The Flash controversy

By now, you should probably have heard about our new product: Mandriva Flash.

However, what you might ignore, is that inside the company this product is surrounded by a lot of controversy.

Some feel it doesn't have a place among the golden Mandriva Discovery/PowerPack/PowerPack+, whose orthodoxy is undisputable and which we should praise like a sacred cow. Other see it as a small product, rushed out by accident while the opposing camp stands that it was eclipsed by the 2007 launch date. Some don't really care about it. These controversies are kind of a common pattern before each product launch: i've almost become used to it. Except, that this time I just don't want to sit down and listen.

In particular, I strongly disagree with Blino's post about it. According to him, Flash would be a key loaded with some piece of software. This is particularly shocking to hear from the main developer of the product!

Don't try to underestimate the Flash: it brings you a lot more than that.

Sure, you probably already know about Linux, so what's the use of Flash for you? As a gift of course! Because, you feel so much about Linux that you want to share it with your friends. Now you can offer Linux to the one you love. The device is a hit for the holiday season and you can put it under the Christmas tree. And even if your friends don't like it, it still is a high-quality 2Gb key (ok Blino, you had this one right...)

But wait! Even if your loved one doesn't care about Linux, there is still one you love for sure. That's you, right in front of the screen! ;-) Rather selfish, and even worse, I bet you'll love to push it even further by showing pride and spreading envy with your very own mobile 3D desktop Linux on a key. Months ahead of Bill's monstruous armies, and with already more clever and fancier effects than the other fruity OS, you can demonstrate it on everyone's desktop and prove the world that you really are a smart guy. So: impress your friends with the Linux 3D desktop!

Pff. With all this I almost forgot to tell you about other niceties like the ability to have your home, bookmarks, cookies & preferences on the key, theauto-connect feature that almost immediatly connects you to the Internet, the built-in exchange partition to swap files with less gifted friends, the famous auto-detection that allows you to boot almost everywhere. All this thanks to the Mandriva Linux 2007 base system, and the live system technologies.

Last but not least, it's fast! Of course it is: what do you expect with a name like this? It will be fast to help you discover Linux, or help your friends discover Linux... This is one of the first objectives we have with this key: make Linux succeed on a large scale. And this is just the continuation of our very reason to exist, the reason the company was incorporated for in the first place.

This leads me to stress out how this product sets us apart from our esteemed competitors: Mandriva is a product company. And is thus one of the many reasons why Mandriva will not fallback to being just the next Ubuntu.

Stay tuned to our Mandriva-is-just-not-the-next-Ubuntu series. Next time, I'll tell you why we won't release yet another 3D desktop...