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TurboLinux Businesses

Rumored LinuxCare/TurboLinux Merger 66

Posted by CmdrTaco from the floating-through-the-rumor dept.
Several people in the last 24 hours have submitted various shreds of evidence that a Letter of Intent has been signed to merge LinuxCare and TurboLinux. Please treat this purely as rumor since the most substantial piece of information we have is a brief email allegedly insiders. I've attached it if you read on. (And speculate on names: TurboCare?)

Subject: [US-staff] Confidential heads up...
Date: Thu, 11 Jan 2001 20:31:26 -0800
From: Paul Thomas

Turbolinux Confidential

Hello everyone,

As i've said many times in the past, one of the jobs of the CEO is to increase shareholder value. One of the ways of doing this, is to find partners for acquisitions or mergers. As part of this, we are constantly in discussions with other companies in our industry. The vast majority of these discussions never result in any substantial relationship or agreement. Our discussions with LinuxCare however have become more serious, and have resulted in the signing of a LOI (letter of intent). A LOI merely states that both companies will make best efforts to reach a definitive agreement.

The boards and management teams of both Turbolinux and LinuxCare believe we have very complimentary strengths, that together make us much stronger as combined companies.

i know you each have lots of questions. Unfortunately because we are still early in the discussions, and don't yet have a final agreement, i don't have all the answers. i will do my best to answer your questions early next week when we have a company meeting. Until then, please stay focused on the business at hand. The one thing i can guarantee is that these things always take longer to complete than staff you think they will (or should).

Thanks in advance for your support and understanding.....paul"
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Rumored LinuxCare/TurboLinux Merger More

Rumored LinuxCare/TurboLinux Merger

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  • Re:one (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Feh, it was the Brits who taught the Arabs buggery.

    Prior to WWI, the Arabs were normal, red blooded heterosexuals.

    But then came Lawrence, of Arabia, who became a great leader of Arabia due to his propenstity to blow up Turks. So, once he asked the Arabs to bugger him, they acquiesced, and decided this was the normal way to have sex.

    Or, um, wait, maybe it was the English Crusaders that taught the Arabs to enjoy buggery.

  • great... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    a new company full of gay orientals.

  • What a wussy European solution (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    m on to your scam. mod UP all america-bashing comments, mod DOWN all critcisms of europeans.

    somebody needs to prevent this in the slash source.

    By advocating this,m I can tell that you are a sissified, emasculated European, probably British, too.

    Real, right thinking Americans don't really on others to legislate fixes for themm, not in personal defense, not in caring for the poor, not at Slashdot.

    Real, right thinking Americans take things into their own hands. May I echo the greatest president of our time, Ronald Reagan, and let a thousand American posts of light spring forth onto Slashdot.
  • because they would be perceived as only supporting one distro -- TurboLinux. They've built a reputation on supporting ALL distros.
  • All Linux Hardware vendors provide support. ie Penguin Computing and VA Linux. I really don't see what the issue is here.

    -miah
  • Yeah, but the Babylonians are responsible for all this base60 nonsense that we see today (like 60 seconds in a minutes...)

    And if they had brains, they wouldn't have fucked with Kuwait.. :)

  • To add to your already insightful comment:

    Suppose RedHat 15.0 is a piece of garbage, shipped without a compiler, running only shrinkwrap software. It has no commercial competition. Hacker Joe sees the situation as an opportunity to start a business, so he takes the RedHat distribution, tweaks it to run standard software, includes a compiler, and releases his own distribution that is just like RedHat, but everything is now fixed. Sound familiar? Mandrake showed us the way. I expect that scenario to play out many times in the future.
  • The *CEO* of TurboLinux doesn't even use proper capitalization in his written statements? Seems a little out of place to me. What's with all the lowercase references to himself? Smells a little fishy around here...
  • Dude...those weren't typos or casual mistakes. He consistently referred to himself as 'i'. Doing so once or twice I can brush off as a typo. Forgetting to capitalize the name of a month I can accept as a casual mistake. Constantly using 'i' instead of 'I', however, is just plain ignorant.

  • For those that don't get it - TurboLinux was originally Pacific HiTech, but they changed their name and kicked out the founders. Perhaps something similar will happen here.

    The founders changed the name when the company was small and young, over a year later they were terminated by the board of directors (who didn't exist at time of said name change). Here's the deal, as I understand it:

    Cliff Miller (and wife Iris, the founders) started PHT, turned it into TL, hired Paul Thomas as the CEO, but wanted him to do what they wanted. The stockholders, as the story goes, told him that, as the CEO, it was his job to do what would make them the most money, which meant getting rid of Cliff. Cliff and Iris (very lovely people) have now started a new company, and I'm sure will do quite well. I wouldn't expect anything this drastic to happen with the (supposed) TL/LC merger.. Cliff & Iris's dismissal could only be described as a power struggle. The company was horribly divided at the time, IIRC - but has stabilized (is stabilizing? some? maybe? ;p) now...

    Peace

  • TurboLinux, as a distribution, is focused on high-end/enterprise server customers (hence : TurboCluster, EnFuzion, many bundled commercial databases, etc..)..

    It *is* possible that TurboLinux could change direction.. Who knows, but that ain't where it's goin right now, or where it's been goin for the past 18 months.. Probably with good reason : *everyone* is attacking the desktop market. You're going to see better desktop distros from Mandrake, Caldera, and Corel (if ya like that kinda stuff) - this is what they do..

    Sorry to burst your (rumored) bubble ;p

    Peace

  • I would say it's more likely that TurboLinux would become more distro agnostic.. TurboLinux will probably be pushed, but not too hard.. Who cares what (free) distro they're using, if they're spending lots of money on classes and support, eh?

    Why should anyone care what I say? Cuz I work for TurboLinux, and I see a large shift towards making money off services and support lately.. We've also been good friends with LinuxCare for a while now - so this wouldn't surprise me.. Can't confirm or deny anything, of course, because I conveniently haven't checked my e-mail yet this morning ;p

    I don't think you have anything to worry about - espescially with regards to supporting RedHat. RedHat and TurboLinux are, by and large, the same. The installers differ somewhat, the gui/curses config tools differ quite a bit, etc.. but if you like to get to the nitty gritty and edit text files, you're editing the same files, still using RPMs, etc.. You probably won't ever find a RH RPM that won't install on TurboLinux. DISCLAIMER: it's commonly assumed that TurboLinux *copied* RedHat, which isn't quite true. Up until RedHat 4.?, TurboLinux did the japanese localization of RH, and made small mods to the distro - then went off and did its' own thing. From what I'm told, their installer has as much of our code as ours has of theirs

    We've also been developing our classes to be somewhat distro-independent. We teach Linux using TurboLinux, focusing on knowing what config files are being used, what other types of initscript setups and package managers are available, etc..

    Of course, this is all speculation, but I s'pose speculation from me is better than speculation from.. some random person who doesn't know anything at all about TurboLinux :). For the record, I've been around ~2 years now, since we were Pacific HiTech.. It's been a bumpy road.. No official company statements here, just rantin' in the mornin about something I know a little about for once..

    Peace

  • Since these aren't public companies, it's a pretty safe bet that the stock price won't be effected by any rumours.

    Slashdot really expects a bit more effort from its karma whores.

  • name (Score:1)

    by csbruce ( 39509 )
    (And speculate on names: TurboCare?)

    No, LinuxLinux. Or at least a company with a name like that would have had an awesome IPO a year ago.
  • Mission Critical Linux [missioncriticallinux.com] is providing Linux solutions and Linux service and support, available now. Why wait for a rumored merger?

  • Is this a canceling thing? So if you have:

    Turbo Linux
    ---X----
    Linux Care

    you can cancel the two linuxes and get TurboCare?

  • I don't %*^*ing believe it! I just posted the same message! Bollox!
  • So, the guy who allegedly wrote this letter is CEO of a major corporation and he can't properly capitilize 'I've?' I'm not sure if this makes a statement about the authenticity of the letter, his attention to detail, or the state of Linux spell/grammar checking. Maybe none of the above.
  • Aha, that's where Star Office and Word come in handy! With Auto-correction features, one can now simply type without ever hitting the shift key, as long as you're not quoting people (and if you're the kind of person who doesn't hit the shift key, you probably don't quote very often).

    So one can type:

    i think thats realy good, but maybe we need ot add even mroe auto correction features.

    and have it come out:

    I think that's really good, but maybe we need to add even more Auto Correction features.

    Yep. The miracle of technology.
  • Make that 3 distros. The Chinese government will have their own.
  • I wonder why Paul doesn't captialize his 'i's.
  • its rumors like these that kill stock and generate bad reviews. although, the merger of linuxCare and turboLinux is an important buisness action that we should be aware of, we should try to keep in mind that this is a rumor and to wait for more substantial information before we change distros.


    the perfect world is a world without lag. a world without lag is a world without people
  • But isn't posting this document right on /. illegal, if not just inappropriate? I don't work for these companies, or anything, and I am not sure where this document came from, but it seems to me that something like this would be better off referred to indirectly than posted for everyone to see, considering that it is in fact a stolen document.
  • Uh, Tools->Autocorrect?

    Then uncheck the "Replace text as you type" box. That allowed me to type "While i wait." Word becomes more useful as you shut stuff off.

    I had a feeling you were going to say that.

  • As i've said many times in the past, one of the jobs of the CEO is to increase shareholder value.

    And starting rumours about new mergers is another great way of getting the stock up a few points isn't it? And it's pretty easy too, what with places like /. willing to post unsubstantiated stuff...

  • i dont think, that there will be only two distros.

    if you think of pcs for example, there are many different computer-shops and even companies (compaq, dell, gateway, ...) that assemble pcs. they even produce own hardware (notebooks, pc-cases, whatever ) but mainly they put together hardware of other manufacturers.

    linux distros are similar in some areas. the components are developed by others and the distros assemble these components. Sometimes they develop some components by their own. it all comes down to what segment of the market you want to reach.

    and after all, the fsb will prevent companies from becoming monopolists ( ok, they try =) )

  • I really love autocorrection especcialy in text like:

    ... where index i ranges over ...

    (Now in which forest of menu options was the possibility of turning this off? thank god I switched to $i$)

  • Re:one (Score:1)

    by kyz ( 225372 )
    It was Americans who invented counting you know.

    It was actually the Iraqis, you know (previously known as Babylonians). One in the eye for you Yanks, they've got brains *and* oil. No wonder you want to leech off them.
  • This is the second post I've seen modded "offtopic", for pointing out poor grammar/spelling that just shouldn't come from the desk of a CEO.
  • As long as there is open source, we'll have hackers (programmers) messing around in the source. Even if Linux turns into something like the commecial *nix*es, I'd say a great percentage of the /. community could care less, cause we can still build our own distro from scratch if we wanna :-)

    As for end-users, well... I haven't yet seen a Linux distro that comes close enough to something like Windows in terms of easy installation, use, and especially configuration. When that comes into existence on the level that home users are used to we can talk about it...

  • I don't %*^*ing believe it! I just posted the same message! Bollox!

    Heh. Bets on you getting (+4, Funny), me sitting at (+1, Offtopic)?

    information wants to be expensive...nothing is so valuable as the right information at the right time.

  • "We can fix your problem faster than anyone!"
    "From 0 to production in no time flat!"
    "Boost your productivity with TurboLinux!"
    "Racing ahead of the competition!"
    "Nobody beats our service!"

    TurboCare (TM)

  • That this doesn't mean LinuxCare will put all their effort to TurboLinux, but continues to make and improve their own products.
  • How about Linux^2 (Linux Square) ? or "Care for a Turbo Linux"? or "Lamest merger ever"? "I once said Duh" Arthur C. Clarke
  • I wish if the brits haven't given Kuwaitis their indepandance back in 1962. Kuwait would have been much cooler with the English around.
  • Nah, there'll be three distributions. Debian, the commercial one, and Slackware. :)

    (Even tho I'm a Debian supporter myself, my older sister (a sysadmin), her fiancee' (a well-informed Windows user) and my younger older sister (an electrical engineer who doesn't really know software at all) all run or are working on running Slack, so... :) )

    --Jo Hunter

  • (And speculate on names: TurboCare?)

    Nah, I don't think they'll be called TurboCare... they'll change their name to LinuxLinux!

    ...

    Many corporate executives and shareholders who make important decisions that will affect the future of Linux don't really know or care what Linux is or does.

    Now please, don't start listing the few CEOs who do understand; we're talking about business people who really don't give a damn. They make decisions without understanding the technical perspectives. They don't want or care to understand anything technical. Their world works in dollar amounts, and the technical knowledge, even just a scratch-the-surface understanding of anything, is just uninteresting microdetails to them.

    My argument is that business executives who want to run a technical company NEED to understand technology. I've had this discussion with quite a few execs like this, and they insist... no, they demand not to understand. They want to look at everything from a business perspective and leave the technical "details" (which really aren't details at all but rather important facts) to the technical people. This is where business will fail.

    These business executives think they know everything. The company wants to "jump on the bandwagon" (another phrase that means absolutely nothing) and deliver Linux solutions. Those idiots (the execs) don't even know what Linux is, but they make up fancy-looking (but meaningless) press releases that tell the world how their "solution" is going to change leverage innovative technology and improve the world. Then they assign the job -- the real work of making their solution a reality (they don't even know what reality they want to achieve) to the technical people who work their butts off to do it. And then (this is the worst part), because those corporate fools insist on not understanding anything technical, they wonder why it takes so long to deliver a reliable solution. So they put their hard-working technical people under extreme pressure, which results in unreliable solutions.

    That is what pisses me off... the "market" is a bunch of people who don't know a damn thing about software. As a result of their incompetence, the world is going nowhere. Everyone (all those companies jumping on the f*cking bandwagon) has their pedal to the metal, but the trans is not in gear! This is why the tech sector, which was overinflated just a little while ago, is crumbling. Reality is setting in. As I've said: to be successful, business people NEED to bite the bullet and take the time to fully understand technology. If they insist on not doing this, as most of them do, they are in the wrong field of business. The tech-sector is not for those who don't understand tech.

    I think that only time will tell... and I firmly believe that in a few years, the remaining tech-sector will consist of companies where the execs know what they're talking about when they mention Linux or another software product.

  • Personally I think this is excellent news...

    For years and years I have been trying to bring Linux into our corporation, only to have upper management put a stop to it. Their reasoning: "There is no service/support for it". At present all of the software/hardware we use has some type of service/maintenance agreement and we cannot consider products that do not come with some type of agreement like this.

    If this agreement between Turbolinux and Linuxcare goes thru I can turn around and re-propose my Linux solutions AND be able to say they they will service and support us if we get into a jam. I love it. Bye bye Microsoft.. .

  • This could be a good thing, assuming that one of the goals of TurboLinux's distribution is to place Linux on the corporate desktop. Too many IT coordinators are concerned over the lack of support for "desktop Linux" and have neither the resources nor training to customize the OS to their businesses needs. Centralizing on one distribution that focuses on end-to-end support (from the server to the desktop user) is the only way these managers / coordinators could consider moving to Linux, and the combination of these two companies could allow that.
  • There is a second source.. News.com [news.com] has a story about this with quotes from TurboLinux's CEO.. It looks like TurboLinux will be absorbing LinuxCare in a stock-for-stock transaction.. here's the story [cnet.com]..
  • All what base60 nonsense? 60 seconds in a minute, 60 minutes in an hour, and you're done with 60.

    Meantime, consider how handy 60 is... it's divisible by 2, 3, 4, 5, AND 6 (and of course, 30, 20, 15, 12, and 10). You can slice it, you can dice it, and when you're done you still have a reasonable number. Thus "I'll see you in a quarter hour", or "we'll spend a third of the hour doing blah, half of it doing blah, and the remaining sixth doing blah.".. you're still on integers. Plus it overlays so well onto a 12-hour clock. with five minutes per hour segment. Considering that they also divided the day into 24 hours, that's pretty slick.

    Give credit where credit is due. Would you rather be using Swatch(tm) Internet Time?
  • I was wondering if I was the only one who noticed that. Hey, we're all humans! :)

    --
    Scott Miga
    suprax@linux.com
  • Actually, as I understand it, TurboLinux has been considering dropping their own distribution, at least for the desktop. That makes a lot of sense to me. It takes a lot of people to update packages and do QA and everything. They'd be better off focusing on products and services for the enterprise. Better yet, they could spin off their TurboTools configuration program as an add-on to Red Hat Linux. That way they could let Red Hat do the dirty work of maintaining the distribution, but still sell something as their own, along with support.
  • > I am willing to take bets that in 5 or 10 years, only 2 distros will exist

    I thought the same thing 3 or 4 years ago: at the time only Red Hat, Caldera, SuSe, Debian & Slackware appeared to be left; all of the others had vanished due to lack of time, or lack of audience. And Slackware looked like it would be the next one to vanish.

    Now TurboLinux & Mandrake are branching their own distributions; look at www.lwn.net for news of distributions, & there are dozens of new ones being created because . . . well, because someone thought it would be cool, & offers a new way to get under the hood & learns how Linux works.

    None of the distributions have a lock on the Linux community; they all have their own problems, & each problem is an invitation to someone to fix & create her or his own distribution. Which may become the flagship distro, as Slackware once was, & Red Hat appears to be today. And some of the current distros will fall out of use, to become entries in Linux Trivia Pursuit.

    As long as we have the source, this waning & waxing of numbers of distros will continue. It is a sign that the Linux community is continuing.

    Geoff
  • Someone had better alert the Debian priesthood of the incoming flock who would rally under its banner ... last I looked it was doing its damndest to put as many bureaucratic obstacles in the way as possible of new developers. Knighthood looks like a less involved process than becoming a debian developer.

    --
  • Wait, no, Linux is CONSOLIDATING!

    Chicken Little, how can they BOTH be bad?
  • While I must admit that I enjoyed reading this fascinating memo, personally I don't think it should have been posted. I'd have been more than satisfied with informed-sounding speculation that later turned out to be correct.
    --
  • super linux turbo good care
    super fast mega care linux
    turbo super mega good caring linux
    super happy caring linux turbo computer fast
    mega quick penguin cautious quick care
    ... and the most scary
    hello kitty.

  • i've alwasy been a fan of not using capitals, ever since my BBS days in the mid 80s. i actually started doing it because the left-shift key on my Tandy 1000EX gave out, and i got used to just ignoring it :). i continued doing it later out of habit, and because i find it makes messages look less formal, and more like a casual conversation (though you'll never see me skimping on grammar, that's a totally different story).

    still, if i'm *ever* writing an email for work, or anything remotely professional, i'll take that extra time to hit that shift key over there. i can't believe that a CEO, addressing his entire company about something as important as a merger, would use lowercase throughout his message. very strange indeed (and unprofessional to boot!). but then i also would be disgusted if a CEO didn't wear a suit and tie on a regular basis. maybe this is the new way of thinking? casual dress and lowercase Is? :)

    - j
  • TurboCare? Come on people, be creative!

    As any Market Guru (tm,patentpending) would tell you, you have to Sell The Product to The Masses.

    Call it LinuxLinux and call it a day.

    Don't you hear the stampeding feet of the masses rushing to your doorstep? I do.

    Rami
    --
  • Our installer is written from scratch in python.
  • As for end-users, well... I haven't yet seen a Linux distro that comes close enough to something like Windows in terms of easy installation, use, and especially configuration.

    If I had the moderation points, I think I'd be inclined to just mark it down as a troll. About the only thing that helps Windows claim to not be 'hard to install' is that most people have never done an Wintendos install. Even when Windos becomes so bolluxed up that they need to do a clean and install, they often get 'an expert' to do it for them.

    Personally, I'd rather do a Linux install than a Wintendos install any day (having done a number of both of them).
    `ø,,ø!

  • For example, my mom won't switch to Linux because she doesn't want to go through the learning curve, not because it's not user friendly.
    I can get that. It's easy for me. My machine is in a shared area. I just give any new roommate a Linux login and never boot to windows (other than for games). Within a month, they're going: "Man this is a neat system.

    I seriously think that a continued disregard for usability may be a FUD tactic on the part of MS. -- I mean given how nasty the OS is (you really have to walk on tiptoes with it) -- all they have to do is suggest that any other OS is harder to use, and people will run screaming. It's an ass-backwards way of keeping people from finding out how nice Linux really is.
    `ø,,ø!

  • As for your issues with the merger, I don't understand your point - Linuxcare is doomed unless someone acquires them. This company has been in serious trouble for over a year - would you prefer they stay independent and fold?

    Secondly, its an easy conclusion that most of the distros will fold. The value add of 90% of the distros out there is negligable at best, and by no means can one forge a succesful business out of downloading RH and pasting their own logo on it.

  • Actually since it is a merger you would either have a summation or a multiplication...


    TurboLinux + LinuxCare
    (Turbo * Linux) + (Linux * Care)
    =
    (Turbo + Care) * Linux

    or

    TurboLinux*LinuxCare
    (Turbo * Linux) * (Care * Linux)
    =
    TurboCareLinux

    So we either get Turbo and Care Linux or We get Turbocare Linux Squared!

  • ...I haven't yet seen a Linux distro that comes close enough to something like Windows in terms of easy installation, use, and especially configuration...

    Alright, that's it! I've had it! There is no such thing as ease of use or user friendliness. It's all your head. It's really all about ignorance and wanting to learn something new.

    For example, my mom won't switch to Linux because she doesn't want to go through the learning curve, not because it's not user friendly.

    And as far as new computer users using Linux instead of windows is concerned, it has nothing to do with user-friendliness either. It's because they want to be able to walk into a store and know that any program in any box that they could possibly buy will work on their computer. Windows is the closest to achieving that as of right now and that's the hardest thing that Linux can compete with.

    In other words, a computer is just an appliance to most people. You wouldn't want to buy bread that will only work in a toaster with such and such OS would you???

    Enough of this "Linux isn't as easy as blah blah blah..." argument. Ease of use is just an excuse to not learn anything new. The term "computer illiterate" really means "I don't give a shit about computers and how they work". Using the unix shell is just as easy as pointing and clicking once you learn how to do it!

    In the 80's when everyone used DOS no one who used a computer was complaining that it was too hard. It was just the people who wanted to use a computer but didn't want to learn how to. So companies like Apple and Microsoft took advantage of this and came out with GUIs and said "You're stupid. Use our product! See? Now you have less to learn!" hence the terms "computer literate" and "user friendliness" were coined.

    Sorry being offtopic...

    --
    Garett

  • How about "Pacific Hi-Tech"? I think that one would make sense...

    (For those that don't get it - TurboLinux was originally Pacific HiTech, but they changed their name and kicked out the founders. Perhaps something similar will happen here.)

  • Get that CEO a keyboard actually accepts a shift key entry before 'i'... or a grammar lesson.

    Hooked On LinuxCare! Phonics for the open (source) minded.

  • Other than this having to do with Linux, how
    is this front-page worthy news?

    Simple, there are no back pages
  • (And speculate on names: TurboCare?)

    ...what about "LinuxLinux"?

    information wants to be expensive...nothing is so valuable as the right information at the right time.

  • distro bias in business plan (Score:3)

    by jpostel ( 114922 ) on Friday January 12, 2001 @07:05AM (#511702) Homepage Journal
    LinuxCare has been pretty distro agnostic up to this point because of the service agreements with the likes of Dell. They have to go with what their clients want and be strong in all. My question is, will this make them more of a distro pusher on their clients? Will their staff be able to provide support to RedHat products without mentioning that TurboLinux has "a better way to do this." I think LinuxCare fills am important space in the commercial linux market by giving companies (like dell) someone to outsource linux support services to.

  • Re:This is bad news! (Score:3)

    by garett_spencley ( 193892 ) on Friday January 12, 2001 @07:18AM (#511703) Journal
    It's been said before but I will say it again.

    The beauty of Linux (and free software) is that as long as there is the desire for something different (more distros) that something different will exist.

    You mentioned debian. But the Linux hackers that don't like debian will make their own "not debian" distros.

    Just go to linux.org [linux.org] and look at all the millions of different non-commercial distributions.

    --
    Garett

  • Re:Key statement (Score:4)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 12, 2001 @07:06AM (#511704)
    And starting rumours about new mergers is another great way of getting the stock up a few points isn't it? And it's pretty easy too, what with places like /. willing to post unsubstantiated stuff...

    Shutup.

    Neither company is even publically traded.

  • Names (Score:4)

    by perlmunkee ( 304359 ) on Friday January 12, 2001 @06:56AM (#511705)
    LinuxLinux...Linux for Linux users.

  • This is bad news! (Score:5)

    by Lover's Arrival, The ( 267435 ) on Friday January 12, 2001 @07:02AM (#511706) Homepage
    This is the beginning, and this is what I have feared for some time now. From now on, expect the business side of the Linux community to consolidate. The simple fact is that the market, perhaps rightly, sees the existance of a dozen different Linux companies all selling the same thing - Linux distributions - as innefficient, and it is only natural that they will push for these companies to merge and consolidate.

    There can be only one. Who will win? Probably the most commercially succesful.

    I am willing to take bets that in 5 or 10 years, only 2 distros will exist, and that they will be incompatible - Debian and the commercial one. When there is only one commercial distro, it will be powerful enough to ignore its heritage, and it will be under pressure from the shareholders and market to capitalise on its holdings. This will mean that it will become increasingly dissociated from its heritage and ideals.

    The true future of Linux and the Open Source way lies with Debian, IMO. The commercial companies just don't have the commitment, and are under to much marketplace pressure to be expected to confirm to fuzzy-wuzzy 'ideals'.

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