07.03.08
Xandros Refutes Claims of Microsoft Involvement in Linspire Takeover
Previous posts about the Xandros-Linspire acquisition are:
- How is Xandros Eee PC Arrangement ‘Complicated’?
- Xandros-Linspire-Microsoft Marriage is Now Official
- More Information About Linspire Getting Devoured
- Quick Mention: Linspire is Over
In this cumulative coverage and aggregation of information we gain better understanding of how Xandros and Microsoft interact. First of all, Rick Lehrbaum summarised the situation as follows:
Two highly vocal — though not particularly successful — U.S.-based desktop Linux vendors have become one.
Xandros is probably known to some people only because of ASUS.
The other day, the CEO of Xandros did not say how the ASUS Eee PC blended in with Xandros as a business, if at all. There is so much secrecy. Watch this new interview with him:
Q: What are the total sales and profits for the combined company?
A: Since Xandros is privately held, these figures are not publicly disclosed.[...]
Q: How is this affect your Microsoft relationship … were they consulted on the deal?
A: It will not affect our Microsoft relationship. Xandros has always planned to continue increasing its product portfolio, and Microsoft understands and respects our strategy in that regard. On whether Microsoft was consulted, Xandros is an independent company and consults internally with its board, management, and advisors, and not with outside parties in making decisions.
Watch the image in Jack Germain’s article about it in ECT. It sums it up nicely. According to Linux Journal’s analysis, “Freespire will continue to be available as an Open Source project.” Well, Frespire was never Free software anyway. █
Highlight: Novell was the first to acknowledge that Microsoft FUD tactics had substance. Novell then used anti-Linux FUD to market itself. 
Highlight: Xandros let Microsoft make patent claims and brag about (paid-for) OOXML support. 
Highlight: Linspire's CEO not only fell into Microsoft arms, but he also assisted the company's attack on GNU/Linux. 
Highlight: Microsoft craves pseudo (proprietary) standards and gets its way using proxies and influence which it buys. 
Highlight: The invasion into the open source world is intended to leave Linux companies neglected, due to financial incentives from Microsoft. 
Analysis: Xen, an open source hypervisor, possibly fell victim to Microsoft's aggressive (and stealthy) acquisition-by-proxy strategy.
twitter said,
July 3, 2008 at 9:47 pm
If you are interested in the EEEPC, Xandros and free software, the following interview and list of issues for freeing the EEEPC may be amusing.
http://blue-gnu.biz/content/interview_jeff_moe_blag_linux_libre_and_more
http://www.blagblagblag.org/pub/BLAG/developers/jebba/eee/FREEEEE.TXT
I’ve seen plenty of youtube videos of the EEEPC running Ubuntu and other distributions but some of it may be tainted. Non free habits die hard.