Colin Anderson wrote:
This is the failing of the open-source business model
I disagree.
The open-source business model fails when the business revenue is
focused upon monetary sales of the (otherwise free) software. The
success in open-source business models comes when the business revenue
is focused upon support and other products and services that utilize the
software.
If you're going to develop your software in an open-source environment,
whatever you do, don't then try to earn your living re-selling that very
same software (even with some flowers bundled-in). You'll only go so
far. It's a very hard road to walk... trying to keep developers from
forking at every opportunity... trying to keep your customers from
concluding that your value-add to the paid-for version is not worth the
pricetag... trying to maintain the codebase as "stable" in the face of
the uncontrolled contributions... and so forth.
If you're developing software that really has value to people where the
real value isn't the software itself (as is the case with games), but
rather the value is in the work that the software can do (as is the case
with Asterisk), then a healthy business can be built around support and
product services utilizing the software. The value in a PBX, be it free
or be it $25K, isn't in the PBX itself, but rather in the calls that the
PBX connects.
It seems a mistake by this rationale for Digium to expect long-term
business success in attempting to sell the software... it will be a
never-ending uphill battle and will repeatedly spawn discussion threads
like this one.
Sell hardware. Sell tickets to conferences. Sell support contracts.
Don't sell free software.
Lee.
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