John Wang on Technology tag:www.dev411.com,2005:Typo Typo 2007-06-16T12:30:22-05:00 John Wang urn:uuid:7fdd6d43e5340f7c48f69aeeb50e3239 2006-07-06T00:29:00-05:00 2007-06-16T12:30:22-05:00

It's interesting to watch the evolution of Canonical <a href="http://www.ubuntu.com/">Ubuntu</a>. It started off by gaining popularity in the desktop space and now it's finally moving into the server space. Linux on the desktop has been a thorn in Linux's side for a while and Ubuntu seems to be the answer. Just recently <a href="http://diveintomark.org/archives/2006/06/02/when-the-bough-breaks">a couple</a> <a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2006/06/29/mark_pilgrims_list_o.html">of people</a> have moved from OS-X to Ubuntu causing quite a stir on <a href="http://apple.slashdot.org/apple/06/07/03/1934251.shtml">Slashdot</a> and <a href="http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2006/06/ubuntu_linux_a_threat_to_mac_o.html">Tim O'Reilly's blog</a>. By winning the desktop, they win users that they can leverage to win the server space. If this strategy sounds familiar, it's the same one that Microsoft used to defeat Novell NetWare. Now that Ubuntu has entered Red Hat and SUSE's turf, it will be interesting to see if they respond with more user friendly desktop editions (I'd be happy for a Linux-version of <a href="http://www.macromates.com/">Textmate</a>). If so, the users will win.

It's interesting to watch the evolution of Canonical <a href="http://www.ubuntu.com/">Ubuntu</a>. It started off by gaining popularity in the desktop space and now it's finally moving into the server space. Linux on the desktop has been a thorn in Linux's side for a while and Ubuntu seems to be the answer. Just recently <a href="http://diveintomark.org/archives/2006/06/02/when-the-bough-breaks">a couple</a> <a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2006/06/29/mark_pilgrims_list_o.html">of people</a> have moved from OS-X to Ubuntu causing quite a stir on <a href="http://apple.slashdot.org/apple/06/07/03/1934251.shtml">Slashdot</a> and <a href="http://radar.oreilly.com/archives/2006/06/ubuntu_linux_a_threat_to_mac_o.html">Tim O'Reilly's blog</a>. By winning the desktop, they win users that they can leverage to win the server space. If this strategy sounds familiar, it's the same one that Microsoft used to defeat Novell NetWare. Now that Ubuntu has entered Red Hat and SUSE's turf, it will be interesting to see if they respond with more user friendly desktop editions (I'd be happy for a Linux-version of <a href="http://www.macromates.com/">Textmate</a>). If so, the users will win. John Wang urn:uuid:6d8e6dbb6481eedd19e691e0b19052ef 2006-06-14T01:32:00-05:00 2007-06-16T12:30:22-05:00

<p>YouTube may be the most popular video sharing website but according to a recent <a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/06/12/youtube_owns_derivative_works/">article on The Register</a> they've burned through nearly $11.5 million in venture funding without any revenue channels. I've often wondered about this. What is YouTube's business model? It looks suspiciously like chasing eyeballs at the moment but I'm hoping one will emerge soon.</p> <p>The article's main issue, that people give YouTube a "worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicenseable and transferable" license to use their work is also of interest. I wonder when we'll see them start to use those rights and in what ways. Will there be a backlash? For now it seems people either don't know about it or are trusting YouTube to do no evil.</p>

<p>YouTube may be the most popular video sharing website but according to a recent <a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/06/12/youtube_owns_derivative_works/">article on The Register</a> they've burned through nearly $11.5 million in venture funding without any revenue channels. I've often wondered about this. What is YouTube's business model? It looks suspiciously like chasing eyeballs at the moment but I'm hoping one will emerge soon.</p> <p>The article's main issue, that people give YouTube a "worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sublicenseable and transferable" license to use their work is also of interest. I wonder when we'll see them start to use those rights and in what ways. Will there be a backlash? For now it seems people either don't know about it or are trusting YouTube to do no evil.</p>