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From: peter@taronga.com (Peter da Silva)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd
Subject: Re: Restrictions on 'free' UNIX / 386BSD (Re: selling 386BSD)
Message-ID: <GTFIR8A@taronga.com>
Date: 18 Aug 92 13:02:28 GMT
References: <PHR.92Aug16224207@soda.berkeley.edu> <WLEIPPE@taronga.com> <PHR.92Aug17110648@soda.berkeley.edu>
Organization: Taronga Park BBS
Lines: 43
In article <PHR.92Aug17110648@soda.berkeley.edu> phr@soda.berkeley.edu (Paul Rubin) writes:
> >[subsidised "free"] distribution is not practical for an operating system.
> >Why is it practical for compilers and not OS's?
> Because the compiler distribution is subsidised by the OS distribution. If
> the OS itself has no protection against unsupported copying, what is there
> to subsidise it?
>Hardware distribution.
But the hardware manufacturers aren't the ones selling the operating system.
> And for clonable machines (Sparc, MIPS, x86) the O/S has to be a
> profit center in its own right.
>The x86 proves this is totally wrong. Nearly all x86 vendors just
>ship ms-dog on their machines with almost no profit
And they pay Microsoft to do so. The operating system is a profit center
*for Microsoft* in its own right. And while it's a screaming horror from
the sewers of hell, it *does* run out of the box without any diddling, and
has a zillion applications for it.
>Conversely, if not enough people want the support,
>the support must not be so important, and then there's not much excuse
>for a proprietary OS.
There's support and there's support. Cygnus isn't selling to Joe Blow who
wants a computer to do accounts receivable for his auto parts business.
THAT's the market **ix needs to survive, let alone prosper, past the next
few years. And *that's* why I don't want to see 386BSD knocked out of the
conventional commercial distribution system.
I'm not talking about esoteric like SunOS or Motif (both nightmares to
support, even compared with System V which isn't exactly something I'd wish
on Joe Blow), I'm talking about load-and-go systems like DOS and Windows
and load-and-go applications like Locust 1-2-3 or Weird Perfect.
--
`-_-'
Have you hugged your wolf today? 'U`
Peter da Silva, Taronga Park BBS, Houston, TX +1 713 568 0480/1032