valinux goes propietary?

Wim De Smet wdesmet at yucom.be
Sun Aug 26 17:37:23 UTC 2001


Massimo Nuvoli wrote:
> Stefano Maffulli ha scritto:
>
> > On Saturday 25 August 2001 20:56, Wim De Smet wrote:
> > > As reported on cnet:
> > > http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1003-200-6954900.html
> > > VA Linux is going to sell propietary modules in the SourceForge
Enterprise
> > > Edition. I guess this is pretty bad for free software, just wanted to
alert
> > > people of it.
> >
> >
> > Given the bad situation on the computer market, I guess more and more
> > companies will go back to more classic and therefore "safe" business
models.
> > This will be especially true for those companies that jumped on the
software
> > libre band wagon just following the wave of Linux popularity.
> > Investors in Wall Street want just be reassured and IMHO VA Linux is
doing
> > that: they're saying "Well, do you guys want us to use a better proven
> > business model? Here we are".
> > I think this is also bad for the advocates of software libre: it won't
be
> > easy now to find successful stories to talk about during conferences,
aside
> > some very good old known names :-(
> > We'll see what happens, though: I still think that it doesn't make any
sense
> > to try to sell proprietary extensions to software, but "old" economy
rules
> > force new companies to act old way. This is the key, I think... but we
go off
> > topic if I start :-))
>
> Good analisys, but there is something missing, the problem is not "yeah my
> company is doing free software so the investors are preoccupied", the
problem is
> that the "old economy" is trying to put the "free software economy" out of
his
> market (this is a big problem and not only on the software).
Off course, it also has something to do with the fact that numerous
companies went out of business the past months. Investor trust is hard to
find, and a conservative business model is the way VA Linux is trying to
convince them to stick with it.
>
> In the free software economy is a bad thing to ave a big company like "VA"
trying
> to put money on the free software and obtain something like a typical "old
> economy" result, money and proprietary extensions (jump on the free
software
> train just following the wave of Linux popularity can be something like
this).
>
> IMHO this is only a signal, the business model of the old economy cannot
be mixed
> with the new model, this with big company, where Wall Street is important
and
> when Wall Street dont wants the new model :-)
>
> The great successful history is "nobody can delete the freedom of the
software,
> if the software is free", VA can do proprietary extensions, someone in the
world
> can do the same proprietary extensions in free software.
>
> :-)
greets,

Wim




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