Date: Sun, 27 May 2001 08:36:02 -0600 From: Brett Glass <brett@lariat.org> To: Fredrik Olausson <fredrik@speechcraft.com>, freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: The desktop apathy Message-ID: <4.3.2.7.2.20010527082742.049003f0@localhost> In-Reply-To: <Pine.LNX.4.21.0105252316300.294-100000@molly.telia.com>
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At 05:27 PM 5/25/2001, Fredrik Olausson wrote: >Hi all, > >Over the past few weeks there's been an increased amount of reporting in >various on- and off-line media about the failure of open-source OS:es on >the desktop. One of the key prerequisites business customers and consumers have for a desktop system (as opposed to a server) is that it be EXTREMELY simple to use and also promoted and supported by a commercial entity with a viable business plan. (Ximian and Eazel both fell pray to the GPL "poison pill.) Were KDE or GNOME BSD-licensed, companies could have come out with their own unique flavors of them and might have filled that role. But the GPL rears its ugly head again, and by precluding unique improvements by vendors (and hence their ability to create well differentiated products) prevents them from succeding. Today, most users of the BSDs (AND Linux) effectively use Windows as their GUI. The other combination that currently shows the most promise for folks in the know is Mac OS X (which combines BSD and Mach with a vendor's own, well-supported commercial desktop). In short, the desktop needs to be commercial, or at least commercializable. The GPL is wrong for this, since its intent is to destroy commercial software. The sad fact that KDE and GNOME are GPLed may be a key reason why folks are still using other options. --Brett To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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