RE: Flame Linus to a crisp!

Downing, Thomas
2003-04-25T12:23:51Z

From: Adrian Bunk [mailto:bunk@fs.tum.de]

>On Wed, Apr 23, 2003 at 10:43:37PM -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
>>...
>> And hey, the fact is (at least as far as I'm concerned), that as long as
>> you make the hardware, you can control what it runs.
>>...
>
>Linux is currently widely used and through this there comes some power.
>Let me try to make examples where this might be important:

You cast these comments in the context of corporate use, so -

The primary reason corporations are beginning to adopt Linux is TCO
- and such adoption is in its early stages, though growing. Such
adoption is _only_ to the extent that Linux will run specific
applications.

Companies do _not_ adopt Linux because it is the only OS on which
their critical applications run. They don't adopt it because it's
the coolest OS out there. All the corporate required applications
run on other O$'s. If support for a facility percieved as desirable
or necessary (in this case, DRM)is not available in Linux due to the
terms of the GPL, corporations will drop Linux in a heartbeat.

Some companies (viz certain very large financial institutions) are
only now just beginning to write applications _on_ Linux. When
Linux has a majority market share, with the rest of the market in
disarray, _then_ you have some power; but only for a limitted time.