[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

[linux-team] Fwd: MICROSOFT ACQUIRES LINUX OPERATING SYSTEM FOR $18 BILLION



J'espère que ce qui suit est une stupide blague, pas drôle du tout. Dès que je
sais d'où cela vient, je vous le signalerais.

Mais considérons un instant que cette nouvelle est vraie, que peut-on faire ? 
Inutile de reparler de la GPL, Gnu ou autre. Il n'est pas impossible que Linux
3.0.0 soit une OS commerciale malgré tout: cela s'est déjà vu un produit Gnu
qui devenait commercial. Mais de quoi disposons-nous pour empêcher ce scénario ?


Bien à vous,

Dany


----------  Message réacheminé  ----------
Subject: MICROSOFT ACQUIRES LINUX OPERATING SYSTEM FOR $18 BILLION
Date: Mon, 21 Sep 1998 04:00:05 -0400
From: "Rousseaux, David" <David.Rousseaux@WL.com>


> MICROSOFT ACQUIRES LINUX OPERATING SYSTEM FOR $18 BILLION 
> 
> QWERTYUIOP, WA /DenounceNewswire/ -- August 21, 1998 -- Within hours
> of IBM's announcement
>            of its $5.7 billion acquisition of the Apache web server,
> the most popular server for World Wide Web
>            sites, Microsoft today announced that it is acquiring
> Linux, the free operating system originally
>            developed by Linus Torvalds and a motley group of worldwide
> programmers, for $18 billion. 
> 
>            Mr. Torvalds, who recently joined a startup called
> Transmeta Corporation in Santa Clara, CA, will
>            personally receive $8 billion in cash and Microsoft stock,
> instantly making him one of the richest people
>            in Santa Clara. The rest of the money will be divvied up
> among the many contributors to Linux, as well
>            as 17 commercial companies which market Linux including
> Caldera, Debian, DLX, Red Hat Software,
>            Slackware, Stampede, S.u.S.E, and Yggdrasil Computing. All
> of the employees, officers, and directors
>            of these companies will immediately become Microsoft
> employees. 
> 
>            Transmeta, which is partly funded by the billionaire (and
> Microsoft co-founder) Paul Allen, will continue
>            employing Mr. Torvalds, although, both parties agree it's
> kind of silly, now that he's going to be so rich. 
> 
>            Asked why he was willing to pay so much money for the
> operating system, Bill Gates, chairman of
>            Microsoft, said, "It isn't a lot of money at all. It's
> nothing." Asked again, he said, "You heard what I said,
>            now stop bothering me." Asked once more, he replied, "Ok
> look, sure we're shelling out $18 billion, but
>            think about it: every person who is currently using, or who
> has ever used, the Linux operating system
>            will immediately need to pay Microsoft $1,995.00, annually.
> Consider that there are over 10 million
>            installations of Linux worldwide. Do the math. We'll
> collect almost $20 billion in the first year alone." 
> 
>            The Linux acquisition could pose a problem for IBM, which
> recently shelled out billions for the Apache
>            web server. Apache runs most commonly on Linux machines.
> Now, Apache will be running on a
>            Microsoft operating system. "It's like a high-stakes game
> of chess," said Indu Strypundit, an industry
>            pundit. "And like usual, we computer users are the pawns."
---------
This message was send by Majordomo 1.94.3. Please repport problems to
manu@rtfm.be. If you want to be deleted from the list, send a mail to
majordomo@rtfm.be with "unsubscribe linux-team" in the body.