[Liverpool] Open war: MySQL community vs. Oracle/Sun's mobilization campaign

[aidan mcguire]

On 17 Dec 2009, at 14:13, Dave Love wrote:

> Screwing the Sun deal can only be bad for the community as far as I  
> can
> tell (and I talk to people in Sun, with whom I have better  
> relationships
> than I've had with people from any other computer company).  Those  
> of us
> in the HPC game, particularly, don't want to see things go further  
> down
> the pan and -- apart from the hardware -- we depend on Sun free  
> software
> which is not MySQL, or even Java, and unfortunately isn't generally
> copy-left.

This argument is not per se about oss versus non oss - its about  
competition in the market for sql database software.
Also I dont think anyone is saying "screw the deal" my impression is  
that the commission are concerned about Oracle holding a dominant  
percentage of the database market.

If Oracle really want Sun then they have been given alternatives  
courses to make the deal happen - ie commit to divesting itself of  
mysql one the takeover is completed.

Confess however i am not a lawyer.

Aidan