We’ve long said that when it comes to Linux, Microsoft should be more like J-Lo than a Dalek. That is, they should engage rather than exterminate. Microsoft made headlines with stupid soundbites but recently there’s been signs of change. So it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise that Microsoft offered a Linux lab at its partner show. We want to continue this engagement: the more each party knows about the other, the more respect each side will have, and the better the market conversation will be. At US OSCON we’ll have Jason Matusow (head of the Shared Source program) and at EuroOSCON we’ll have Bill Hilf (head of Microsoft’s internal Linux lab). They’ll both be speaking and I hope you’ll seek them out for conversation. They’re nice and reasonable folks, not at all the baby-eating kitten violators some would have you believe, and you’ll learn a lot about Microsoft and how Microsoft views Linux from talking to them.
