Sun and Open Source

We don't even yet know what Sun means by "open source", but already the pundits are arguing about whether making Solaris "open source" (whatever that turns out to mean) will help them or hurt them. On the one hand, we have Sun thinking that their service network and promised superior performance will push them upward. Service and support certainly are important, and are a great way for a Linux vendor (apps or OS) to extract money from a free product, but I don't see this adding much to the attractiveness of Solaris 10. It's a nice extra, but it isn't going to cause people to switch, or stop people from switching away. Performance is another issue, though. If Solaris 10 really can outperform Linux, that can be a reason to switch. But it has to be near mind-blowing to have much influence. Of course, there is another way: if important apps only run on your OS, or run badly on anything but your OS, or are painful and difficult to run elsewhere, you can be open source while effectively maintaining the same monopoly you had with closed source. I had mentioned this before at How to make money with open source, and here's an interesting take from an interview with Sun's Jonathan Schwartz: (From APLawrence.com A.P. Lawrence provides SCO Unix and Linux consulting services http://www.pcunix.com