Ellison dithering is costing Oracle money
The President was said to be dithering on Afghanistan. The Senate was said to be dithering on health care.
It's both a technical term and a non-technical one. Dither makes your CD clearer by preventing banding on a recording. Dithering in this case is good, it clarifies.
That's not what the critics mean. They mean shaking with cold and doing nothing about it, in short vacillating. The insult means you should take action, some action, before you catch your political death.
Over the last few weeks open source users have gotten into a dither over Larry Ellison's dithering. He demands the EC approve his purchase of Sun, no preconditions, and when that's not happening he just stands out there in the cold.
It's not making the music of this merger any clearer, or its picture any sharper. That is certain. The intent to use mySQL is falling, Sun is losing server share, and companies like Red Hat and VMWare's SpringSource unit are taking up the slack on Java for their own reasons. IBM is not going to let Open Office just die.
My silly idea, of creating a Foundation among mySQL stakeholders, makes more and more sense. Separate the code from the money, and you take the money, Larry.
Business, like nature, abhors a vacuum, and the impasse between Oracle and the EC, while highly entertaining and strangely satisfying in a nationalistic sort of way, is bad for business. And business is business. It's not romance, it's not war, it's not about feelings. It's just business.
Pride goes before a fall, Mr. E. A mySQL Foundation raises money, improves maintenance of the code base, and lets you make more money in the long run than winning a pissing match with the Eurocrats.
Stop dithering and do business.