Free for All

Bates

After reading Wayner's Free For All, I was impressed with his keen grasp of the burgeoning Open Source movement, as well as the excellent style of writing.
— Slashdot

John T. Landry

A journalist and former programmer provides an intelligent, pointed history of open- source software. Linux triumphed because its meager funding forced it to be a truly open operating system, and because Linus Torvalds excelled at encouraging volunteers to contribute improvements and additions. The author believes the open-source movement will flourish because of its inspiring ideals. But he balances his praise with a sober analysis of how corporate inertia and microsoft's well funded predation may restrict open-source software to applications for sophisticated users.
—Harvard Business Review, July-August 2000

Simon Garfinkel

Here is one place is the history, present, and future of the Linux and the Open Source movement— from its humble beginnings as an academic curiosity to a future that may challenge Microsoft's position of dominance. Peter Wayner has done a service by weaving together the technical, political, and economic threads into a tapestry that is understandable by all, geeks and suits alike.
—Boston Globe

Publishers Weekly

Necessity remains the mother of invention-or so it seems judging by this intriguing history of the free software movement. A self-confessed nerd who covers technology for the New York Times, Wayner starts by describing how computer programmers who wanted to tinker with proprietary source code were frustrated by the "no trespass" signs posted on operating systems like UNIX, Apple, DOS and Windows. They ultimately formed a grassroots movement that retaliated by building independent systems. Once they achieved their goal, they were determined to keep the source code open to all, following the tradition of academic research labs. As soon as these hackers developed a simple operating system, a worldwide network of interested programmers contributed free time and ideas to make it run smoothly on all manner of machines. One of the major results of this experiment in intellectual freedom is Linux (named after its originator, Linus Torvalds), an operating system that many claim is more stable, more adaptable and more accessible (and infinitely less expensive) than the current commercial leaders. That may explain why it's used in more than 50% of the Web servers on the Internet. Wayner writes in hushed tones of the exclusive group (almost all men) who worked on Linux out of the simple desire to play in the guts of the machine. But if anybody thinks that these are a bunch of harmonious code-lovers, Wayner's tales of nasty flame wars between the founding fathers and of turf battles petty enough for Dynasty reveal that even nerds are not above a little mud wrestling. Illus. not seen by PW. Agents, Daniel Greenberg, James Levine Agency. Author tour; 15-city NPR radio tour. (July) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.|

Library Journal

In the 1980s, a handful of dedicated programmers began sharing the source code to software they developed. Over the years, this movement to share programming code led to the establishment of the "open source initiative," which assured that few restrictions were placed on the redistribution of source code used for developing free software. Wayner, a journalist for the New York Times and Salon magazine and author of Digital Cash: Commerce on the Net, traces the history of this free software movement from its early days to the present. He focuses on the incredible story of Linus Torvalds, creator of the popular Linux operating system. Wayner acknowledges that the free software movement has many weaknesses yet to be overcome, but he believes that it will flourish. He predicts that the devotion of Torvalds and others like him to the free software movement will win out in the end over corporations like Microsoft, changing the way we use computers on the job and at home. Recommended for an informed audience.--Joe Accardi, Northeastern Illinois Univ Lib., Chicago Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.\

The New Yorker

In an entertaining, unabashedly partisan chronicle of the [Linux] movement, the author presents such memorable characters as Richard Stallman, the programming wiz who was an early advocate of free software, and his mild-mannered Finnish disciple Linus Torvalds, the creator of Linux, If you've ever wondered why anyone would give away perfectly good code, you now have a place to turn for enlightenment.