[advocacy-discuss] The OpenSolaris "Attitude"

[Jim Grisanzio]

Ian Collins wrote:
> Jim Grisanzio wrote:
>>
>> Yep. The Solaris brand is strong. That's the reason we used it to name 
>> OpenSolaris. :)
>>
>>   
> But how about the converse? 

Yep. There are good arguments on both sides depending on the market 
conditions at any given time.

> Part of the strength of the Linux brand is it's ubiquity.  Just about
> every major distribution call its self "Bla [enterprise] Linux".  We
> don't see that with OpenSolaris.  

Linux is a decade old though. OpenSolaris is 2. That's a big difference. 
How many Linux distros were there two years after Linux started? (I have 
no clue, by the way :)).

> Every OpenSolaris distribution has its
> own name, even Sun's distributions use the Solaris rather than
> OpenSolaris brand.

So, is that the direction we should continue?

> There has to be a better way of associating the brand with the
> distributions.

Yah, I'm no brand guru here so I don't know. But is the brand 
necessarily tied to the community culture? I would love it if the 
culture emerged naturally from the /bottom/, rather than being created 
from the top (in this case by Sun with various branding efforts). It's 
probably a combination of both. I'm not really concerned about the 
brand, per say, but I'm more interested in the underling gut of the 
community. When people say "OpenSolaris" ... what does that mean?

Jim
-- 
http://blogs.sun.com/jimgris