On Mon, 2003-12-08 at 10:14, Preston Crawford wrote: > That's why I went with Fedora instead of buying this. I'd love to > continue to support OSS with my dollars, but not if I'm going to be told > I can't run Samba or MySQL or Apache for development on my box. This > kind of arbitrary breakdown in licensing is what Microsoft does and is > part of why I prefer Linux instead and don't use MS any longer. They aren't telling you that you can't run Samba, MySQL, or Apache for production on that box. They are just not rolling out the packages or offering the superior service options. You pick what you want to do. It's a stable platform for you to work from. <FLAME ON - somewhere around here> Moreover it is far from arbitrary lines being drawn. They are targeting the distributions and support according to certain price points which that type of distribution and support offering makes sense. If you think it's not worth it that's fine plenty of others are doing it a little bit different with a different price point. RedHat is a good company trying their best to do the right thing and walk a tight rope. They need to charge enough to continue their service and to help open source as well as to make some return for their shareholders...etc. They also have to contend with people taking cheap and unfair shots at them. I support the entire OSS movement and respect any company that makes a commitment to it even if I personally don't want to pay what they want to charge. In the past I have been rough on companies that produce non-free distributions when they are non-free (as in freedom) because of the incorporation of 3rd party proprietary ad-ons. I do so because these types of distributions keep potential users from using the whole of their OS for the sake of some 3rd party ad-on. It is better to release a free (as in freedom) OS (with the allowance of including brand identification non-free material) and providing any 3rd party ad-ons as an additional purchase option. This is a step that SuSe has taken. I just hope other companies will choose to divide these things out going into the future across all distributions. RedHat has gone above and beyond this call of duty by offering a free as in freedom and beer OS to us and restraining all of their distributions to only include free software (as in freedom) in their base. </FLAME OFF> So in summary...just give them a break, they are trying to be as responsible and respectable as they can. -Chris "As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged. And it is in such twilight that we all must be most aware of change in the air, however slight, lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness." - Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas
