As you probably know, the most popular Open Source RDBMS, MySQL, is being acquired by Oracle, which – some say – will most likely mean the end of the open source project. MySQL has been eroding Oracle’s profits for quite some time now, and there’s a fat chance that Oracle will kill MySQL in order to keep its high profits.
Why should we care? Well, without MySQL, the web would be much different than it is today. Popular open source applications like WordPress and Drupal, millions of websites and applications rely on MySQL. A lot of start-up companies use MySQL in order to cut down costs and not invest in expensive, proprietary RDBMSs.
But we, the people, have the power to stop it by writing to the EC in order to block the transaction. Read what Michael “Monty” Widenius, MySQL’s creator, has to say on the matter: Help saying MySQL.
PS: Do you know the difference between God and Larry Ellison? God knows He’s not Ellison…
Well, switch to postgres
Yes, that would be the logical step to do…But I still hope I won’t have to! Go European Commission.
For fuck’s sake man, MySQL is open-source. Grab the source and continue to develop on it. Oracle hasn’t killed MySQL. Developers have.
MySQL is up and running and we just want to keep it that way.
Sun’s acquirement by Oracle doesn’t mean that MySQL will die. This is FUD spread either by stupid people, either by people against the merge. Even if Oracle itself won’t develop MySQL anymore (although this is not sure), other people / companies could.
I really don’t understand the purpose of this post.
Calling some of the most influential people in the open source world stupid is beyond lame from my point of view. Oracle – as any other big corporation – exists for one thing and one thing only: make money. For quite some time Oracle has been losing money due to MySQL. Don’t tell me that given the opportunity, they won’t try to “solve” this problem…
PS: I don’t expect an objective opinion from you, since you’re an Oracle employee…
I am not an Oracle employee (anymore). But the GPLv2 license (under which MySQL is released) clearly states that one cannot change the software and redistribute it using a lesser permissive licence. Therefore, even if Oracle won’t contribute to MySQL’s development, any other company / individual could (e.g. MariaDB, which is developed as a MySQL branch by Michael Widenius).
Like I said before: Oracle won’t kill MySQL even if one won’t be able to use the MySQL name (the same situation applies now when MySQL is still owned by Sun), the lack of developers will.
Read this article. It’s quite clear and should explain everything to you…