Linux On the Verge

The Tipping Point virus

Gladwell applies this principle to social trends to explain why something previously esoteric or unknown, such as a children's toy or an obscure independent film, can so unexpectedly take the world by storm and, once it has run its course, just as suddenly flame out again.

The subtext of this week's LinuxWorld trade show suggests that the platform is hovering right around its tipping point, about to grab the technology limelight the way the Mac or Windows once did. To longtime advocates, it has been a front-and-center pursuit for many years, but the developments in the space during the past year or so -- the aggressive pursuit of a Linux installed base by companies such as IBM, HP and Oracle, and the acknowledgement of the Linux threat by Microsoft -- show that it's just this close to bursting into the mainstream. And likely developments in the coming six to 12 months, including Linux-enabled grid computing and Linux on the desktop, mean that a flameout like the one Gladwell describes simply won't happen. If Linux hasn't quite arrived yet, it'll be here soon, and it's going to stay awhile.

So what will give it that last final push up the hill? That question is a lot more relevant to VARs than some might think. It's a chicken-and-egg dilemma, the question of whether solution providers help legitimize a market by getting into it, or does an established market attract a lot of solution providers? It's probably a bit of both, depending on the size of the VARs in question and which verticals they play in.

But regardless of whether you're the chicken or the egg, one thing is clear: To reach and surpass that magical tipping point and sustain itself as a viable long-term technology solution, Linux needs a stronger VAR presence than it has now. Virtually every company at this week's show has a channel strategy -- at least they all claim to have one -- but they range from formal partner programs to, "We've got someone looking into it." Finding Linux solution providers to interview can sometimes be about as easy as getting Larry Ellison to compliment Bill Gates.

This simply isn't an issue for companies that sell licensed software, because those companies by definition need VARs to survive. Open source is a different animal, free and shapeless, and establishing a VAR network isn't so cut and dried. But as the Linux installed base expands, solution providers will be key to distributing the technology and especially to providing the integration and other added services that will make this stuff go.

Linux vendors will need to adapt their operations to include solution providers because that's who most of their customers are most comfortable working with. As these partner programs fall into place, the Linux scale will tip into a whole new computing era.