Re: an open letter to George Soros

[James Bottomley <James.Bottomley@HansenPartnership.com>]

I'm not interested in disputing or evaluating any of the allegations raised in 
your letter, I'll leave everyone to draw their own conclusions.  However, I am 
curious about the consequences of what you propose.  In particular, your 
remedies.

Let us assume that George Soros accepts your letter and withdraws funding from 
Transmeta.  What are the consequences for Linux and Microsoft?

Transmeta could easily collapse, thus throwing several prominent Linux 
developers out into the job market.  Worse, the resulting publicity about the 
reasons would create a media circus that would be highly damaging to Linux as 
a whole and the release of 2.6 in particular.

Microsoft is bound to capitalise on this and sieze the opportunity to try to 
displace Linux from the server and enterprise (the very places it currently 
feels the greatest heat from Linux).  I don't claim it would succeed, but it 
will certainly try.

The net effect of your proposal therefore would be to cause a stall in Linux 
development and hand Microsoft an opportunity to capture the Server market and 
the Enterprise.  Is that really your aim?

If you really hold true to the principles of openness, why not instead ask 
Soros for funding to create a company that will produce the OS you think Linux 
should be and compete directly with Microsoft in "the client" arena?  At least 
that would be a positive remedy, intead of the wholly negative one you 
propose.  Perhaps it would even give you the opportunity to see at least one 
of your works proliferate?

James Bottomley