I am not sure John what you meant. I would see that fewer dollars for the purchasing the OS and tools, means more dollars for consulting and customization. I have a friend locally who provides lower cost solutions for office environments including email, firewalling, web servers, etc. using Linux and OpenSource. His team is competent so the customer gets a good, stable environment. Since the customer does not have to pay for vendor licenses, they can afford to pay for his services. It is a win-win.
Again, I think the idea of the giving to open source is to have the tool available for your use when you need it...without having to pay. This is particularly good if you work or contract to different clients. As for off-shore development and overseas, it may actually protect your investment. After all, the overseas developers who participate also share in the effort. It makes a lot of sense for the individual programmer and for the small business. It may make less sense in general for the large company, but there are exceptions. One exception is that it make sense for breaking monopolies such as Microsoft Office or IIS. So Sun, for example, can provide a basis for upselling hardware and other services that run or host the base software nicely. So they never buy the base software, but they buy the customization services and the value-added add-ons (see Snort vs SourceFire). Ray -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of John Luce Sent: Tuesday, March 02, 2004 12:55 PM To: Research Triangle Java User's Group mailing list. Subject: Re: [Juglist] Why is volunteering for open source abadthing?(wasTechEngage III) Dollars and Projects that are being sent overseas... ----- Original Message ----- From: "Angel, Arnold (NIH/NIEHS)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "'Research Triangle Java User's Group mailing list.'" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Tuesday, March 02, 2004 9:41 AM Subject: RE: [Juglist] Why is volunteering for open source a badthing?(wasTechEngage III) Open source should represent Standardization which translates into greater efficiencies, less waste and more dollars for new projects and research and development. Support software standards by supporting Open Source. -----Original Message----- From: Kenneth Sizer [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, March 02, 2004 9:31 AM To: Research Triangle Java User's Group mailing list. Subject: RE: [Juglist] Why is volunteering for open source a badthing?(wasTechEngage III) I find myself torn by this issue. On the one hand, I like -- and I mean *really* like -- open source projects. The people I know who work on open source projects are top-notch and the products I use (or have used) are good, if not great, pieces of software. This is no surprise: Like the banjo players in the hills of Western Virginia, these products are not undertaken as a means of getting rich, famous or otherwise "making a splash"... they are the result of people doing what they like to do. This is how the very best music, poetry, software, etc. is created. On the other hand, the argument about giving away the fruits of one's labor also rings true and harkens back to a quote by Colonel Tom Parker (Elvis' manager), which went something like, "Don't give people something today and expect them to pay for it tomorrow" Perhaps an over-simplification, but... > -----Original Message----- > From: Michael Silverstein [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: 2 марта 2004 г. 7:41 > To: 'Research Triangle Java User's Group mailing list.' > Subject: RE: [Juglist] Why is volunteering for open source a > badthing?(wasTechEngage III) > > > Merritt, Eric said: > > The vast majority of work for programmers in this country is custom > > inhouse' development for mid-large companies. These are the types of > > applications that don't exist in the open source world. Also the > > type of applications that companies use from open source tend to be > > operating systems (linux/bsd), office tools (open office) and the > > like. How many programmers could resonable be employed in these > > types of endeavors? 5,000 - 10,000? Thats a small percentage of the > > total number of programmers nationwide. I don't think that > > programmers providing thier work under an open source license > > has anything to do with the devaluation of programmers. I > > think that, generally, the availablity or people with good > > progaming skills for a tenth or less of what a programmer > > generally makes in the us is what is devaluing programmers. I > > hate to see this happen, but its inevitable. Globalization is > > a good thing in the long run, but short term it hurts > > specific industries. Right now the industry its hurting us' > > the us and european IT industry. Pointing to OSS as the > > source of the industries problems is a failure to look at the > > wider picture. > > I think OSS is simply one term in a larger economic equation. I don't > think any reasonable person could point to any one thing as the cause > of large scale economic change, short of some global catastrophe. > > The effect of hours contributed to OSS projects may be greater than > you think. Consider this small, overly simplified example: > > To use your example of in-house projects, in the past companies > creating software for these projects faced 'build' vs. buy' decisions, > usually doing a little of both. The set of options has now expanded to > include 'download for free'. > > If you contribute an hour to an OSS framework and that framework is > adopted within 1000 projects that would otherwise have made a 'build' > decision, you have effectively reduced the demand for labor by 1000 > hours. > > Alternatively, consider the possibility that some companies would have > made 'buy' decisions but were influenced to go the 'download' route by > the availability of free software. If enough of that happens some > vendors may respond by orienting themselves more toward services, in > some cases letting some of their product developers go. These > developers enter the labor marketplace, possibly competing against the > people who contributed the software. Labor supply goes up, demand and > rates go down. These developers start contributing to OSS > projects in order to gain experience and get their names out > and the cycle continues, or actually reinforces itself > through feedback. > > Or perhaps in some cases companies in foreign countries make > 'download' instead of 'buy' decisions so fewer dollars flow back into > this country. > > > The bottom line is that I'm having difficulty coming up with an > economic framework in which giving away one's time to free software > projects is a net positive factor in overall job growth. > > Note that this is quite different from companies' paying developers to > write software that is then given away for free, like Java, Eclipse, > etc. which a somewhat different topic. > > ----------------------------- > Mike Silverstein > SilverMark, Inc. > The Object Testing Company > www.silvermark.com > > --- > Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free. > Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com). > Version: 6.0.576 / Virus Database: 365 - Release Date: 1/30/2004 > > > > _______________________________________________ > Juglist mailing list > [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://trijug.org/mailman/listinfo/juglist_tri> > jug.org > _______________________________________________ Juglist mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://trijug.org/mailman/listinfo/juglist_trijug.org _______________________________________________ Juglist mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://trijug.org/mailman/listinfo/juglist_trijug.org _______________________________________________ Juglist mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://trijug.org/mailman/listinfo/juglist_trijug.org _______________________________________________ Juglist mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://trijug.org/mailman/listinfo/juglist_trijug.org
