Google admitted that she also wanted to buy GitHub
The director of the cloud division of Google Cloud Diana Green (Diane Greene), answering the moderator's questions at the Fortune Magazine event , made an interesting statement regarding the purchase of GitHub by Microsoft: “I would not mind if we bought them, but that's okay” (I wouldn’t t have minded buying them, but it's not OK), she said . Thus, one of the Google executives actually admitted that she, too, was not averse to purchasing a hosting platform.
Earlier there were rumors that Google had made an offer to buy, but Diana Green refused to confirm or deny these rumors. She hoped that GitHub would remain completely neutral under the wing of Microsoft.
For the Redmond corporation, GitHub is a key asset in the highly competitive cloud computing market. Diana Green also noticed that the two Google products are now on the list of the most popular repositories on GitHub. She expects that under Microsoft control the situation will not change.
Chris Wanstrath, the founder of GitHub, allegedly made a choice between Google and Microsoft in favor of the latter because of his acquaintance with Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella. However, as the owner, he has the right to sell his company to anyone, and even give it away for free if he so wishes. And here the amount of the transaction is $ 7.5 billion.
Today, GitHub is the most popular source code repository on the Internet. It hosts 85 million repositories that 28 million developers are working on. Companies place projects, documentation and code here, organize the joint work of their employees. There are examples of personal blogs and even commentary for third-party blogs on GitHub. This platform is also used by large corporations, including Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Google and the same Microsoft.
After buying GitHub, it probably lost its status as an independent platform. Now the question arises whether companies that consider Microsoft as their competitor will continue to use it. A similar question arises with respect to ordinary developers, many of whom see Microsoft in a bad light. Many still remember how the former CEO of the company Steve Ballmer in 2001 called Linux and all free software a “cancer tumor” , as he threw a chair at an employeewho said about going to google. Steve Ballmer was furious and cursed (“F --- ing Eric Schmidt is a f --- ing p - sy. I'm going to f --- ing bury that guy, I’ve done it before I'm going to f --- ing kill Google ", according to the employee). All this is in the history of Microsoft, and the image is difficult to fix. Will the developers continue to upload their code here? These questions remain open.
Shortly after the purchase, The Verge conducted a survey among representatives of some large companies whether they would continue to use GitHub. Google representatives declined to comment, and Facebook representatives said they would continue to use this site as long as it remains as useful and convenient as it is now.
Judging by the words of Diana Green (“I really hope that Microsoft will leave the project completely neutral”), she shares the concerns of many developers. Most of them are now waiting. They are watching what happens next. Actually, this transaction is not yet completed: it should be closed within a year.
Some developers are optimistic about the deal , mentioning Microsoft’s commitment to the free software movement in recent years and the company's history of developing excellent tools for developers.
Others remain pessimistic. For example, Victor Felderinvolved in many open source projects, says that it's not even Microsoft, but the fundamental independence of GitHub. If the project had bought Google, Apple, Amazon or Facebook, nothing would have changed: such a deal strengthens the concentration of power in the hands of commercial technology giants and takes power from the free community.