCO’s Linux. In case you’re interested, here it is.
Ouch! This sits on the verge of violent content (and nothing that we endorse).
Will Xandros et al ever receive treatment which is similar to SCO’s? That seems unlikely because the immediate reaction did not go as far as DDOS attacks. However, one thing to be aware of is that the Asus Eee, which will be released next month, runs a variant of Xandros and it should therefore be avoided.
Keep your hand off products that give credibility to arguments that patent tax needs to be paid to Microsoft, for unsubstantiated FUD and some payola. “Payola,” you ask? Yes, indeed. Linux companies received money from Microsoft, rather than paid Microsoft. They were paid to support a divide-and-conquer strategy, so it’s a short-term loss for Microsoft and a long-term loss for Linux.
Some problems will end if distributors who sold out are shunned.
[Brad Smith, Microsoft:] But, as you’ll see in the press release it makes clear that on the patent side, we dealt with both of these sides of the equation. We dealt with the need for an up-front balancing payment, a balancing payment that runs from Microsoft to Novell, reflecting among other things the large relevant volume of the products that we have shipped. And you’ll see, as well, an economic commitment from Novell to Microsoft that involves a running royalty, a percentage of revenue on open source software shipped under the agreement
If you want Linux to stay Linux (as in “Linux is not Windows”), then do not choose Novell. Playing catch-up with Microsoft is the worst possible strategy. Paying Microsoft for Linux is a sin.
Content is available under CC-BY-SA