Debate continues on whether open core business models are a winning strategy with a capital "w" or not, and whether customers care. I want to take a different approach to the discussion here.

Manufacturers today produce a dizzying array of video hardware whose graphics processing power alone outstrips entire computer systems of just ten years ago. However, it’s not always been easy for Linux users to take advantage of this hardware. Until recently, the more exotic 3D acceleration features in particular have often required introducing closed source, proprietary drivers.

Here's the Bilda board at work, this is a hardware controller controlled by Linux via usb. It's extremely fast and allows for projection of all kinds of great shows. 360 degrees rotating laser projection, thanks to Linux control...

The patent system receives more mockery and jabs while monopolies like Apple exploit it in order to marginalise competition

Canonical is the first Linux shop to have agreed to license the codec in question, H.264 from MPEG LA. Even though Red Hat and Novell are also available for use on PCs, they have not licensed H.264.

Red Hat has issued a reminder that version 3 of Red Hat Enterprise Linux will reach its EOL on the 31st of October, 2010. No further updates, including security updates and critical fixes, will be available after that date

Alright - enough speculation and assumptions, lets look at some cold hard numbers. Two recent games that had successful Linux ports would be 2DBoys World of Goo and Frictional Games enumbra Series. 2DBoy reported that since they released their Linux port of the game 10% of their total game sales have been for the Linux platform.

The Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) calls the spade "a spade"; Nokia's solution to the extortion problem cannot be generalised, so patent reform is urgently needed