Hi Rick, and Welcome! You have raised some really deep issues, and so you should probably know that there is a history of conversations around this kind of topic that you will enjoy coming up to speed on. I hope that my reply will clearly give you my personal opinion, as well as offer some helpful background info.
On Thursday 03 February 2005 18:12, Rick Owen wrote: > Greetings, > > I've just joined the list. If I'm posting to the wrong list No problem, this is the correct list. > If this turns out to be one of > those flame inducing topics like asking "how can anyone use that > piece of crap editor xxxx?" on comp.editors then please know that > I do it in ignorance. No, my troll-guard slept through your entire email. (heh). > Several times, however, I''ve installed OO on > colleagues' computers only to have them call me in a panic when > they save a document, edit it some more, and then get this > message when they attempt to save it again: snip.... > The message itself is enough to discourage a potential Office > user for switching Your email brings up several very deep points which bear much discussion. I will try to summarize my personal opinion: 1) OpenOffice.org (OOo) is a disruptive technology (as Harvard biz prof Clayton Christensen uses that term) which caters to a different set of "customers" than Microsoft Office's best customers (please see link below for more on Christensen); 2) OOo's best customers are "overshot" customers who are not willing to pay a premium for the extra features of Microsoft Office AND nonconsumers who simply can't afford or illegally copy Microsoft Office; 3) OOo is exploding in countries like Brazil and Spain, where there are lots of overshot customers and non-consumers; 4) The office productivity suite is a commodity, and the business model for creation and distribution of the office suite is about to flip from functionality (Microsoft) to reliability then convenience and finally price; 5) Businesses which derive their incomes from the sale of the office productivity suite will increasingly face declining revenues, as the commoditization wave rolls ashore. I have written way too many similar emails here on this subject, and so to avoid being strangled by our fellow list mates, I will just say that you might wanna read some of these links, because there are lots of commonly-held values here at OOo that you will find out about by reading these links. Of course, since this is an open source project, these values will constantly change, and your opinions are valuable. Still, reading these links will bring you up to speed: Our marketing page has lots of good info, especially our Strategic Marketing Plan, which forms kinda more or less the thoughts of our team as to the general direction that the marketing of this project should be heading: http://marketing.openoffice.org/strategy/ Here is the general marketing page: http://marketing.openoffice.org/ I think that open source is such a big deal and so different in the course of human history from anything that has gone before, I am heading up a community project to make a film about open source, called "The Digital Tipping Point". You can read about it here: http://www.digitaltippingpoint.com/content/view/46/60/ > If it sounds like I'm on a soapbox, I am. OpenOffice is good. > Not good; great! I want it to succeed in a big way! However, I > know from personal experience that people are resitant to change > and as soon as that message pops up (especially for someone > sticking their neck out a bit), they'll just scrap it. There is a really smart guy in Boston by the name of Bhaskar Chakravorti who wrote a book called "The Slow Pace of Fast Change", which is linked below. We interviewed him for the Digital Tipping Point film. Basically, Dr. Chak breaks this whole migration process down into its elemental pieces in his book. As I said, your question raises some really deep issues, and to even touch on all of the very profound issues that your email raises wil take weeks and weeks of discussion and weeks and weeks of reading books; OR, you can just wait until September, 2005, when our movie comes out and will explain it all to you. Heh. Seriously, though, we have talked lots and lots about this subject, and I have written lots and lots about Dr. Chak and Dr. Christensen, and that's just me, and there are many, many more people on this list who have written more clearly and more intelligently than I on this topic. If you want to get just a thumbnail sketch of what we have discussed here about this topic, try googling Einfeldt Chakravorti Christensen disruptive and then step back from your monitor cause it's gonna explode. Here is Dr. Chak's link: http://www.slowpacefastchange.com Here is Christensen's link: http://www.claytonchristensen.com and his biz gig on selling books on disruption theory: http://www.innosight.com Again, Welcome! --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
