Dear friends:
I am exhilirated by Linux and at the same time concerned about its
future:
I have been using Linux for about a year and a half (first Red Hat and
for the past year Linux-Mandrake, now upgrading to 7.1, and I just love
it. For a year I ran Linux and nothing but Linux. Recently, due to the
continuing encroachment of Windows Media Player, I have had no choice
but to install Win98 as a dual Linux-Windows system. Why? Almost
overnight stations everywhere were switching to WMP. For me this is not
a question of entertainment alone but of professional needs. As a
Russian translator, I suddenly discovered that most Russian television
stations now broadcast their domestic programs in Russian using WMP? The
same goes for many other languages.
And the same goes for many other areas that Microsoft is relentlessly
pursuing even as the judge is about to hand his verdict later this
afternoon.
The following two articles made a very deep impression on me. I am NOT a
programmer, but the writing is or seems to be on the wall. What
precisely? Not that Linux is dying. On the contrary, it is exploding all
over and conquering new territory every day, from the new IBM S/390
mainframe computers down to embedded systems. I enjoy reading LinuxToday
(www.linuxtoday.com) just to read the daily headlines that are a
rollcoll, a cavalcade of Linux's fantastic successes. Recently, I
discovered that GeoVRML will bring 3D for the first time to Linux.
The authors of the two articles below express deep concern about a key
tendency in Linux, namely, that of FOLLOWING technological innovations
on the Windows and Mac platforms (I don't mean Microsoft's "innovation"
but that of Windows developers and third party software companies
developing applications for Windows and the Mac) rather than LEADING
them.
The first article deals with a potentially astonishing development for
computers in general and a devastating blow to Open Source, namely, the
Star Wars talkie computer strategy, i.e. a possible Voice Recognition
OS, developed by Microsoft or Apple. The author bemoans the nearly total
neglect of this and other critical technologies by the Open Source
Community. He claims that such a talkie technology would have to be an
OS technology, and he opines that this may well be Microsoft's secret
plan, i.e. to keep stalling until the technology is fully developed
(shades of their first attempts at a browser, at Windows Media Player
and at a PocketPC). If Microsoft succeeds, the author believes that it
will continue its monopoly power for at least another generation.
URL:
http://linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2000-06-07-017-06-PS-MS
The second is an article on Microsoft Patents ASF Media Format: Stops
Reverse Engineering. Again, the author laments the fact that the Open
Source community would rather spend its time creating yet another text
editor rather than getting together and forming its own standard,
software and pushing for its implementation and universal adoption.
Again, he implies that Linux is a follower and not a leader.
URL:
http://linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2000-06-07-002-20-OS-MS-SW
I am not raising these issues because I have the answers but in order to
spark a serious discussion by professionals about the issues raised in
these and other articles.
Is GNU/Linux a leader or a follower and should it be?
If RealPlayer falls by the wayside (the signs are already there, no
matter how rosy the 120 million base of users picture looks because
Microsoft has bundled its WMP Server with Windows 2000), what will Linux
have left. We will be surfing the Web blind, groping in the darkness of
a Microsoft world dominated by Microsoft's "embrace, extend and
extinguish" concept of standard-adherence. In other words, we will be at
the mercy of Microsoft.
More importantly, Linux will be at the mercy not only of Microsoft but
of proprietary software companies in general, of strangulation by UCITA,
etc.
My own general impression after being a regular reader of LinuxToday for
over a year is that Linux is, generally speaking, REACTING to
developments in the proprietary world rather than leading it by
developing new technologies. Linux is obviously a great visionary
achievement by a dedicated cooperative worldwide movement, but it began
as an attempt to duplicate UNIX on the PC (and also recently on the
Mac). KDE is fabulous, and, like everyone else, I am very excited about
KDE2, but again, it is an attempt to duplicate Windows (albeit in a
superior way). So is Koffice. And I guess so is Gnome. And so is Mozilla
an attempt at creating a superior browser rather than a whole new
technology that might make a browser obsolete in the first place (such
as the Napster, for instead, or Gnutella). And Sun's StarOffice, my
default Office program, a wonderful, feature-rich program more than
sufficient for most of us, is again an attempt (successful, I assume) to
duplicate and possibly to outdo Microsoft Office).
So, is Linux a leader or a follower. And what should it be?
Should it duplicate what other proprietary systems have already done or
should it compete with them by revolutioning existing technology and
drawing people to it not only because it can do what Windows does only
so much better, with such fabulous reliability and true multitasking,
etc., but rather because it offers something truly revolutionary?
In short: what would happen if Linux had developed voice technology and
were able to suddenly surprise the computer world with a Star Treck
talkie PC? Wouldn't that turn the entire desktop world upside down?
Just thinking aloud, folks.
Thanks for listening.
Benjamin
--
Benjamin and Anna Sher
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sher's Russian Web
http://www.websher.net
