Check your figures [LWN.net]

Check your figures

Posted Jan 17, 2009 1:43 UTC (Sat) by nix (subscriber, #2304)
In reply to: Check your figures by jspaleta
Parent article: A Software Populist Who Doesn't Do Windows (New York Times)

I don't know: we don't have the data, and the financial world is churning
so very hard right now that I'd find it hard to disbelieve *anything* I
heard in that domain.

Furthermore, I don't care. I have no idea why you care. What's the worst
that happens? Say Canonical implodes because Mark Shuttleworth has been
secretly firing all its cash reserves into orbit. Net consequences? Some
Debian developers lose their jobs and have to find new ones (tough on
them, but if you cared so much about people employed by Canonical I doubt
you'd have been calling them such nasty names lo these many months).
Ubuntu development will probably slow and it may merge back into Debian or
something like that.

No software is lost: no work is lost: Launchpad, if it weren't already
free, would probably be promptly freed (as what use is it if Canonical is
gone).

So why the hell are you making such a lot of noise about it?

Oh, and this nonsense is off topic.

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Check your figures

Posted Jan 17, 2009 11:52 UTC (Sat) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link]

Also, businesses do not only have expenses and revenues, Jeff; they have investments, profits, leasings, devaluations, taxes to name a few concepts. No, life is more complicated. When you invest in a business you don't just expect it to break even; you invest in it until you can profit from it. The three Shuttleworth statements "not close to break-even", "requires more investment" and "is sustainable" are not mutually exclusive: just picture the pre-break-even Amazon which was investing heavily in their businesses to have a healthy business for many years, and it makes sense.

Knowing exactly which kind of sustainability Shuttleworth is talking about requires an intimate knowledge about Canonical finances and future plans. Even if you had access to this material you would probably dispute it, so why bother?