Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project • Hacker News Board

Re: Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project

#61

Post by peterwwillis » Thu, Jul 09, 2020, 2:15 PM UTC

Legogris wrote: post #30

biggestlou wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one from IBM is on the board because Google wants to control the project and apparently has no interest in governing it in conjunction with non-Google entities

Not saying you're wrong, but do you have any source for this or is it just a guess? There are several other plausible explanations.

From the linked article:

> IBM continues to believe that the best way to manage key open source projects such as Istio is with true open governance, under the auspices of a reputable organization with a level playing field for all contributors, transparency for users, and vendor-neutral management of the license and trademarks.

Based on this comment it sounds like IBM is saying that Google's OUC is not a vendor-neutral manager of license and trademark. It's also suggesting that there won't be a level playing field or transparency.

Basically IBM just wants it managed by an independent un-biased entity. Which sounds fair, if the whole purpose of the thing is not profit for one org, but the profit of a community.

More evidence to my argument that it is impossible for a corporation to own and develop a true community-led solution. The corporation is a slave to its shareholders and profit margins, so the community's wishes will never take priority.

Re: Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project

#62

Post by tedk-42 » Thu, Jul 09, 2020, 2:28 PM UTC

maffydub wrote: post #20

deanCommie wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I generally believe in Google's altruism in their open source contributions, that good faith does not carry forward to any of their open source initiatives when it comes to Google Cloud. Maybe I'm cynical, but it seems pretty obvious to me that Google embraces OSS with Istio, Kubernetes, etc only out of necessity and being a distant 3rd in the Cloud race, and this is their attempt at some sort of differentiator…

I suspect Google felt they got burned with Kubernetes - doing a lot of the initial development, donating it to the CNCF and then not profiting much from it (e.g. still being distant 3rd in cloud).

Pretty much my feeling about the whole thing. It's someone's attempt within Google to not let the horse out so fast when there was a buck to be made on it.

Android brought people into Google's ecosystem.

Kubernetes could have positioned Google better in the cloud space but I think they were late to the party due to their failure to understand what customers want.

Re: Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project

#63

Post by Andrex » Thu, Jul 09, 2020, 2:34 PM UTC

fcantournet wrote: post #39

maffydub wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect Google felt they got burned with Kubernetes - doing a lot of the initial development, donating it to the CNCF and then not profiting much from it (e.g. still being distant 3rd in cloud).

Google did profit massively from kubernetes, moreso than any other big company (Hello Red Hat lol) It was (for better and for worse) the #1 reason to adopt GCP for our main cloud platform, and we're not alone. It's has seen immense adoption that it wouldn't have had if it hadn't been in a neutral foundation. The work was definitely not done by Google alone (~30%). IS GCP "still" #3 ? Yes. Is it because they didn't ge…

> better at abusing their current dominant position (hehe it sucks doesn't Goog ? heh? Doesn't it ?)

Just wanted to say this one weirdly petty/obnoxious concluding line tainted an otherwise solid comment. Seems unnecessary.

Re: Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project

#64

Post by foobiekr » Thu, Jul 09, 2020, 2:35 PM UTC

Zafira wrote: post #16

Google234 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you please elaborate on what this has to do with this dispute about how to open source the trademark?

My understanding is that there is a faction in Google that believes that making Kubernetes freely available as it did was a massive strategic mistake on the part of Google[1], tantamount to giving away the crown jewels. With this in mind, my impression is that there is a strong suspicion that Google is trying to find a way to continue to control the direction and ability to monetize Istio (and future projects if this…

Geeze. If kubernetes is google’s Crown Jewels they must be in terrible shape internally.

Re: Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project

#65

Post by duxup » Thu, Jul 09, 2020, 2:44 PM UTC

ehsankia wrote: post #18

deanCommie wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I generally believe in Google's altruism in their open source contributions, that good faith does not carry forward to any of their open source initiatives when it comes to Google Cloud. Maybe I'm cynical, but it seems pretty obvious to me that Google embraces OSS with Istio, Kubernetes, etc only out of necessity and being a distant 3rd in the Cloud race, and this is their attempt at some sort of differentiator…

I don't understand why everything any company does has to either be 100% altruistic or 100% out of greed. Why can't there be a middle ground? Obviously they see the value of open source, especially with projects like TensorFlow, but at the same time, after having spent so much resources developing these, they still want to reserve some control so that their investment can stay useful and agile to their needs. That se…

>I don't understand why everything any company does has to either be 100% altruistic or 100% out of greed.

With all discourse on the internet IMO there's way too much all one thing or another. Companies and people made lots of decisions surrounding various projects, and the reasons can be altruistic one day, about profit the next, or a little of both with the same decision.

Re: Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project

#66

Post by jeffbee » Thu, Jul 09, 2020, 2:47 PM UTC

Zafira wrote: post #16

Google234 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you please elaborate on what this has to do with this dispute about how to open source the trademark?

My understanding is that there is a faction in Google that believes that making Kubernetes freely available as it did was a massive strategic mistake on the part of Google[1], tantamount to giving away the crown jewels. With this in mind, my impression is that there is a strong suspicion that Google is trying to find a way to continue to control the direction and ability to monetize Istio (and future projects if this…

There is (or was, while I was there) a feeling coming from Tech. Infra. leadership that the company must avoid "industry-enabling" software projects and conference papers. There also is/was a faction that desired to avoid "getting Hadooped", referring to the map/reduce knockoff. Hadoop has a large mindshare outside Google but it is also incredibly bad and about 20 years behind Google internal practices. It both enables and disables the industry at the same time. So they didn't want that to happen with Borg.

Re: Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project

#67

Post by revel » Thu, Jul 09, 2020, 2:48 PM UTC

In my (worthless) opinion, I'm 90% sure that Google wants to drive istio in the direction of supporting AnthOS and that's why they're vying for control of the project. It seems increasingly clear to me that their entire cloud strategy seems to be to use AnthOS to try and perform an end-run around AWS

Re: Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project

#68

Post by polskibus » Thu, Jul 09, 2020, 2:53 PM UTC

johannes1234321 wrote: post #41

deanCommie wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I generally believe in Google's altruism in their open source contributions, that good faith does not carry forward to any of their open source initiatives when it comes to Google Cloud. Maybe I'm cynical, but it seems pretty obvious to me that Google embraces OSS with Istio, Kubernetes, etc only out of necessity and being a distant 3rd in the Cloud race, and this is their attempt at some sort of differentiator…

I don't see altruism, but alignment of different interests. Summer of Code is a huge project they finance, seems altruistic but is a recruiting&marketing tool. Publishing libraries like protobuf and abseil serves to drive standards in directions they like. Chrome/Chromium drives the open web, ensures their say on standards and gives the ability to set them. Android/AOSP brings leadership in mobile devices to them. Ag…

Moats, moats everywhere.

Re: Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project

#69

Post by ocdtrekkie » Thu, Jul 09, 2020, 2:53 PM UTC

Andrex wrote: post #63

fcantournet wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google did profit massively from kubernetes, moreso than any other big company (Hello Red Hat lol) It was (for better and for worse) the #1 reason to adopt GCP for our main cloud platform, and we're not alone. It's has seen immense adoption that it wouldn't have had if it hadn't been in a neutral foundation. The work was definitely not done by Google alone (~30%). IS GCP "still" #3 ? Yes. Is it because they didn't ge…

> better at abusing their current dominant position (hehe it sucks doesn't Goog ? heh? Doesn't it ?) Just wanted to say this one weirdly petty/obnoxious concluding line tainted an otherwise solid comment. Seems unnecessary.

It's incredibly accurate though. One human remark shouldn't ruin a comment full of substance for you. This isn't a Reddit comment, it's an HN response with a tail of humanity.

Re: Why IBM doesn’t agree with Google’s Open Usage Commons for the Istio project

#70

Post by znpy » Thu, Jul 09, 2020, 2:54 PM UTC

fcantournet wrote: post #39

maffydub wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect Google felt they got burned with Kubernetes - doing a lot of the initial development, donating it to the CNCF and then not profiting much from it (e.g. still being distant 3rd in cloud).

Google did profit massively from kubernetes, moreso than any other big company (Hello Red Hat lol) It was (for better and for worse) the #1 reason to adopt GCP for our main cloud platform, and we're not alone. It's has seen immense adoption that it wouldn't have had if it hadn't been in a neutral foundation. The work was definitely not done by Google alone (~30%). IS GCP "still" #3 ? Yes. Is it because they didn't ge…

> Google did profit massively from kubernetes

i should check if it's still the case, but I remember a time where every effing kubernetes tutorial would make you spin up a k8s cluster on google cloud.