A lack of ingenuity, running around pretending to be ingenuity, often breeds that quality in other endeavors. The linux and open-source communities are brimming with innovation, something which is reflected every day from tabbed media players like “kaffeine” to sexy window managers like “beryl” and its crazy wobbly windows physics. Sometimes, the pretend innovation of companies like Microsoft (regarding the Windows operating system, at least), combined with the success of Apple’s television ads, breeds brilliant satire. Take this fake ad on YouTube, for instance:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVOnFdMf0RU
Great stuff. First of all, nice touch with the smart, attractive woman. Too many men running too many tech companies wouldn’t have thought of that one (in the same way that using semi-naked people to grace Ubuntu’s original desktop was bold, but a bit much). I like how the idea of open source is related to “people just share stuff with you?” Clever. I also like how the other two OSs are resigned to their fate, while linux is portrayed as more open and agile. Nicely done.
This blog entry is brought to you by Drivel, an open-source blog editor that speaks about five blog protocols; it’s written on a KDE desktop, while watching “Meet the Press” streaming from Stevo, my open-source PVR in the living room across my home-made gigabit network; KDE and linux are part of the KDE Ubuntu distribution, running on a homemade computer. Just about the only proprietary thing in this process is the SBC/Yahoo internet connection. Don’t worry . . . one day, that too will be an open, community effort.
