Microsoft Dilutes Open Source, Coins 'Open Surface' 191
sfcrazy writes "Now, Microsoft is coining yet another term to further confuse users — 'Open Surface.' Senior Director for Open Source Communities at Microsoft, Gianugo Rabellino, said at Oscon 2011 that customers don't care about the underlying platform as long as the APIs, protocols and standards for the cloud are open. That's when he threw the term 'open surface.'" This seems to have more than a grain of truth to it — after all, programmers have been creating open-source software with closed-source programming languages for many years, and I'm certainly more impressed by Google's willingness to let me export my data than I am turned off by the fact that they use a mix of open and closed source software to run the Google circus.
Strawman attack (Score:4, Interesting)
Published APIs are important, nay, necessary for "cloud" applications and services to be useful to developers to build upon. Open source is necessary for community based development of the underlying applications or services.
Open source software is completely irrelevant in this instance and this appears to be a simple strawman attack from Microsoft against the open source movement.
Stop the hating already (Score:1, Interesting)
Microsoft has taken some big hits and seems like they are ready to play ball with the community. They are totally OK with modifications to their phone platform where Apple and Android Handset makers are not. They have reversed their stance on linux and are actively using it, contributing to it, and offering it as part of their cloud services. Is Ballmer a nutjob? Yes. Do you really think after how badly he tanked the company since Gates left he's calling the shots anymore, and will not be "stepping down" soon? Come on.
Microsoft, please first open "surface" Skype. Give us somewhere to get an API key and a protocol specification to the Skype network so we can make apps to send push notifications to Skype usernames that subscribe to them. Digium has stopped Skype support for Asterisk, open up the protocol and instantly every PBX software in existance can have a Skype module -- instantly you add amazing corporate-level value to your product. Make all your services as easy to manage for Linux admins as Amazon's cloud platform services are. I might even use MS-SQL server in my web app if it were hosted on a server I could manage with nothing more than an SSH and the occaisional VNC connection. Give Oracle some real competition to Java and SQL, give Apple some real competition to handheld gaming/communication, give Google some real competition to Online Presence Management and Advertising.
You have the potential to surpass your former glory, but you aren't going to do it by mimicing anymore. Drop "embrace, extend, extinguish" for "innovate, profit, liberate". Hell, you want some amazing branding, open source Windows XP and watch the ensuing holy war in the open source community over which Desktop OS to run once the first mashup is made. Change with the times and you will not be left behind.
Re:What is the point of the linked page? (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm not really sure how this differs from typical APIs where the programmer...
One is a marketing term that Microsoft can slap a trademark application in for, the other is not? Then Microsoft can claim to be the only vendor with Open Surface(tm) systems, or OSS.
Who does that server really serve? (Score:3, Interesting)
All I am going to say to those of you who think "open source" does not matter is read Richard Stallman's paper "Who Does That Server Really Serve?"
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/who-does-that-server-really-serve.html [gnu.org]
Having open and honestly published API's and protocols is important and certainly better than nothing, but there are so many other reasons why access to source code is important for trust and freedom in computing.
Re:Embrace, Extend, Extinguish (Score:2, Interesting)
Microsoft would be correct in assuming that most users wouldn't care about the openness of the underlying platform as long as API's, protocols and standards are open.
The problem is that API's, protocols and standards pretty much never are open without releasing a reference implementation. The API's for Windows are not open simply because they do not offer access to every aspect of the underlying platform. To make a completely open API, you have to release the sourcecode to whatever the API is for; it's the only way to ensure everything is accessible. Publishing a limited set of API's is NOT open.
Microsoft themselves have repeatedly demonstrated the difference between an "API" and "Full access to the underlying platform".
So this leaves the adage "Never attribute to malice what can be adequately explained by stupidity.". Assuming Microsoft isn't stupid, that leaves only one explaination.