[CentOS] Red Hat CEO: Go Ahead, Copy Our Software

[Les Mikesell]

On Fri, Aug 16, 2013 at 9:53 AM, Johnny Hughes <johnny at centos.org> wrote:
> >
> The bottom line ... Robert is correct, the relationship is certainly
> symbiotic and not parasitic.  Red Hat (the company) needs to make money,
> and software that is built on the same code base is available for free
> as well.  It is a win-win ... which is exactly what the GPL provides for.

Red Hat is clearly aware that they would never have become a popular
distribution in the first place without their own freely
redistributable release.    My question is why they now think it is
better to not provide that directly - and get the brand recognition,
community input, and potential support customers using the exact code
as they will as paying customers.  Why push them to work-alikes with
different branding where many users won't even understand the
relationship, with the obvious danger that another brand may compete
for paid support?

-- 
   Les Mikesell
     lesmikesell at gmail.com