“Apple’s restrictive control measures and policies will ultimately fail, according to Linus Torvalds,” Nicole Martinelli reports for Cult of Mac.
“‘Technologies that lock things down tend to lose in the end,’ said Torvalds at the keynote of LinuxCon Brazil,” Martinelli reports. “Torvalds made the remark in answer to a question about Microsoft’s secure boot feature, saying the initiative – like Apple’s DRM – won’t last forever because ‘people want freedom and markets want freedom… I’m an optimist: openness is successful in the long run, secure boot is another one of these passing fads,’ Torvalds said.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: People want “openness,” Linus, so Apple will ultimately lose? Oh, you mean like Linux on the desktop?
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Lynn Weiler” for the heads up.]
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Apple’s iOS – on iPad only! – passes Linux in U.S. operating system use – April 21, 2011
Oh please. Isn’t there an Occupy rally he needs to go to?
LOL
… honest opinion. And he is not terribly wrong. Just not particularly right, either. I was on the fence about Linux a dozen years ago – leaning strongly towards the newcomer.
Then came Ten. I never looked back. Except at work, where I used Linux, Solaris and Windows. It’s a good system. For uber-geeks.
Ooh good one Fig.
Subtle but clever, cause he’s all about open (transparency) and so are those poor souls who are getting the shit kicked out of them by fascist jackbooted thugs just for excercising their freedom of speech.
Throw on your uniform and meet Linus down there and you can pepper him with questions about openness, freedom, transparency, and all those other nouns that scare the crap out of corporations and govenments alike.
Linux is the new black. Just wait and see.
Don’t hold your breath though.
LOL! A picture paints a thousand words. Great graph MDN. 🙂
A good thing too, for those of you who can’t read, otherwise you’d have missed out on the punchline.
MDN, lmao.
I think he’s right. People do want freedom. But most people also want to feel protected. When one comes at the expense of the other, this want for freedom is playing second fiddle pretty fast…
People just want to get their work done. This inane navel-gazing over the trivial underpinnings of the operating system is only important to geeks, dweebs and many so-called analysts and bloggers.
Apple is popular because people can get their work or task done with a minimum of BS.
Indeed! The vast majority of the purchasing public don’t even have any clue what he’s talking about. Open? Closed?
Even Linus doesn’tr have a clue about what’s talking about.
Roflmao
Yeah, he’s obviously way over your head.
Now get up off the cell floor and pick up you ass, your cellmate wants to use it, again.
People want freedom – to have a choice of apps, to have a great selection of apps to do a variety of things, and to have a choice of which platform the just works for them without making them do a lot of extra crap just to keep it running, secure, stable, etc.
That’s why people are choosing Apple. They really don’t care about supposed restrictions, because Apple has created a developer system which encourages and demands quality apps. People really don’t care if you can hack into the iPhone’s file system. Most don’t even know such a thing exists.
Exactly, the kind of world Linus is talking about is where the criminals walk around the streets of NYC freely, raping and pillaging people and stores willy-nilly. You have to take your anti-viral and other medication to protect yourself as best as you can, but the medicines can’t keep up with the crooks. Some of us would like to have some police around to catch the crooks, first.
Ahh so now Linus Torvalds is promoting rape and pillage in NYC? Really, is that what you take away from the article?
Rather than let the criminals walk around freely to pursue their crimminal pasttimes, we should charge them for the pleasure, is that it?
Or better still, put everyone on medication as some sort of protection against anal penetration, broken glass, and the willy-nillies? Oh dear.
Perhaps you should get yourself conceal and carry permit. Also, maybe you should stay home, lock all your doors and windows, hide the family in the cellar and just shiit your pants, because, trust me when I tell you, no one is coming to save you.
Hah! What a high IQ moron. He couldn’t be more wrong. He basically quotes the Windows example which is slowly losing favor if anything, at least to more enlightened souls who don’t just look for bargain tech. Protected tech environments ensure a secure and consistent experience for end users. What a concept! Only a nerd/geek wants that openness so he can screw around with it, such has become the hackers way regardless of the real cost to such openness (evil hackers like it too!). How’s that “open” Androidy fragmenty thing work’n out fer yah? Malware abounds yah say? Inconsistent experience yah say?
iPhone, iPad & Mac is an oasis in a world of ‘Droid & Windows troubles.
Another ignoramous with tourettes.
Technologies that lock things down tend to lose in the end,’ said Torvalds […]
Torvalds made the remark in answer to a question about Microsoft’s secure boot feature, saying the initiative – like Apple’s DRM – won’t last forever because ‘people want freedom and markets want freedom…
show me where Linus is wrong about that statement. Steve Jobs knew DRM would be disruptive for not only the market, but for consumers as well. After witnessing the massive consumer embrace of iTunes Store, he set out to abolish DRM, attacked it publicly, the same way he did Flash, and used the strong consumer interest in digital music as leverage against those who have been screwing us over for years to lighten ip on their draconian measures.
Steve, like Linus, is right. We want freedom from repressive forms of control. Whether that’s in our personal lives or in our technology BUT LET’S BE CLEAR… No one especially Linus is advocating hacking, or evil hacking wherein they get the gold and we get the shaft.
Open doesn’t always devolve into chaos! Loopholes do, however those who would exploit loopholes for personal gain, aren’t necessarily doing it for financial reasons, perhaps it’s the recognition of their peers or whatever, but for you to even remotely suggest “openness” doesn’t have any chance whatsoever, or that Linus is promoting insecurity is laughable.
Also, for you to equate Google’s brand of “open” to Linus Torvalds philosophy of an open-platform is moronic in and of itself. Larry Page and Linus Torvalds aren’t even in the same league and yet PETER BLOOD would have us believe they both want the same things.
Low IQ maroon.
By the time Apple “loses” this battle, they will have defined a new front. I don’t recall anyone ever begging for an “open” eco-system on their TV. You know why not? Because the multitudes want things like TVs to “just work”. That’s what we get with our walled garden. I for one, like it just fine. I don’t think I’m alone in this.
Yes, Apple is going out of business 35 years and counting. #AppleIsDoomed.
I’ll try to contain the rest in a single sentence.
Dear Mr. Torvalds, other than creating/reverse engineering another *nix kernel based on and heavily inspired by the free BSD (IOW no unique offering to the world, except for the free and open routine), hitching that to the GNU project and then riding that glory train to every customer who’s willing to put up with fake Rolex of the world than supporting authentic and original article; what else have you done that uniquely qualifies you to predict the demise of a most successful company renowned for multifaceted creative/innovative energy with a rich history longer than you’ve been in business yourself?
Don’t speak!!
what makes YOU, KRquet, qualified to summarize his life’s work in a handful of meaningless sentences? THANK YOU for containing yourself. If I had to read anymore of your drivel, I might puke.
You know, Croquet is a game played with big balls. Krquet is game played without balls.
Explain to us krquet what your “going out of business” comment has to do with this article? Or, as you succinctly put it, ” what else have you done that uniquely qualifies you to predict the demise of the most successful blah blah balh…”
I want a link to his words predicting the demise of Apple, Inc.
There are none is there? Because like a few other dimwits in this thread, you think he means Apple as a company, instead of what he actually said about apple’s restrictive control measures and policies.
Policies and control measures can change overnight and even with a change in leadership.
Oh and one more thing, stop putting Apple on a pedestal. Lemming.
Torvalds is a fool.
Apple have won and are winning – and the term ‘open’ is meaningless.
Berlisconi is a fool and he knows the meaning of openness, doesn’t he?
He’s open about his sexual predatory practices, huh? And yet, you gave him a pass didn’t you? Kept electing him as your Playboy in Chief.
Now. See the way my ramblings about your country’s leadership make about as much sense and relevancy as your comments about Torvalds? Hope you do because I didn’t really mean any of it.
But just the same, Torvalds is not anti-apple, so why would you think Apple is in some kind of race with Linux?
Tell us Derek, what has Apple won? Was there a contest I hadn’t heard about?
The breakdown in Torvald’s logic comes from a misunderstanding of how the real world works. What people want is often in conflict with reality (or simply in conflict with what other people want).
People WANT everything to be free. We all WANT gobs of money, great sex, to live forever, perfect health, peace and harmony etc. Good luck on that.
A more intelligent form of reasoning is to logically conclude that systems that work, that are reasonably priced, are largely trouble free and that serve the needs of a large number will succeed.
Torvalds has been out of the mainstream so long he thinks his tributary is a river.
Excellent!
1
And he didn’t read Daniel Kahnemann’s Thinking, Fast and Slow
And he was named after one of the losers in Charles Schultz’s Peanuts
And he was served a Mickey Finn shortly before his comments
The breakdown in Torvald’s logic comes from a misunderstanding of how the real world works.
NO, the breakdown comes from a massive failure in reading comprehension.
What makes you the expert on what people want? You haven’t got a clue as to what I want, so don’t lump me in with the rest of your friends and family.
Greedy much? Most people I know work hard for the small pleasures in life that bring them joy. They don’t expect things to be given to them for free.
Maybe you do, or perhaps you learned that growing up ( you are grown up, aren’t you ) but you should try to get out more often.
Same as it ever was…
He’s just jealous his version didn’t take off like Apple’s use of Unix did.
And why didn’t it take off? Because more than wanting something for free, people want something that works and works well, and actually helps them get things done quickly and easily.
That’s why Linux has failed to gain any significant market penetration with consumers. It’s just too difficult, too fragmented, and too unsupported to be useful by anyone. Throw in a lack of applications that people can find, install, and use when working with other people, and yes Linus, you have a failure on your hands.
So he’s obviously qualified to talk about how Apple will ultimately fail.
Don’t discount the fact that Microsoft continues to wage war against Linux to undermine it’s acceptance in enterprise, which last I read was gaining a bit of momentum from those looking for an alternative to Windows.
That is not an endorsement from me, just a point of contention that there are myriad market forces impacting the adoption of any product, especially ones being produced by those who haven’t got a prayer of succeeding due to financial constraint.
Linux is a commercial failure for the very reasons you talk about, as it should be, but also because of the very nature of the platform; share and share alike, and comparing the glacial adoption rate of the Linux platform to other commercially successful platforms like Windows and OS X seems a bit disingenous, but that’s just me.
Commercial and open platforms are two very different concepts, different as night and day, like Barnes & Noble and public libraries; one is in the money-making business and the latter is offering a free public service, for the very same product.
Unlike B & N, public libraries depend heavily on community support for donations, fees and contributions, and most of all public participation. Without it, libraries fail.
No one here can begin to imagine what’s really on Linus’s mind, no more than they can comprehend why Woz would choose to giveaway his creations, rather than exploit them for money, but as far as I’m concerned, those who would bad mouth Linus and his freeware mentality may as well be attacking Woz for wanting to give his projects away for the betterment of the human condition.
I mean really, why would anyone attack either of these men just because they have contrary opinions? Some of you carry on as though you were personally hurt by Linus’s wont to give away his products.
Personally, I’ve never used Linux because I was too busy trying to earn a living using Apple products and as they say, if it ain’t broke, why fix it?
As for MDNs chart, it’s about as commercially relevent as this article. What’s pathetic is MDN is comparing two completely different concepts; commercialism versus shareware to make the point of how irrelevent Linus Torvalds comments are.
I love it when MDN tears into those who would try and make Apples to Oranges comparisons and call no joy and yet, anyone who believes this business of comparing Linux to the way Apple operates are comparable, is ridiculous on its face.
+1 well said
You know who would agree with Linus? Steve Jobs.
He wrote publically about the dangers of DRM and the manner in which it stifles creativity and innovation. But,
Lockdown is a strange word and I wonder why he chose that one, and it’s too bad the reporter didn’t press him for an explanation. Of course to someone like Woz or Linus, “lockdown” could be something as simple as a password protecting the computers in the public library.
“Apple’s lockdown mentality” could mean anything, especially when its taken out of context, but as is the wont around here, shoot first-ask questions later is the prevailing attitude.
I love Linux, especially any Debian-based distro, like Ubuntu. It’s an amazingly powerful OS, and you can get software to do just about anything. Still, it’s all you; you (and some forums) are your support. The year of the Linux desktop has been coming for forever, but if something as simple as Ubuntu couldn’t pull it off, it will probably never happen.
The only, only possibility is developing nations. Maybe they will generate enough momentum, but from what I understand, MS basically gives software away in those countries to prevent Linux.
Also, I just got the memo that we don’t like Ubuntu anymore and we’re all switching to Mint…
He’s probably right if you’re a computer… I don’t want to use the word “geek,” there’s something better. Aficionado? Fan? Buff? You know, like those guys with the Hondas that are all modified and tweaked. Anyway, if you’re one of them, he’s right, but you can’t equate them with “people.” I’m an engineer, I know what it’s like being part of a small specialized world. You don’t realize that the rest of the world just doesn’t care. It’s kinda why most cell phones are so horrible. When I worked at Qualcomm I’d see these phone prototypes and think “who wants that crap?” But the guys who designed it thought they were awesome. So I’m glad that there’s Linux and all of its derivatives for the tweakers to be creative, but the rest of us just want to get some work done.
this is is a a-hole!
so let me see,
if i let the door of my house open, i’ll feel secure
if i let my car door open, i’ll feel secure
if i let the gaz open inside the house, i’ll feel secure
something’s not right here…
how can he say an open system is better, and thus prevailing over a closed system? stupid stupid man
Takes one doesn’t it?
Comparing the threats of Linux’s open system to the threat of leaving your personal possessions unlocked, speaks volumes about the world around you, and your place in it.
Nice try but, …what was the phrase you used, “stupid, stupid man”?
He s right!
That’s why people live in houses with glass less windows and curtain doors, cars with no roofs and bank accounts without passwords…. because they just want it Open!
Another dumbass Finn. He has a loser Nokia mentality. Nokia is the Jokia of the world now, and this guy never changed with the world after inventing Linux. He is still locked in the ’90s, as is his country’s tech failure, Nokia.
Open and Closed is a spectrum. A spectrum with a lot of grey between the imaginary absolutes at each end.
There are lots of “closed systems” that are tremendously successful and that we all use every day.
Man, you started out so well and then you stumbled by not including “open systems” in the third sentence.
I hope Apple and my shares continue to lose like in the last 10 years…
Paddles!!!!
Stand clear.
I’m sorry Mrs. Linux.
Yeah, because the Linux community wins… Umm… Well, never, actually.
And as long as they mistakenly believe that people value “free and open” above actual quality, they never will.
Regular people don’t give a shit about your ideology, Linus, they want intuitive software that works. Get that through your head.
Steve saved the country when he relocked it. “Ultimately” is “eternity”- it’s an abstract word.
Then why is Linux just a hobby OS. Is there a Linux version of Office? No. Do you see Linux hardware in retail stores, no. Do you see a whole software selection in retail stores, no. So Linux is so open that nobody wants to use it. Linux is also open like Microsoft’s Windows to all the crap that people DON”T WANT. Viruses, spyware, malware. It still isn’t easy to use for the lamen out there. Most of the software is beta at best with no real direction to make it fully working that I’ve seen. Apple locks some things down for a reason, usually security is Apple’s primary concern. Most switchers from the PC are going Mac because it is locked down so viruses, spyware, malware and trojans don’t mess with people. Your so called open software that lets all that crap in is what people don’t want Linus.
Actually, you probably use Linux every single day. You’re only able to read this because a network of Linux web servers listened to your HTTP request and was nice enough to deliver this web page from across the world to your Mac.
That “hobby” OS is apparently reliable, secure, and has enough available hardware to be the backbone of this other “hobby” called the Internet.
Oh, and the Linux version of Office is called LibreOffice (there are actually dozens, but that’s the most popular one at the moment).
It more then that,
Linux runs over 400 of the 500 supper computers. All your cable boxes. Most routers and a multitude of other devices we see and use every day run some version of Linux.
Furthermore Linux is more secure against viruses and malware the osx google it!
And to your state ment about finding software in store ( linke you can go any ware but apple to Mac software) Linux doesn’t need to put software in stores it can all be received through the different app stores that are built into the os ( known as repositories) which by the way we around long before Mac app store!
I’m glad to know we all won’t go hungry with 400 supper computers running Linux.
The point is that beyond servers, Linux has virtually no desktop presence and is invisible to consumers. And it’s not like there’s one form of Linux that is used for all of these servers, set-top boxes, etc.: it’s more like a form of Unix that has been sliced and diced to fit various uses.
The point is that Linux is nothing like Apple, and that Linux’s push into the consumer world flopped massively. Why? Because there is no gatekeeper, no watchdog, no guardian against the thieves and villains. IT professionals running “supper” computers may not need that (debatable sometimes), but consumers absolutely do, and that’s why Linus is wrong.
Flopped? Linux drives more consumer products than any other OS.
Your not understanding the context of what he is saying. The guy does not think on a level of brand x or brand y and consumers.
When linus says “users” he literally means “engineers”. Seriously.
Read up about how linux destroyed the big unix vendors and completely changed the course of computing. You’ll start to see the context of where he is coming from.
Linux has virtually no desktop presence and is invisible to consumers.
Thank you Captain Obvious! Stop trying to compare desktop shareware to commercial powerhouses like OS X and Windows.
Stop and think for a minute will you?
The only reason Linux servers are even commercially available is because of Microsoft’s business practices and policies.
IBM, HP, et. al., offer Linux as an alternative and those who adopt it are grateful for the choice. Any small business, given a choice between Windows and Linux servers would probably choose the latter if they could get a modicum of support and if that means marginalizing Microsoft then how is that a bad thing?
As a recent Apple convert I can say he is completely full of ****.
I have a number of Linux boxes in my business they are all cheap and imbedded in a cabinet and not for general consumption just like linux should be.
I will say going to Mac has been great my tech support guy is now without us a customer.
RED
Linux is quickly becoming the most attractive option for an up-to-date operating system on at least on computer platform: PowerPC Mac.
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