Oracle's Java lawsuit undermines its open source credibility
Found on Ars Technica on Friday, 13 August 2010
Even though Oracle appears to have a solid basis for legal action, the lawsuit could permanently burn bridges between Oracle and the broader Java ecosystem. Such blatantly antagonistic litigation sends a clear message to the open source software community that Oracle is a hostile and abusive interloper rather than a contributor.
The move reflects Oracle's unwillingness to publicly account for the egregious inconsistency between its message of enthusiasm for open source software and its aggressive conduct towards other companies in the ecosystem.
Oracle also operates with double standards. At the same time it's fighting against the usage of Java, Oracle relies on Open Source itself. It distributes and supports Oracle Enterprise Linux, which is nothing but a re-release of RedHat Enterprise Linux. Oracle just removes all trademarks and relies entirely on RedHat and the Open Source community to develop and maintain the operating system.