VA Linux Now VA Software 236
g2g was among the people who noticed that Slashdot & OSDNs parent, VA Linux Systems has changed its name to VA Software. vasoftware.com is the new domain as I guess they are focusing on SourceForge and OSDN. On the upside, I guess newspapers will stop calling the company 'Linux' all the time.
Knowing our tech-savvy media (Score:3, Funny)
This just makes customers nervous (Score:2, Insightful)
When larger companies do this it creates quite a hit in the financials. Most even suffer enough losses to fall off the face of the earth. Markets like to interface with companies that are well-defined, to begin with.
I miss their hardware lineup -- really thought it was a GoodThing(TM). I'd say we're going to lose another good friend, in the long run
Re:Knowing our tech-savvy media & PR moves (Score:2)
--CTH
Considering its dismal performance (Score:2)
Re:Considering its dismal performance (Score:2)
"And in other news
www.vasoftware.biz (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Knowing our tech-savvy media (Score:2, Funny)
VA... (Score:3, Funny)
They're still around?
Re:VA... (Score:1)
This reminds me (Score:5, Funny)
But I suppose the new name better reflects their business.
Re:This reminds me (Score:1)
YMMV
Re:This reminds me (Score:3, Funny)
We trained hard - but it seemed that every time we were beginning to form into teams, we would be reorganized. I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganizing; and what a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress while producing confusion, inefficiency, and demoralization.
Petronius
77 BC
Just like my employer...
++Clarity? (Score:1)
well of course (Score:4, Funny)
...because it's really Red Hat == Linux, right? :)
Maybe good (Score:1, Interesting)
I predict... (Score:1)
Nope (Score:1)
Nah, oracle is busy supplying the US government with free (cough) software for the national ID card database.
VA Linux wanted to be called LINUX (Score:5, Insightful)
Why take the NASDAQ symbol LNUX if you don't want to be known as Linux?
Re:VA Linux wanted to be called LINUX (Score:2)
Re:Their new stocker symbol... (Score:2)
Way OT, but (Score:1)
Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
From the press release:
Are they planning on changing their ticker symbol or do they enjoy the contradiction of it all?
Re:Huh? (Score:1)
I think it's in the plans, but it isn't for definite, yet.
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Funny)
Are they planning on changing their ticker symbol or do they enjoy the contradiction of it all?
They're not planning on it, but the next ticker symbol for this company will be LNUXQ (followed quickly by LNUXQ.OB).
May be a chance for open source (Score:4, Insightful)
On the upside, it might make people see Open Source as something not necessarily Linux, but as a serious way of developing software. Open Source is more then Linux.
But will they ... (Score:2, Interesting)
that's a little close to.... (Score:1)
Re:that's a little close to.... (Score:1)
Just wondering that myself (Score:2)
Just imagine the confusion of having a ticker symbol of LNUX if you don't identify that anywhere in your company name. As LNUX is up to 2.84, this morning, I'd say they're safe from the NASDAQ axe, which accidentally chopped off Sedona [yahoo.com] the other day.
Watch out! (Score:1, Interesting)
Err, something like that. I'm sure Dave will rip me on this, but so be it
SF & OSDN ?= Katz? (Score:5, Interesting)
Yeah, I got that idea from Roblimo's note to kuro5hin [kuro5hin.org] about why it was being dropped by OSDN [kuro5hin.org].
One question: How does Katz fit into the whole OSDN/Sourceforge idea? Keep in mind that Kuro5hin wasn't a part of the OSDN/Sourceforge idea...
(No need to reply with "Just take him off your reading list", I am curious of the answer Taco/Roblimo will give. Aren't you?).
Re:SF & OSDN ?= Katz? (Score:2)
But to your broader question... I'm not sure that he does fit in. Not very well at any rate. I don't know his financial arrangements, but I imagine that he actually does make money for VA. I mean, there's at least one extra ad view for each person who posts "What is this Jon Katz garbage?!" and another ad view for "Just go to preferences and block articles by JK" and another for the people who go to preferences and block it...
Re:SF & OSDN ?= Katz? (Score:2, Interesting)
With your userID, I don't know if you were reading before the slashcode was released. Took forever. When everyone bitched about it, CT's answer was "every time someone asked for the source, I pushed it back a day". That is a striking example of his maturity.
This board isn't run by good people. It's run by petty tyrants. The success is a result of the readers/posters (even the FP'ers, trolls, etc.). It was/is largely in the right place at the right time, and attracted the right people. It has grown beyond the PTB, and they are having trouble coming to grips with that.
(Go ahead, mod me down. I've got karma to burn.)
Re:SF & OSDN ?= Katz? (Score:1)
Plus, he doesn't have to release his source, GPL or no. There's a place for immature people like deRaadt and others.
~~Wayback machine~~ (Score:2, Offtopic)
I hope Rusty gets kuro5hin back up. Bet he'll be more anal about backups after this. One of the things I like about k5 is that it reminds me of what /. was a few years ago.
Re:adequacy full of trolls? (Score:3, Funny)
And I've been wondering... will enough heads explode while boggling that very question to just make it stop entirely?
Re:SF & OSDN ?= Katz? (Score:3, Troll)
I never bought the arguments that because /. was so intertwined with the open source movement that /code had to be open source too. Sure it would have been logically inconsistent, but then when are people ever logically consistent.
It would have been a different thing had Taco been talking up how open /. was and then never released anything. But even during all the whining that I remember, there was always an ancient tarball of the /code sitting around. Whenever I saw or read Taco talking about /. or /code, he always said "Yeah, it's open, but we haven't released a version for quite a while. I'll release it when its ready for public consumption." (or words to that effect) He was almost always apologetic that the source hadn't been updated. But you know what? It was his code and it was his right to do whatever the hell he wanted to do with it. How would you like it if everyone demanded to read your version of the Great American Novel even though the rough draft was only half done? (I know, I know...I'm an Amerio-centric pig...whatever.)
This board is not run by petty tyrants. It's run by good people who are sick and tired of being flamed for every minor mistake. Its success has come in spite of the FP'ers who add absolutely nothing to the discussion (although I admit some of the trolls are pretty funny.)
-sk
Re:SF & OSDN ?= Katz? (Score:2)
~z
Re:SF & OSDN ?= Katz? (Score:1)
What about MY 'leet user id? I don't remember *not* having access to some (albeit archaic) version of slash.
I can't believe I started using a different id later just because my user name is so stupid!
Not A Valid Question (Score:1)
Katz doesn't fit in, in that he's too small of a piece in the puzzle. This would be like asking "How does John Smith, who works in the marketing department at HP, fit into the HP/Compaq merger?" It's just not a valid question.
-Waldo Jaquith
Re:Not A Valid Question (Score:2)
ObTopic: Katz is probably a "contributing something-or-other" as opposed to a direct employee, so their relationship should be flexible enough to deal with VA's changes.
Re:Speaking of Katz... (Score:1)
To have had money when they IPO'd (Score:2)
Given that was an off the wall IPO and one of the first Linux IPO's, but still...
Brain fart.
Re:To have had money when they IPO'd (Score:2)
I also think there was something funny going on that caused the stock to inflate so fast. Aren't there some accusations that the brokerage manipulating this and several other stocks?
thank god (Score:1)
Question (Score:1)
So what for /., OSDN, etc (Score:3, Interesting)
Given the current state of web advertising I cant imagine that anyone would want to buy them, so VA will probably be stuck with them for a while to come whether they like it or not.
Anyone want to buy /.? Going real cheap :)
At least... (Score:5, Funny)
Baz
Click dem links (Score:1)
This is old (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:This is old (Score:2)
Tom.
SFOE? (Score:2, Interesting)
if you want to help the free sourceforge effort, lend a hand with Debian-SF [gnu.org]... let's really get this codebase cranking! 2.5 installs great on woody, 2.6 (the last ever public snapshot) on its way...
Huh? (Score:1)
VA Software SourceForge now AI Hotspot (Score:1)
No matter what the name of the parent company, you can mod the SourceForge parent company 'way up for being the ne plus ultra main AI research focal point for environment Earth and parsecs around. [sourceforge.net]
As of today Fri.7.DEC.2001 there are 382 Open Source AI projects living in infamy on SourceForge, [sourceforge.net] where you may click on Software Map and pass down through Scientific/Engineering to explore the Artificial Intelligence category. [sourceforge.net]
The critical mass of AI ingenuity there is racing into the future towards the Technological Singularity. [caltech.edu] Already the Mentifex Artificial Mind in MSIE JavaScript [sourceforge.net] and in Forth for robots [scn.org] has been ported into Visual Basic as Mind.VB [virtualentity.com] and into Java as Mind.JAVA AI. [angelfire.com] The future of humankind and of robotkind is in the worthy hands of VA Software/SourceForge.
Well (Score:5, Funny)
Sigh (Score:3, Insightful)
If people changed their name, each time they started doing somethign different, you'd never keep track. Companies are no different. The name, per se, really doesn't matter. It's the -identity- that counts. And that is something VA* is rapidly losing.
The only time I've seen name-changes be profitable is when the company desperately needs to ditch the old identity. (eg: Windscale's name-change to Selafield was purely for PR reasons, cos Windscale had an image so utterly carp that Satan himself would have looked on with envy.)
A good example of a company losing out is Lucent. Bell Labs made a REAL blunder on this one. Nobody knew who they were. No identity had been created. And yet, they were trying to play right alongside the REALLY big players. It was a disaster.
VA* should go back to VA Research, because that's a name that was (and is) known. It's established. It gained credibility. Not the company, the identity. Companies (and people) don't gain credibility with others, by and large. It's the image that does. That's why trademarks (literally, the mark that identifies the origin, for trade) are so important. Because THAT is where the money lies.
(You could build two absolutely identical computers, for example. But if one of them had a sticker labelling it as the product of a trusted company, and the other didn't, it wouldn't matter that the person building them, and even the parts, were the same. People buy the label, not the product. The product is simply the thing that the label is stuck onto.)
Re:Sigh (Score:3, Informative)
Why not? Because... (Score:3, Interesting)
How many people outside of programming understand wildcard characters?
When was the last time Joe Q. Windows User needed to know what a wildcard was, what it looked like, or what it meant?
Nobody will save time and effort this way, because nobody outside of programming is intelligent enough to use this "abbreviation". :-)
Just curious.. (Score:2)
It's been coming for months; anyone can go find this out for themselves. Stockholders will already be notified..
How on earth is VA changing it's name slightly a newsworthy article?
Seriously... slashdot has been going downhill.. the number of quality articles has been going down, down down....
It's not even funny. The editors don't edit.. the titles are often sensationalist and misleading. They are often full of grammatical errors, as well as syntactical ones.
Sure, I might make mistakes.. but I'm not the editor..
C'mon guys. Let's get back to posting nerd news that MATTERS, and having some intelligent discussion.
In other news... (Score:5, Funny)
To reflect the fact they do not, have never and will never sell apples, Apple computers have changes their name to "Mac"
To reflect the fact that they are now more of a computer manufacturior rather than a machine manufacturer, and that they also operate at both a personal and business level, International Business Machines (IBM) have changed their name to International Computers & Stuff (ICS).
To reflect the fact that they are not mandrakes, do not look like mandrakes, and - despite the fact they are french - rarely even eat mandrakes, Mandrake Software are changin their name to "ThatFrenchDistro".
and so on....
To reflect the fact that I am not really Denholm Elliot in Indian Jones and the last crusade, I will now be changing my name by Deed Poll to "Depressed Cupboard Cheescake", to better represent my psychological state.
Thankyou, and.... Goodnight
similar to dropping ".com" from Company Names (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm afraid that this will be a similar trend. The Wall Street love affair with Linux is over. No longer can a company put Linux in its name and demand large sums of venture capital. VA wants to decouple itself from what it perceives as a sinking ship, the "Linux trend".
Notice that I decouple this from the technical merits of the operating system. To argue that Linux-based business models have proven difficult to establish profits is not the same thing as to undermine the Linux operating system.
I love the operating system but don't think many of the current "Linux companies" have viable business models. I favor the IBM approach. They are embracing Linux under their established IT services business.
Re:similar to dropping ".com" from Company Names (Score:2)
Uh oh (Score:1, Funny)
Linux Company? (Score:1)
VA Research was a fine name. 'VA Linux' just inflated the IPO rush.
VA Research :) (Score:1)
I can see a Linux-only company adding it to their name (though the examples I can think of are dangerous -- LinuxGruven? LinuxCare?), VA Research I think was a cooler name. VA Systems would be a nice generalized, plausable-deniability name, too
On that note though, I think "VA Software" is better than "VA Linux" as a company name. Nobody asked me about the name change, though
Cheers,
timothy
better, not beter (Score:1)
Does anyone else think....? (Score:2)
Does anyone else think they should give up the LNUX ticker symbol and the Linux.com [linux.com] domain? Not that they should have to necessarily, but it might be a good idea, especially considering they have kind of gotten out of the "Linux business". Obviously they are still involved with Open Source software, but that is a much larger set than the subset that is "Linux".
Just my 2 cents.
anyone else thinks of Newsforge slashboxes here? (Score:1)
They stream out 2 feeds there, newsforge and newsvac. And, BTW, when one uses Newsforge, the Slashdot feed is there to add...
(Yes, my article rejected by Slashdot was posted on NewsVac...)
The Three Biggest Threats to VA (Score:3, Interesting)
Really, the largest three threats to VA are:
a.) getting delisted,
b.) having a profitable business model, and
c.) being able to overcome their leveraging.
a.) Getting delisted would mean that any new issues of stock wouldn't find a market on NASDAQ though it would prob be an OTC Penny Stock (e.g., found on the "Pink Sheets"). They would have a harder time finding underwriters for new issues of stock or, if they elect a best efforts underwriting, willing investors to buy the stock.
b.) A successful businessplan. All of us have seen a lot of stupid companies die from not having a solid way to make money. We have all seen raving open-source lunatics turn into begrudged closed-source adherents (not supporters) when the paychecks stopped. You need to make money and have reasonable margins. I haven't seen many open-source plans that scale beyond a small, thrifty business... and VA is neither. I'm not convinced that Red Hat is much better because (as we have seen in /. before) they are quite good at cooking the books.
c.) VA is highly leveraged, meaning they have a lot of creditors. A real challenge is going to be paying off the creditors and still maintaining enough of a profit margin to keep their heads above water. If you don't start a business with profit, it becomes an order of magnitude higher to gain one later. As an example, ask any small business owner who has had to take out a loan and try to make a profit in the short term while incurring serious debt. You can't reinvest as much into the business which is absolutely crucial when you are trying to start up.
Pity poor Linux Hardware Solutions. (Score:2)
Remember way back when VA (then called VA Research) snapped up Linux Hardware Solutions [valinuxsystems.com]? They were acquired at the same time as "Enlightenment Solutions." Afterwards, they changed their name to "VA Linux Systems," probably because nobody knew what the hell "VA Research" meant.
A few months later, they announced their IPO. Folks there must have felt drunk when they saw their stock valuation vault to - well, it was the biggest first-day pop in history [wired.com], let's just put it that way. Even Eric Raymond piped up [wired.com] about the windfall (salient points for the busy: "Wow. Thanks, Linux hackers. I'm buying a new gun. Charities can go fuck themselves.")
All this was only two years ago. How time flies. I'm looking at my comparatively antediluvean userID and feeling all nostaligic.
Incidentally - VA's stock has been doing not-so-badly since November [lycos.com]. Interesting.
LNUX (Score:2)
Re:LNUX - ticker symbol has not changed (Score:3, Informative)
A company can request a change of stock symbol, but it's rarely done. More common is what happens in bankruptcy. When a NASDAQ-listed company goes into bankruptcy, its symbol gets a "Q" on the end, as you can see here when At Home Corp. [downside.com] was changed from ATHM to ATHMQ on October 10, 2001.
Another year... (Score:3, Funny)
What about the stock ticker.... (Score:3, Insightful)
I bet if they don't change the stock ticker every time Red Hat's stock goes up so will VA (this, of course could be an insider traders dream).
Of course I'm sure it'll go down when RHAT does as well. Also, I think Red Hat has too much marketing invisted in the "Red Hat" brand to change the stock ticker.
Oh well, nice try as a linux company VA, I really thought you'd make it (or atleast stay in the game).
Be respectful! (Score:2, Insightful)
No need to change the ticker symbol (Score:2)
Looking at the past trend, with ups and downs, the share price has maintained a drop of about one order of magnitude per year. If it continues the trend it will shortly reverse the small gains it has made recently and head down into sub-$1 range shortly. That will lead to its delisting, obviating the need to change from LNUX to SOFT or whatever.
Re:VA Bankrupt coming soon! (Score:5, Informative)
Looking up LNUX [yahoo.com] shows that it has a moderate downslope, then being relatively flat since the beginning of September, with a recent moderate rise.
This is not totally unlike the Dow Jones Ind. Avg. [yahoo.com], which is recovering quite nicely from the Sept. 11th events, and is even making up ground lost since the recession started and the dot-bomb era.
Now, I am not sure that VA is going to do well. But the stock market doesn't agree. At this time, the stock is up ~3%
Re:VA Bankrupt coming soon! (Score:1)
What are you talking about? The scale of the "moderate downslope" are no where near the DJIA. Take a look at the same chart against the DJIA [yahoo.com]. You can say what you want about VA Linu^H^H^H^H Software, but please don't claim their stock hasn't been volatile.
Re:VA Bankrupt coming soon! (Score:1)
More graphs - compare vs RHAT and MSFT (Score:2)
Here's another interesting graph:
Compare LNUX vs RHAT [yahoo.com]And yet another:
LNUX vs MSFT [yahoo.com]VA Linux is perhaps an under-performer, but the general trends can be seen in all the graphs.
Re:More graphs - compare vs RHAT and MSFT (Score:1)
VA Linux is perhaps an under-performer, but the general trends can be seen in all the graphs.
Um, during the lifetime of the LNUX vs. MSFT chart that you chose, a quick eyeballing shows MSFT to have gone up about 25% and LNUX has gone down about 55%. What's the particular trend that you're referring to?
Unless, of course, you mean that the trend itself is that MSFT is on an upward path and LNUX is on a downward path, which does seem to be what the future holds. I just thought you were referring to something else.
Re:More graphs - compare vs RHAT and MSFT (Score:2)
Even more interesting is this graph: RHAT vs. MSFT [yahoo.com].
Food for financial thought. By the way, RHAT is trading about triple what it was on Sept 10. I wish I'd put money down.
Re:More graphs - compare vs RHAT and MSFT (Score:2)
Gee, it's too bad I can't adjust the starting and ending day more precisely, maybe that is a feature we need. At least the other posters (both pro and anti- rhat/linux) brought up these charts at the default settings.
Re:More graphs - compare vs RHAT and MSFT (Score:2)
I would say yours is the most meaningful, because it starts with MSFT and RHAT both at a low and compares where they've gone since. All the others have MSFT and RHAT at different moments in their respective histories and don't make a very good comparison.
Re:More graphs - compare vs RHAT and MSFT (Score:2)
Re:More graphs - compare vs RHAT and MSFT (Score:2)
You're changing the "1 month", "2 month", "3 month", "1 year", etc thing, right? That changes the start date. The end date is always the current date.
By selecting 3 months, you're looking at a comparison since Sept 8. That's pretty close to the day the planes hit, which we could reasonably call a low point for most stocks. It was certainly a low for RHAT.
Re:More graphs - compare vs RHAT and MSFT (Score:2)
Or this [yahoo.com].
Re:More graphs - compare vs RHAT and MSFT (Score:2)
Re:VA Bankrupt coming soon! (Score:2)
Re:VA Bankrupt coming soon! (Score:1)
LNUX it's self looks over valued at $2. There should be turn around plays with fractional price/cash ratios. LNUX needs reverse splits to give room to fall without being delisted.
Buffet thinks we will see 6% or 7% outa stocks for the next 10 years and he knows what he's talking about, but +1.5% above bonds is not enough for fixed income people to justify holding stocks IMHO.
Hey moderators (Score:1)
If you think that by modding down people who say the truth, you can conceal that VA had a TERRIBLE performance so far, then you are more stupid than you seem. Same goes for moderating up this little hypster.
Now go on and mod me down, but don't think that people are so stupid as to not check the full graph of LNUX. And that graph is revealing a lot, a lot of painful truth, that VA Linux Systems or whatever it's called, is a piece of shit and should be avoided like weaponized anthrax.
Re:Hey moderators (Score:2)
I am sure in a couple of months this article will be referenced by many when VA finally does go belly up. Its sad to see Slashdot sell out so much to their corporate master in the hopes that they actually might be able to ride out their options.
Re:Hey moderators (Score:2)
Face it, everybody here is aware that the stock dropped like a rock and is worthless. I think it is interesting that it is not dropping right now (not that I would recommend anybody buy it, either), since I (and I bet you) would assumme it is still dropping. Why can't people point out facts that contradict the assummed wisdom?
Re:Clueless moderators... (Score:2)
Re:VA Bankrupt coming soon! (Score:2)
Read my other post. The stock was totally and incredibly overvalued at $200+.
You sound like an angry man who bought some of those same stocks when they were overvalued, and are now pissed that you didn't get out earlier.
Re:VA Bankrupt coming soon! (Score:2)
I didnt see your other post before I replied -- might have been before you wrote it. I have just seen so much astroturfing lately to save stupid business plans.
If I show anger, it is because I have watched too many people get burned in the market trying to tie their CPU/Software activism into profits. When it fails, I think it hurts the movement.
Re:VA Bankrupt coming soon! (Score:1)
Re:VA Bankrupt coming soon! (Score:2)
If I were Linus I would have sued VA for tarnishing the Linux name. :)
Re:kinda old news (Score:2)
Re:TechTV (Score:1)