After seeing this article yesterday, I did a bit of research. One _big_ reason
why Sourceforge/VA/OSDN is moving over to IBM/Webshere/DB2 from PostgreSQL is
the resulting product will be jointly marketed by Sourceforge and IBM's
zillions of sales people. So not only will they get a shiny, new db, but
backend revenue.
"The companies will jointly market and sell the software as part of the
commercial agreement. "-- 4th paragraph, last sentence.
http://www.eweek.com/print_article/0,3668,a=30025,00.asp
"In a separate announcement today, VA Software announced a significant
commercial agreement with IBM focused on the joint marketing and sales of the
next generation of SourceForge™ Enterprise Edition." -- 7th paragram from
their press release at
http://www.vasoftware.com/news/press.php/2002/1070.html
Perhaps the PostgreSQL team bidding for the job, if any were even consulted,
didn't frame the project as IBM did -- a product joint venture. It's a good
tactic and I don't blame Sourceforge one bit for the opportunity.
The decision wasn't entirely technical so I don't see this as a loss for
PostgreSQL. DB2 isn't a slouch db by any means but not many companies will be
able to bargain with IBM as Sourceforge did. If you're a retailer in Topeka
with 3 locations, I doubt IBM would give you the same attention or joint
marketing deal they gave Sourceforge. DB2 ain't cheap.
--
Best,
Al Hulaton | Sr. Account Engineer | Command Prompt, Inc.
503.222.2783 | ahulaton@commandprompt.com
Home of Mammoth PostgreSQL and 'Practical PostgreSQL'
Managed PostgreSQL, Linux services and consulting
Read and Search O'Reilly's 'Practical PostgreSQL' at
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