Monday, August 09, 2004

U.S. may be left behind in open-source technology, Red Hat's Szulik warns - Computerworld

U.S. may be left behind in open-source technology, Red Hat's Szulik warns - Computerworld "Portraying his company as part of a global effort to create a larger worldwide software industry, Red Hat Inc. CEO Matthew Szulik opened the LinuxWorld Conference & Expo here today with a warning that the U.S. runs the risk of missing out on the move toward open-source.
Szulik implied that the U.S.'s attitude toward open-source, as witnessed by recent developments in U.S. law and copyright, education and patent policies, could threaten this country's pre-eminence as a technology supplier. "The United States is increasingly becoming a fast follower," he said."

Maybe somebody should point out to this guy that his company looks and acts a lot more like Microsoft than an organization truly committed to free or open source software. Actually, that's probably (at least selectively) unfair to Microsoft, in terms of promoting the global goals Szulik espouses -- e.g., I think Microsoft is probably doing more than Red Hat or any other (increasingly oxymoronic) "commercial open source" vendor to make information technology available to all schools etc.

No comments: