[Cialug] So who didn't see this one coming?

[Matthew Nuzum]

Brandon Griffis wrote:
> By taking this cash they're arguably admiting that their customers need
> "protection" from IP suits from Microsoft.  This translates to being aware
> of IP infringements.  As a Linux distributor SuSE is bound by the GPL.  If
> they know of IP infringing software in the system and haven't moved to
> report/change it they are in violation of section 7 of the GPL and are not
> permited to redistribute Linux.  Any way this goes it ends bad for
> Novell/SuSE.

>> > > would be relatively easy to attack some of the key applications that
>> > > make running linux worthwhile.
>> >
>> > My thought is that, as someone else said, they're going after Samba, or
>> > that they're going after OpenOffice.

We're seeing a sudden influx of open suse users join the Ubuntu
community because they feel they've been betrayed.

Also, and maybe I'm wrong, I read the press announcements as saying that
people who contribute code that is used in suse are safe. This would
include Samba or OOo, wouldn't it?

I still subscribe to the theory that this move is designed to undermine
the Linux community and take some steam out of it's growth, which is
getting significant enough to be an annoyance to Microsoft...

I'm actually in San Francisco at the annual staff meeting for Canonical
now, and it is truly amazing to see how fast we're growing, especially
in Asia, Africa and South America. All over the place we're going
against Microsoft and winning 30,000 - 40,000 desktops at a time -
surprisingly even in schools, where licensing costs are not nearly as
critical of a factor (because Microsoft is 80%+ discounted there).

We're definitely starting to annoy Microsoft. They've got to do
something to stymie the exodus, especially in the minds of the youth
(aka schools).
-- 
Matthew Nuzum
newz2000 on freenode