Comments on: Moonlight and the dupe quiz? Microsoft or Novell?

Is Novell using Microsoft, or is Microsoft using Novell? Come on. Are you serious? Is there any doubt?

[stephenwalli]

On Sun throwing stones ...

"Stephe sometimes gets carried away in thinking that people actually intend all of the intelligence of which he accuses them." Yes -- it is indeed a bad habit of mine.

But let's be fair. Simon is throwing stones at the Microsoft Silverlight license and not Miguel's Moonlight work. And it IS a proprietary software license, just like the one for SunSolve (Solaris 10 patching software from Sun):
http://sunsolve.sun.com/show.do?target=tous

All the same friendly clauses about phoning home, preventing benchmarking, and reverse engineering, etc.

But in the end, we know that they're both really licenses around THE PRODUCT (OR SERVICE) not the software, and they are put in place by company lawyers to protect the company (and its shareholders). I could wander my way down to this link on the Alfresco website:
http://www.alfresco.com/products/ecm/enttrial/register/terms.txt

That's what I'm agreeing to in order to *trial* Alfresco. Same lack of transferability. Same prevention of reverse-engineering the binaries. Same restrictions of use "to execute the Program(s) solely for the purposes of trial and evaluation of the Program(s)".

Glass house and all.

[luis.villa]

"Glass house and all. "

Ouch. And Matt can't say he wasn't warned ;)

[Matt Asay]

Good point, Stephe, but mostly immaterial

You captured the first paragraph of my post, which was Simon's argument, not mine. I spent time suggesting that you're right, but that Novell should work with Microsoft from a position of strength, not weakness.

Were you intending to strike at my argument? Because I can't read anything in what you said that actually applies to my post....

[stephenwalli]

Strength or Weakness?

Fair comment. I was reacting to the licensing debate.

So to your premise that Novell is dealing from a position of weakness. I'm not sure I see it that way.

Customers want a platform on which to develop/deploy applications. Java is the default cross platform language, despite lots of commentary on the relative strengths of C#/CLI. Historically, Microsoft has tried to convince customers that they should develop their apps on Windows because .NET is so easy/powerful/etc., ignoring the customer need for cross-platform, and insisting that C# doesn't compete with Java. Microsoft has always [gently] waved the IP FUD message at Mono, or damned it as an "interesting science experiment."

Novell is now in a position to be a customer believable C#/CLI on Linux. They anchor the community. Lots of Red Hat customers are vaguely unhappy with the arrogance most vendors adopt in their success, but not unhappy enough to move because there's no real benefit to moving. (There's probably a negligible cost difference.) Being the recognized leader in the Linux world of a "better" development/deployment paradigm may be enough to spark interest and re-evaluation again. It's a positive differentiator.

Would you explain what you mean by "It would be much better to command interoperability from a position of strength, as Red Hat is doing (or as MySQL is doing in databases, JBoss has done in application servers, etc.)"? I'm not sure I understand which positions of strength you mean.

[bgiffo]

Odd definition of "strength"

Like Stephen, I struggle with the "position of strength, not weakness" argument. I assume by that you mean that Novell should terminate the MS agreement and develop Moonlight without Microsoft. Which would be great, except that the finished product wouldn't be very good without Microsoft's cooperation. I'd describe that end result as, well, weak. As opposed to getting MS to cooperate, and having a much better, shall we say, stronger, end result.

As I've said before (http://dbstrat.com/?p=87), it just seems like you've lost any ability to be objective when it comes to Novell. Despite your snark, it seems clear that Novell wants to be popular with customers. The market, not any of us, will determine how that turns out.

[Matt Asay]

"Strength" = market share

I think you knew that's what I meant, but there, I've said it. If Novell's Linux offering is only interesting as an off-shoot of Windows, it's not that interesting.

Microsoft recognizes this. That's why it negotiated with Red Hat first (for a year). Red Hat wouldn't capitulate on the patent FUD. Novell had no choice (or no integrity).

Bgiffo thinks otherwise, but it's wildly unclear to me why he/she bothers to read the blog at all when he/she finds my position so "biased." And so it is. I'm not a big fan of losers. I can appreciate a market-loser, but not someone that sells their integrity to have a shot at popularity. That's exactly what I feel Novell has done.

So go read elsewhere, Bgiffo. I'm sure you'll find plenty of people at Novell who agree with you. You just won't find many on Wall Street who do. (Noticed the stock price lately?)

[Matt Asay]

I think I finally understand

As I was writing off an email to Stephe (probably went overboard, Stephe - please forgive me), I realized that part of this confusion may stem from how we each view the scenario. For me, it's not just a dollars and cents decision. This why I've never been comfortable with Novell's patent partnership with Novell, nor these efforts to deepen it. It has nothing to do with liking Red Hat more than Novell. It has everything to do with feeling very strongly that there *is* such thing as right and wrong in business, and it's not necessarily whatever a judge would say is right or wrong. I feel that what Novell did was wrong in a very real, moral sense. It might have made sense for its customers/its business, but I think it was wrong for open source.

And I believe open source vendors have a duty to abide by the spirit and letter of open source. Novell has not, in my view. It has not even come close in this Microsoft tie-up.

You who read this may disagree, but you should know that my "bias" stems from my ethics, which lead me to believe that Novell's locking off Linux is wrong. Period. If you don't agree, you probably won't like much that I write. My personal ethics are interwoven through everything I write. I just can't be anyone else. And I can't see this as "just business."

[ghold4]

Matt, Your a BoneHead...

Matt, Your a BoneHead...