This is probably one of the worst conclusions to a saga that lasted for several years and was followed closely by so many people; yes, it’s true that Sun has been slowly, but steadily, disappearing from the radar as a major player in this industry, but it has also continued to innovate all the while it tried to determine its relationship to Open Source, and by extension how it was going to survive in this Great Open World.

Similarly, Oracle has been a company that — similarly to Sun — thrived on proprietary, dominant solutions while Open Source competition gradually eroded its dominance; look at how many of the world’s most popular sites are powered by MySQL and you’ll see why for some — and increasingly many — needs an Oracle licence is now completely pointless. Yet contrary to Sun Microsystems, Oracle has maintained a profitable business as large enterprises maintained their custom.
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