IBM, whose decision to back Linux years ago was a driving force in its adoption by business, called on developers of the open-source operating system to make it more “green” and to stop copying Windows, if they want to see Linux on the desktop.

Bob Sutor, VP of open source and standards at IBM, told attendees of the LinuxWorld Conference in San Francisco, that what the open source community needs to make Linux popular as a desktop OS used by consumers and businesses are “some really good graphic designers.”

“Stop copying 2001 Windows. That’s not where the usability action is,” Sutor said during his afternoon keynote.

Sutor’s comments came a day after IBM announced at the show that it was joining Linux distributors Canonical, Novell, and Red Hat in building Microsoft-free PCs for business. The four companies agreed to provide hardware partners with the software to build desktops that would have alternatives to Windows and Office.

IBM’s comments to the Linux community of developers carry a lot of weight, given the huge investment and contribution the tech company has made to the OS. IBM threw its weight behind Linux in December 2000, when it promised to spend $1 billion on development of the OS the following year.

Sutor offered “predictions” that collectively seemed more like a roadmap of where IBM would like to see Linux evolve over the next 10 years. Among the areas developers should focus is in making the OS more green, Sutor said.

Linux needed to become even more efficient in its use of resources to bolster efforts to reduce energy consumption in the data center. Even though server virtualization, load balancing, better resource management and other technologies make the OS efficient today, “there’s got to be more.”

Eight iPhone owners have joined an elite clan: Their Apple gadget is running a program that cost nearly $1,000.

When the iPhone first hit the market in June 2007, those who paid the $499 entry price — and signed the two-year AT&T contract — owned a status symbol. A year later, we have the iPhone 3G, Apple’s speedier, sleeker and, most important, less expensive smart phone, which introduced a section for downloading third-party applications. Now that the phone is affordable enough for a wider audience, a new status symbol has emerged: a seemingly useless application called I Am Rich.

Its function is exactly what the name implies: to alert people that you have money in the bank. I Am Rich was available for purchase from the phone’s App Store for, get this, $999.99 — the highest amount a developer can charge through the digital retailer, said Armin Heinrich, the program’s developer. Once downloaded, it doesn’t do much — a red icon sits on the iPhone home screen like any other application, with the subtext “I Am Rich.” Once activated, it treats the user to a large, glowing gem (pictured above). That’s about it. For a thousand dollars.