Path: csiph.com!eternal-september.org!feeder.eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Ivan Shmakov Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc Subject: [OT] free software Date: Thu, 04 Sep 2025 18:25:44 +0000 Organization: Dbus-free station. Lines: 71 Message-ID: References: <107u4ha$2osd4$1@dont-email.me> <107vicd$2u7bl$1@dont-email.me> <107vkg0$36qlh$1@dont-email.me> <1080dts$2u7bm$2@dont-email.me> <1080hed$3f6hn$1@dont-email.me> <108m6ft$fkhm$1@dont-email.me> <108vuu7$2sngv$7@dont-email.me> <1092j1h$3ghoq$5@dont-email.me> Injection-Date: Thu, 04 Sep 2025 18:50:57 +0000 (UTC) Injection-Info: dont-email.me; posting-host="bd30ab30932db06a6ba534cf492c5bdc"; logging-data="2062031"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1+iSfT9rr1QEKiN5LUAu+A2" Cancel-Lock: sha1:kWN8s5/qycotsxBV7h6i0HN2XgU= License: CC0-1.0 (original contributions only) Xref: csiph.com comp.lang.misc:11219 >>>>> On 2025-08-31, Lawrence D'Oliveiro wrote: >>>>> On Sun, 31 Aug 2025 13:35:51 +0000, Ivan Shmakov wrote: >> Indeed, one good thing about free software is that when one company >> closes down, another can pick up and go on from there. Such as how >> Netscape is no more, yet the legacy of its Navigator still survives >> in Firefox. >> I'm not sure how much of a consolation it is to the people who owned >> the companies that failed, though. > Companies fail all the time, open source or no open source. When > a company that has developed a piece of proprietary software fails, > then the software dies with the company. With open source, the > software stands a chance of living on. It sounds like we're in agreement on this point, no? My other point, however, is this: when you do run a business, shouldn't you be more concerned that said /business/ succeeds, rather than the products it delivers, whatever they might be? And from where I stand, releasing software targetting tomorrow's computers is, as a rule, a better business practice - than targetting decade-old ones. > E.g. Loki was an early attempt at developing games on Linux. They > failed. But the SDL framework that they created for low-latency > multimedia graphics lives on. Yes, that too. (Though I like my Firefox example better.) >> Also, what indication is there that GNU is 'dominating' the >> landscape? Sure, Linux is everywhere (such as in now ubiquitous >> Android phones and TVs and whatnot), but I don't quite see GNU >> being adopted as widely. > Look at all the markets that Linux has taken away from Microsoft -- > Windows Media Center, Windows Home Server -- all defunct. Windows > Server too is in slow decline. I've had very little interest in Microsoft since the 1990s. About the only Microsoft-related news I've since paid attention to were that Microsoft contributed a fair chunk of code to Linux; that Microsoft acquired Github; and that Windows now has WSL. I have no idea what Windows Media Center is (or was), and what alternatives to it the GNU project, http://gnu.org/ , now offers. (I'd guess VLC and FFmpeg might be such alternatives, but last I've checked, they were not part of GNU.) > And now handheld gaming with the Steam Deck. You will find GNU there. So I've read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steam_Deck and found out that the device runs SteamOS which, as of version 3.0, is based on Arch Linux, thus presumably retaining a fair chunk of GNU within. (Bash, Coreutils, Libc, to guess a few packages. I doubt it includes GNU Emacs or GNU Chess, though.) That said, I'm not sure Steam Deck can /itself/ be said to dominate the market: w> Market research firm International Data Corporation estimated that w> between 3.7 and 4 million Steam Decks had been sold by the third w> anniversary of the device in February 2025. How big a market share of handheld gaming computers is 4e6? Also, I gather it's not a direct competitor to Android and Android-based mobile computers, right?