OSSPACK

It looks like Android may not be as far behind Apple iPhone (and iOS devices) as it may seem when it comes to mobile web usage, as new research from Quantcast shows the little green robot is gaining on iOS.

It is not known if Jobs will accept his award in person at the Beverly Hilton ceremony, as the CEO is selective about which events he attends. A number of other celebrities are being honored this year however, such as anchorman Dan Rather, inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil, and Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin.

Steampunk, the pseudo-Victorian mechanical aesthetic favored by alternate history and science fiction buffs seems like an unlikely source of inspiration...

The Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC) has filed suit against 14 consumer electronics companies on behalf of the developers of BusyBox for violating GPLv2 licensing requirements. The lawsuit covers almost 20 Linux-based products, and targets companies including Best Buy, Samsung, Westinghouse, and JVC, says the SFLC.

Just as Microsoft has being accused of playing dirty over sales tactics and patents, the software company has launched its first open source organization. The CodePlex Foundation aims to act as a liason between commercial enterprises and open source developers and communities while increasing open source participation, says the foundation.

An IDC study predicts that open source software will grow at a 22.4 percent rate to reach $8.1 billion by 2013, says eWEEK. Meanwhile, in an SEC filing, Microsoft has added Linux vendors Canonical and Red Hat to its list of as rivals, and acknowledges the growing threat of Android.

A lobbying group has been launched by more than 70 companies, academic institutions, and communities, to promote open source software as a "transparent and cost-effective option" for U.S. government agencies. "Open Source for America" counts AMD, Canonical, Google, Novell, Oracle, and Red Hat among its members.

A software company based in Redmond, Wash. has released 20,000 lines of code under GPLv2 for three Linux device drivers. Microsoft says its first open source Linux code contribution is designed to speed the performance of the operating system when it's run in a Hyper-V virtual machine.

Google followed up on Thursday's announcement of a Linux-based Chrome OS for netbooks by listing nine technology partners that are supporting the open-source platform. Meanwhile, one report claims that Intel, which is not on the list, is collaborating with Google on Chrome OS.

Google announced an open source operating system aimed at netbooks that combines the Linux kernel with its Chrome browser. Google expects to release open source code for the Google Chrome Operating System later this year, and will ship a final version in the second half of 2010, says the company.