IBM to Oracle - You Can't Buy Open Source

mrops writes "CNET has up a short article about IBM's reaction to Oracle's recent acquisitions. From the article: 'Handy was responding to comments made by Oracle CEO Ellison to the Financial Times, where he said that he wanted Oracle to control a 'full stack' of software, including the Linux operating system. If Oracle did try to buy a Linux distributor, such as Red Hat or Novell, Handy said 'we'd stick to our strategy of having two or more independent distributors and have to wait and see what happens.'" It should be pointed out, as noted in yesterday's Slashback, that Ellison has no intentions of purchasing Red Hat.

Re:Why not?

['nother poster]

The licensing that the open source software exists under says that everyone else can simply take that code and do what they want as long as they provide the source. There is no way for Oracle to take it away is what they were saying. I don't think they are trying to do that anyway. I think, like many others, that they simply want to step into the game with an installed base to get an advantage.

The business model they have in mind...

[ArrowFlynn]

Oracle, like IBM, Sun and others are still all experimenting with the ways that they can make FOSS development work for them. Oracle is not likely to try to "own" any distribution of Linux, there's no profit or future in that. Instead they, like everyone else, want to set the open standards. Leading on open standards is leading the competiton. Rebecca Henderson, Professor of Management at MIT, has a a great talk on the new hyper-competitive world of open source. You can view it for free through MIT's Open Course Archive: http://mitworld.mit.edu/video/274/ [mit.edu]

Apache Geronimo

[JimmyFo]

Didn't IBM just buy this opensource project: http://geronimo.apache.org/ [apache.org] and make it http://sourceforge.net/powerbar/websphere/ [sourceforge.net]? 1) Take open source software 2) Brand it 3) Profit?

Re:Oracle buys IBM

[Kadin2048]

Not sure if that was a joke, but just in case it wasn't:

Oracle Corp. (Nasdaq: ORCL)

• Market Cap $73.07 Billion USD,
  
• revenue $13.41 B
  
• gross profit $9.15 B
  
• Employees 49,872

International Business Machines Corp. (NYSE: IBM)

• Market Cap $128.6 Billion USD,
  
• revenue $91.13 B
  
• gross profit $36.53 B
  
• Employees 341,750

So if either company were to buy the other, it would be IBM acquiring Oracle, but I think Oracle's probably too big for them to swallow in any event.

Oracle is certainly the more profitable company though, in terms of profit/revenue, but then again they don't really manufacture anything, while IBM still makes and sells a lot of stuff.

Bssst... Thank you for playing

[Anonymous Coward]

"All OS means is that the code is published"

You are only 1/10th correct.

Wrong- Even Microsoft admitted this was wrong.

Now go read up and become an educated Slashbot.
http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php [opensource.org]

1) Free Distibution
2) Source code
3) Derived works
4) Integrity of The Author's Source Code
5) No Discrimination Against Persons or Groups
6) No Discrimination Against Fields of Endeavor
7) Distribution of License
8) License Must Not Be Specific to a Product
9) License Must Not Restrict Other Software
10)License Must Be Technology-Neutral