Quick thoughts on the (possible) demise of OpenSolaris
Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols writes that the "writing is on the wall.
Latest Posts
Microsoft sneaks in Firefox extension via Update
The good news is that Microsoft is writing extensions for Firefox. The bad news is, the Redmond giant is slipping the extension onto systems without notifying users and making it difficult to get rid of the extension.
What do you want for free? Do users have to pay up to complain?
Matt Asay excorates the whining masses that are taking Twitter to task for its ill-considered removal of the @replies feature. Asay says "pay money so that you actually have the right to voice your displeasure as a customer rather than as a user.
Using selfishness to put crowds to work for you
How do you enable "the wisdom of crowds"? Part of the power of community is that a group of people can solve problems much more easily than individuals, but only if you can provide tools that make it possible for them to do so and appeal to their own interests.
Miro puts code up for adoption
I've heard of "orphaned" code, but this is a new one. The Miro project is trying a new approach to funding: asking enthusiasts to "adopt" lines of code.
Oprah comes, Oprah goes: Who cares?
As a tool, Twitter has its advantages and disadvantages, but does it really matter if Oprah Winfrey decides to keep up with her account or not? Apparently the Silicon Alley Insider finds it fascinating, even tracking the number of people following her and the rate of new followers compared to other popular folks on Twitter.
The argument for free fonts
Bring up free fonts around typeface designers, and you'll probably get an earful about the relative quality of free and open source designs against the professionally designed fonts. Mark Pilgrim, over on Dive into Mark gives an earful back.
What does Oracle mean for Sun's open source efforts?
So much for a big blue Sun. Instead, the company is being gobbled up Oracle for about $7.
Prioritizing bugs to boost Linux adoption
What are the problems that need to be solved to boost Linux adoption? And in what order?
Yet another "Mac vs. PC" article that misses the point
BusinessWeek has yet another article on the relative costs of Macs vs. PCs, and author Arik Hesseldahl comes down on the Mac side:PC makers in the Windows camp have done everything possible to make their products progressively worse by cutting corners to save pennies per unit and boost sales volume.
Google releases source for Google Update
Word came down from the Google-plex last Friday that the company has decided to release the source code for Google Update. Codenamed Omaha, Update is a software installer that automatically updates Google Earth, Chrome, and other Google-produced apps designed to run on Windows.
Savory hacks the Kindle for ePub and PDF support
Jesse Vincent is doing Amazon's work for it. Vincent has put together an app called Savory that runs natively on the Kindle to convert ePub and PDFs dropped into the Kindle 2 document folder.
Quality improves for Google Summer of Code
The Google Summer of Code student application period wrapped up last week, and the overall number of applications is down from 2008. However, this is shaping up to be a good thing.
Perfectionists need not apply
If you're a perfectionist, or prefer to solve problems alone, you're going to have some problems working with community projects. Individual contributors and companies need to get used to working in the open, and be willing to work towards perfection rather than trying to nail it the first time.
How to make technology conferences suck less
There's a dirty little secret to technology conferences: Most of them suck to some degree. It's about time someone started thinking about how to make conference time more valuable and less stale, especially now that companies are cutting back on travel to shows.