The open source industry in 2008 will be marked by more news out of Microsoft, IBM, Oracle and other big IT vendors, less start-up funding, more M&A activity, and an increasingly serious talent shortage.

It's been at least a week since the last bout of Microsoft FUD hit the wires, so I guess it was time for a new wave. Today's FUD comes from an article Microsoft released on how its security compares with that of Linux. It should come as no surprise that Windows comes off as the Second Coming while Linux is left on the wrong side of Acheron.

While Vista worries lead some IT pros to consider Mac OS X and Linux as alternatives, technology professionals will be facing different kind of technology barrier should they decide to adopt Mac OS X and Linux instead of Microsoft Vista.

The software industry in the future will be dominated by two types of software platform - open-source Linux and the proprietary Microsoft Windows platform - said Jim Zemlin, the executive director of the Linux Foundation.

Microsoft's charge into the high performance computing game continues at pace. The software maker this week announced that its new cluster operating system - HPC Server 2008 - based on Windows Server 2008 will ship next Summer. In addition, the code dandy has fired up a Parallel Computing Initiative to develop more parallelized software for both HPC and business users.

"Fundamentally this particular study will over-count Windows share and undercount Linux. Al Gillen at IDC, who we have a lot of respect for, says this himself in your article. Why is Linux so under-counted in this research?"

Ballmer's statement -- along with follow-up claims by Microsoft executives that they had found violations of 235 patents in Linux and other open-source software -- caused a sudden refrosting of what had been a slowly thawing relationship between the company and the open-source community.

It’s been a while since Microsoft signed up any more Linux distro vendors to participate as patent-protection partners. But on October 22, the Redmondians announced they’ve added TurboLinux to the fold.

Microsoft's compliance with the 2004 EU anti-trust ruling offering some good news to open source developers and users. The agreement will make it much easier for commercial and especially open source providers to create products that work with Microsoft products. As a result, Microsoft will no longer be able force itself upon new markets by offering a level of integration that isn't available from competing vendors.

Remember BayStar? That company is the probably most major link between Microsoft and SCO. As you are aware, SCO’s lawsuits against Linux (vendors/users) began in 2003 and an E-mail that we have just receives reveals the following nugget of information.

Four years ago, Red Hat got tired of SCO's FUD and told them to "Put up or shut up." Now Microsoft is smearing around the FUD with its patent claims. Should Szulik put on a fedora and "Prove It!" pin and pwn Redmond? Who do you think would win this match up?

Tom Sanders is reporting that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer gave a talk at a company event in the UK last week saying that Red Hat customers need to pay Microsoft for its beloved IP, whatever it may consist of:

The head of the Open Invention Network (OIN) has dismissed Microsoft's claims that Linux violates over 200 of its patents. OIN chief executive Jerry Rosenthal told vnunet.com that Microsoft's assertions are simply an attempt to undermine the open source movement.

Microsoft's latest affront to the Linux community is their "STATE GOVERNMENT SAYS LINUX WAS TOO BIG A RISK" campaign, and I'm sick of them ad-spamming Linux related articles with this piece of garbage. The Linux Scorecard blog digs a bit deeper and discusses the claim, and the man who originally made it.

In the future, Linux might very well have a fighting chance on European soil, against Windows. Following Microsoft’s Senior Vice President and General Counsel, Brad Smith did not rush to anticipate a worry free outcome for the Redmond company over the pond. Although the dismissal of the company’s appeal by the Court of First Instance of Luxembourg, was a clear indication of the full support of both the European Commission’s 2004 antitrust ruling against Microsoft, and of the €497 million financial penalty, Smith argued that additional third-party claims could follow.