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IBM: Open letter to the Java development community from Rod Smith, VP Java Software, IBM

“There has been a lot of discussion this past week regarding
Java, IBM’s relationship with Sun, Sun’s Java 2 Enterprise Edition
(J2EE) brand name, and our commitment to industry standards. We’ve
heard some of you say that you are looking for details of what’s
going on. I want to take this opportunity to clarify IBM’s position
in these areas.”

There is an important issue at stake here: the freedom to
develop in an environment that will remain open, available, and
unified. Without a stable base of open standards, software
developers will find their move into the world of e-business
complicated.

“IBM’s support for open standards hasn’t changed — it is the
same as it was four years ago, as it was six months ago, and as it
was last week. As a company, we are deeply committed to industry
standards that best support the multi-platform, multi-vendor and
dynamic environment that the Internet has enabled. Simply put, we
believe that e-business is all about “cooperating on standards and
competing on implementation.” This can only occur in the context of
true, cross-industry commitment to these standards.”

Complete
Story

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