OStatic

Today, I was looking at a couple of interesting news and opinion pieces that made me think of an unfortunate truth that we've written about before: Linux has no marketing. The first piece that got me thinking about this problem was Roger Grimes' post on how the Mac platform is much less frequently targeted by hackers than Windows, because it's much less entrenched. That's even more true for Linux, where users have nowhere near the number of security headaches as Windows users have. The other piece I noticed was this one, which points out that even though the official release of Windows 7--expected to be Microsoft's first hit OS in many years--is three weeks away, it's already running on one in 67 personal computers.

Windows 7 has the potential to close the door on opportunities for Linux-based netbooks, and shut a lot of people out of new opportunities to try open source applications. And yet, I don't doubt that the hackers and crackers will be all over Windows 7, circulating new breeds of malware aimed at it. What if Linux had coordinated marketing behind it, and a targeted advertising campaign made the point that Linux-based netbooks can boot faster and are vastly more secure than Windows netbooks? That just might work, if it weren't a pipe dream.

Is Moblin, the open source mobile operating system initially launched by Intel and now overseen by the Linux Foundation, a potential thorn in Microsoft's side? It seems from Microsoft's own stance toward the early stage netbook- and smartphone-focused OS, that it is not. There are also reports that Microsoft may in fact favor Moblin among Linux-based operating systems aimed at computers that Windows might otherwise run on.

Last week, at the Intel Developer Forum conference, Microsoft's Silverlight team demonstrated the Silverlight 3 web application framework running on both Windows 7 and Moblin Atom chip-based devices.? The announcement from the Silverlight team was very ecumenical, describing the Novell-sponsored open source Moonlight implementation of Silverlight as aimed at the broad range of Linux platforms, while Silverlight 3 will be especially adept at running on Moblin. What is Microsoft's real stance toward Moblin?

As Slashdot, Moblin Zone, and ZDNet UK are reporting, the very first netbook preinstalled with Moblin version 2 for Netbooks is likely to launch next week, very probably at Intel's Developer Forum (IDF) in San Francisco, or at Portland's LinuxCon. ZDNet UK did an interview with Imad Sousou, head of Intel's Open Source Technology Center, in which he implied as much. Sousou has also confirmed that Moblin version 2 will be made widely available after that, with many new features.

While Microsoft's Windows 7, due in October, is going to be aggressively pushed in the netbook space, Moblin will join Ubuntu and Google's upcoming Chrome OS in the effort to keep innovative open source operating systems going in the fast-growing netbook space. Intel has handed stewardship of Moblin over to The Linux Foundation, which could help its chances. Netbooks represent an important frontier for open source adoption and innovation, and I have my own guess at who will be shipping the first Moblin v2 netbook.

In a recent discussion with LinuxPlanet about Linux netbooks, Cathy Malmrose of ZaReason (a Linux netbook OEM) made the following statement about European startup Jolicloud, which is working on a Linux-based netbook operating system: For the cloud, I'm headed off to Paris tomorrow morning to talk with the JoliCloud developers. JoliCloud appears to have the most promise at this point.

Malmrose isn't the only one taking notice of Jolicloud. CNet's Josh Lowensohn has taken the beta version of Jolicloud's OS through some early paces, and says: I've been giving it a thorough run-though over the past few days and have come away impressed at what it's trying to do. Some bits and pieces are definitely still beta, but the underlying approach of making Web sites and software applications feel the same, as well as introducing users to new ones to use is really innovative. Does this unusual netbook operating system have a chance?