Interclue and What Going Proprietary Can Do 149
Linux.com (which shares a corporate overlord with Slashdot) has an interesting look at what going proprietary can mean for your overall effectiveness. Using Firefox extension "Interclue" as the object lesson, the piece looks at both the engineering and social difficulties surrounding the project. "Even more significantly, the efforts to commercialize only detract from the software itself. The basic idea behind Interclue would make for a handy Web utility, but seems too slight to build a business around. The effort to do so only leads to complications that do nothing to enhance the basic utility, and to pleas for donations that can only annoy. The result is that, if your position on free software doesn't lead you to avoid Interclue, the efforts to monetize it almost certainly will."
Proprietary solutions (Score:1, Insightful)
Isn't this cherry picking? (Score:5, Insightful)
After all, OS_X is the merging of proprietary and open source as well.
I think this current example presented the way it has is a bit propagandistic.
Both OSS and Proprietary have their virtues and vices, and it's a question of the project manager's competence whether or not a project brings out more of the former or the latter.
what the fuck is this? (Score:5, Insightful)
What's with the incoherent summary? Nowhere in the summary did this even mention what "Interclue" was supposed to do, and why we should care about attempts to "monetize" it (lame corporate speak when applied outside the finance world).
Editors must be sleepwalking through the end of '08.
forked review (Score:3, Insightful)
If the a lack of a Creative Commons license for linux.com content doesn't lead you to avoid the website, their efforts to indoctrinate you certainly will...
history repeating itself (Score:5, Insightful)
Software history tends to repeat itself. I remember back in the 1980s, when software distributed on floppy disks often had copy protection. Legitimate users voted with their feet, because it was too much of a nuisance -- e.g., you couldn't back up your software. Software houses eventually got the message and stopped doing it. Now, a generation later, we seem to be going through the same silliness again, except that now they call it DRM.
Similar deal with these little proprietary pieces of crapware. Back in the 90s, there was a period when the internet had gained quite a bit of mindshare, but OSS hadn't. During that time, you'd get people posting lots of trivial little pieces of software on the web, with various schemes intended to extract some small amount of money from the customer: nagware, adware, shareware, crippleware, ... That whole scene was a total dead end. In most cases, programmers found that the amount of revenue they got was essentially zero; this was the users indicating that although the software was somewhat useful to them, it wasn't useful enough to pay money for. Then OSS started getting popular, and most clueful users started to realize that it was a better way to go. Now we have some new software platforms -- firefox+xul, browser+ajax, and the iPhone -- and everyone seems to need to learn the same lesson all over again. At some point, the users who didn't go through this in the 90s are going to realize some of the same things. They're going to realize that spending $5 or $10 on lots of little pieces of software will eventually add up to real money. They're going to realize that it's a hassle to have to keep track of all the software, registration numbers, etc. They're going to realize that it's no fun to have to go back and reproduce this whole set of proprietary apps every time they buy new hardware.
nowt but 'perfect predictive hindsight' (Score:5, Insightful)
You know what makes a good proprietary conversion of an open source or free product? Succeeding.
There is no certain way to succeed in *anything*.
There are always going to be thousands of failures for every success in the software world, and thousands of moderate or short term successes for every 'killer app' class of success.
I don't want to hear about also rans being analysed to prove a point that was arrived at before the article was even begun.
Considering the source. (Score:5, Insightful)
Does it really surprise anyone that Linux.com would be against any project going closed source? That would be kind of like being surprised the Westboro Baptist Church put out a statement denouncing homosexuality.
The key sentence in the article (Score:5, Insightful)
The basic idea behind Interclue would make for a handy Web utility, but seems too slight to build a business around.
To rephrase: If your product isn't valuable enough for people to spend money on, it will be hard to make money selling it. The rest of the article is a fairly well-written review of an obscure add-on, with very little insight about open vs. proprietary software.
Re:Considering the source. (Score:3, Insightful)
It also seems that they deliberately took a project that was doomed to fail.
"The basic idea behind Interclue would make for a handy Web utility, but seems too slight to build a business around."
Yeah, so, they took a project that couldn't be commercialized effectively, tried to commercialize it, and failed.
This isn't a lesson in going from OS to Commercial, it's a lesson in predictable failure.
Re:forked review (Score:2, Insightful)
Fuck CC. They need to use the GFDL license. They can monetize by selling tshirts and coffee cups at their concerts.
I also agree (Score:4, Insightful)
Slashdot does have a tendency to spin everything into a "TEH FOSS IZ TEH ONLE SULUZION!!!11!!" direction, and to either distort stories, or select cherry picked stories.
The truth is, to which I agree with the OP on this, that every single idea isn't something to build a business around. Kind of like web browsers- it's perfectly acceptable to me, and millions of other computer users throughout the world, that anyone making an OS would view that as a feature to be bundled. And yet... teh FOSSies still can't forgive MS for competing with their beloved Netscape, no matter how horrible that browser (and company) was in reality.
However... there actually ARE ideas which are not only economically viable, but will thrive as a commercial enterprise. Would you REALLY trust a FOSS tax program? I wouldn't. Would you trust a FOSS app which converts documents to PDF? Sure!
Both software models have their place. The sad fact is, there are zealots on both sides who are more interested in commercial vs. free than in using the right tool for the right job. It's always seemed to me that the FOSSie outcry over commerical software was really just their justification for MS hatred, rather than opposition to commerical software- that's why Slashdot grants Apple their "most favored monopoly" status, despite the fact that Apple is not just a commerical product company... but is so with brutally impunity.
Re:The key sentence in the article (Score:4, Insightful)
Dual licensing. (Score:3, Insightful)
It's Byfield (Score:1, Insightful)
His latest MO is to promote a piece of proprietary software in a piece mistitled to sound critical.
But despite the title, this piece appears to be nothing more than an Interclue press release. Note that while it does casually mention that it's proprietaryness carries some vague baggage, most of the article just describes all the add-in's features in a positive light, and re-emphasizes it's usefulness.
The only thing I can't find is where he promotes Mono.
Whoosh (Score:5, Insightful)
If you think Newspeak is next generation then you must be at least 90. I'll get off your lawn now.
Re:I also agree (Score:4, Insightful)
The question should really be, would you *really* trust a program that nobody could audit?
Re:what the fuck is this? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's a great marketing strategy, really. Post some blurb about some product no one has heard of--and make it's dilemma known to an audience with a broad interest around such problems, and a potential interest in said products.
sheepishly, the intrigued masses walk into the clutches of the marketers to find out more about this company, and what it does.
I hate marketing.
Re:Proprietary solutions (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh, and I'll give you 1/2 point because my syntax is incorrect. The correct phrasing should have been:
Your Newspeak is ungood. "bad" is ungroupthinkful. Use "doubleplusungood".
Re:Proprietary solutions (Score:3, Insightful)
It's true, requiring the software and its derivatives to remain open reduces commercial involvement, but its the only way to prevent companies from simply taking the community's work, adding features (without sharing them) and distributing the program without source.
Besides, open source developers don't usually want to see another company selling a version of their program without contributing to the community.
Re:I also agree (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know if "trust" is the right word. Both programs can contain errors. The product with a guarantee to cover your ass if the error lands you in trouble with the IRS is the one that I'd be most likely to go with.
Which sounds better:
A) Saving a fifty dollars on a piece of tax software, and an audit from the IRS lands you a hefty fine plus interest on the amount that was really owed
OR
B) Spending fifty dollars on a piece of tax software, and an audit from the IRS lands you a hefty fine plus interest on the amount that was really owed that is paid for by the company that made the tax software?
While FOSS has its place, there are times when going with the proprietary solution has more inherit value. The best solution in the above situation is a FOSS product that will cover any expense incurred due to an error in the software, but in the real world a project like that would die after the first bug.
Re:I also agree (Score:3, Insightful)
What does this have to do with tax software? A business could certainly offer paid indemnification even while giving away the software under a F/OSS license. I won't guarantee that it's a successful business model -- I haven't tried it -- but there's nothing inherent to the business or the software which prevents this approach.
Re:I also agree (Score:3, Insightful)
The software and the insurance are two separate things. The fact that your tax software was closed source has nothing to do with the guarantee that it doesn't contain known errors.
This is an opportunity for OSS vendors: they could offer guaranteed patches, an SLA even. For a small fee, they could compensate you for when things go wrong. Come to think of it, this is what vendors are already doing, along with insurance companies.
The inherent value is not in that it's closed source, but in the company backing up its claims.
Re:I also agree (Score:4, Insightful)
Whereas Microsoft already had: that's the point. In this context anti-competitive doesn't mean "aiming for lock-in" but "exploiting overwhelming market dominance in one field to unfairly gain overwhelming market dominance in another". In a world where nearly everyone bought Windows, bundling a browser with it for "free" (i.e. not allowing the consumer to choose not to pay that portion) meant that even if the competitor's product were completely free it would still have to be considerably better and well marketed to gain mindshare. That's as competitive as putting me up against Usain Bolt in the 100m: no matter how arrogant I am, my best hope is for him to be struck by lightning.
Re:I also agree (Score:5, Insightful)
Odd that Slashdot (or Linux.com I guess) needed to look at Interclue to see what going proprietary does for you.
Why not give us detailed report on the history of VA Linux->VA Software->Sourceforge? No third party needed. You start a company to build servers that run Linux and do well. Then you buy up Andover to get various FOSS scene web sites to generate buzz. Change your company name a few times just in case anyone is following you.
Decide to IPO at $30/share. None other than the great economist Eric S. Raymond tells us it is a can't miss proposition winner, he being hired to act as the company's Open Source mouthpiece and keep them comitted to the principals or openness and sharing and the like. Everybody cheers your big IPO and sees it as proof that money can be made while staying Open. Stock price like $300+.
Before the cheers die down you find out can no longer make go of it in the server market so you try to sell proprietary software. Release a proprietary version of the previously OSS Sourceforge, form the OSDN then promtly kick out K5 and, again, throw in a name change to OSTG.
Again find out that your business model doesn't work, sell your flagship product, Sourceforge, to CollabNet.
Best I can tell the company is now "leader in IT community-driven media and e-commerce", which I think means it sells ads and trinkets. Stock price last I checked was in the $0.85 range.
So anyway, I don't see why they needed to go study Interclue.
Re:I also agree (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem was that MS used anti-competitive measures to hurt Netscape's market share and promote I.E.
That rationale came after the BSOD-fueled MS hatred.
I generally see about a ratio of 4 anti-fanboi posts to 1 Apple fanboi post when Apple comes up in discussion.
It has definitely changed quite a bit this year. Go back a couple of years and any negative remark about Apple would earn you a lesson. From what I've observed, this goes in cycles. Early on Slashdot was very anti-Microsoft. Stories would be twisted (misleading headlines, for example...) to get the pitchforks a'wavin against MS. It was all fun for a while, but Windows 2000 came out and over time people started to adopt it. With the BSOD virtually extinct and the main stability issues addressed, the tired jokes were getting... old. Eventually these people earned mod-points and general opinions on Slashdot started to balance a bit. The main difference? Back then you could say that Windows didn't support color graphics and get modded as informative for it. After the backlash you had to be a lot more careful about what claims you made.
So what does this have to do with Apple? Right about the time the iPod came out, Apple was pretty highly regarded around here. I might have my timing wrong. Maybe it was OSX running on BSD. Eh, I dunno, I didn't pay that much attention to the Apple stories. Any criticism would land you in trouble. I remember a story where a dude stuffed a PC into an iMac case. I made a joke like "It'll be the first time a Mac ever saw GTA!" and.. blammo, troll. (As I recall, the moderation went back up after I explained it was a joke.) Apple was riding high up until the iPhone came out. I'm not sure what precisely happened here. I remember the iPhone was actually well receieved, but maybe it was a case of too many silly iPhone stories soured people. (I wouldn't rule out a bit of envy, too. I was guilty of this. I was stuck in a contract, couldn't get one, so I'd crack jokes at its expense.) I dunno, I think the real turning point was the people waiting in line at that store for no apparent reason close to the launch of the iPhone 3G. Turns out they had a reason for being there, but by the time that was discovered a good time had already been had at their expense. So more anti-iPhone stuff. Anti-iPhone leads to anti-Mac, and so on. (Not that the Air was an underrated machine...) Well that's died down and we're starting to see s'more balance.
A couple of years ago I predicted that 2007 would be the year Google became Slashdot's villain. Well, that hasn't happened yet, but I'm starting to see signs of it. Then after the hate comes out, people will step up and even things out, then on to the next big bad guy.
I personally would like to see what effect removing Slashdot's moderation system would have on fanboyism.