On Thu, 16 Jan 2014, Brett Viren wrote:

> --=-=-=
> Content-Type: text/plain
> Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
>
> Yasha Karant <[log in to unmask]> writes:
>
>> How exactly does a for-profit corporation buy an endeavor such as
>> CentOS?=20=20
>
> By hiring the key, primary developers, I would imagine.
>
>> Could RH buy SL from Fermilab/CERN?=20=20
>
> RH can try (and has succeeded once in the past) to hire SL developers
> away.  However, both labs have a wide and deep pool of technical ability
> and I don't think RH could begin to exhaust that by this practice.

The SL developer contacted RedHat.  RH did not try to hire SL developers 
away.

>
> Personally (and please note the various conditional phrases), as long as
> Debian exists and continues to follow its own constitution, all of these
> corporate machination do not worry me.  My feeling is that the only
> thing that keeps RH derivatives going is historical inertia and, in only
> a tiny fraction of the installations, adherence to RH conventions in
> order to enable the use of proprietary software (aka evilness).  If RH's
> business decisions begin to levy significant costs on this community,
> comparable to the (low) cost needed for the many talented SL admins to
> upgrade their experience to Debian, then we will see a gradual draining
> of the SL user base.  This draining will be first seen in those users
> who are not part of the primary SL target (which is particle/nuclear
> physics) and so will largely leave SL unaffected at first.  If the costs
> increase further and become prohibitive to FNAL's strategy of respinning
> RH sources then they will switch to Debian (or some popular corporate
> derivative, because directly leveraging Debian would make too much
> sense).  If we ever do reach this description of reality, this sea
> change will occur well after the break-even cost point has been passed
> unless some charismatic, pro-Debian person takes a leadership role in SL
> at FNAL and forces the issue early.
>
> If all this does come to pass, it will be a good thing, in my opinion.
> At the very least it will teach a legion of people to laugh at the irony
> of calling a RH respin "Scientific Linux" as they discover the relative
> cornucopia of scientific software which exists in Debian and which is
> lacking in SL.
>
> Okay, enough cloudy crystal ball gazing, carry on with the speculation.
>
> =2DBrett.
>
>
>
>
> --=-=-=
> Content-Type: application/pgp-signature
>
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> Version: GnuPG v1.4.12 (GNU/Linux)
>
> iEYEARECAAYFAlLX8t8ACgkQEixH2Z0dKCz7LACfVK3/PeqbZS+UM/BceQRbTmVk
> PEgAniVN9YSspDmcl0nfmbxC3OlTm193
> =HUvY
> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
> --=-=-=--
>

-Connie Sieh