Alfresco, my employer, is based in London, so I go over once per quarter for management meetings. Because I’m there so often, I took the time to get an Oyster card, which manages payments while riding on London’s public transport. Tiny did I know that Linux enables my …
Archive for May 26th, 2008UNEP Finance Initiative: Innovative financing for sustainability Campaign Finance - Brookings Institution Google Finance - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Financial Terms Dictionary - Personal Finance Glossary Personal Finance, Personal Finances, and Financial Advice - Forbes.com
26
05
2008
 
Google’s slow transformation into an open, transparent companyPosted by: admin in Business and PoliticsTo some, Google has long been a champion of open source, hiring top open-source developers and contributing to a range of open-source projects, in addition to its Summer of Code. To others, Google has been the worst enemy of open source, bumping AGPL-based code of its Code.Google.com and only selectively contributing back to the projects like Linux and MySQL from which it derives benefit. I’ve been in both camps. One thing is increasingly clear to me, however: Google is opening up to open source. Earlier this week, I noted its Google I/O Conference, which will serve open source’s most important constituency: developers. CNET News.com reporter Steve Shankland writes of Google’s Android as “Google’s highest-profile attempt so far to use the collaborative programming method to change how computing is done outside the company’s walls.” All good. But it’s actually Google’s promised transparency about its crown jewels–its search algorithms–that makes me think Google is finally ready to truly open up. Perhaps this newfound transparency derives from its 61 percent search market share, but the shift is welcome, if still hesitant: A friend called me on Friday to ask what I thought about Novell. “Does it have a chance?” he asked? The answer is increasingly, “Yes.” I never would have thought I’d be saying that, but whatever the cause of Novell’s resurgence, it feels like the company is making a serious comeback. Yes, it has yet to displace its competition: Ubuntu has more momentum but still lacks a winning revenue model that might hamper its transition from community standard to enterprise standard, while Red Hat continues to barrel forward yet doesn’t feel as invincible as before. But Novell’s progress in its Linux business is nothing to sneeze at, with 65 percent growth in its last quarter. That progress is a direct result of its interoperability agreement with Microsoft, a relationship it has been extending of late. I’ve harshly criticized this agreement because of the patent cloud it has put over Linux, but after speaking with a range of Novell SUSE/Microsoft customers about it, I’m increasingly convinced that the only company that’s sold on the important of patent protection in the deal is Microsoft. As one current customer noted to me, “The patent coverage for SUSE had exactly zero relevance to us in making our decision to go with SUSE.” Customers may be indifferent to the patent pact, but Novell’s alignment with Microsoft has been very good so far for its business. Were that the only thing it was doing, however, it might not be much to cheer. Novell has been very busy on a range of different fronts: Several years ago while still working for Novell, I considered going to work for Microsoft in Europe. (Had I waited long enough, I could have worked for Microsoft while still at Novell, but that’s another story, albeit one that’s paying off well for Novell.) I thought I could help the company figure out open source and navigate the thorny issues that prevent it from embracing open source. I gave up on that quixotic quest, and in retrospect it was the right decision. Sam Ramji, Bill Hilf, and others are doing a far better job of nudging Microsoft toward open source than I would have. But the larger reason is that Microsoft has put an apparently insurmountable hurdle in its path to fully engaging the open-source community, and to my ability to fully support its embrace of open source:  (Credit: CNET News.com)Patents. It’s unclear to me why Microsoft refuses to back off this issue. It stands alone in its dogmatic insistence on fouling the open-source downstream. Microsoft’s solo crusade against open source through patents baffles me. It also prevents me from working for them or with them. I’m not alone in this. Top News Archive - Yahoo! Finance Finance - INSIDERinfo Finance search engine. Finance related … UNEP Finance Initiative: Innovative financing for sustainability The Chinese Finance Association World wide web Public Library: Finance NONPROFIT FINANCE FUND: Services for nonprofits nationwide Say Government Employment and Payroll Data Finance & Development, March 2008 - Contents - Volume 45 - Number 1 |
Entries (RSS)