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http://blogs.cio.com/node/292

"" The enterprise software business is changing dramatically and
tomorrow's industry will look very different to today's. The converging
impacts of slowing growth, competitive pressures, and more demanding
customers will cause a splintering of today's monolithic industry
offerings -- and in a surprising turn of events, the software industry of
the future will look much more like the open source software industry of
today. ""


I guess the software industry has become like a highway - in the sense
that best to pull into the service station that you see coming up or else
run the risk of running out of petrol before the next service station
comes along miles down the road.


Have A Nice Cup of Tea

--
1/ Migration to Linux only costs money once. Higher Windows TCO is forever.
2/ "Shared source" is a poison pill. Open Source is freedom.
3/ Only the Windows boxes get the worms.

T'was the Mon, 15 May 2006 07:24:18 +1200 when I remembered Have A
Nice Cup of Tea <> saying something like this:

>I guess the software industry has become like a highway - in the sense
>that best to pull into the service station that you see coming up or else
>run the risk of running out of petrol before the next service station
>comes along miles down the road.

I have no idea what you're trying to say there.

But I did read the article. Was interesting. So software is being
comodditised by open source software. This is true. I'm running free
shopping cart software on my computer, powered by a free web server
and a free sql server. I'm looking at installing CRM software, which
is also free. These are things that in the past people have had to pay
lots for, but are now available to everyone. I presume this trend will
continue, where there's significant demand for a software resource,
eventually there will be an open source replacement that does 80% of
the task, at 20% of the cost.

And so there's predictions that software will be free, but you'll be
paying for support. So I'm predicting there will be increased demand
for in-house IT support people within organizations over paying
multiple software subscriptions to all the various pieces of software
used throughout the organization.

Shame about the reducing profits though, it makes the software
industry not so attractive. I can still see the value in justifying
price based on the value the product gives to the customer. The
difference between what you could have sold the software for, versus
what you were forced to sell the software for is lost profits. Will
this affect innovation within software development houses as being
profit-driven to develop new products doesn't work as well if an open
source product could commoditie your market? Or will this force
software development houses to innovate even more to out-innovate open
source competition which traditionally lags behind closed source
products in terms of features.

Another question is, are open source products sufficiently customer
focused enough to be successful? I mean the strength of using Office
isn't just Office. It goes into ease of use, ease of updating, ease of
support and downloading new features, templates, help files, etc...
Look at all the support provided to IT professionals @
http://technet.microsoft.com. All those webcasts, virtual labs, every
single document that's available for free is paid for through people
purchasing products like Windows Server. It's all focused on what the
customer needs, because if the customer isn't being satisfied, it's
more than easy enough to switch over to say open source offerings. But
is there sufficient force within the open source community to focus on
the total customer experience rather than just the product? From what
I've seen, I'd say the answer is partially yes. There are forums where
advice is given out freely to anyone asking for it. As long as the
trend of people involved with the product returns to give something
back to the community in terms of development or support, I could see
the open source model of doing things continuing to be successful to
the detriment of closed source products and profits within the
software industry. I think I'm going to transition to knowledge
management instead
--
Cheers,

Waylon Kenning.

Waylon Kenning wrote:
> Shame about the reducing profits though, it makes the software
> industry not so attractive. I can still see the value in justifying
> price based on the value the product gives to the customer. The
> difference between what you could have sold the software for, versus
> what you were forced to sell the software for is lost profits. Will
> this affect innovation within software development houses as being
> profit-driven to develop new products doesn't work as well if an open
> source product could commoditie your market? Or will this force
> software development houses to innovate even more to out-innovate open
> source competition which traditionally lags behind closed source
> products in terms of features.

A lot of software development isn't product-based anyway, it's bespoke
systems within corporates and the like. I've done a lot of development and
only one of those projects was a product as such. Even then we weren't
selling the product, it was a hook to get people using a service.

On Mon, 15 May 2006 11:10:25 +1200, Waylon Kenning wrote:

> Another question is, are open source products sufficiently customer
> focused enough to be successful? I mean the strength of using Office
> isn't just Office. It goes into ease of use, ease of updating, ease of
> support and downloading new features, templates, help files, etc...

Translated:

The strength of using M$ Office is the extremely way it can be used to
install viruses, trogans, spyware, and all manner of malware simply by
opening a document, or receiving an email.

M$ Office is a product for morons cobbled together by a marketing company
for the sole benefit of the marketing company itself.

Remember - M$ does not have it's primary goal as providing software with
safety, security, and reliablility.

It's primary goal is to extort as much cash from people and other
corporations for as little effort as possible, while at the same time
ruthlessly attacking any other IT company that shows up as a perceived
"threat".

The fool is parted from his money, that trusts Micro$oft or its products.


Have A Nice Cup of Tea

--
1/ Migration to Linux only costs money once. Higher Windows TCO is forever.
2/ "Shared source" is a poison pill. Open Source is freedom.
3/ Only the Windows boxes get the worms.

T'was the Mon, 15 May 2006 18:24:39 +1200 when I remembered Have A
Nice Cup of Tea <> saying something like this:

>The fool is parted from his money, that trusts Micro$oft or its products.

Alas I'm the fool, I tried reasoning with you. I do continue in the
hope that one day you'll rise to the level of intelligent debate.
--
Cheers,

Waylon Kenning.

Waylon Kenning wrote:
> T'was the Mon, 15 May 2006 07:24:18 +1200 when I remembered Have A
> Nice Cup of Tea <> saying something like this:
>
>
>>I guess the software industry has become like a highway - in the sense
>>that best to pull into the service station that you see coming up or else
>>run the risk of running out of petrol before the next service station
>>comes along miles down the road.
>
>
> I have no idea what you're trying to say there.
>
> But I did read the article. Was interesting. So software is being
> comodditised by open source software. This is true.

Yep, and commoditising means no big margins any more used to support top
heavy company structures. What exactly justified Oracle's and MS's
margins? a product you just had to have because it is a have to have.
These days though the prices charged are getting seocnd looks, just like
Unix I think these applications from mega corps will end up in smaller
and smaller niche/boutique markets driven there by OSS and small agile
and efficient companys.

I'm running free
> shopping cart software on my computer, powered by a free web server
> and a free sql server. I'm looking at installing CRM software, which
> is also free. These are things that in the past people have had to pay
> lots for, but are now available to everyone. I presume this trend will
> continue, where there's significant demand for a software resource,
> eventually there will be an open source replacement that does 80% of
> the task, at 20% of the cost.

I believe so. I am coming across it all the time. Previous versions of
software that need upgrading and wow! look at the price hikes and oh
dear we have no budget.....hello GPL software.....

> And so there's predictions that software will be free, but you'll be
> paying for support.

This is Sun's new model.

So I'm predicting there will be increased demand
> for in-house IT support people within organizations over paying
> multiple software subscriptions to all the various pieces of software
> used throughout the organization.

Yep, or they wont pay and live with any issues. This might sound bad but
in reality I deal with vendors products we have paid lots for and get
crap support, so we could go GPL and pay nothing and get at worst crap
support......

> Shame about the reducing profits though, it makes the software
> industry not so attractive.

To programmers or suits? programmers will still be able to make a good
living there just wont be the suits around making a good living off the
customers and programmers backs.

I can still see the value in justifying
> price based on the value the product gives to the customer. The
> difference between what you could have sold the software for, versus
> what you were forced to sell the software for is lost profits.

Lost profits or extortion? are customers really that dumb that they dont
realise what is happening? dont you think they get ****ed off at being
ripped off?

Will
> this affect innovation within software development houses as being
> profit-driven to develop new products doesn't work as well if an open
> source product could commoditie your market? Or will this force
> software development houses to innovate even more to out-innovate open
> source competition

I think if they could they would, trouble is I dont think they can.
Again look at the latest feature in the new MS Office, do we need them?
I dont I get by very well on oOo and that's $500 v a
download....support? I'd have to pay someone to support either if I
needed it.

which traditionally lags behind closed source
> products in terms of features.

Sometimes but not always, do you think Apache lags IIS? BIND is behind?
Sendmail a snail?

;]

I just installed munin for monitoring my servers, BMC patrol might have
more features but costs and arm and a leg and is just not needed.

> Another question is, are open source products sufficiently customer
> focused enough to be successful?

Yes IMHO, lets not forget there could be 20 or 30 OSS solutions to a
customer's problem out there, with research the customer picks the
solution mostly closely aligned with what he wants.

I mean the strength of using Office
> isn't just Office. It goes into ease of use, ease of updating, ease of
> support and downloading new features, templates, help files, etc...
> Look at all the support provided to IT professionals @
> http://technet.microsoft.com. All those webcasts, virtual labs, every
> single document that's available for free is paid for through people
> purchasing products like Windows Server.

OSS also has lots of online documents, personally I have few issues
finding enough documentation to do what I need to do.

It's all focused on what the
> customer needs, because if the customer isn't being satisfied, it's
> more than easy enough to switch over to say open source offerings.

yes and customers are.

But
> is there sufficient force within the open source community to focus on
> the total customer experience rather than just the product? From what
> I've seen, I'd say the answer is partially yes. There are forums where
> advice is given out freely to anyone asking for it. As long as the
> trend of people involved with the product returns to give something
> back to the community in terms of development or support, I could see
> the open source model of doing things continuing to be successful to
> the detriment of closed source products and profits within the
> software industry. I think I'm going to transition to knowledge
> management instead

Yep, always a good back stop....I think the moves are away from focusing
on buying a package to making the business work, business wide. By this
I mean no one these days buys a package and runs it and expects it to do
everything they want it has to be modified to meet the need, this is
where OSS can hold its own and win IMHO. The people who design these
solutions and build them would seem to have very good job security, more
so than the vendors of packages.

regards

Thing

On Mon, 15 May 2006 19:34:13 +1200, thingy wrote:

> To programmers or suits? programmers will still be able to make a good
> living there just wont be the suits around making a good living off the
> customers and programmers backs.

And that is a good thing, IMHO.

Those suits would have to go somewhere else to do their leiching - like
maybe a law firm... or an appliance store. ;o)


Have A Nice Cup of Tea

--
1/ Migration to Linux only costs money once. Higher Windows TCO is forever.
2/ "Shared source" is a poison pill. Open Source is freedom.
3/ Only the Windows boxes get the worms.

On Mon, 15 May 2006 18:44:43 +1200, Waylon Kenning wrote:

>>The fool is parted from his money, that trusts Micro$oft or its products.
>
> Alas I'm the fool, I tried reasoning with you.

Seriously, good luck to you if you really do trust Microsoft - I think
you'll need luck on your side if that's where you're at.


Have A Nice Cup of Tea

--
1/ Migration to Linux only costs money once. Higher Windows TCO is forever.
2/ "Shared source" is a poison pill. Open Source is freedom.
3/ Only the Windows boxes get the worms.

Have A Nice Cup of Tea wrote:
> On Mon, 15 May 2006 19:34:13 +1200, thingy wrote:
>
>
>>To programmers or suits? programmers will still be able to make a good
>>living there just wont be the suits around making a good living off the
>>customers and programmers backs.
>
>
> And that is a good thing, IMHO.
>
> Those suits would have to go somewhere else to do their leiching - like
> maybe a law firm... or an appliance store. ;o)
>
>
> Have A Nice Cup of Tea
>

ah, explains the noel lemming quality staff.....and noel lemming's prices...

regards

thing

On Mon, 15 May 2006 20:27:54 +1200, thingy wrote:

>> Those suits would have to go somewhere else to do their leiching - like
>> maybe a law firm... or an appliance store. ;o)
>
> ah, explains the noel lemming quality staff.....and noel lemming's prices...

<cackle>

Yeah!


Have A Nice Cup of Tea

--
1/ Migration to Linux only costs money once. Higher Windows TCO is forever.
2/ "Shared source" is a poison pill. Open Source is freedom.
3/ Only the Windows boxes get the worms.