spacehunt.info

First of all, thank you DebConf5 organizers! You guys did a fantastic job in providing the opportunity for both DDs and non-DDs alike to meet face-to-face with each other. Debian definitely is alive and kicking!

So it is with great disappointment to see articles like this (”No Way For Linux To Replace Proprietary Software”) when I came back to Hong Kong. It’s an op-ed piece in a local newspaper by Charles Peter Mok, and begins by attacking last week’s Evans Data report for lacking objective data, therefore the conclusion reached (OSS adoption is speeding up) is too far-fetched. This is followed by (translation to English mine):

In fact, due to their love of open source systems (sic), open source supporters often are shallow when it comes to analysis and reaching conclusions, and confirming their subjective wants become their priority; of course, open source critics, like the Microsoft Windows camp and Sun Micro’s Unix camp, sometimes do the same thing.

Maybe he takes the /. crowd too seriously? Anyway, he then essentially translates the month-old SG Cowen report as an example of an objective argument… actually the translation is rather dubious. For example, the report only said “Linux seems to be hitting a limit” (via BusinessWeek); he translated that as “Linux’s development has reached the stage where it’s facing piling limitations”. What a nice and objective extrapolation!

Moving on, he uses the report to reach the conclusion that (again translations mine):

… whether Linux will still enjoy considerable growth, or the red light has been lit, is at the moment too early to say. Enterprise and personal users who use proprietary software such as Windows are still the majority.

Thanks for stating the obvious, Charles. So where’s the objective argument that supports the title of the article?