Apple

I have many Linux-using friends who have no plans whatsoever to buy an iPad, and I respect them for having that stance. They are opposed to closed, locked, proprietary systems. I share their general values, but have chosen to buy a third-generation iPad and plunge headlong into creating iBooks using iBooks Author. I see the iPad as a exquisite tool for getting the word out about FOSS - free and open source software.

Apple is expected to sell 65 million iPads (or more) in 2012, according to analyst Canaccord Genuity. That's 65 million people I can inform about FOSS opportunities, such as the amazing Inkscape vector drawing program and OpenShot video editing program. Inkscape already runs well on Mac and Windows, and OpenShot is coming to Mac and Windows, so why not seize the chance to inform people about these programs? » Read more

On January 19, Apple held a large, education-related event on in New York City. Just as with almost any other Apple event, pre-event speculations were all over the place. It was clear that the announcement was going to target the textbook market, but what wasn't clear was its scope. As AllThingsD's Peter Kafka wrote: "the key thing to watch at the Guggenheim is whether Cue brings up reps from the big textbook publishers like Pearson and McGraw-Hill onstage, or whether the focus is on letting educators and others build their own books, so they can bypass both the publishers and the antiquated textbook procurement system." » Read more

This post originally appeared in Tim O'Reilly's Google+ feed and on O'Reilly Radar.

This tweet by Steve Case (@stevecase) struck home for me, because in the aftermath of Steve Jobs' death I've been thinking a lot about O'Reilly, wanting to make sure that we streamline and focus on the stuff that matters most. » Read more

The following is an excerpt from Gary Hamel's forthcoming book, What Matters Now, to be published in December 2011 by Jossey-Bass Business.

In 1997 I bought an e-tablet from A.T. Cross, the pen company. Codeveloped with IBM, the CrossPad was hailed as a breakthrough product that would open up a whole new category--portable digital notepads. I'm a copious notetaker, so the idea of turning my scribblings into digital files was too good to ignore. » Read more

Open source has always had an on-again, off-again relationship with profit.

Richard Stallman's FOSS idea was anti-capitalist. Eric Raymond's open source attitude is profoundly pro-capitalist.

Yet the first open source companies to emerge in the early part of the last decade used FOSS licenses, not the "permissive" BSD-type licenses Raymond favors. They wanted community support, and an equal relationship among developers encouraged it. » Read more

Mobile Linux platforms are making incredible inroads into the emerging smartphone market. The market leading position that Apple developed and which seemed insurmountable just 18 months ago has now been eclipsed by the Android platform, alone. As the MeeGo smartphone platform enters the market this trend toward mobile linux ubiquity can only be expected to continue.  Further, the extension of these linux-based operating systems into higher value computing devices is, in parallel, threatening to transform the nature of personal computing. » Read more

I recently wrote about the $4.5 billion auction for Nortel's portfolio of 6,000 patents that went to a consortium that included Apple, Microsoft, and RIM (Blackberry) -- three of four smartphone platforms. In the wake of this sale, Interdigital has contemplated monetizing its portfolio of 8,500 patents, perhaps even putting the company up for sale. Google announced that it has bought over 1,000 patents from IBM for defensive purposes. Perennial investor Carl Icahn suggested that Motorola cash in on some of its immense portfolio of 18000 patents. » Read more

When the Supreme Court declined to speak to software patenting in the Bilski case, there was wailing and gnashing of teeth in the open source software world. The new Bilski test for patentable subject matter looked at first like the status quo for software patentability. But, being the sort of person who tries to check clouds for a possible silver lining, I noted a possibility that courts and the Board of Patent Appeals and Interferences would read the test to invalidate some software patents. Later I noted that there were a number of early decisions finding software unpatentable. » Read more

Earlier this week, Fast Company posted an article by Jens Martin Skibsted and Rasmus Bech Hansen (thanks to Gunnar Hellekson for sending it my way) that may be of interest to folks seeing success with their open source and open innovation efforts.

The article is entitled "User-Led Innovation Can't Create Breakthroughs; Just Ask Apple and IKEA" and here's how it starts: » Read more