Best of the blogs: Robinson Crusoe is to open source what crack cocaine is to upfront license fees — Matt Asay draws that comparison (or something like it) in Repenting toward open source. “Be wise. Go open source,” Asay urges. SaaS: “As some wiseguy once said, those who ignore the lessons of history are doomed to repeat the seventh grade. Based on that principle, I think I have to nominate the entire IT punditocracy to do exactly that…a lot of the current gushing about Software as a Service (SaaS) makes me think our industry is doubling as a home for amnesiacs,” Bob Lewis writes. Lewis offers some contractual tips, should you decide to sign up for SAP’s hosted apps service. Columnists’ corner: One of the biggest obstacles to desktop Linux is simply getting an OS installed onto a PC. As Neil McAllister points out, standardization is not the only way to further Linux on the desktop: a common installer could be the answer. “Developers from various distributions could come together to standardize a new, single distribution — but not some kind of uber-Linux to end all Linuxes. On the contrary, the sole purpose of this lean, stripped-down distro would be to get a fresh machine up and running with the Linux of your choice.” Quoteworthy: Federated identity presses just about every IT hot button, from compliance, security, and privacy to outsourcing — because you may be relying on outside partners to vouch for someone’s identity. Given the sensitive nature of identity information and the very real possibilities of fraud, financial damage, or privacy violations, turf wars and legal liability questions are inevitable. — Steve Fox, in The follies of failing to federate identity. Technology Industry