June 27th, 2007
Most Presidential candidates use open source
Douglas Karr at the Marketing Technology Blog decided to survey the Web sites of Presidential candidates, finding out what software they were running and where they were hosted.
(Why is this fellow here? All will be revealed soon, grasshopper.)
Karr’s methodology was not rocket science. He used Netcraft. You can do it, too.
Karr was expansive in defining candidates. He included several non-candidates, including Newt Gingrich, Al Gore, Wesley Clark, Chuck Hagel and (as of now) Fred Thompson.
What no Bloomberg? (Linux and Apache at Rackspace.) Thus we have Mike, and his signature, at the top.
Of the announced candidates, most run open source. Nine run Linux, two run FreeBSD. The rest run Windows Server 2003.
It’s curious that open source dominates among Democrats, with only Hillary Clinton crossing the aisle to run Windows. Four Republicans — Jim Gilmore, Rudy Giuliani, Ron Paul, and Mitt Romney – run Linux. The other five Republicans (and Arthur Branch) run Windows.
Personally I think this proves nothing. Candidates don’t decide on Web site operating environments. I also think total operating costs depend far more on the Web host you use than the OS you run.
So file this under fun stuff. Unless you really, really hate Hillary Clinton. In which case you don’t need this excuse to continue.
Dana Blankenhorn has been a business journalist for 30 years, a tech freelancer since 1983. You can follow Dana on Twitter. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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| 06/29/07
