[Info-vax] OT: Elephants Can't Dance

[Bill Gunshannon]

In article <49c9914a$0$90266$14726298 at news.sunsite.dk>,
	Arne Vajhøj <arne at vajhoej.dk> writes:
> Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>> In article <49c6e956$0$90268$14726298 at news.sunsite.dk>,
>> 	Arne Vajhøj <arne at vajhoej.dk> writes:
>>> Bill Gunshannon wrote:
>>>> In article <13946$49c28a06$cef8af62$15275 at teksavvy.com-free>,
>>>> 	"John Smith \(not the one @ HP\)" <a at nonymous.com> writes:
>>>>> "Neil Rieck" <n.rieck at sympatico.ca> wrote in message 
>>>>> news:1f81536c-a5cb-4e39-8512-41e882d591db at d19g2000yqb.googlegroups.com...
>>>>>
>>>>> According to this link:
>>>>> http://www3.sympatico.ca/n.rieck/docs/open-source-biology.html (look
>>>>> for the yellow text), the amount of money made on Linux is well into
>>>>> the multiple billions. 
>>>> For who?
>>> For companies selling the HW it runs on (IBM, HP, Dell).
>> 
>> That's not money made by Linux.  If they didn't have Linux they would
>> have bought the hardware to run something else.
> 
> True. But they did sell them with Linux.
> 
> SUN also has sold 1 SPARC box for X $ and 1 Solaris license for
> 0 $ - I don't think they consider that not making money on
> Solaris.
> 
> Hardware needs an OS.

Yes, but it doesn't have to be Linux.  Unless they are actually charging
money for that copy of Linux, Linux isn't making any money.  It's all just
creative accounting done even better than the government.

> 
>>> For companies selling support on Linux (Redhat, Novell, IBM, HP).
>> 
>> They could have made monety selling support for any OS.  So that really
>> isn't a selling point for Linux either.
> 
> I don't see the point.

Simple,  One can sell support for anything.  IF Linux weren't there they
would be making just as much money by selling service for some other OS.
Again, it isn't Linux that is making the money it is having people with
expertise that you can pimp.  Doesn't even have to be Open Source.  People
have been making money selling Unix support since long before Unix went
public.  Heck, I used to do it when I worked for Martin Marietta.  They
made nice money pimping my abilities.  :-)

> 
> If we follow your logic then HP is not making money on VMS, because
> they could have been selling them HP-UX. And they are not making
> money on HP-UX because they could have been selling them VMS.

Don't see the logic here.  They are selling both of them and so both
of them are making money.  Linux is free, how do you make money "selling"
something you are giving away?  Any money that comes in from peripheral
actions is not making money on Linux but on those peripheral actions.

> 
> They could have made money selling support for any OS, but they
> did sell support for Linux.

Exactly.  They didn't need Linux to do it, it could have been any OS.
So then, how much money is Linux making?  Answer: $0.  It is the people
being pimped who are bringing in the money and the actual OS is really
irelevant to the equation as it could be any.  And for many companies
it is more than just one.  I doubt any company breaks down their service
revenue by which OS a person supports at any given point in time.  I
provide support for a lot of different OSes.  No one is keeping track of
how much of my time goes to which machine I happen to be looking at at
any particular point in time.

> 
>>> For companies selling commercial software to run on Linux (Oracle,
>>> IBM, Redhat).
>> 
>> What commercial software only runs on Linux?
> 
> Oracle DB, DB2, Sybase ASE, WebSphere AS, Oracle AS, BEA WebLogic (that
> is really Oracle now), Oracle ERP (whatever they call it now), SAP etc..

What?  Oracle only runs on Linux?  SAP only runs on Linux?  In what world?

> 
> I would say most of actively developed software.

Only runs on Linux?  That has to be the funniest thing I have ever seen here.

> 
> >                                               WHat would have kept it
>> from running on any other Unix-like OS?
> 
> Most likely nothing.
> 
> It also run on Windows.
> 
> But the customer preferred Linux.

I wonder how much Oracle is running on Linux compared to other OSes.

> 
>> None of the supposed millions tied to Linux are in any way specifically
>> tied to Linux.  They were there all along.  Linux just does a better job
>> of hyping things so more people know its name.
> 
> It is a very tiny part of IT expenditure that is dependent on a
> specific OS.
> 
> The customers just chose to spend their money on stuff where the OS
> is Linux.
> 
> And it is not millions. It is billions.
> 
> And actual revenue is not hype.

Its supposed dependence on Linux is.

bill

-- 
Bill Gunshannon          |  de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n.  Three wolves
billg999 at cs.scranton.edu |  and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
University of Scranton   |
Scranton, Pennsylvania   |         #include <std.disclaimer.h>