[plug] Choice comments

[Leon Brooks]

Eric Smith wonders (http://lwn.net/2002/0307/letters.php3):
> No one is forcing [Microsoft] to use GPL'd software.  It's simply
> another choice.  Of course, Microsoft doesn't want people to have
> choices, but isn't it strange that they complain that choices are
> available to them?

Meanwhile, Craig Mundie, representative of a convicted monopoly 
(http://www.sun.com/executives/perspectives/bad.html), software pirate 
(http://www.ensignuk.com/news/industry_news/110105.htm) and confessed outlaw 
(http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/industry/03/05/microsoft.states.ap/) 
pontificates (http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104-847303.html):
> Rather than form a federation with Microsoft and work with what
> we had already created, there was this notion that the world
> should be offered an alternative

Three important things come from this: ONE - CHOICES

After Mundie's statement, there's really not much left to debate in terms of 
whether Microsoft really wants choice. There _is_ scope for discussing the 
kind of choice. We could beat around in the bush a fair bit, weighing up 
alternatives, but I'll cut straight to the chase:

Microsoft only wants choices it can control, and it can't control the GPL.

Now, the ``form a federation with Microsoft'' part... sure, let the sheep 
form a federation with the wolf, but it'll be on the wolf's terms, and 
involve a constant supply of mint sauce. We've seen words like those before 
in many compensation cases. It's all about control.

TWO - PAST AND FUTURE

The history of William Henry ``Trey'' Gates III shows that what that boy is 
all about, has been all about since at least his teens - and so what his 
company is all about - is control. And that's a major Achilles' heel, because 
anyone so fixated on something can be controlled themselves.

Bill's been extremely fortunate that the only real challenge to that control 
has been benevolent and decentralised Free Software. If a powerful competitor 
like Larry ``hair's-breadth from being richest'' Ellison could push Bill's 
buttons so hard, a few years of corporate Judo would see Microsoft totalled.

Microsoft seems to be dying of a thousand mostly self-inflicted cuts anyway. 
Call it karma, Divine judgement, whatever, their constant breaking of the 
Golden Rule is coming back to bite them ever harder - enough to hurt.

THREE - WHAT'S MY PART?

A bigger question than the fate of Bill's flagship is: do you want to base 
your business around a company which continues to lie to and mislead friends, 
partners, enemies, courts, employees and stockholders freely and with 
apparent indifference? Are you happy with the well-dressed, confident rep 
from MCS, or is it time to look at history to see what Microsoft's real place 
for you is? Does your future lie with a lone potential corporate Titanic, 
or with a rich selection of standard, interoperable components?

CONCLUSION

The GPL is about control, too. Corporate control is doled out from on high, 
after being sucked to to the center, like a black hole. The Free Software 
milieu is less regular, ranging from dictator to ogliarchy to solo to chaos, 
and the structures frequently change. Control is dispersed.

The pivotal control issue is that the GPL makes and _keeps_ available not 
only a large number of applications and comprehensive development tool sets, 
but a large number of working examples and jumping-off points. Where a viable 
Free and standard solution exists in a market, the playing field is more 
level, it is much more difficult to justify an overpriced, overcontrolled 
proprietary solution. Witness the path of SCO and in lesser degree Sun.

This is precisely what Microsoft don't want. They are a battleship fighting 
in an age of air supremacy, and can't push a button and magic themselves into 
a carrier. They've seen cruisers sunk and sinking and they're panicking.

Cheers; Leon