Wordpress could face serious competition – from Microsoft

Just a follow-up for this for some anti-MS balance... :-)



I've seen a lot of posts recently (primarily from the ALT.NET guys I mentioned above) about how the code for this particular project isn't really the best example of how these new technologies should be used, and in particular it encourages some "old-school" design mistakes in the areas of OO design and code structure.



Still, at least they're trying.

Oops - that was supposed to be a reply to Nate's last comment - not sure what happened there.

I think I'm going to post a "don't feed the trolls" sticky note to my monitor with your name on it, just to refresh my memory in these cases where it lapses.

Pretty much the same argument you have about Apple embracing OSS they way they have. Only Apple has contributed code to projects (webkit), embraces OSS by utilizing community projects instead of making proprietary code (apache, webdav, ical, BSD, Linux) and helped progress major projects like CUPS without killing them off.

I've already established that the "Only" part of that statement was wrong. The rest is no big deal, but I'll cover it anyway.



As we've said many times before, they're two different companies, so sometimes it can be difficult to draw comparisons, but I'll stand by my claim that MS is WAY, WAY more towards the "freedom" end of the scale than Apple, if you're looking at the products they actually release.



I don't see any of the examples you site on Apple's behalf as being significant indications of "good will" or a desire on their part to promote the cause of free software. Webkit and CUPS are some of the few instances where they actually contribute code back to the projects, but they're legally required to do so according to the licenses, so I don't know if I'm going to pat them on the back for that. The CUPS situation is a bit more complicated since they hired Sweet, because they then could theoretically have an internal fork under a different license that they wouldn't have to contribute their changes publicly for. As far as we know, they haven't done that, but then again if they had we wouldn't know about it, because they have a strictly enforced code of silence preventing their employees from uttering a single word about anything that happens in their business. Wait, were we talking about loving freedom?



As for the others you mentioned like Apache, I'm not sure what credit Apple should get for packaging those along with their OS, or in the case of BSD, building their *proprietary* OS on top of. Where does Linux fit in, exactly, since you listed it?



It's a no-brainer choice for a company that's "not in the business of selling / developing software" (your words) to not write their own web server. For MS, on the other hand, who IS in that business and also that of creating software development tools and platforms, it DOES make sense for them to write their own, since they can extend it in step with the rapid innovations they're making in terms of language design, etc.



At the end of the day, it's important to realize that neither company has the well being of the free software / open source ecosystem as a primary goal. However, I contend that the products MS releases are much more geared for openness than those released by Apple. Their OS is designed to be run on any hardware that you can make it work on, whereas Apple's actually contains code to *prevent* it from running on anything but their own hardware.



While Apple may wisely make use of open source software to achieve their goals and even contribute back sometimes (where required or convenient - "marketing" as you would say), every single product they release (that I can think of) is designed with hooks to drive you towards their other products and away from the competition: OS tied to hardware, iTunes store to iPods, etc., etc. Not to mention the outright anti-competitive practices happening in the iPhone app store lately.



You don't get much more of a stark contrast to that than MS going above and beyond to help a project that was started with the publicly stated goal of making an open source copy of Microsoft's work to ensure that people don't get locked in to their platform.

Please forgive the excessive quoting, but it would get too confusing otherwise. Also, Intense Debate sucks because it's making me split this comment up since it's too long. (Admiteddly, it is too long, but oh well).

It's good to hear they're using their own development platform for this, it makes it sound like this "platform" is more of a marketing tool than anything else.



Regardless, my point is: MS isn't "embracing" FOSS, they're just using it as a marketing tool.

That's incorrect. I think I pointed out pretty clearly (as did they on their project page) before that this is primarily for educational purposes, and is secondarily intended to produce a *free software* blogging platform for the benefit of anyone who wishes to use it. Do those things have "marketing" benefits, in terms of giving them a good name for doing good deeds? Sure, but that doesn't mean that's the primary objective.



Even if marketing was hypothetically their motive, though, you're saying that like marketing is a bad thing, which I know you (as a die-hard Apple fan) cannot possibly believe.

AFAIK they haven't contributed any code to any major open source projects, nor contributed any software that would help the progress OSS (i.e. any software other than frameworks), nor have I seen them "embracing" OSS in their own systems.



To me, a conspiracy theory is in order, only because of their very recent past (e.g. MS sues Novell, SCO) - my theory is: MS is creating these "excellent" frameworks (.net and silverlight) and by providing openness adoption occurs, we all know the losers win by openness. However, after after adoption takes place a standard is set and a lock down occurs. Classic MS, they control what the frameworks can do on what software, ultimately only on Windows Server.



So, I hope they make great software but I'd be weary of any restrictions, present or future.

So much incorrect here, I can't possibly cover it all. Most of their contributions have been in the realm of software development, so it's understandable that you wouldn't be as familiar with them as I am, since I work with this stuff (and this platform specifically) on a daily basis.



While there are many examples that disprove this opinion you've stated, I'll stick to just a couple, for the sake of brevity. Just yesterday I heard another story about MS hiring a an open source developer (of an ORM framework) and paying them to continue working on their project, which is something they've done a lot of lately.



But the most notable example (for several reasons - conveniently debunking the core concept behind your theory above) is their recent contributions to the Mono project, specifically in support of Moonlight. Giving them codecs for free and other code contributions as well as their full suite of testing code to ensure compatibility with their Silverlight implementation is a big deal when you realize that the sole purpose of the Mono project (and Moonlight) is to produce a *free software* implementation of the .NET platform, (out of MS control - since that's what you're worried about) so that people WON'T be locked into running on a platform controlled by Microsoft.

Yeah, Rob Conery and SubSonic was the one I was referring to above; I just couldn't remember the names initially since it was mentioned in passing when I heard it. I must have also been confused on the timeline (or heard it from an old interview), since that happened more than a year ago.



More than one of the contributors to this free software project are Microsoft employees, and their work on the project is sanctioned / funded by MS, so there's one example of MS contributing code to a free software project, if that's what you were looking for.

Thank you. Yes, I said that wrong before.

Hippies love freedom from clarity.

It's good to hear they're using their own development platform for this, it makes it sound like this "platform" is more of a marketing tool than anything else.



Regardless, my point is:

MS isn't "embracing" FOSS, they're just using it as a marketing tool. AFAIK they haven't contributed any code to any major open source projects, nor contributed any software that would help the progress OSS (i.e. any software other than frameworks), nor have I seen them "embracing" OSS in their own systems.



To me, a conspiracy theory is in order, only because of their very recent past (e.g. MS sues Novell, SCO) - my theory is: MS is creating these "excellent" frameworks (.net and silverlight) and by providing openness adoption occurs, we all know the losers win by openness. However, after after adoption takes place a standard is set and a lock down occurs. Classic MS, they control what the frameworks can do on what software, ultimately only on Windows Server.



So, I hope they make great software but I'd be weary of any restrictions, present or future.



Pretty much the same argument you have about Apple embracing OSS they way they have. Only Apple has contributed code to projects (webkit), embraces OSS by utilizing community projects instead of making proprietary code (apache, webdav, ical, BSD, Linux) and helped progress major projects like CUPS without killing them off.

I found this
http://blog.wekeroad.com/blog/microsoft-subsonic-...

Well, I'm not sure about that, but I do know one thing *I* hate: people making broadly generalized insults about a certain "type" or person, even if it's a stereotype. It's even less palatable when coupled with (what comes off as) an arrogant proclamation that "their" understanding of something like "freedom" doesn't measure up to your enlightened standards.



Any fool can easily recognize that the statement in my precious comment is completely true. There are many different senses of both those words ("love" and "freedom"). It's probably that way in every society, but it's most definitely true in our own.



Now, if you asked any random "hippie" whether they "love freedom", my bet is that an overwhelmingly high percentage of them would tell you that they do. To even attempt to argue with them on that, you'd have to first define the term. What sort of freedom are you referring to? The "free love" that made the original hippie culture famous? Civil liberty? Religious / spiritual, etc., etc. Only then could you attempt to make the claim (which I'm assuming is the point of your initial joke / comment) that they don't truly "love" it, based on philosophical differences you may have with them on how exactly freedom should be valued and preserved.



As a perfect illustration of the varying senses that some of these words (specifically "hippie" and "freedom" can take), my original reference to both was in the context of a point about the culture of free software. Perhaps it wasn't a clear enough reference, but RMS is arguably the most recognizable single person associated with the free software movement, and he is often jokingly referred to as a "hippie". Granted this may be mostly because of his personal appearance, but I think it probably also has a bit to do with his outlook on life and "freedom" issues (software and otherwise). My apologies for that not being direct enough in that regard.

Perhaps. Perhaps a 40 and 300 word response to 4 word jokes you don't think are funny is a little much.

OK. Do you have the name of the ORM framework project? I am googling a bit but not getting a obvious quick hit.

Perhaps I did react too strongly, and I apologize for that. I just didn't (and still don't) see the humor in "hippies don't love freedom", and the nature of the subsequent supplies just seemed to indicate that you were only trying to get a rise out of me and not actually contribute to the discussion, so that's what struck me as "trollish".

You can read up on Microsoft's recent support of the open source community; there's a lot of stuff out there if you're interested.



I'm not sure why you wouldn't think that the kind of help they've given to the Mono project is significant, if that's what you're implying. In this particular example, they may not have contributed any source code, but are you saying that only source code contributions are worth anything, and any other form of help is meaningless? Perhaps I just don't get where you're coming from there.



Like I said earlier, no one is suggesting that they're transforming into a free/freedom software based company, but I do think they're doing a lot to enable lots of good free software work, and they've also made huge advances in other areas of openness.



In addition to releasing open source stuff of their own (this project as an example), open APIs to their service based offerings (Live is widely regarded to have a better, more extensible and flexible API than similar offerings from Google and Yahoo), and helping out other people and projects with their platform, even to the extent of giving assistance to people who are making alternate (non-MS-only) implementations of their platform itself, they have also been much more open to community input, to the extent that they have changed direction in some of their implementation choices based on that community feedback.



Check into the ALT.NET community if you're interested in more on that front. They're a group that formed around being excited by the technical progress that MS was making in it's development tools and languages, but were vocally critical of some of the aspects that have traditionally been associated with the MS dev scene / culture.



Rather than ignoring or even trying to silence such criticism from their dev community groups (like some companies I could name with insane gag-order restrictions on their SDKs), MS has publicly embraced that negative feedback and changed their practices accordingly, to be supportive of people with different philosophies. The ASP.NET MVC framework (one of the things that this Oxite project is an example implementation of) is one example of that.

Because it seems at least a little unlikely to me. And the codec and testing framework examples don't really convince me that Dan is considerably mistaken.

I heard it in an interview with Miguel de Icaza, probably on some podcast. I don't remember which one off the top of my head, though, since I listen to a lot of them.



He was mostly talking about the testing code, but he mentioned in passing that they also gave them the codecs and "other contributions", or something to that effect. Those other contributions may or may not have been Moonlight specific (could be Mono in general).



Why?

Do you have a source for the claim that Microsoft employees have given "other code contributions" to moonlight?

Classic. Hippies hate clarity.

Maybe you just don't love hippies. :-)



But seriously, "love" and "freedom" can mean different things in different contexts (in this case, software), and different people can have varying opinions on how best to "love", preserve, value, etc. something like "freedom".

If that works for you, great. My comment was just a silly little comment that hardly deserved a response. So if it saves me from the lecturing, great!