Software "Open Monopoly"

garoush writes "The following article is at C|Net.news Software "open monopoly". In it "Sun developers Petr Hrebejk and Tim Boudreau say the economics of open-source software will break Microsoft's operating system hammerlock and replace it with a what they describe as an 'open monopoly.'" I Personally have issues with such claims. With .NET, MS is positioning the company at "services" -- in effect MS is now gearing up to take on a new monopoly: "services" at the "consumer" level. If you agree, I don't see how "open monopoly" can break MS. After all, your average "Joe the consumer" doesn't know a thing about open source. " The submittor has an interesting point - but I think that even if John Q Public knows nothing about open source, if the services he uses are running open source, it doesn't matter.

But but but...

We already have open monopoly [freshmeat.net]!

Re:what is wrong with.....

if it is an OSS monopoly, would that not mean that the people are in total control?

If I understand what you imply by "the people", the the answer is "no". Just take a look at most (NOT ALL!!!!!) OSS projects today: while there are some notable exceptions, the developers are not interested in making "better software for the people", but "better software for themselves". I am not making a negative value judgement here; there is nothing wrong with this attitude! If you are going to write software for free in your own time, I EXPECT that you will write the software you want, with the features you want, and document it however you want, even if those things don't advance the needs of the larger user base.

But this model doesn't put "the people" in control any more than a closed source model does! In fact, while it might make the monopoly a little more transparent, it completely removes all incentive to be responsive to the "needs" of the "users" (i.e., those users who are not also active developers); in this sense, an OSS monopoly may actually be WORSE for the "the people" than a closed source monopoly is. The closed source monopoly at least has to worry about pleasing government regulators and large volume customers; OSS projects don't even have those hurdles to overcome.

Everyone is wrong.

No one will correctly predict where things are going. Computers and the devices that run them are too varied and change too quickly. No one ever expected Microsoft to go anywhere early on. Microsoft never expected the internet to go anywhere, which is why they are still having a hard time getting their shit together. Eventually, something strange and surprising will come out of the kludge that is screwball desktop OSs and people trying to connect everything in the universe to the net, and it will change everything. Such is that nature of the chaotic beast that is the transistor.

Re:Everyone is wrong.

Your headline, and the gist of your statement is correct, everyone (likely) is wrong. But your focus is too narrow. This chaos is not limited to the effect of the transistor.

Look back a couple hundred years to the days where cargo was shipped via sailing vessels. Then one day someone (James Watt?) designs an efficient steam engine. Someone else (Robert Fulton) figured out a way to effectively drive a ship using a steam engine. Most of the shipping companies (my great great grandfather 's company included) could not foresee the impact and benefits or this technology. As a result, his son (my great grandfather) basically put him out of business by taking advantage of the benefits of steam powered ships.

The electric motor is another good example. When they were first exhibited, they were unreliable, and room filling (remind anyone of another tech that we know and love?). Today, electric motors are effectively invisible.

History continues to show us that innovative people will realize unorthodox uses for gadgets that many think will never have a purpose. And those unorthodox uses will (overall) make our lives easier, and more pleasant to live.

Open Source Development - a new process

The important thing to note about the Open Source is that it is a new process for the creation of software products. It is more efficient that the traditional means of creating software, so much so that the resulting software products are often free.

Before Henry Ford, there were lots of little companies that built cars by hand. Ford's new process for creating cars made them cheaper. The small car companies at the time said, "But most people will always want hand-built cars, because they are custom built and better quality." They were of course wrong - the more efficient process won in the end. The only way that car manufacturers of the time could survive was by producing cars by the same process, so very few of the companies survived.

Microsoft will try everything they can to stop the progress of open source, but in the long term, the more efficient process will win. Just like the car manufacturers of old, the only way that Microsoft can survive is to start using the new process. Unfortunately for Microsoft, it's a loose-loose situation, because the new process is so efficient that it is hardly possible to make a profit from it. So, either way, Microsoft dies. I give it ten years max.

Ten years may not seem like a long time, but remember that it is less than ten years since the launch of Windows 3.1