http://linuxgeeksunited.blogspot.com/2007/12/how-open-is-open-enough.html
Written by: Don Sanderson

We have seen the signs that changes are happening. Not just specifically in the Linux world, but in Open Source, Open Standards and in the proprietary world as well.

Companies like Microsoft are sharing information, whether it’s because they want to or because a court of law compels them. The recent announcement of sharing SMB protocols with the SAMBA group is evidence of that.

Also, Microsoft has entered the realm of Open Standards by trying to push their own version of an open document standard through the works. While I am not altogether impressed by their methods, it is telling that they see the need to play the open documents game. It’s what businesses, governments and community agencies are clamoring for.

IBM and Sun, to name two of the biggest players in the market, have released some of their most important software under Open Source licenses recently. Giving us a view that they are not just laying back and watching anymore, but are becoming more assertive, even aggressive in pursuing Open Source solutions.

Novell, once the dominant giant in networking with it Netware products, is reinventing itself using Linux and other Open Source apps to regain some of their statutre in the network world and has produced recently some of the best work yet in a Linux offering.

The GPL Open Source license has now been defended at least twice publicly and successfully.

Things are looking good for Open Source and Open Standards. Where do things go from here?

People need to insist on having Open Standards. When you install a word processor, you want to make sure you are getting one that allows you to save it and transport it so that anyone, with any word processor can read it or edit it. That’s a fundamental part of having access to Free Speech. Except it’s not Government imposing closed communications on you, it’s corporate giants. In the name of Big Business, we have allowed corporate types to dictate how, when and with what we should communicate with.

Small businesses are moving to Open Source solutions more and more in order to save on operating expenses, licensing costs and more. As these small business continue to adopt Open Source solutions, they will need to have more “open” access to do business and access other avenues, such as tax preparation and government document filings.

The B2B industry will need to “Open” up quite a bit if the big Corporates who have been resisting find their small business customers stealing away to do business with others who will support their new Open Source software solutions.

It takes time to make big changes such as these. It’s not as mundane as “X OS sucks” and “Y distro is great.” Other Operating Systems like MS Windows will never g oaway entirely and Apple, Linux, Windows and others will continue to share the market as they have, perhaps with market shares of some decreasing while others take up a bit more, but in the end, the monopoly of Software and computers is over and on it’s way out. Even if not Linux, the attention has been brought, the spotlight been shined on the disastrous position that corporate greed and government blindness has wrought.