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Linux Software

LinuxToday Acquired By Internet.com 41

Posted by Hemos from the dealing-with-the-world dept.
debrain writes "Looks like LinuxToday was acquired by internet.com. " No numbers were specified - LinuxToday will be joining Internet.com's LinuxPlanet.
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LinuxToday Acquired By Internet.com More

LinuxToday Acquired By Internet.com

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  • I just took a look at internet.com and saw what they did to BoardWatch magazine. And other sites. Sad. LT and /. are my 2 favorite sites by far. I won't be using LT after they change the format.
  • Companies do realize that there are different segments of the Internet community, but they don't really pay attention to that when making statements. This foolishness will hurt them in the long run.

    Linux users are technically savvy users. I'm not discussing someone's mother who uses their linux box, but real users, who read Linux sites.

    These users, by and large, distrust commercial entities. This is the younger, hot-headed Linux crowd. Those of us who work with Enterprise systems that include Linux among a suite of operating systems are not distrustful of commercialization of Linux, because we view it as another tool, one we like, but still a tool.

    This press release was an example of bad PR. Referring to themselves as a marker leader for Open Source news is a double edged sword. Business people like leaders, because leaders are more likely to prosper. However, Linux depends upon a grass-roots user base, largely young users (I'd guess that over 75% are ages 15-25) who don't like businesses snatching up Linux.

    However, as a company trying to make money off Linux news, who is your target market? Is your target market free software zealots who will only use truly free software? Is it users who take pride in Linux being free (like beer, I have a misguided friend, IMHO, who is a dedicated Linux user with no qualms about closed-source code who never compiles his own code)? Or is it IT people who use Linux professionally and have no qualms about purchasing software for business use on a Linux system?

    I would suggest that the latter is your focus group as a corporation. These users are not going to be swayed by a dumb sounding press release (that will catch eyes). The additional user group that this appeals to are people like my boss, a non-technical guy who is interested in technology. Market leader in Open Source appeals to him, as he is interested in Linux, and he is going to be drawn to a site like this. These are the types of viewer who will influence buying decisions, and are the people that advertisers will seek out.

    By making the page more corporate, merely by issuing this press release, they make the site more valuable to to advertisers by switching the demographics from younger home users, to those interested in pushing Linux into enterprise environments.

    While the press release sounded moronic, I think that it will have a positive influence on the site from a business perspective, even if it seems less "Linux"-like... It's funny how much Linux has changed since I first played around with it a few years ago.
  • I wonder when the Stock markets will tire of YAICIPO (Yet Another Internet Company Initial Purchase Offer) ? * I am the geek who learnt Karate then kicked your sorry butt in front of the entire school. And now I'm waiting for you...
  • Has anyone noticed that linuxplanet.com and microsoft.com's site design contain much of the same layout? I also found it strange that they use many of the same typefaces for their headlines. The strangest part, is if you go to read a document, the "Print this article" icon uses a Windows system typeface, and contains a Windows Printer icon. ...and I thought I was on Linux Planet.


    _________
  • Perhaps a broader view of what constitutes a market would help you understand the statement. There is, without a doubt, an Open Source market, just as there is a Kids-and-parents-playing-in-the-park market. And a Senior-citizens-attending-church market. That no money changes hands does not necessarily imply that it is not a market. Additionally, presence in a market -- even in a self-proclaimed "leading position" in a market -- does not imply a stranglehold on said market or any given resource.

    An example might help illustrate this. Let's go back to the market of children and parents playing in city parks, and let's assume that a company has managed to obtain 75% of billboards that are visible from all parks. They can rightfully claim to have a leading position in that market -- but it does not restrict the market in any way. Other billboards can be constructed. Entire new parks can be developed. The market might leave city parks and head to the beach instead. There is nothing inherently wrong with seeking that leading position in a given market, and it doesn't necessarily mean anything negative for the market.

    Fun debunking the RealNames mythology [drizzle.com]

  • See their corporate page (Score:3)

    by jflynn ( 61543 ) on Tuesday October 19, 1999 @08:13AM (#1602201)
    According to the internet.com site [internet.com], they already did in June 1999, symbol INTM.

    It also mentions that they are 20% of Mecklermedia, which was acquired by Penton Media in Nov. '98. Anyone know anything about those corporations?

    The copyright notice at the bottom seems to me (IANAL) to gobble up all rights to posted comments as well, but that may be typical of sites other than Slashdot.

    And of course, Microsoft is listed as a major sponsor. But that probably applies to over half the web as well.

    I'd like to hear confirmation from LT and their slant on this.

  • Yup. (Score:1)

    by Rabbins ( 70965 )
    You are right... they are up about 10% on the news.

    Penton Media is a Cleveland-based business media company. They own numerous newsletters, magazines and publications dealing with various business segments. They also organize trade shows in various markets, but mainly industrial and supply chain markets.

  • IPO = "Initial Public Offering"
  • IPO = Initial Public Offer

  • Hmm. (Score:2)

    by drwiii ( 434 )
    I suppose this is good from a marketing standpoint.. I just find it a bit unsettling that all these community sites are being locked into corporate agendas.

    Congratulations, Andover, you now have a competitor.

    --

  • If we've only owned these domains/sites for a relatively short amount of time, it stands to reason that it will take some time for us to figure out exactly what the best way to handle everything is. How about some constructive suggestions, instead of Anonymous Coward rants? P.S. Why don't you tell me what we've "taken" from the Open Source community while you're coming up with complaints that we haven't "given anything back"? P.P.S. Anyone who thinks of me as a "suit" is already confused.
  • *sniff*...if that's what they want, good for them, but I tell ya it sure is weird to see all the sites in the community getting bought up by Suits...

    What's next?...Rupert Murdoch buys Attrition.org?...Martha Stewart buys 2600?...Proctor&Gamble buys HNN?

    -diva
    (poor but having a damn good time!)
  • Looks like pretty much all the Linux community sites have managed to sell out in one form or another. Not much independant content available anymore. Perhaps it is time to move on for an old individualist like me... That is hysterical, could someone moderate this up.... "Gee all the creative folks sold out, an individualist like me might as well follow." BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!
  • internet.com now holds a leading position in theOpen Source market

    Since when is there an open source market? What are they talking about? Isn't it nice to know that someone is trying to gain a monopoly stranglehold on opensource discussion venues?

    Consolidate, consolidate, don't stop the consolidate!!


  • I like the press release. The whole idea that someone can have a "leading position in the Open Source market" has a whole bunch of assumptions behind it that are mostly good news for the Open Source movement.

    One assumption that's not so good is that if there is a market for Linux information sources, then there can also be a monopoly on major Linux information sources. This could be good or bad, depending on intent and who's siding with who. I'd be wary if the information sources that new users would tend to turn to start to get consolidated under one roof.

    --

  • I wonder if they are goin to move the site to StoryServer as they did with others.

  • internet.com history (Score:4)

    by ajs ( 35943 ) <ajs.ajs@com> on Tuesday October 19, 1999 @07:00AM (#1602217) Homepage Journal
    Interesting. I used to have a lot of friends who worked for "The Internet Company, Inc." which was internet.com before they failed and sold the domain off.

    This was always one of the scarriest things to me. How can a company that owns internet.com fail?! All you have to do is put a credit-card submission form on your home page with a "give us a dollar and get your name on our site" or whatever. Remember, if you just type "internet" into most browsers, you end up at internet.com. How many newbies do you think do this? The answer, as I recall, was lots.

    Ah well, leave it to a startup to not see what they've got.
  • Shouldn't they have said "LinuxPlanet will now be a feature of LinuxToday"?


    Sigh. I'm kinda nervy about this one. "Our goal is to maintain and enhance our position as a leading destination for content, community and commerce" Not bad at first. But the last goal . . . yeah, selling Linux is good. Bringing money into the community is good (I like to eat too). But that sounds too close to the comercialization of Linux to me. Maybe I'm just being arrogant, but the idealisim nerves are firing like crazy . . . . . .
  • in Linux pages being bought by bigger companies. Although it'll be good to see Dave and the bunch get something for all the work that they've put into linuxtoday, because they really have done a lot and LinuxToday is _great_. While slashdot has the big stories, I see ALL of the Linux news at LinuxToday. But, back on my topic, I'm not entirely sure that this great commercialization of Linux sites is such a good thing. The problem tends to be that there is the possibility for a more definite bias/slant when owned by a large parent company and having to deal with company politics as such. But, at the same time, it points towards the growth of Linux. And it does require quite a bit of time and resources to run a large site, and getting this back and more is a good thing.

    Anyway, I'm just rambling as I see all of the sites I frequent being bought out. Best of luck to Dave, Dwight, Marty, and the rest of the LinuxToday crew!

    --
    Jeremy Katz
  • If you don't like consolidation, you can always help deconsolidate things by creating your own opensource discussion venue. You don't even have to do the coding, as there is software you can download.

  • I really like linuxtoday - if they ruin it, I will mourn the site for sure
  • Gee, have you noticed how our favorite opensource sites have started linking to the "ANDOVER.NET PARTNER SITES" and not to the other opensource sites?

    here's an example: appwatch.com [appwatch.com] - not a bad site at all, and yeah so maybe freshmeat did it first, but is andover.net keeping them (and anyone else who's not in their clutches) out of the opensource spotlight?

    when nobody's making MILLIONS of dollars from opensource stuff, it's easy to stay fair and impartial, but when the people running the sites have to answer to management and not the opensource community, things change :(

    :(

    It all sort of sucks. Those of us who haven't made our millions off opensource yet and still code/compile/etc becuase we actually LOVE to do it seem to be the ones getting the short end of the stick while other get rich from our work.

    maybe slasldot/andover should offer a financial reward for slashdotters who post stories and moderate... that seems plenty fair to me. Share and enjoy, right?
  • It only talks about the benefits to internet.com, and how this gives them leverage in the open source community. Some mention of why this is good for linux today's readers would have been nice. As well as an explanation of what they think they can do for the OS community. This article sounded like "Look we just bought a big Linux site. Now we can exploit Linux users. Yay us."
  • Well, if any of you remember cooltype.com from the days before it merged with "WebPedia", it was a great, GREAT Photoshop tips site... When it merged it was less good, but still usable (it had the content but didn't have the looks anymore), and then when internet.com bought webpedia... well, just go to cooltype.com [cooltype.com] now and see if you can find more than a handful of photoshop tutorials! And they used to have DOZENS...

    I hope this doesn't happen to LinuxToday as well...

    Daniel
  • So when are they going public?
  • Bah. Looks cheeze. Their "Top Ten" is too funny.
  • Internet.com recently bought TheCounter.com, built by two Swedens (an 18-year-old and his older brother, I think) for an unknown, but large, pile of money. TheCounter.com still works properly, it seems. And they run Linux, too. :-)
  • Has anyone compared storyserver with what can be done in a few weekends with php/mysql or postgreSQL, etc. I've built sites with mySQL/perl, but this will be partially maintained by non-techical people.

    -jeff

    BTW:
    http://www.netcraft.com/whats/?host=www.linuxpla net.com

    www.linuxplanet.com is running Apache/1.3.3 (Unix) PHP/3.0.7 AuthMySQL/2.20 on Solaris
  • maybe slasldot/andover should offer a financial reward for slashdotters who post stories and moderate...

    Now there's an angle to get moderated way up... appeal to the moderators greed!

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