Re: Flame Linus to a crisp!

[Adrian Bunk <bunk@fs.tum.de>]

On Fri, Apr 25, 2003 at 08:36:00AM -0400, Downing, Thomas wrote:
> 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.

There are even in bigger companies already many production machines
running Linux. I don't say that it's impossible for them to switch to a
different OS, but this would be a non-trivial switch (if this is
critical infrastructure) and a non-cheap (both for training the staff
for a different OS and for buying soft- and perhaps hardware) switch.

cu
Adrian

-- 

       "Is there not promise of rain?" Ling Tan asked suddenly out
        of the darkness. There had been need of rain for many days.
       "Only a promise," Lao Er said.
                                       Pearl S. Buck - Dragon Seed