There hasn't been much Web chatter around Open Kernel Labs, but late last week, the Chicago-based Open Kernel Labs, a spinout from Australia's NICTA, announced a $7.6 million investment from Chrysalis Ventures, Neo Technology Ventures, and Citrix Systems.
This follows a $2.5 million grant Open Kernel Labs recently received from NICTA.
Not much noise is made about Open Kernel Labs because it operates in the embedded-virtualization market, providing microkernel technology to manufacturers of electronics such as mobile handsets.
Importantly, while based on the open-source General Public License 3, the company is able to segregate differently licensed components and run on Linux, Windows, or other embedded operating systems (including real-time operating systems), which is a critical requirement in the embedded world.
True to its open-source roots, developers can dig through information on the source code, another key advantage to an open-source microkernel technology. The embedded market invests a lot of time and resources in customizing code: it's the one market in which modifiability of source code is a must-have feature.
I haven't seen much funding in the embedded-operating-system market since my own company in that market, Lineo, sold to Metrowerks in late 2002. It's nice to see the eruption of the mobile market turning interest toward open-source embedded software again.
In the interest of stirring the "Australia-hates-MySQL tempest in a teapot" just a little more, I thought I'd throw in my $.02 before the US dollar is devalued again, making it worth $.01.
For those who haven't been following the news, Kaj Arno, MySQL's vice president of Community, wrote:
Several Sun Microsystems Inc employees, especially related to the Database Group, have been denied short stay business visas to Australia, over the last few months, as they have been seen to be competing with local Australian businesses unfairly.
The first part would be easy to pass off, but the second part ("seen to be competing with local Australian businesses unfairly") is more incendiary.
It's also pure conjecture. As Arno admits in the comments, an IRC chat with an unnamed Australian prompted his declaration that Australia was barring MySQLers from visiting the country due to "unfair competition." The Aussie in question apparently indicated that he had complained to the Australian government about MySQL's local business practices (which seem to consist of such nefarious activities as "serving customers" and "making great software").
Arno assumed that this Australian's complaint was the cause of the MySQL (now Sun) employees being denied a visa. He could well be right, as the Australian border security service may have policies of initially denying visas for any company about which it has received complaints.
It is, however, more likely that the MySQLers were denied on other grounds. It will be interesting to hear the outcome, but one thing is clear: whatever Oz's intentions toward Sun employees may be, its arms are outstretched to open source, generally. Some day Australia may welcome Arno and his crew back with open arms, even as their wallets are opening up now.
In the US, Mac sales are growing three times as fast as PC sales. The Australians, however, are putting us to shame. In the land "Down Under" made famous by Men at Work, Olivia Newton John, and Crocodile Dundee, Mac sales are growing at six times the industry average.
With Mac sales growing 52 percent in Australia in Q2 2008, Australia is officially the world's fastest-growing Mac population.
Oy, mate! Throw a little of that Mac on the barby!
It seems reasonable to suggest that no nation should cede its sovereignty to any private, commercial interest. Not without careful consideration and serious safeguards. It also seems reasonable to suggest that governments should interact with their constituents in an open, transparent manner, in both the media they use and the technologies used to convey their policies, laws, and debates.
Though reasonable, few governments actually do this. Well, Australia just took a big step toward ensuring that not only are its Parliamentary debates and proceedings free to the public in terms of cost, they are also free to the public in terms of freedom.
The project that accomplishes this, OpenAustralia.org, has been completely done with open-source software, available here.
Larry Lessig argues that "code is law," meaning that the very software we use to construct the Internet, intranets, etc. has a powerful effect on what is actually possible through these communication media. A closed architecture can have a profoundly deleterious effect on freedom, both in the political sense and in the practical sense. On Microsoft's software I can do what Microsoft allows. On open software...? I determine my destiny.
It is therefore important that Australia opted for open-source software in capturing the mind and history of its parliament. This is what sovereign nations do. Or, at least, it's what they should do.
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