Miguel de Icaza, leader of the Free Software Foundation's Gnome (GNU Object Model Environment) project, has given Microsoft's .Net a ringing endorsement in a LinuxWorld interview with The Register's star reporter, Andrew Orlowski. He wants to see version 4 of Gnome -- the open desktop developed for GNU/Linux -- based on .Net, which he has studied in depth as part of the Mono project to develop an open source version of the .Net Development Framework.
Update: a later story by the same author suggests Richard Stallman , GNU's founder, is "surprised and dismayed" by Icaza's comments.
For latecomers, GNU is where Stallman started developing what is now usually called Linux, long before Linus Torvalds became involved. The "open source initiative" started as a breakaway from Stallman's "free software" by removing the moral and philosophical dimensions to make it more appealing to businesses. Stallman is giving a talk at the Skeel Lecture Theatre, Queen Mary College (Mile End) at 7pm on Tuesday, February 12. All welcome.
