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Technology Stocks : Red Hat Software Inc. (Nasdq-RHAT) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Eric Sandeen who wrote (169)	7/27/1999 7:14:00 PM
From: Gerald Walls	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1794

thestreet.com (Red Hat Risks) Antagonizing the Linux community. Much is made of the risk Red Hat faces in antagonizing the Linux community -- which is, to put it mildly, tilted pretty far in the "software should be free" direction. The more Red Hat looks like a commercial success -- and the more Linux programmers and customers generally perceive Red Hat as taking their beautiful, free baby away from them -- the more it will be disliked, even reviled, in the Linux community. Already, comparisons are being heard to their ultimate evil empire, Microsoft. I think this is way overblown. Red Hat's success and future lie not so much in the Linux world of years past, but in attracting new Linux users. The opinions of the early Linux boosters will be less important than Red Hat's emergence in the business community as a stable, well-financed, well-respected corporation. As Red Hat CEO Bob Young frequently points out, the company tries to show its respect for the Linux community by scrupulously playing by the rules in the Linux game, immediately contributing its many software improvements to the Linux community generally.