"Is Open Source Dying?"
Submitted by blackbelt_jones on Tuesday 30th of October 2007 03:56:52 PM
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This article from Eweek, provocatively entitled "Is Open Source Dying?" is a few months old, but I still got a kick out of it:
First the good news. After listing some rather vague points that I have already forgotten, the author arrives at his conclusion:
Quote:
Does that mean open source is dying? Of course not.
Whew! You had me going for a minute! But there's no need to be so condescending about it. I'm not the one who asked.
We've all seen articles cast in this general rhetorical mold, about whatever. "Is Debian dying?" "Is liberalism dying?" "Is decent Chinese take-out dying?" They all start out the same, and they all wind up in the same place: Nope. False alarm... but there are problems. Crazy rhetorical questions are a great way to make boring articles seem temporarily interesting, but very few things actually die, other than your beloved cocker spaniel, and eventually, you. Disco never really died, and some people are still putting on Greek Tragedies. Linux isn't going to die because it's not a business. Therefore it isn't going to go out of business. Linux dies when all of its 10-20 million users decide they'd rather use something else. Microsoft isn't going to die because it's Microsoft. I'm 49, and I'm pretty sure that I'll be leaving this world before either one of these entities. The moribund rhetoric distorts more than it illuminates. But it does generate web hits.
Another great thing about crazy rhetoric is that it is guaranteed to bring out the crazies. From the comments:
Quote:
Utopianist, Communist, Anticapitalist, whatever the label, the concept of open source runs contrary to sound business practices, and life in general. Even in the darkest depths of Communist USSR and China, the profit motive is what drove people forward... (blah blah blah) If life teaches you only one thing, it should teach you this one important lesson: only motivated people can be reasonably counted on to act as they are expected.
Which is why those revolutionaries at that Maoist front organization, IBM, got involved with Linux. This person really has no idea what open source is, but I think it's hilarious that he thinks we're not motivated. Doesn't he know we're fanatics?
Quote:
Open Source has actually been dying for decades. The biggest problem with Open Source Software is the advocates. They promise much more than they can actually deliever (sic). Another problem with Open Source Software is the advocates themselves.
And you know what else is wrong with open source? The advocates! Open source has been dying for decades? Sixteen years ago, the Linux kernel was an undergraduate's hobby.
Quote:
Believe it or not, the command line is dead.
Fuck you.
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A moment of clarification: I'm not that dumb.
Note: For "open source" I keep referring to Linux here. I hope I haven't given the impression that I think the words always mean the same thing. It's just that Linux distros are the only concrete examples of open source that I know much of anything about.