Oracle didn't see this coming. There were some significant concerns when Oracle took stewardship of Sun's open source projects like MySQL and OpenOffice, and these concerns led to contributors to OpenOffice asking Oracle to fork over control of the project. Oracle refused. [more inside]
posted by juiceCake on Apr 18, 2011 - 108 comments

New York Times business columnist Joe Nocera's column last weekend excoriated HP and SAP, and presented Oracle in a positive light. One problem: Nocera's fiancee is the PR person for Oracle's lead attorney in its lawsuit against SAP. Woops. (via gawker)
posted by VicNebulous on Oct 14, 2010 - 25 comments

The OpenOffice.org Project has unveiled a major restructuring that separates itself from Oracle and that takes responsibility for OpenOffice away from a single company. ... Driving home the changes, OpenOffice.org project is now The Document Foundation while the OpenOffice.org suite has been given the temporary name of LibreOffice.
posted by Joe Beese on Sep 28, 2010 - 45 comments

"Financial crisis
Stalled too many customers
CEO no more."

Sun Microsystems chief executive Jonathan Schwartz resigns via twitter haiku.
posted by Artw on Feb 4, 2010 - 62 comments

O great and wise Oracle, whose wisdom is as vast as the sea, just who the heck are ya and what do you do? [more inside]
posted by kmz on Nov 2, 2009 - 19 comments

Oracle to acquire Sun for $7.4 billion. This gives Oracle, among other things, Solaris, MySQL, Java and OpenOffice, and means that Oracle is now a hardware manufacturer rather than a reseller. [more inside]
posted by ardgedee on Apr 20, 2009 - 60 comments

Peter answers.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane on Jun 2, 2007 - 54 comments

Web programmers take note, gotAPI is an excellent collection of searchable programming references wrapped up into a customizable interface.
posted by Roger Dodger on Sep 21, 2006 - 17 comments

"I'm worried, Larry. A financial planner counsels his client: "...I think it's imperative that we start to budget and plan. New purchases should be kept to a minimum. We need to establish and execute on a diversification game plan, to eliminate (yes, eliminate) all debt and build up a significant, conservatively structured, liquid investment portfolio...." Sound advice, but you wouldn't have thought this dickhead gentleman would need it.
posted by mojohand on Feb 12, 2006 - 18 comments

Developer in space? Oracle has announced sweepstakes to send a developer into orbit. Answer a quiz and win a sub-orbital space flight. Contest is open to software developers who work with Oracle software in connection with their employment. Start cramming. Good luck! (And for the rest, with a $10,000 deposit for the $98,000 ticket, nothing stops us from booking our own space flight with Space Adventures.)
posted by jellybuzz on Dec 8, 2004 - 6 comments

Export Restrictions on a website? I had to agree to this before downloading stuff from Oracle:
I am not a citizen, national or resident of, and am not under the control of, the government of: Cuba, Iran, Sudan, Iraq, Libya, North Korea, Syria, nor any other country to which the United States has prohibited export.
posted by arnab on Sep 10, 2002 - 10 comments

This nuclear detente, as sponsored by Oracle The growth of the IT industry in India, which has many connections to the US and the West, might be a stabilizing factor in the country's relationship to Pakistan. Hopefully, the presence of western companies and economic growth will also be a check on the growth of hindutva, or Hindu nationalism. (NYT registration required)
posted by rks404 on Aug 11, 2002 - 3 comments

What did Gray know and when did he know it?
"Just after the deal was signed, an Oracle lobbyist handed a $25,000 campaign donation to an aide to Davis who was involved in negotiating the pact."
posted by nobody_knose on Jun 12, 2002 - 11 comments

The Sybli's raving mouth, according to Heraclitus, speaks without mirth or adornment or perfume: with the help of the god her voice continues for a thousand years: Plutarch - Why The Pythia No Longer Prophesies In Verse... So, what kinda gas was she huffin'? The Sybil on solvents--an archeological update on the Oracle of Delphi (NYT: you know the drill...)
posted by y2karl on Mar 19, 2002 - 7 comments

Microsoft tells you why Oracle system wont work. Kind of like Burger King telling Colonel Sanders why the whopper works, but honey barbeque wings don't.
posted by Grok09 on Nov 12, 2001 - 11 comments

Shareholders are shocked - shocked, I tell you! - to discover that Larry Ellison has been overstating Oracle's capabilities and earning potentials in public... and personally profiting from the deceit to the tune of $895 million! What will the little Gates-hating, sex-harassing genius think of next?!
posted by m.polo on Mar 11, 2001 - 8 comments

MacOS X built for Oracle?! David Coursey's "top ten" reasons why MacOS X was built so that Larry Ellison could become more competitive with Bill Gates. Sounds good to me.
posted by Brilliantcrank on Nov 16, 2000 - 1 comment

The Register has an article describing how Oracle hired thugs to prove that Micro$oft did indeed back/finance users groups, watchdog groups, and other entities. (found on the Hacker News Network)
posted by Dean_Paxton on Jun 28, 2000 - 4 comments

Does MySQL suck? That isn't actually the topic of a thread at the OpenACS project site... but everyone sure *thinks* it is. :-) OpenACS is a project to port the ArsDigita Community System off of Oracle onto PostgreSQL (of which, BTW, v7.0 ships this week). If this is your cuppa, check it out. [via /.]
posted by baylink on May 8, 2000 - 8 comments