5 Replies to “deRaadt interview”

  1. I don’t really understand what Theo complains about wrt SUN. The permission to use stuff without having to contribute back is given clearly in the license, which OpenBSD too sticks on the top of every source file.

    So where’s the problem?

  2. It’s the difference between “must” and “should”. Also, it seems short-sighted for vendors not to support at least OpenSSH. It would cost Sun/IBM/Apple/etc. more to support OpenSSH inhouse than it would to send Theo and co. $5000/year.

  3. I’m curious if anyone within OpenBSD has approached some of these other companies with specific plans about sponsorship. Complaining that free code isn’t being paid for, or saying “give us money” without an obvious plan showing where it goes is unlikely to get results.

  4. > I’m curious if anyone within OpenBSD has approached some of these other
    > companies with specific plans

    yes.

    They got the runaround.

    IBM even sends users to the openssh lists to get support that they pay IBM for.

  5. justin says,

    “I’m curious if anyone within OpenBSD has approached some of these other companies with specific plans about sponsorship. Complaining that free code isn’t being paid for, or saying “give us money” without an obvious plan showing where it goes is unlikely to get results.”

    This is pretty much the ‘open source’ approach to the problem — sure, their core could spend time courting vendors, negotiating, and so forth, but they’d rather be doing what they’ve been doing instead. By coughing up a quick gripe and getting back to work, they can get end users and everyone else with too much free time to handle the evangelism for them.

    It’s counterintuitive, but this has benefits in a few ways — vendors get to hear the argument from their actual customers and from within (despite that one tactless CSR, IBM surely employs a large number of people who do appreciate the situation), rather than some ‘beggar’ trying to stage a pledge drive. It also provides some insulation from clueless managers who might waste everyone’s time trying to negotiate exclusivity or some other sort of ‘in.’

    As to Sun, it seems like Theo has some reason to feel betrayed after being a fan/advocate of theirs for so long. There were some documentation issues a while back (were those ever resolved?), and the company is a bit unique for having derived their initial successes from BSD while now rarely hesitating to spread FUD about free projects when it serves their interests.* Sociopolitically, it’s been amusing (and occasionally annoying) to watch Sun treat Linux as a “new market” — even while talking up SCO indemnity — while the BSDs seem to get handled at arm’s length and taken as a threat to their core business.

    I’m not sure if anyone’s bothering to feel chagrined about Genesi, who’ve run into the arms of OpenSolaris for their more successful second act after wrangling with OpenBSD in their first… That’s highly tangential, and I’m only mentioning it because /I/ find some sort of dark humor in it,** but it’s got to be a bit annoying to wade through whatever that was, see the other party move on to a favorable partnership, and not even get the shrift the ISC gets for providing BIND.

    *Of course, per http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/12/06/scott_mcnealy_on_suns_secret/ , this is ‘only’ because their customers are stupid. Whether Sun’s model over the past decade has selected for particularly stupid customers is a matter for meditation — and an attempt at low comedy — but their AMD64 stuff is certainly price-competetive now, at least.

    **while, of course, I can’t stop apologizing to Dale Rahn for whatever happened to him during all that, and I have to express my amazement at the way the current order of things seems set to work out for the best between Genesi, Freescale, Sun, and probably the consumer now that the personalities involved formed a better understanding of the market…

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