

Open source to shape cloud computing, but not dominate it - ptn
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10278914-16.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-5

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yesimahuman
I don't understand the author's point. You can't compare a library/system like
hadoop to an implementation of that system. Apache Hadoop isn't a business.

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strlen
That article irks me as it makes no sense. First, there in fact is very little
room for _commercial_ software in the cloud: the clouds are built using either
in-house developed tools, open source software, or combinations thereof.

Second, what people run _on top_ of cloud platforms is almost always open
source software: in fact, it would be hard to see open source distributed
computing projects such as Hadoop and Voldemort gaining much traction
_without_ "the clouds".

Third, there's a whole business model for open source software: the software
itself can be released free (as both in speech and in beer), while the
customer would be charged for the _service_ of running the software on
vendor's premises (the vendor nets a profit, while the customer still as they
don't have to build out the hardware infrastructure/perform systems
administration/customize the software themselves).

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pcc
Three misc thoughts:

1) To me there seems to be a long distance between "no place for open source"
vs "open source will shape but not win..."

2) While it may be so that "the vendors of today are the same vendors of 10
years ago"; that does not hold true when sliding this 10yr window back in
time. I certainly don't think its fair to say this will needs hold true in
future either. Maybe the best that can be said is that "vendors appear to have
time constant of around 10yrs"

3) What's with all this talk of "winning" anyway? Winning implies there is an
end / finish line - tech is so transitory I don't know if its possible to say
anyone has ever "won" anything, maybe "dominated" for some period of time, but
its never really over, is it?

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c00p3r
yeah, tell amazon to remove all their xen-based services.

