Happy New Year to all the members of this list!
I wrote an article about marketing of open source software and I would
like to ask your help on reviewing it before I submit it to article
directories and publish it on our website. It would be very helpful for
me, if you would take some time to read it and let me know what you
think, especially because English is not my native language.
Catharina
*Marketing of Open Source Software and the roll of the End-user.*
Since over six months now, I've changed my Mac for an open source
system and I am very satisfied with it. What surprises me actually is
that still so few people use a fully open source operating system, so
I did some research to what keeps people from doing that.
* Out of an interview we did among starting entrepreneurs in The
Netherlands, it became clear that most of them had never heard
about open source software
* At posts on Internet forums it appears that among people that
have heard about it, there is still a lot of ignorance and
mistrust on the possibilities and the user friendliness of open
source.
* When we wanted to buy a laptop without a Windows license in the
city where we live, we could not get it in any computer shop.
This makes clear that the barriers for people to move to open source
are related to:
* Ignorance
* Trust
* Availability
All of these aspects are related to the marketing of open source or in
fact, the non-marketing of open source. Most open source projects
hardly have a budget for marketing and their main goal is to develop
the software. The companies that do have a budget for marketing mainly
aim for the server or corporate market in stead of the desktop users.
So, it is not a miracle that the general public has hardly any
knowledge on the subject.
The question raises what can be done about it and who should do it. We
can't expect the open source community to spend huge budgets on
marketing and if they did it would not be a healthy development. If
more money is spent on marketing then on software development a
company should ask it self what the point is of their existence. Such
a strategy would certainly not fit in with the ideas behind the free
software movement.
But still, the open source community is not powerless compared to
commercial companies with huge marketing budgets. The power of the
marketing of open source software lies mainly at the end users en in
total they outsize the amount of marketeers at companies as for
example Microsoft, Apple and Adobe. The end users also outsize the
number of developers of open source who at the moment make the
biggest contribution to the existence of open source software. It's
the end users that should take the responsibility for the marketing of
open source. Some examples of what they can do:
*Ignorance:*
* Join social bookmarking sites, such as *Stumble Upon
http://www.stumbleupon.com, digg http://www.digg.com and
technorati http://www.technorati.com bookmark everything you
come across and like in relation to open source software in
general or the open source product you're enthusiastic about.
* Take an active part in Internet forums where open source (but
certainly also closed source) is a subject and in your signature
enclose a reference to an interesting open source related
subject or product.
* Start a web log and blog about open source software.
* Order promotional material, such as stickers or posters at
companies that have that available and stick them to your
laptop, car or spread them in public places.
*Trust:*
* Order or burn cd's with an open source operating system or other
open source products and spread them among your friends and
family and if needed, help them with installations.
* Show people what software you use and what it can do.
*Availability:*
Ask at computer shops for a computer with a free operating system or
without a license for a closed operating system. Demand generates
availability; if enough people do that, the market must react.
These are my ideas on what can be done by the end user to improve the
marketing of open source software, but I am sure there is much more so
please feel welcome to give more suggestions and let us start to
become the biggest and most successful marketing team on the world..
As a start I will post this article on our website
http://www.open-of-course.org, a site for free and open content
courses and tutorials. This article will be the start of a course in
marketing open source and you are very welcome to join me to develop it.
begin:vcard
fn:Catharina Bethlehem
n:Bethlehem;Catharina
tel;work:084-0030924
url:http://www.freelancenetwerk.nl
version:2.1
end:vcard
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