By Dave Whitinger, Linux Today 

Update: Heise has exposed this as a hoax.

A press release, allegedly from the .net jury which earlier this year awarded the prestigious Prix Ars Electronica to Linus Torvalds, claims discovery of secret strategy by corporate giants to control the open-source movement.

"Their joint venture startup will most probably become one of the leading Linux distributors, directly attacking Red Hat and SUSE," claims the press release. 

In a press statement allegedly from members of the .net jury of this year's Prix Ars Electronica forwarded to Linux Today, we read that next year's Ars Electronica Festival will be entitled "Open Source". This has been unofficially agreed upon by the direction of Ars Electronica and its sponsors (Siemens, Microsoft, Oracle, and Hewlett-Packard, among others. 

The interesting part of the press release discusses a strategy whereby Microsoft, Siemens, Oracle, and HP are working on a Linux distribution joint venture. 

Quoted from the press release: 

Because we have also just learned that the above-mentioned IT-companies are involved in a linux distribution joint venture and a strategic alliance. Their joint venture startup will most probably become one of the leading linux distributors, directly attacking Red Hat and SUSE. 

This is the classic oligopolistic strategy. They cannot buy linux, nevertheless, they will take control over the distibution of the competitor. 

[...] 

But the information about the secret linux distribution joint venture between Microsoft and Siemens in combination with next years topic made us alert. 

Our conclusion: the industry has strongly lobbied and put pressure on at least one jury member to award "linux". We now have to interpret this in persepective of next years ars topic. They pushed the topic. The idea is to use the art and science community to soft launch their linux activities and control open source strategies. They do understand that open source has evolved into a stronger development strategy and they have to jump that train early enough, in order to avoid another "internet" desaster. 

So as artists writers and scientists we are used as lab-rats and cheap alternative researchers. This is NOT what artists need and it is certainly not what Ars Electronica should be aiming at.

Expect a followup story when more information becomes available.

Related Story:
Linux Torvalds Wins Prix Ars Electronica Golden Nica (May 29, 1999) 

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