Redhat taking a beating - stock opportunity here?

[Evan Leibovitch]

Ansar Mohammed wrote:
> Oracle is clearly going to come out the bad guy here.
You guys couldn't possibly be more wrong. They're going to get FOSS into
places that never considered it before, including all those traditional
"Oracle shops" who depend on Oracle for everything. Admins and
developers who will be able to pay their mortgage -- while working on
Linux -- will be celebrating, not denouncing, Oracle's support.

> I think this is going to do allot of damage to Oracle's perception in the Open Source world;
This makes no sense at all.

Developer geeks never thought much of Oracle in the first place, and
after all their main products are quite proprietary. So there's no
damage to be done, the rep was never much to start with. OTOH, Oracle's
embrace of Linux is going to create jobs -- maybe careers -- for people
who know and work with open source. The net effect of Oracle's entry is
a gain of Linux use and a gain in Linux employment -- the only real
loser here is Red Hat, which now has a huge competitor that's arguably
as aggressive and mercenary as Microsoft. Any non-Stallmanist who thinks
this is a step backwards out to re-examine what it is they're trying to
advocate in the first place. (And if you _are_ a Stallmanist, you've
probably always hated Oracle anyway...)

Of course, one can take it as a given that Oracle doesn't really much
care about its rep amongst developer geeks. It's not in business to be
loved, especially amongst anyone whose not a potential buyer of its
products or services.

- Evan

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