Because of these network effects, however, it may be better to make the conversion sooner rather than later. As much friction as there would be to switch services now, that is only going to increase as current services gain even more of a user base. So while there are strong difficulties to switching, if we ever want to promote an open service, we should do so as soon as possible, because every day we wait is a day that closed services become more entrenched.
Nick On Mon, July 14, 2008 12:24, Fred Benenson wrote: > Interesting stuff. I think its a good idea, but with one caveat: it > neglects > to take into account challenges of network effects, and in fact > discourages > networks and services in general. I find that somewhat counter intuitive > to > our goals of encouraging collaboration online and utilizing social > software > to achieve our goals. In other words, if Students for Free Culture had to > abandon Facebook as an organizational tool, I fear that our ability to > organize would be significantly more limited. > > Perhaps that is a sad remark about the independence of our peers (and > their > ability to hold principled views on software and user freedom) but it is a > necessary reality we have to accept understand as organizers. > > If a user is using Microsoft Word and switches to OpenOffice, so long as > the > functionality is the same, and the end result is the same, the means don't > really matter. Perhaps gcc is a better example -- so long as the > application > takes C code as input and outputs an executable, it is arguably 'better' > that I use the free version of a C compiler rather than the proprietary > version. > > But this point doesn't scale well with services dependent on network > effects > like Facebook or Twitter. This is because these services depend on other > people using them. This makes the 'friction' to convert people much higher > and is why the fax machine is not valuable until everyone you know is > using > one. Software libraries and components are perhaps the same way -- the > same > argument could be levied against the creation of Linux -- that its not > worth > until every part of the stack is "free" ... Well that battle is still > being > fought. > > Anyway, while I sympathize with the ideology here to a great extent, I > worry > about the statement's discouraging of use of social software in general. > > Hopefully identi.ca will prove me long, but I have to admit that i've been > neglecting it because of the strong network effects of Twitter. > > > F > > On Mon, Jul 14, 2008 at 12:06 PM, Nelson Pavlosky <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > wrote: > >> Perhaps this is a statement that SFC should endorse? With the >> appearance of identi.ca perhaps the time for free, open network services >> has come and the sun is setting on walled gardens ;-) >> >> http://autonomo.us/2008/07/franklin-street-statement/ >> >> ~Nelson~ >> _______________________________________________ >> Discuss mailing list >> [email protected] >> http://freeculture.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss >> > _______________________________________________ > Discuss mailing list > [email protected] > http://freeculture.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss > _______________________________________________ Discuss mailing list [email protected] http://freeculture.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discuss
