Now, let's look at a Slashdot article from back in September.

http://slashdot.org/articles/99/09/22/1723203.shtml

From that article, I'd like to point out a few insightful comments. #5, #98, #136, and #150.

Take a look at this article.

From here, we're beginning to suspect something is wrong with this company. Certainly, there is. What's wrong? Well, their distribution of Linux is simply Red Hat Linux with some Mandrake Linux stuff thrown in. BUT, LinuxOne has removed almost all references to Red Hat, and replaced it with LinuxOne.

Now look here, and then read this comment by Bruce Perens.

Just to prove that the readers of Slashdot aren't the only suspicious ones, here is an interesting look at LinuxOne by Business Week.

There is an interesting review of LinuxOne's product here.

Finally, have a look here.

Now that you have a pretty good grasp on what's going on, we can continue. I was perusing LinuxOne's website, and I stumbled across contact info. So I decided to give them a call, and ask a few questions. Needless to say, their sales associates know what they know from reading a product booklet. Yes, I know that not everyone can be totally informed of a product, but that's not an excuse for giving misinformation, as you will read below.

00:00 - 00:21 (Call Connection)

00:22 - LinuxOne: "Good Morning, LinuxOne - How may I direct your call?"
00:24 - Accipiter: "Hi! Uh, Sales please?"
00:26 - LinuxOne: "And, you are, Sir?"
00:27 - Accipiter: "Ahh, My name is Roger."
00:28 - LinuxOne: "Okay..And, How can I help you, Roger?"
00:30 - Accipiter: "Well, I'm looking to purchase LinuxOne, the Operating System..."
00:34 - LinuxOne: "Uh huh."
00:35 - Accipiter: "And I'm probably going to be deploying it for a small business application..."
00:39 - LinuxOne: "Okay."
00:40 - Accipiter: "I was wondering if you could tell me a little bit about it."
00:42 - LinuxOne: "Ah, it is uh, the LinuxLite is probably the easiest to install of all of our Competitors..."
00:49 - Accipiter: "Ok.......Who are your competitors?"
00:51 - LinuxOne: "Ohhhh.....Red Hat....Mandrake....Uh, VA Linux...I Mean, there's a lot of competitors. Uh, anyway...We're the easiest to install....You just have to drag and drop into a...one single file from our CD on to the C drive...you have to have 600 megs free on your C drive, and um...the full kernel is available. Uh, 2 2 1...1 2. It has all the applications..."
01:23 - Accipiter: "In the kernel?"
01:24 - LinuxOne: "Uh huh! And, it runs on top of Windows..."
01:28 - Accipiter: "Wait a second..."
01:28 - LinuxOne: "98 or 95."
01:29 - Accipiter: "It runs IN Windows? I thought it was a seperate operating system."
01:32 - LinuxOne: "It is. But it runs on top of Windows, yes. As an application."
01:36 - Accipiter: "Ok...ummmmm, How about Stability?"
01:39 - LinuxOne: "It's as stable as any of the other uh, versions of Linux."
01:43 - Accipiter: "Okay. ummmmmmm, Uh, who did you say the competitors were? You said there was Red Hat, Mandrake, and who else?"
01:50 - LinuxOne: "Umm, VA Linux...There's uh, a lot. (laughs)"
01:53 - Accipiter: "They make a --"
01:53 - LinuxOne: "Corel.. (laughs)"
01:55 - Accipiter: "Oh, Okay...Corel? Yeah I've -- I think I've heard about that one. Ummm, What kind of applications come with it?"
02:02 - LinuxOne: "There's umm...uh, umm....Programming. There's a C++ Programming tool. There is, um, a desktop organizer..."
02:13 - Accipiter: "Okay...Do you know what that's called, or...Do you know which one it is?"
02:16 - LinuxOne: "Yeahhh...I can look that up, but, sorry I don't remember..."
02:19 - Accipiter: "That's all right."
02:20 - LinuxOne: "It has...Sorry, Hold on..Um...Can't quite put my finger on it...um, Hold on just a second."
02:32 - Accipiter: "Okay."
02:35 - LinuxOne: "Uhhh, the desktop organizer is called, um, The query tool is called KDSQL. A word processor called Maxwell, The organizer is just called organizer - It's like a Calander, an organizer, a schedule program. There's a text editor, um, a um...Postscript viewer called Ghostview...uhh, and there's a uhh, Voice Mail and Fax um......tool so you can recieve either Voicemail or fax."
03:15 - Accipiter: "Can you send faxes?"
03:16 - LinuxOne: "Uh Huh!"
03:17 - Accipiter: "Oh, Great."
03:18 - LinuxOne: "And...There are various utilities, including an address book, an archiver, a scientific calculator, um, a clipper that does [unintelligable] page history, so if you're updating files and things. A file manager, uh...an editor for hexadecimal systems....A..um, HP Laserjet control Panel, so that you can direct your printing."
03:45 - Accipiter: "Oh, a Laserjet?"
03:46 - LinuxOne: "Yep."
03:47 - Accipiter: "Ah, do you know which models it supports?"
03:49 - LinuxOne: "Ummmm....No, I'm sorry I don't...."
03:53 - Accipiter: "That's all right, Okay.."
03:54 - LinuxOne: "There's quite a -- I can get, I can get...If you wanna hold on I can get that information."
03:58 - Accipiter: "I'd appriciate that."
03:59 - LinuxOne: "Okay, um, let me finish the utilities....There's a Floppy formatter, a note taker..."
04:06 - Accipiter: "Do you know what formats that floppy, uh formatter can format in?"
04:09 - LinuxOne: "Uhh..Linux."
04:11 - Accipiter: "That's it?"
04:12 - LinuxOne: "Yeah. Well, we have another utility if you want to...format in Windows."
04:16 - Accipiter: "Okay."
04:18 - LinuxOne: "Ummmm...There's a terminal emulator, a RPM manager called KPackage."
04:25 - Accipiter: "What is RPM?"
04:26 - LinuxOne: "RPM is uh, the program language that you program uh, within Linux."
04:33 - Accipiter: "Oh, so you can actually make programs with RPM?"
04:35 - LinuxOne: "Yes, it's a C++ programming, uh, programming tool."
04:38 - Accipiter: "Oh! Very cool..."
04:40 - LinuxOne: "Uhhmmm... A --"
04:42 - Accipiter: "Does that include a compiler so if I want to...if I write my - if I write my program in RPM, I can compile it with RPM too?"
04:49 - LinuxOne: "Yes."
04:49 - Accipiter: "Oh, Great!"
04:50 - LinuxOne: "There's a Moon phase that...something that displays the phases of the Moon. It's really cool."
04:54 - Accipiter: "Okay."
04:55 - LinuxOne: "Uhhhh, a Mouse pedo...pedio meeta, which measures your desktop mileage, how much heh, you've been moving around."
05:03 - Accipiter: "Okay."
05:03 - LinuxOne: "Uh, you can...There's a personal time tracker."
05:06 - Accipiter: "Oh, so that's like uh, what they have on the little...the little handheld machines."
05:11 - LinuxOne: "Uh Huh!"
05:12 - Accipiter: "Oh, Great!"
05:12 - LinuxOne: "Um, Uhhhh...A process management tool, a tape backup tool...and, um, another program called World Watch. Plus, there's utilities on the other G-Nome that I haven't um,"
05:26 - Accipiter: "What is that?"
05:27 - LinuxOne: "There's...This is just the KDE desktop. There's another whole set of applications."
05:32 - Accipiter: "Now what do you mean by desktop?"
05:34 - LinuxOne: "Uhh, a desktop is like, you know, like Windows. Or, a Mac. It's a whole different set of Windows."
05:40 - Accipiter: "Oh, I thought you said this runs under Windows."
05:42 - LinuxOne: "Yeah, it does but it has it's own desktop."
05:44 - Accipiter: "Ohhhhh, I see. Okay, Interesting."
05:46 - LinuxOne: "And it's called KDE. You....The letters K D E."
05:50 - Accipiter: "Right, Right."
05:51 - LinuxOne: "And there's another desktop called G-Nome. That's included also."
05:56 - Accipiter: "And that supports everything KDE supports?"
05:58 - LinuxOne: "Pretty much the same utilities, but I haven't explored those at, at this time. Sorry."
06:02 - Accipiter: "Okay, no problem."
06:03 - LinuxOne: "Um, With regard to the um..."
06:05 - Accipiter: "Yeah, the HP LaserJet."
06:07 - LinuxOne: "Yes! I'm about -- Just hold on and I'll get..."
06:08 - Accipiter: "All right, Thank you very much."
06:08 - LinuxOne: "A device driver list."
06:11 - Accipiter: "Okay. Now, your website says you're going to be developing some device drivers, is that correct?"
06:16 - LinuxOne: "Oh, we already have more device drivers than any of our competitors."
06:20 - Accipiter: "Great! Well, do you know what you support?"
06:21 - LinuxOne: "Yep, Yes I do. It's 3 or 4 pages, but you're most interested in the HP..."
06:27 - Accipiter: "Well, uh I have several peripherals, like I have a um, Memorex um CD Rewritable Drive, I have a DVD-ROM. Does Linux support DVD?"
06:36 - LinuxOne: "Yeah."
06:37 - Accipiter: "It does?"
06:37 - LinuxOne: "Yes it does."
06:38 - Accipiter: "Great, so you can play movies under it and everything, huh?"
06:40 - LinuxOne: "Yep."
06:40 - Accipiter: "Coooool."
06:41 - LinuxOne: "Ahhhh....Device Drivers, Hold on. AGP, (mumbling), network support..."
06:53 - Accipiter: "Oh, it supports networking too!"
06:55 - LinuxOne: "Yep."
06:55 - Accipiter: "Wonderful!"
06:56 - LinuxOne: "(mumbling)....Yeah, you can run Apache also."
07:02 - Accipiter: "What is Apache?"
07:03 - LinuxOne: "It's the...a Linux operating system server."
07:08 - Accipiter: "Uhhh, What do you mean by that?"
07:10 - LinuxOne: "It's a server architecture."
07:13 - Accipiter: "I don't understand. I'm sorry, I'm just, I'm a little illeterate."
07:17 - LinuxOne: "It's just a server. Hold on just a second, Sir."
07:20 - Accipiter: "All right, thank you!"
07:28 - LinuxOne: "Ah, right now I'm the only person here, uh answering the phone so could you hold on just a second..."
07:32 - Accipiter: "Absolutely."
07:33 - LinuxOne: "All right, thanks."
07:33 - Accipiter: "You're welcome."

07:34 - 08:31 (Dead Air)

08:31 - Accipiter: "You still with me?"

08:32 - 09:11 (Dead Air)

09:12 - LinuxOne: "Okay! Sorry to have kept you waiting."
09:14 - Accipiter: "No, not a problem."
09:15 - LinuxOne: "Looking for device drivers here, let's see..."
09:17 - Accipiter: "Yeah, because basically what I'm, what I'm really interested in is....I have an HP Laserjet 4, and um, I'm very interested in getting the drivers for that, however I also noted that your website says that you're going to be developing several devide drivers, and you just told me you have more than your competitors, correct?"
09:35 - LinuxOne: "True!"
09:36 - Accipiter: "Okay, Now, I was wondering if you um, Number 1 supported DVD. Do you have, does LinuxOne have a DVD player under Linux?"
09:43 - LinuxOne: "Um, there is something a-brewing within the Linux community that has a Linux driver."
09:51 - Accipiter: "For DVD..."
09:52 - LinuxOne: "For DVD. But, it's not currently available in our version."
09:56 - Accipiter: "Okay."
09:56 - LinuxOne: "But it can be downloaded from the Linux....uh, community, and I'll send you a free newsletter to - once you order, to um, sort of plug you in to the network."
10:08 - Accipiter: "Okay, now how about um, I have a uh Memorex uh Rewritable drive. It's a CRW-1622 ah, well basically what device drivers is LinuxOne developing, or have developed?"
10:21 - LinuxOne: "Well, I have 4 pages. Can you send...do you have a computer modem that accepts fax?"
10:28 - Accipiter: "Ohhhhh, no, not here at this location I don't."
10:33 - LinuxOne: "I can mail it to you, if you want or...I mean what, what specifically, I mean, it does run HP machines. Like, I don't have all the lists of specific HP drivers, but I know it runs HP because I have an HP at home and it runs that, and..."
10:51 - Accipiter: "Oh, you run this operating system at home?"
10:52 - LinuxOne: "I have...uh, and the um, and it runs uh, in our office."
11:00 - Accipiter: "Well let me ask you a question. How do you like it? Personally."
11:02 - LinuxOne: "Uh, I use it for work. So, it's a good operating system. It's...I think it'll be much easier to program in Linux than in Microsoft."
11:14 - Accipiter: "Right, with that RPM that you suggested, right?"
11:16 - LinuxOne: "Yeah."
11:16 - Accipiter: "Yeah, that's very cool."
11:18 - Accipiter: "Ummm, I had a few more questions....I'm trying to think....Okay, uh, Oh! Well, obviously price."
11:26 - LinuxOne: "Oh! $9.95"
11:27 - Accipiter: "And that's for..."
11:29 - LinuxOne: "That's a special price. That's for the entire...the entire uh kernel."
11:34 - Accipiter: "Really?"
11:35 - LinuxOne: "Yeah!"
11:35 - Accipiter: "Just the Kernel?"
11:36 - LinuxOne: "The kernel, and all the applications. Yep!"
11:38 - Accipiter: "Great! Uh, $9.95 is that for the full operating system, or is that for your Lite?"
11:42 - LinuxOne: "Uh huh!"
11:42 - Accipiter: "Okay, now as I said, I'm going to be deploying this for, in a small business application environment, which consists of about 5 or 6 machines, each in a seperate office, ah plus there will be one machine uh acting as ahh, an internet firewall. I have an internet connection coming in to the building, and I would like a firewall set up. How is uh, LinuxOne on security?"
12:04 - LinuxOne: "Umm, Our version, and most of the distributions do not have -- eh, they are not secure at this time."
12:11 - Accipiter: "They're Not?"
12:12 - LinuxOne: "No they aren't."
12:13 - Accipiter: "Okay, ummmm."
12:16 - LinuxOne: "Uh, but you can add your own level of security to a firewall."
12:20 - Accipiter: "Oh, oh that's great. Um, now, what is your website running? Is your website running this, or...."
12:28 - LinuxOne: "I'm sorry?"
12:29 - Accipiter: "Is your website running this? Or..."
12:32 - LinuxOne: "Yes."
12:32 - Accipiter: "It is!"
12:33 - LinuxOne: "Yes."
12:33 - Accipiter: "Cool! Oh, all right, so it's definitely good on serving pages and such, right?"
12:37 - LinuxOne: "Uh huh! It's fast."
12:39 - Accipiter: "Really...Okay...ummmm, so, let's see...It's good on um stability you said, right?"
12:48 - LinuxOne: "Yep."
12:48 - Accipiter: "And obviously since your website is running LinuxOne, correct...."
12:53 - LinuxOne: "Yes."
12:53 - Accipiter: "....and um, that would make it pretty secure I would imagine. I mean, if you're running a website on it....All right, um....Tell you what I'm gonna do. My associate had uh, had recommended a distribution called Slackware, have you ever heard of it?"
13:05 - LinuxOne: "Uh Huh."
13:06 - Accipiter: "How uh, How does this compare to Slackware?"
13:08 - LinuxOne: "Ummmm, We have more device drivers than they."
13:11 - Accipiter: "Really?"
13:12 - LinuxOne: "Quite a bit more, yeah. From what I understand, our program is easier to link after you run uh, your compiler."
13:22 - Accipiter: "I don't understand what that means."
13:25 - LinuxOne: "It's just the programming language."
13:27 - Accipiter: "Oh, Really...is that, Does that go back to that --"
13:28 - LinuxOne: "[unintelligable] in case you download applications."
13:29 - Accipiter: "Does that go back to RPM?"
13:32 - LinuxOne: "Uh huh."
13:32 - Accipiter: "Oh, Okay. All right, and How would somebody learn how to program in RPM?"
13:37 - LinuxOne: "You'd plug yourself into the Linux community, and they'll help you."
13:40 - Accipiter: "Really..."
13:41 - LinuxOne: "Yeah, it's like a, uhhhh, like a big umm, I don't, I can't explain it's like..."
13:48 - Accipiter: "So basically if I go on to a website and ask everybody, well..."
13:52 - LinuxOne: "There...I can send you the newsletter article that can give you all the places for signing up for...."
13:58 - Accipiter: "So Oh, cool! So they'll let me --"
14:01 - LinuxOne: "like 'I'm a new Linux user.' "
14:02 - Accipiter: "And I wanna learn how to program in RPM."
14:04 - LinuxOne: "Right."
14:06 - Accipiter: "Oh, Cool. And they'll answer my question?"
14:08 - LinuxOne: "Uh huh!"
14:09 - Accipiter: "All Right. And that's an, How much is that?"
14:11 - LinuxOne: "Oh, that's Free!"
14:12 - Accipiter: "Is it really?"
14:12 - LinuxOne: "Yeah, it's a free newsletter. I'll send it to you, no problem."
14:15 - Accipiter: "All right, well, what I'm gonna do, is, can I get your name first of all?"
14:18 - LinuxOne: "Sure, my name is (Name Withheld). (Name Withheld.)"
14:22 - Accipiter: "(Repeats Spelling)."
14:23 - LinuxOne: "Uh huh."
14:24 - Accipiter: "Okay, and uh, what I'm gonna do, is I'm gonna check into, I mean yours sounds the best so far, I mean I've called Red Hat, and um, they seemed a little uh, blase about it...but they were pretty informative. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna check into um, I also have a list of them here, Slackware is one of them. SuSE is another one."
14:45 - LinuxOne: "Well, call us back, I'd be glad to send you, ah, do you want me to just send you the free newsletter? I'd be glad to do that."
14:50 - Accipiter: "Well, you know what, not yet, because I don't know how this is gonna pan out just yet."
14:57 - LinuxOne: "Sure, not a problem."
14:58 - Accipiter: "So ahh, But I will call you back."
15:00 - LinuxOne: "All righty."
15:00 - Accipiter: "All right, thank you very much for your help."
15:01 - LinuxOne: "Uh huh."
15:02 - Accipiter: "Bye."

15:02 - 15:07 (Call Disconnect)

Notes:

1) At time 00:51, she names VA Linux as one of their competitors. VA Linux sells actual computer systems preloaded with Linux, not a distribution. They're really not a competitor.
2) Time 01:24 is where she confirms that all the applications are indeed, in the kernel itself.
3) Starting at time 04:25, I ask what RPM is. She proceeds to explain that RPM is a programming language, when in fact it is the Red Hat Package Manager, which is basically a quick way to install and/or remove applications from a system. Also, at 04:49 she confirms that RPM includes a program compiler.
4) At time 04:55, she is referring to Mousepedometer, which does what she states.
5) She is pronouncing Gnome as G-Nome at time 05:12. No big deal, but it demonstrates the lack of information these associates have.
6) She also confirms (incorrectly) that DVD is supported under Linux on 06:36. (It's being worked on under supposedly "questionable" legalities. Apparently, she is aware that support is not complete, but she doesn't tell me until 09:43 and even then, she's not entirely sure.)
7) Time 07:10 is when she says that Apache is a "server architecture."
8) She states that she is the only one answering the phone at time 07:28. This call was made at about 11:30 in the morning on a Thursday. Where is everyone else? ONE person is left to answer the phone during lunch?
9) 09:17 is when I ask about their device drivers. She tells me they have more than their competitors, but their work has yet to be seen.
10) At time 10:33, she leads on that she uses this product at her home, and confirms it at 11:02.
11) She states once again that RPM is used for programming. Time 11:16.
12) HERE is the kicker. At time 11:42, I tell her I want to set up a firewall, and I ask about the security of LinuxOne. She goes on to say that LinuxOne, as well as MOST Linux distributions are not secure. I have NO idea where this came from, nor do I know why she can speak for all the other disributions. From 12:11 to 12:20, I am in shock that she said that.
13) She tells me that their own Website is running LinuxOne, when in fact, it's running a standard Red Hat install. Time 12:29.
She confirms it at 12:33, as well as 12:53.
14) Time 13:08 is when she informs me that LinuxOne has more device drivers than Slackware.
15) At time 13:12, she tells me that their program is easier to link when a compiler is run. What I say on line 13:22 is true. She then tells me at time 13:25, that it deals with "programming language", and goes back to RPM.
16) Time 13:32 to 14:08 is where she describes to me where to go to learn how to program in RPM.

Conclusion: This sales associate was VERY uninformed. Okay, she may have not been the most technical person in the world, but at several points in our conversation she gave me total misinformation. It would have been perfectly okay to say "I don't know", but instead she insisted RPM was a programming language, and that Apache was a server architecture.

The company was in business for 6 months before filing for their IPO. As a matter of fact, LinuxOne's S1 forms were almost identical to Red Hat's S1 forms, but where Red Hat appeared, it has been changed to LinuxOne.

The whole company smells like a scam. They're trying to use the Linux name to get rich, while at the same time making Linux look bad by putting out this poor excuse for a distribution.