[LINK] Has Open Source Lost Its Halo?

[Bernard Robertson-Dunn]

Has Open Source Lost Its Halo?
Slashdot
http://linux.slashdot.org/linux/07/02/15/1947224.shtml

PetManimal writes:

"Open-source software development once had a reputation as a grassroots 
movement, but it is increasingly a mainstream IT profit center, and 
according to Computerworld, some in the industry are asking whether 
'open source' has become a cloak used by IT vendors large and small to 
disguise ruthless and self-serving behavior. 
<http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9011340&intsrc=hm_list>

Citing an online opinion piece by Gordon Haff, an analyst at Illuminata 
Inc., <http://www.illuminata.com/perspectives/?p=252> the article notes 
that HP and IBM have not only profited from open-source at the expense 
of competitors, but have also boosted their images in the open-source 
community.

The Computerworld article also mentions the efforts by the 
Microsoft/Windows camp to promote open-source credentials: '[InfoWorld 
columnist Dave] Rosenberg is more disturbed by the bandwagon jumpers: 
the companies, mostly startups, belatedly going open-source in order to 
ride a trend, while paying only lip service to the community and its values.

Take Aras Corp., a provider of Windows-based product lifecycle 
management (PLM) software that in January decided to go open-source. 
Rosenberg depicted the firm in his blog 
<http://www.illuminata.com/perspectives/?p=252> as an opportunistic 
Johnny-Come-Lately. "I'm not impressed when a company whose software is 
totally built on Microsoft technologies goes open-source," said 
Rosenberg, who even suspects that the company is being promoted by 
Microsoft as a shill to burnish Redmond's image in open-source circles."'"

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Regards
brd

Bernard Robertson-Dunn
Sydney Australia
brd at iimetro.com.au