Github about to be Miscrosofted?

[TechyBen]

There are rumours Github and MS are in talks for a takeover, and sadly it's not Github buying MS!

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/06/02/microsoft_github/

Quote

Microsoft has held talks with GitHub with a mind to potentially buy the popular source-code warehouse, folks closely familiar with the discussions have claimed...

 

...GitHub is said to carry at least a $5bn price tag after it was last valued at $2bn during its latest funding round in 2015. That may be a figure Microsoft isn't quite willing to cough up just yet.

 

It would be cheaper than 2 Minecrafts for them.  

 

I'd not really want to see MS have that much control over a repository of any type. It's rather worrying, that it could spin it out to something else. For example, lots of open source games or video/audio products use Github. Would MS have more sway on affecting those communities through ramping up costs, removing support/features to the site? Though hopefully if they ever did, a new repo would open up in its place.

[Cheezdoodlez]

I suspect alot of people will move away from github if this happens. The FOSS-community sharing their code on a M$-platform? Seems unlikely.. 

[jagdtigger]

R.I.P Github....

[TechyBen]

Yeah, "in the spirit of things" that probably will happen. IIRC FOSS is already freely available and searchable on Github, so MS could currently just copy/paste if they wish. However, them controlling the site, would leave a bitter taste in the mouth, knowing that at any point, MS could change their mind in how they treat such repositories.

 

The strength of FOSS is not that it is just freely available. It's that the community can work together on it. Anything that threatens that, threatens it's ability. All the code in the world means nothing, even if visible, if your the only person who has to trawl through the millions of lines of code alone.

[WereCatf]

Would be a sad day, I use Github quite a lot. I do run Gogs for my own, personal projects that I don't plan to share with other people, but I put on Github anything that I don't mind sharing.

[mr moose]

They already work together a fair bit so doesn't surprise me they are talking about merging etc.  I think people tend to forget MS are not just an OS company,  many people have been pointing to open source software as the way of the future. You gotta go where the future is if you want to stay relevant,  That's why they are starting to embrace Linux. 

[Misanthrope]

Well we certainly know Microsoft is "embracing" Linux, declaring as much as love for it in fact and selling it on Azure.

 

This certainly I see as Microsoft "extending" it's reach to Linux and FOSS

 

That only means that the next part it's probably coming.

[jagdtigger]

3 minutes ago, mr moose said:

You gotta go where the future is if you want to stay relevant,  That's why they are starting to embrace Linux. 

Its more likely that they realized that open source is a threat to them so they are gonna neutralize that threat. Just like project sunset in GITS....

[Sauron]

3 minutes ago, mr moose said:

They already work together a fair bit so doesn't surprise me they are talking about merging etc.  I think people tend to forget MS are not just an OS company,  many people have been pointing to open source software as the way of the future. You gotta go where the future is if you want to stay relevant,  That's why they are starting to embrace Linux. 

Microsoft has pretty much ruined almost everything they touched, I have no doubt that them buying github would have nefarious consequences for the platform in the long run. At first it will be preferential treatment for customers of their other services, then maybe logging in with your microsoft account and so on until the platform will only work with their own vc software and will be tied in with their other product licenses.

[Sauron]

7 minutes ago, Misanthrope said:

Well we certainly know Microsoft is "embracing" Linux, declaring as much as love for it in fact and selling it on Azure.

 

This certainly I see as Microsoft "extending" it's reach to Linux and FOSS

 

That only means that the next part it's probably coming.

Torvalds still has the last word on what happens to Linux, so for now I think we're safe. He won't be around forever though...

[mr moose]

1 minute ago, jagdtigger said:

Its more likely that they realized that open source is a threat to them so they are gonna neutralize that threat. Just like project sunset in GITS....

If you think it is possible to extinguish open source you probably don't understand the size of it.   How exactly do you think MS are going to neutralise a movement that builds software on licenses you can't own?

[captain_to_fire]

I hope this doesn't happen especially Microsoft

 

[mrchow19910319]

15 minutes ago, Misanthrope said:

Well we certainly know Microsoft is "embracing" Linux, declaring as much as love for it in fact and selling it on Azure.

 

This certainly I see as Microsoft "extending" it's reach to Linux and FOSS

 

That only means that the next part it's probably coming.

monopoly 101. 

 

 

[mrchow19910319]

if this is apple doing the same thing this forum is gonna blow up and crashed the server of LTT forum. 

 

/s 

[mr moose]

4 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Microsoft has pretty much ruined almost everything they touched, I have no doubt that them buying github would have nefarious consequences for the platform in the long run. At first it will be preferential treatment for customers of their other services, then maybe logging in with your microsoft account and so on until the platform will only work with their own vc software and will be tied in with their other product licenses.

If they start making it MS-centric, the open source community will simply move to a new service.  As far as I know git (Ruby) is all public license.  If github changes to the point people don't want to use it then people will simply make a new one and everyone migrates.   It's a little slower on the software side of things, but you can see how the migration works when you look t the inordinate amount of messenger services and social apps that have come and gone over the last 20 years.  ICQ, Yahoo, Vent, and now skype.  When one services takes a dive another steps up tot he plate.

[captain_to_fire]

1 minute ago, mrchow19910319 said:

monopoly 101. 

 

 

This reminds me

and this...

[Radium_Angel]

1 hour ago, TechyBen said:

There are rumours Github and MS are in talks for a takeover, and sadly it's not Github buying MS!

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/06/02/microsoft_github/

I'd be concerned if it didn't come from the Register, who are notoriously unreliable.

[Misanthrope]

16 minutes ago, Sauron said:

Torvalds still has the last word on what happens to Linux, so for now I think we're safe. He won't be around forever though...

And yet he hasn't adopted GLP v3 which is concerning.

 

All I'm saying here is that there's been enough time for the FOSS community to start creating an alternative kernel to Linux. Google did and they're now really making bank on it but it doesn't requires a big name company to do so for big capital interest, or rather, a group of them should see it's in their own best interest to invest on it collectively and not be locked down by a bigger fish because if it's not Microsoft it will be Google or another rich player like Amazon, Facebook, etc. Who can and will provide alternatives if (or rather, when) Torvalds is no longer around.

[mrchow19910319]

2 minutes ago, captain_to_fire said:

\

well I dont have time to watch this right now but I remember seeing someone said online that bill gates learned the lesson after those years that MS got targeted by the US justice system , then he became a philanthropist.  I think this comment/ explanation/ accusation is a bit of a stretch, but I couldnt help but thinking that there is some truth to it. If someone want to attack somebody, that somebody cannot be a living saint. 

[Sauron]

6 minutes ago, mr moose said:

If they start making it MS-centric, the open source community will simply move to a new service.  As far as I know git (Ruby) is all public license.  If github changes to the point people don't want to use it then people will simply make a new one and everyone migrates.   It's a little slower on the software side of things, but you can see how the migration works when you look t the inordinate amount of messenger services and social apps that have come and gone over the last 20 years.  ICQ, Yahoo, Vent, and now skype.  When one services takes a dive another steps up tot he plate.

Yes, but large companies may not have the flexibility to change platform and may end up being sucked in, until eventually MS' service becomes the standard. Stuff like Skype ought to be dead by now, but it still has a bunch of customers that would have a hard time switching.

[jagdtigger]

11 minutes ago, mr moose said:

If you think it is possible to extinguish open source you probably don't understand the size of it.   How exactly do you think MS are going to neutralise a movement that builds software on licenses you can't own?

Extend it with things that only you own but most consumers need them, and when its spread is wide enough  turn your coat and pull your stuff from everything except from your own distro... They have enough software stuff and money to actually pull this off.

[captain_to_fire]

3 minutes ago, mrchow19910319 said:

I think this comment/ explanation/ accusation is a bit of a stretch, but I couldnt help but thinking that there is some truth to it. If someone want to attack somebody, that somebody cannot be a living saint. 

That's why I said it reminds me of Microsoft's past anti-trust litigation from both the US gov't and the EU.

[suicidalfranco]

R.I.P. Giyhub. You will be dearly missed.

 

pressing F to pay respect

[mr moose]

15 minutes ago, jagdtigger said:

Extend it with things that only you own but most consumers need them, and when its spread is wide enough  turn your coat and pull your stuff from everything except from your own distro... They have enough software stuff and money to actually pull this off.

The whole EEE only works in certain situations.   Many of the examples Used that people think are EEE are in fact simply breach of contract or license agreement. 

 

Do you think MS are going to add proprietary features to linux or github that will make it unique enough to draw the main users into a position of dependence?  And if so do you think that the OSS community will not simply go elsewhere when said features are abundantly obvious?

 

again, OSS is not going anywhere anytime soon, and companies even as large as MS do not have the power to stop it.

 

https://www.techrepublic.com/article/red-hat-summit-open-source-is-the-future-but-only-if-it-can-expand-beyond-developers/

https://blog.sourcefabric.org/en/news/blog/3592/5-Reasons-the-Future-of-Software-is-Open-Source.htm

https://community.intersystems.com/post/why-open-source-future-and-if-not-what-hampers-it

https://venturebeat.com/2017/05/22/how-open-source-software-will-drive-the-future-of-auto-innovations/

 

Tthe idea that Open source can be killed by introducing proprietary features, is like insinuating you can convert atheists at an atheist conference by giving them bibles.

 

EDIT: and lets not forget that this is the company that tried to put iphone in an early grave, and has been writing code for apple for decades.  pointing to one or to successful cases of beating the competition does not change the fact they are just as borderline failures as any other company out there.  And such cases do not prove they are intending anything let alone are likely to be successful.

[jagdtigger]

3 minutes ago, mr moose said:

Do you think MS are going to add proprietary features to linux or github that will make it unique enough to draw the main users into a position of dependence?

They managed to do it once with windows, call me crazy but it seems to me they attempting to do it again....