Bonum Certa Men Certa

Why the OpenSUSE FAQ Misses the Point

THOSE WHO can spare 5 minutes should probably read the whole thing. It's a very good and detailed analysis that echoes a lot of what we've been showing. Here are some bits of interest:

I consider enthusiatically supporting a company that calls your underlying community a “cancer” to be a “sell out”. I consider promoting Microsoft technologies to the direct detriment of competing Free and Open Source technologies to be a “sell out”. The “clear conditions” and “few specific areas” are irrelevant. The question of “selling out” is very much a subjective one, because it requires one to make a value judgment based on actions. And that’s about as far as you can go with the arguement on whether Novell “sold out” or not - do you think they did? (Hint: the answer is yes.)

And “fierce competitors”? Please. Microsoft has two major development platforms it wants deployed right now: .NET and Silverlight. Novell is doing everything it can to spread both of them wherever it can.

[...]

Well, I don’t know what you mean by “pushing”. I do know that:

* Miguel de Icaza thinks OOXML is “superb”, superior to ODF, called criticism of it “FUD”, considers ISO approval was a good thing, and so on [1] [2] [3]. * Novell announced that the “Novell edition of the OpenOffice.org office productivity suite” would support OOXML very early in the game [1]

These could be construed as “pushing” OOXML. Be careful now: the argument that OOXML support - now, after approval - is needed is not relevant. The problem is that when the discussion was started, and OOXML was proposed specificially to counter ODF, Novell stood firmly behing Microsoft.

The reason people think Novell is “pushing” OOXML, even if technically Novell recomments ODF, is because most people judge by actions, not words. Novell has taken a lot of action to support (”push”) OOXML. ODF? Not so much.

It also provides me an opening to touch on my favorite pet peeve: just because someone disagrees with you, does not mean the message is “FUD“. If someone is laying out a reasoned argument - it is not “FUD”, no matter how much you might disagree with the premise or conclusion. It doesn’t mean you agree with someone’s argument, but you don’t just get to dismiss legitimite criticism by calling it “FUD”. Let me help you out:

This is FUD: “Linux infringes on 235 Microsoft patents.” “Linux is a cancer.“ This is not

[...]

Here we have the FAQ that caused me to write this entry; I won’t use openSUSE precisely because it is “sponsored” by Novell - and so, according to the FAQ - I am being clearly ignorant and being absurd.

First, the easy pickings: Tomboy/F-Spot/Banshee/Beagle, etc. - no I don’t use any of those because I won’t have mono on any of my machines. I dare say most people that disagree with the Novell/Microsoft deal don’t use mono. (And here’s the thing: I don’t care if someone wants to use them - I just don’t think they should be included by default in some many distros. But the key to gaining mindshare is to have your products on the desktop, and that’s why Novell pushes so hard to get these things included in the default GNOME and so on.)

[...]

As I mentioned in another blog post Novell’s relationship with openSUSE is not one of “mere sponsorship”:

* openSUSE is a trademark of Novell * openSUSE EULA is was a “Novell Software License Agreement” [I see this has changed for the new release.] * openSUSE is promoted as “openSUSE from Novell” on Novell’s own website * The openSUSE site is copyrighted by Novell. * The openSUSE “Community Board” is lead by a Novell-appointed chairman, and must contain a majority of Novell employees.

[...]

In a way, this speaks to the heart of the matter: Microsoft has been hell-bent on destroying Open Source for a long, long time - and still Novell gets into bed with them. Limiting the discussion to patent issues attempts to obscure the fact that Novell is enthusiastically pushing Microsoft technology into the Open Source ecosystem as hard as it can. Patents may be one part of the issue, and an important one - but the larger issue to me is embracing an anti-Free Software company like Microsoft.



The comment from Ted Haeger is worth reading too.

Last year we analyzed the Microsoft/Novell FAQ.

No Value

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

Destruction and Distortion of Information, Including Facts About Linux (Bonus: This is Destroying the Planet)
All that LLMs have going for them is hype, and moreover media that intentionally misrepresents them and their supposed capabilities
Google Seems to Have Just Killed All Instances of Invidious
YouTube is rapidly becoming just "another Neflix"
 
Italian Media Covers Richard Stallman's English Talk Ahead of Tonight's Public Appearance
article in La Stampa
Microsoft Skype in a Freefall: About 20% Decrease in Site Traffic in 3 Months (Amid Microsoft Phasing Out Credits)
Microsoft axing more services/features may mean that now they scrape the bottom of the barrel and Skype will simply die, discontinuing service (like ICQ) in a matter of years
Gemini Links 12/02/2025: Depression, Gabbro, WikiTok, and More
Links for the day
Links 12/02/2025: Health, Security, and Monopolies
Links for the day
Gemini Protocol is Increasingly Important to the Net
Gemini Protocol will turn 6 this summer
Former EPO Manager Warns That the Illegal 'Court' for "Unitary Patents" Enables “Law Shopping”
Daniel X. Thomas opposed the very existence of the UPC, which any honest person could recognise was both illegal and unconstitutional
Like GAFAM, the EPO is Passing the Financial Pains to Staff
the EPO is operating illegally at this point
Morale at Microsoft Ruined by the Company Labelling Thousands of Workers 'Low Performers', Sacking Them on the Spot and Denying Them Basic Benefits
people laid off as "low performers" go to social control media to bemoan the label
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, February 11, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, February 11, 2025
Links 11/02/2025: Current state of the Internet and Smallnet Information Services (SIS)
Links for the day
Conservative Estimate: Over 10,000 IBM Workers to Be Laid Off in the Next Two Waves
The morale is low and layoffs are expected soon, with mass layoffs likely happening next month and then again later
Links 11/02/2025: Trade Wars and "Crisis for American Universities"
Links for the day
Parasitic LLM Slop Sites Destroy the Ability to Find "Linux" News in Google News
Remember that Google News laid off lots of its workers
Richard Stallman's English Talk in Italy Less Than 24 Hours Away (Torino) and Then Another Talk in Italy Scheduled (University of Bozen-Bolzano)
He's active and he travels a lot in spite of his medical condition
IBM Layoff Rumours, Large-Scale Implementations Weeks Ahead (in March 2025)
There are some people corroborating
Links 11/02/2025: Nutritional Poverty, Closure of USAID, More Fictional 'Valuations' Around Buzzwords
Links for the day
Perl Programming Leftovers
recently in perl.org
Microsoft in Africa: From 98% to Less Than 10% in Just 16 Years
Microsoft being on less than 1 in 10 Web-connected devices in Africa is a very big deal
Almost as If MElon Reads Techrights
The joke we started appears to be spreading
Microsoft Blasted for Adding Insult to Injury: Workers Laid Off Without Prior Notice, Without Severance Payment and Basic Coverage (Like Health), Then Stigmatised as Bad Performers So They Cannot Find a Job Elsewhere
Such stereotypes end entire careers
Gemini Links 11/02/2025: NeoVim and Deploying Other People's Code
Links for the day
BetaNews is Still Publishing LLM Slop/SPAM About "Linux"
Assuming it is indeed LLM slop, it seems clear BetaNews has no intention of improving or is simply unable/unwilling to improve
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, February 10, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, February 10, 2025
Scheduled Maintenance Tomorrow and on Valentines
If the site (or Gemini capsule) is offline for a bit, the maintenance windows are likely the root cause
If Matthias Kirschner Loves Free Software, He'll Change the Name of the Microsoft-Sponsored Organisation He Governs (in Order to Avoid Confusion)
The FSF-EEE does not really like Software Freedom, it just loves money (including Microsoft's)
Soylent News Lessens the Scope of Discussion Due to Persistent Trolling and Online Abuse
if they make it a lot harder for new people to participate, then they limit the "general appeal" and reach
EPO's Local Occupational Health, Safety and Ergonomics Committee (LOHSEC) in The Hague: Workers Are Getting Sicker, Conditions in Which to Assess Patent Applications Deteriorate
"According to the Office statistics the total number of days of absence has gone up from 12.4 to 13.1 total number of sick days per Full Time Equivalent (FTE) from 2023 to 2024."
The Standard Needs to Improve Its Standards for Fact-Checking, Aaron Swartz Had Nothing to Do With Reddit and He Detested the Company That Created It
The Web is already bad enough as it is
When the Livestream of Richard Stallman is Apparently Bury-Brigaded Offline You Finally Learn to Avoid Google/YouTube for Streaming
Please, people, stop uploading to Google/YouTube
New Paper From the EPO Highlights Large-Scale Discrimination at the Office, Where People Are Rewarded for Granting More and More Illegal Patents
Even the Kremlin is probably more competent than this
Links 10/02/2025: Ban on D.E.I. Language, Listeria Risk/Outbreak
Links for the day
Links 10/02/2025: Announcing "Stringless" and Mental Health Improvement
Links for the day
Links 10/02/2025: Facebook Mass Layoffs, "Meta" Did What Aaron Swartz Had Done But to the Tune of 81.7 Terabytes
Links for the day
Microsoft Tarnishing the Brand of Arch
Of course Arch can do whatever it wants, but being associated with Microsoft is a badge of shame
The Ultimate and Inevitable Fall of OpenAI (Even Brave is 'Bigger' Now)
"When you advertise at the Super Bowl, you’ve reached just about every consumer in America. It’s the last stop. If you’re not profitable yet, you never will be."
Adding Slop to Your Blog Only Makes One Assume All the Text is LLM Slop
Simon Coter from Oracle has turned to slop
Macao is Leaving Microsoft Behind
Windows is falling to new all-time lows
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Sunday, February 09, 2025
IRC logs for Sunday, February 09, 2025
Microsoft's WSL (LSW) Shows That It Can Never Love Linux, Only Windows
that's just how Microsoft rolls
Activism in Times of War and a Coup
'Linux' Foundation works for fascism
What the Silencing of Neatnik Tells Us About Linus Torvalds Inside a Microsoft-Dominated 'Linux' Foundation
Is Linus Torvalds free to express his mind as he wishes about every topic, even just any technical topic?
Windows Down to 11.35% in Senegal, as Measured by statCounter
Another all-time low (Windows was at 99% in 2009)
"Latest Technology News" in BetaNews is LLM Slop Promoting OOXML and Proprietary Software at the Expense of LibreOffice and OpenDocument Format (ODF)
Remember that "open-source" and Open Source aren't the same; the former is fake