Decoding Microsoft's open source argument, May 21, 2001

On May 17, Microsoft Senior Vice-President Craig Mundie submitted a column to ZDNN decribing why the "commercial software model alone" can sustain the industry's growth. The following is a point-by-point counter-argument from Michael Tiemann, the chief technology officer at Red Hat, a supplier of Linux and open source solutions for Internet infrastructure.

In antitrust terms, this scheme to coerce big corporate customers to upgrade to Windows XP and Office XP, not to mention whatever it takes to bring their servers to "current" software, fairly shouts "monopoly practices." And it seems certain to attract what people at the courthouse call "judicial notice." Yes, Your Honor, here we have Microsoft demanding a revenue spike solely for its own purposes and promising consequences if customers don't cough up on schedule.

Torvalds didn't go looking for cyber-stardom, he just wrote a Unix-based operating system in the bedroom of his home in his native Finland. (By the way, interesting aside: His wife is a national karate champ).

Torvalds seems to accept his stardom reluctantly, more as a responsibility or even a curse than as some external valuation of his worth to humanity.

The first quarter was a rocky one for Unix servers, as the U.S. market shrunk by about 2 percent because of a slowing economy, according to a survey by market researcher Dataquest.

Because the Linux operating system is a derivative of Unix and doesn't sell enough units to demand its own category, Dataquest lumped it in with Unix for this market-share survey. Dell doesn't offer any Unix-based servers

The Linux revolution is turning into an evolution, with its prospects on the server and client splitting into two distinct paths of unequal fortune.

The news on the server front is as good as the desktop news is bad, however. The TPC win signals that Linux is moving toward becoming a true mission-critical, enterprise-class system that can effectively compete with the Unix and Windows platforms

 ELC Chairman Dr. Inder Singh of LynuxWorks said, "The embedded Linux energy level in Europe is extraordinary. This organizing event is a direct result of needs expressed by our members. We are confident that ELC-E will launch with a running start."

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