From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: pechter@gmail.com (William Pechter) Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2017 13:29:46 -0400 Subject: [TUHS] System Economics (was is Linux "officially branded UNIX") In-Reply-To: <6899fbbf-3f03-77de-be38-66a25b082c71@case.edu> References: <20170314224547.GB14659@naleco.com> <20170315192815.GA15120@naleco.com> <20170315202723.GG2995@mcvoy.com> <6899fbbf-3f03-77de-be38-66a25b082c71@case.edu> Message-ID: Chet Ramey wrote: > On 3/15/17 4:27 PM, Larry McVoy wrote: >> On Wed, Mar 15, 2017 at 03:45:24PM -0400, Clem Cole wrote: >>> SVR4 (aka UnixWare) was available for source - the problem is many people >>> did like the price to see it. It was $100K. But the source was available >>> it was open and many, many of people with PC and had access to it, wrote >>> drivers for it etc. >> That's a pretty peculiar definition of open. Which is fine, I guess, >> but you need to realize that that's open much like a high end country >> club is open. It's open to the rich people, to the connected people, >> everyone else is left out in the cold. > This is the same access vs. affordability argument we're seeing played out > in other segments of US society. > > I have access to a Porsche, as do thousands of others (some of whom choose > not to buy one), but I can't afford one. > I have copies of the old 8086/8088 PC Xenix. I don't know if SCO or Microsoft even sold the sources. My old boss ran very early Microsoft SCO on a PDP11. Don't know if he had sources. Even working as a sysadmin for an AT&T oem of System V wouldn't get me access to the source through normal corporate means. Perhaps I could've bribed an engineer with a Pizza to let me get to his machine without a screen lock... but he'd have been risking his job. Bill -- Digital had it then. Don't you wish you could buy it now! pechter-at-gmail.com http://xkcd.com/705/