Countering the latest salvo of Microsoft"s Get the Facts campaign against open-source software, Novell this week launched a Web site devoted to "unbending the truth" about Linux in the enterprise. Novell chief executive officer Jack Messman is also in the process of sending an e-mail to Novell customers. Messman"s e-mail debunks a memo that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer sent to customers last week. In his memo, Ballmer wrote that Windows has economic and security advantages over open-source software and warned that Linux users are fair game for intellectual-property lawsuits.
Ballmer"s widely publicized e-mail came at the one-year anniversary of Microsoft"s Get the Facts campaign, a marketing effort by the Redmond, Washington, software giant that compares Windows favorably with Linux. In the e-mail, as Microsoft has done throughout the campaign, Ballmer cites passages from studies conducted by industry analyst firms that show Windows to be superior to Linux.