ESR's Desktop Linux 2008 Deadline 535
jesboat noted Eric S. Raymond and Rob Landley's essay about what the Linux community must do to achieve dominance entitled "World Domination 201". It says
"Idealism about open formats will not solve our multimedia problem in time; in fact, getting stuck on either belief in the technical superiority of open source or free-software purism guarantees we will lose. The remaining problems aren't technical ones, and none of the interesting patents will expire before the end of 2008. We've got to ship something that works now. If we let this be a blocking issue preventing overall Linux adoption during the transition window, we won't have the userbase to demand changes in the laws to untangle the screwed up patent system, or even prevent it from getting worse. It's a chicken and egg problem, demanding a workaround until a permanent solution can be achieved. We can't set the standards until after we take over the world."
So this is what ESR has been doing! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:H.264 (Score:1, Informative)
Re:The only real problem of Linux is (Score:1, Informative)
Currently, multimedia support is considered an essential part of the desktop. However, it is illegal for an OEM to include various bits (DeCSS, MP3, codecs) without license agreements, and there isn't one person an OEM can pay for this license. Redhat doesn't even offer the option of paying them for this support.
So until the multimedia problem is solved, the pre-installation problem for the general public will wait. There are and will be niche places to get a PC with Linux pre-installed, but they won't be fit for the general public.
Re:Any Fact Checking? (Score:1, Informative)
So yeah, Microsoft would win that cagefight but they couldn't just buy Home Depot outright with cash in ESR's anarcho-libertarian utopia. No big deal - it's not like you published a call-to-arms paper for general consumption.
Re:Just remove the 'Open'? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:H.264 (Score:3, Informative)
It doesn't.
Flash 6 introduced the Sorenson Spark codec that was essentially a variant of H.263 (not H.264).
Flash 8 added support for On2 VP6, a proprietary codec.
H.264 is not presently supported by Flash.
Re:World Domination 201? (Score:2, Informative)
RTFA! From the first paragraph:
Suffice it to say that capping on ESR w/o reading the (lengthy, well cited and well written) article is what strikes me as sophomoric...