Wikipedia drops Red Hat for Ubuntu
What's that sucking sound? It's the sound of money leaving the open-source ecosystem as Wikimedia, the organization behind the popular Wikipedia, has opted to dump its Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) deployment for unsupported Ubuntu, as The Register reports. Yes, Wikimedia could get support for Ubuntu, but it has elected not to do so.
With 350 servers, I'm sure Red Hat wasn't ecstatic to lose Wikimedia as a customer. That said, it was just a matter of time:
Right now, Wikimedia is using custom Ubuntu versions that have its own software configuration tools. Carr said Wikimedia has plenty of Linux expertise and a standard support contract doesn't make a lot of sense. Canonical is also hoping that Wikimedia becomes more involved with the Ubuntu support forums and with the process of deciding what needs to go into future Ubuntu releases, too.
I'm frankly surprised that Wikimedia ever used RHEL in the first place. I'm not deprecating the value in a supported, certified stack, but Wikimedia strikes me as the sort of organization that would happily self-support open source from the beginning, rather than going with a commercial open-source offering.
Even so, I wish Wikimedia would pay Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, for a support contract to help it fund its operations and further development. I don't think open source can endure unless we make it a renewable resource, which requires contributions of code or cash back into the system.
Matt Asay brings a decade of in-the-trenches open-source business and legal experience to The Open Road, with an emphasis on emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities. Matt is vice president of business development at Alfresco, a company that develops open-source software for content management. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mjasay. 
I'm afraid your entire article hinges on a mistaken assumption. We have never, at any time, used Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and were never, at any time, a customer of Red Hat.
You further seem to assume that Wikimedia (a 501(c)3 non-profit supported by donations) doesn't already involve itself in the open-source ecosystem, which is entirely incorrect. We run an open-source stack from top to bottom, creating all of our own custom software as open source (eg MediaWiki, created to run Wikipedia in 2002 and developed openly ever since) and contributing back fixes and patches for the other software we use (Squid, PHP, Apache, MySQL, memcached, etc)
As a non-profit with a very small technical staff, we've always self-supported our free software stack, but a number of open source-supporting for-profit companies including MySQL and Canonical choose to offer us some official support free of charge. This is generally more symbolic than practical, as most cases where major escalation is required involve us contacting engineers directly rather than going through the support channel...
-- Brion Vibber, CTO, Wikimedia Foundation
Seems odd to pick the clunky bloated mess that is Ubuntu for a server. Makes absolutely no sense.
- by mikalg October 15, 2008 12:15 AM PDT
- Oh for heavens sake. I am happy you were not surprised by this Matt, but it is the Open Source way of things.
- Reply to this comment
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(6 Comments)Look, the model works something like this:
Open Source touts FREE software in all of it's offerings.
Open Source support can be freely available in groups,forums,email, and even a google search.
Open Source support is generally LESS EXPENSIVE than non Open Source products.
Open Source allows Independent changes to customize your software for your needs.
Open Source is OPEN SOURCE for heavens sake.
This is all CLEARLY STATED/ADVERTISED on all Open Source projects/software. It DRIVES its use/adoption.
Is it surprising that Linux trained IT can manage its own support of OPEN software given some time with the software's use?
Absolutely not. Is it surprising that a company would choose to pay their OWN support staff (considering they need them any way) instead of a third party/other support?
Eventually, all Open Source CAN lead to this, and it is Open Sources second greatest challenge/weakness. The first being the fact that FREE is so readily used/synonymous in connection with Open Source.
If I have not a need to pay MORE for support...I will not. Not many corporations would/will, regardless of good intentions.
Open Source has made the software free. Great for me. Until I have complete understanding of the software itself, I can get support if I choose to. Great for me. I can at any time I feel comfortable, drop my support as I have the ability at some point to support it myself (it is OPEN after all). Great for me. Not so great for you.
Makes perfect sense to me.