OEMs Looking to Ubuntu for Netbook Market 224
Anon writes "Mark Shuttleworth provides much more detail today about development of the Ubuntu netbook platform, and says OEMs are calling Canonical when they want to start building netbooks. Channelweb notes: 'It's actually a big deal. For example, Dell CEO Michael Dell has been carrying around an early version of a Dell mini-notebook, and referring to it as the device for the next billion Internet users [...] Asus has become an industry rock star by using GNU Linux to power its Eee PC. HP's niche Mini note runs SLED 10 Linux. The iPhone, of course, doesn't run Microsoft software. Is anyone paying attention in Redmond?'"
They are listening (Score:4, Insightful)
And here comes the next round from a company on it's way out the door and no longer truly innovating: litigation!
Is anyone paying attention in Redmond? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes.
At least OLPC [engadget.com] and Asus [engadget.com] are.
If ya think about it.. (Score:5, Insightful)
The eee, Netbook remix, ume-launcher and all OSS-friendly friends fit into the latter. Let's face it - the operating system is slowly melting into the background. Vista, for instance, is trying to kick and scream its way back to the front of your widescreen LCD - but sooner or later, people are going to 'ho-hum' them into oblivion, and get on their Intarwebs the easier way.
P.S. lolsauce.
Stop the mind control (Score:4, Insightful)
what does this have to do with ubuntu? (Score:5, Insightful)
if anyone is a bigger offender of lock-in it's apple. why do slashdotters act like it's some kind of victory? is this about a brand or about freedom as you all caw on about?
Re:Stop the mind control (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Linux critical mass (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure that's what they'll want to do, but for Microsoft the chief problem is while everyone else is concentrating on mimimalistic systems whose specs were top-notch six years ago, everything in Microsoft's code base has been going the other way. By the looks of it, they're going to try to reposition Windows XP for low-end systems, because it will run reasonably well on these systems. Vista and Windows 7 are going to be no-shows. There's simply no evidence I can see that suggests that Windows 7 is going to be any less a resource hog that Vista.
And good luck to them recoding for Silverlight. I think they're going to need it.
LIMP (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Stop the mind control (Score:4, Insightful)
Difficult to beat the price (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:If ya think about it.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Interface needs a make over (Score:5, Insightful)
What's needed is a kind of minimalist mode, where contol buttons and menus don't get in the way, but can be exposed easily and intuitively as they're required. That's going to be a lot of very hard work.
Re:what does this have to do with ubuntu? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:If ya think about it.. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:ASUS Eee PC (Score:3, Insightful)
Do not get me wrong - I'm all for Linux. But I guess the mini-notebook producers have put Linux there because they didn't need anybody's permission to do it. First. Second. I think they also tried to provoke M$ to get some bargaining chip in negotiations.
Now that new market have opened, rest assured, M$ will do anything to grab it.
After all they already brought XP from dead...
Re:a case of gaining a different victory than soug (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:If ya think about it.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Stop the mind control (Score:1, Insightful)
So dear mister Stallman, just think about it as a fork. OK?
Re:Not just Netbooks... (Score:3, Insightful)
They needed no permission (Score:3, Insightful)
This is exactly it. Manufacturers are learning that if they ignore the WinTel platform definitions and just give us the good tech that makes sense, we'll gobble it up.
Some of us will even think of new and clever things to do with it. It sounds scary, but that's where you build the brand values that matter in the long run.
Microsoft not interested (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Interface needs a make over (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh well, I guess still better than computer = Windows...
Re:Stop the mind control (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Stop the mind control (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Difficult to beat the price (Score:1, Insightful)
With viral marketing, astroturf and blogspam.
Can and can't (Score:3, Insightful)
The nettop is not intended to replace your laptop. That is what your "desktop replacement" laptop is for.
The nettops are way cooler than that and if you would get out of your "can't" rut you could probably think of a few applications in your life that are worth the three hundred bucks to you.
Re:what does this have to do with ubuntu? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Linux critical mass (Score:3, Insightful)
Microsofts choices are few
They can keep selling XP on small devices. But linux is still capable of being scaled down further. Where it goes XP can not follow.
WinCE cant run real Windows XP software. It does not even compare to what can be run in Linux. No body wants CE. Microsoft has not even offered it as a choice.
Vista and Windows Seven are two heavy
Microsoft would be forced to write a new OS or bring back windows 98. WinCE is too different under the hood. It does not even have the concept of "current directory". Microsoft stripped out the mouse API, then realized when it was time to work on smartphones that they needed a mouse API. So did you add it back in. No, they wrote a new API incompatible with the win32 api. They are not going to be able to merge WinCE and Windows Vista.
Re:Stop the mind control (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Stop the mind control (Score:2, Insightful)
If you generalize all those systems as "Linux", people will (and they now do) get pissed off because of all the differences between the Linux in they eee (Xandros GUI) and the Linux in their Dell (Gnome) and the Linux in their school (KDE) and whatnot...
Merchandise it as Apple does, "Mac, with Unix tech. inside"... similarly, Ubuntu with "Linux tech inside".
Re:They are listening (Score:2, Insightful)