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Wal-Mart, Moore's Law and Open Source
J.E. Kazor writes: "In MIT's 'Technology Review' magazine, Michael Schrage writes about Wal-Mart, Moore's Law, and Open Source. Perhaps instead of spending all of our energy bashing bashing the 800-pound gorilla, Microsoft, we should align the support of a 900-pound gorilla, such as Wal-Mart. Such a symbol of cost conscious efficiency should embrace the benefits of Open Source."
what happens when the technology you are promoting is adopted by people you might not like? You know, the whole anti-globalist thing?
Lots of differnt answers to that question.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Microsoft doesn't engage in anti-ethical business practices? Surely you jest!
If Wal-Mart emulates the smaller business that it later undersells and bankrupts, wouldn't you call that an economic/retail version of "Embrace and Extend?"
Don't get me wrong, I don't have a personal vendetta against Microsoft, but to say that they have not done the exact thing that Wal-Mart has--only on a software level--is just untrue.
"It's a very tangled subsystem." --Windows kernel guru
Open source hippies. Sheesh.
"Embrace open source?". The hell the should.. just as they should not 'Embrace' any other buzzword or technology. Why? Because to PROPERLY be flexible, you have to look at ALL Your options.
That's the problem with many open source zealots these days. So many of them can't see beyond the purchace price of the software, or the fact that they can hack away at the code. They blab about security.
Open source security? Is open-source a better model for security? In a way.. as anyone who cares to can go have a look at it.. but does that make anything open-source better? No, absolutely not. It's like arguing risc-vs-cisc... someone saying their processor is 'better' because it is risc. In other words, they mix up a technology or methodology being better with an actual implementation being better.
Cheaper? Certainly in some cases. But in others, the cost of windows is NEGLIGIBLE compared to the cost of other tools in use... tools that don't HAVE an open-source equivalent. Tools that have some serious technical support.
I'll advocate free tools anytime... if they make sense. But in many cases, the proprietary stuff IS better, that's reality.
In an ecological sense as well as when you ecamine small town economies in a simplistic sense, Wal-Mart is a great ofender, however the range of damage to the economies of the world doesn't begin to approach the carnage that appears in the wake of Microsoft as it stomps it's way across Tokyo, London, and Washington.
The Open-Source movement doesn't need to select a new enemy so much as recruit allies more effectively. The OSS movement doesn't often address the political issues (to the extent needed) surrounding modification of market models that is at it's core - because the Free Software Foundation isn't getting the job done. This is promarily because the OSS movement is made up primarily of technically savvy indeviduals rather than politically savvy indeviduals. The OSS movement needs to take a page from the NRA with regard to fund raising and political power brokering. OSS proponants often make the mistake of believing that the Electronic Fronteirs Foundation is representing the cause of OSS in the political arena, when in fact the EFF is a civil liberties organization - which serves a great purpose and addresses a great need but does not by charter serve the interests of the OSS community, except where (as is often the case) the civil liberties issues they do address are of interest to the OSS community.
Selecting a new enemy at this time would be admitting defeat. The OSS community doesn't need to select a new enemy so much as confront the selected enemy in the arenas in which it does battle. The Open Source Software Community needs an effective lobying organization acting soecifically in it's interest.
--CTH
--Got Lists? | Top 95 Star Wars Line
Wal-Mart is a retailer that drives many other small local retailers out of business.
But, Walmart is not a monopoly, and it does better by being more efficient, rather than mowing over everyone in its way. Business is hard. The market rewards efficiency. Kmart used to be a top dog--look at them now. Sears was the top dog for almost a century--look at them now.(Not as bad off as Kmart, but not were they where.) Good business practices help all businesses, even the small ones, because it keeps them sharp.
Damnit, Jim, I'm an anarchist, not a F@#$!^& doctor!
1) Walmart is an early adopter. The author implies it is not.
2) Linux does have a "market giant" behind it: IBM. IBM is number one in system services/integration.
Basicly what Walmart did is computerize inventory
and actually used the data. Walmart was full of
things you wanted to buy. Kmart was full of stuff
you didn't want to buy. Kmart left the unsellable
stuff on the shelves and failed to re-order what it did sell. Hell, Walmart could run their business on home made no-OS software. What they do is not all that difficult; Target easily duplicated it. The problem is a management and commitment problem: Walmart computerized, studied the data and followed through.
Sears, Kmart, Woolworth wallowed in pretending to use technology. They had systems, but dumped the data on the floor. There's a big difference in collecting the data and using it. Most middle managers couldn't tell the difference between an arithmetic mean and fitted curve. Their job was to deny benefits and raises to minimum wage slaves. Walmart treats their workers like shit too, but somebody there is studying the workflow and constantly tweaking it. Sears employees let customers pile up at the registers as they refused to accept Visa and Mastercard (Sears card only).
Walmart's crushing of the dinosaurs is not some great innovation. It was common sense and pretty easy to do. Crushing Microsoft is a bit more difficult to do than bankrupting Kmart.
What? It's their property; They can put as many security cameras as they want on their property just like you can do to your home. They can also CHOSE which music they want to sell. You don't have to shop there. You act like they are forcing you to shop there. Get real. I don't know what moron modded that up.
So we should embrace the policy of the way Wal-Mart cencors music that it finds offensive? I didn't realize censorship was part of the Open Source movement.
The world moves for love. It kneels before it in awe.
4. Ive heard of some walmarts not selling birth control in any form.. (I guess they want to decide who lives and dies)
They also don't sell backhoes.. The gas station does not sell bicycles. So what. If you want birth control, go to a drug store. The inventory choice might not be driven by any factor other than keeping a low profile so even church people will shop there. It might not be a political statement. Their choice of inventory is left up to them and should not be driven by public opinion polls. It is a business. Maybe they want to be seen as the clean cut family shop on the block where you don't have to explain products to your 3 year old. They also don't sell adult magazines and videos. It's their choice. They do not claim to have every product made.
The truth shall set you free!
Sure I *love* spending the .91 a gallon I pay for premium fuel, all sparked by a Walmart gas war. They are selling at cost. They have been doing this for the past week. 2 mom and pop stations are now doing the same. I'm sure "the mart" can hang on much longer then mom and pop can.
THE HORROR! I'm sure all those mom and pops like Shell, ExxonMobil, and Chevron are shivering in their shoes. Maybe they'll actually be forced to come up with ways to be more efficient, so they can lower the cost, too, and reduce their own prices.
Given Walmart's practices of invading cities and eliminating all the mom-and-pop stores, I think I can safely say that they are forcing you to shop there<\QUOTE>.
"Mod, mod, mod...and another troll bites the dust."
I was with you right up until: "And tailoring software does not mix well with the ideology behind open source."
:)
:) ?)
Why do you say that?
Most programmers (something between 80 and 90%, if the Smart People I've heard are to be trusted) work on custom, in-house software (whether working full-time or as consultants, one-off programmers, etc), just the sort of tailoring you're talking about.
I don't know what percentage, but certainly some number in the several thousands of programmers just in the U.S. program with open source tools. They're free to modify GPL or similarly licensed software to do whatever the heck they want, and if there's no redistribution (that is, if it truly remains in-house), they have no obligation to release source to anyone else, either, though they might if they wanted to take part in some cross pollination
(Or do I completely misinterpret your point, which is possible
timothy
jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
This article raises some good questions about Linux, and business.
I dont think that there is a question that OpenSource could save money for Walmart, but you can see from the other posts here that there are questions about whether or not the churn rate at Walmart would have some impact on systems and profitability at some layer or other.
So the question is this, which services can Linux and its applications offer that offer a clkear incentive to Walmart. Maybe we need to start thinking about which services Linux offers that can minimize the impact of that churn rate.
Or maybe we need to think in a different way than that -- Instead of trying to replace systems entirely, how can we help to augment systems? Can we fit in the food chain in some other place?
"Retail Link" has got to have a large food chain associated with it.
* Integration between retailers systems and the retail link software on the supplier's side.
* The retail link software for suppliers.
* The messaging gateway between supplier and walmart.
Any of these could be a component that we could offer up as a tool.
what if the feature set in the "Retail Link" that we offered, was more modern, and more scalable thanks to our judicious use of the Linux Kernel?
What if we sought out freely available messaging tools that offered SSL, or TLS capabilities?
I guess all I'm saying is that the Linux community can move quickly, we are small, retailers are big, if we want to swim with the fish, we might have to decide which way the current is going first.
The real message is to identify those businesses in the supply chain that have incentives to cut costs and have some ability to ripple down the supply chain.
One great example is automotive manufacturers.
Don't know how interested they are, but they have the power, the resources and the skills to implement Open Source solutions if it suits them. They also have huge chains of suppliers who must integrate or go out of business.
Other potentials are any company that must compete with Wal-Mart. These outfits must be desperately looking for ways to streamline. If a compelling case can be made for Open Source, someone out there will bit.
And so on and so forth.
Wal-Mart is a retailer that drives many other small local retailers out of business.
Wal-Mart doesn't drive stores out of business, ratehr, it's the consumers who chose Wal-Mart over their local stores that cause small stores to close. It's a matter of choice, and many people chose to vote with their pocket book. Wal-MArt often is no cheaper than other chains - in fact, their policy is to price at the competitor's prices and make a greater margin due to lower costs. If a competitor wants a price war, they'll fight back and win, but they typically don't start one.
So how do local stores survive - by offering things, such as service and selection, that Wal-Mart doesn't. I buy video games at a small store - I know the owner, and he tajkes care of me. If a game is junk, he recommends not buying it. When PS2's were hot, he had them for his regular customers - at retail price. If I want a certain used game, he'll hold it when he gets it. Wal-Mart doesn't provide that service, and I'll pay a little more for it. He also beats the big chain rentals by charging less and having reasonable late fees - such as a dollar for one day rather than a full 3 day rental price.
Price isn't everything, and by serving customers who value service over price, small stores can survive. Wal-Mart's real threat is to the Kmarts and Targets - which is why Target went up market and KMart looks like it'll stick to urban locations here wal-Mart can't get space and some Super-K's.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Hello.
I have decided to relate my own view of Wal-Mart based upon a previous working experience there. I began work there last year, September 20, as a bike assembler. Had signed up for a full time permanent position. Some of the business practices were, suffice to say, horrible. Like some other posters have said, I did have to work off the clock, sometimes up to an hour of unpaid work. I didn't gripe too much though, when you have a job, you usually try to let things slide at the beginning.
Things went on like this for the entire time I worked there. My reviews are late, I was denied a raise due to the night crew making a mess of my area and my inability to keep it clean on my days off. Yes that was their reason and what was written down, that I couldn't keep an area clean on my days off. That first review was three weeks late, which I admit is rather uncouth, but once again I stupidly let it slide.
Here is the real kicker now. Four months to the day I was hired, on December 20 and four days before x-mas, they decided to fire me. I was never told a reason and I called and was still not given a reason, they just hung up on me.
This is the expected business practices of Wal-Mart as I was fired due to the season being over, but ahh, I wasn't hired for seasonal and was hired as a permanent employee. Losing that job suddenly has raised hell for my finances and I can't even drive my car anymore without gas money or insurance. They are truly an evil company, far beyond what Microsoft could ever hope to become, and I urge everyone here to shop somewhere else. Low prices be damned, I would rather pay a little more and know it didn't come from such downright evil business practices
There are plenty of other places to shop, even though most of them are still big retail stores, but at least they aren't Wal-Mart. It has been a few months, and I still wonder if I have time enough to do anything, but I doubt it. Advice would be nice if anyone replies, but even if you just read, I hope you have a different view on this company than you did before...or at the very list are bitterer than you were before.
Wal-mart is more evil than Microsoft. I've seen way to many small cities where I've lived (Wichita, Ks, Huntsville, Al, Murfreesboro, TN) have a Wal-mart show up, setup a small store ... put tons of small shops out of business, then abandandon the small store (usually leaving an ugly skeleton sitting around for years) to put up a super-center and proceed to put the other -chains- in the area (grocery stores, electronics stores, etc) out of business.
The standard of living goes down in these areas as the shop owners are forced to work as employees instead of employers for far less money and the profits of all of those businesses go to Wal-mart's HQ in Texas instead of back into the local economy.
The culture of the area also begins to vanish as the area is homogenized into the streamlined Wal-Mart style of strip mall neighborhoods.
There are many many many other examples of this across the country. There are social and scientific studies done on the matter. Very few show positive benefit for the local economies or culture.
Microsoft may put technology companies that have been around for 5-10 years out of business. Wal-mart puts shops that have been around 50-100 years out of business and destroys pieces of Americana in the process.
At least with Microsoft they do add innovation to their market. There are things that I can do on my Linux desktop today that I probably wouldn't be able to do without Microsoft. I want to see Microsoft brought back in line so that they are not monopolizing the industry, but I don't want to see them removed completely.
Wal-mart on the other hand could go away completely and I would be happy. Even with the rising prices. And, if the corporations that feel stung by Wal-Mart would realize it, they could help stave off this problem by treating other retailers equally to how Wal-Mart is treated (ie, equal costs and equal availability).
Wal-Mart is the monopoly with the far worse need for being regulated here.
It is more productive to voice thoughtful opinions (reply) than to judge (moderate) others.
Wal-Mart "passes the savings on to you" by:
- Importing goods produced by Chinese slave labor
- Transferring "last mile" distribution costs to customers, taxpayers, the environment, pedestrian safety,
...
This second item bears more explanation:- Wal-Mart takes from its customers. Customers "willingly" drive farther to shop at Wal-Mart, but usually based on the price of gas (6 cents per mile) rather than the full amortized price of automobile operation, which according to AAA is 51 cents per mile.
- Wal-Mart takes from taxpayers. Wal-Mart generates a lot of VMT (vehicle miles traveled) but doesn't pay for the roads to carry it. Oh, they may pay for an extra lane and signal in front of the store, but not for increased capacity in the several-hundred-square-mile market area.
- Wal-Mart takes from everyone in its market area. VMT by its nature steals from the public good because cars on a per-mile basis don't pay for their negative side effects: air pollution, water pollution (including temperature rises due to impervious surface runoff), noise pollution, increased danger to bicycles and pedestrians.
- Wal-Mart takes from the environment. Besides the environmental concerns due to increased VMT, there are two more. First, there is the runoff from its vast parking lots and large store (during a rainstorm, this suddenly increases the temperature of streams by several degrees, which kills fish since fish cannot tolerate temperature changes the way people can). Second, Wal-Mart makes disposable buildings. Wal-Mart builds its large buildings to last seven years, then leaves them as vacant blighted eyesores as they move to even bigger superstores.
When it comes to Wal-Mart, "efficiency" means "theft" -- not the sort of efficiency that Linux should associate itself with.Agreed! Wal-mart is by no means a monopoly. There are Targets, were KMarts, Sears, whole Malls, and then your specialty stores. If Wal-mart drives every single one of these out of business by just being more efficient and not cheating, a la sueing someone out of existance or taking a great loss on a product like US Steal used to or making deals with cities that say if there is a walmart there can be no target, etc. then there will still be room for others to do it bigger badder longer stronger.
Its almost like calling McDonalds a monopoly
The ultimate network admin tool needs HELP!
This is only true where Wal-Mart has established, large scale competitors.
When Wal-Mart opens a new store, they usually sell many items at a huge loss, ostensibly to draw in new customers. But since many local, small-scale businesses cannot afford to match those below cost prices, they founder and die. Once gone, wal-Mart raises prices. This is called predatory pricing, and is illegal. In that kind of game, the deepest pockets win, which is why when they compete with larger companies (Target et. al.), their prices are similar; they each have enough resources to price match the other for an extended period of time.
Wal-Mart has been found guilty of predatory pricing and fined. But the practice continues. Hence the comment that Wal-Mart drives local, small retailers out of business. They do.
You're right, though, in that one of the real problems is that most people shop to save a buck. They'll drive all over town getting 18 mpg in their SUV because Coke is $0.49 cheaper at Schnucks this week.
Who marked this insightful?
Do really think they're trying to put Exxon, Shell, etc. out of business? Who do you think WalMart gets their gas from? Many, if not most, gas stations are privately owned. Thery're more like franchises. There's someone in your community that owns that station. They just buy all their gas from one supplier and advertise it that way.
This isn't WalMart against Shell. It's WalMart against Your Local Mechanic. Sellingat or below cost isn't efficient, it's abusive.
Um, there's no evidence that Walmart is actually saving consumers money on these machines. Quite frankly, I wouldn't be surprised to see them making a profit.
I wish I had some way of marking every "Wal-Mart is evil!" post as offtopic in one fell swoop. Walmart probably is evil to some extent; every large corporation is. But the author's use of Wal-Mart as an example tends to obscure his real point. The key passage in the article is the closing paragraph, quoted here with every instance of 'Wal-Mart' changed to '[Big-Biz]':
Those of you who want to focus on '[Big-Biz]' as evil are obscuring a more important question; can Open Source break into [Big-Biz]? The thing is, computers really have produced a considerable pay-off for [Big-Biz] and small-biz. That is why they use them. In the case of [Big-Biz], however, cost-effictiveness is probably the sole reason they use them. [Big-Biz] doesn't care about the cool factor.
So, if we want to see Open Source grow beyond colleges and a few small-bizs we need to seriously consider how to show [Big-Biz] they can save money by adopting Open Source Tools.
Implicit, but not mentioned explicitily, in the article is the extra question "Can we get [Big-Biz] to adopt the philosophy of Open Source as a cost saving measure as well?" By definition [Big-Biz] wants to make lots of money and to squeeze out their competitors. That kind of behavior is what made them [Big-Biz] in the first place. From their viewpoint you don't squeeze out your competitors by creating great tools and giving them away for your competitors to use against you. We need to find ways to make the argument that the win from this behavior is greater than any possible loss.
However, if you hate [Big-Biz] because you hold anti-capitalist views, then you should also be against helping them to understand Open Source. Personally I think that kind of stance is both quixotic and wrong-headed. But you should be clear in you purposes.
Jack William Bell
- -
Are you an SF Fan? Are you a Tru-Fan?
However, Wal-Mart has done some really awful things to contractors who work for them. (I've heard other stories) A good friend of mine did a bunch of work for them. After completing almost all of the project, one of the things they were working on didn't test properly. Instead of allowing my friend to go back and correct the problem, Wal-Mart said they couldn't fix the issue and refused payment for the *complete* project.
It's been tied up in court for almost two years and my friend has almost gone under because of this. They can afford to hold out until my friend settles for pennies on the dollar.
Wal-Mart does donate money, don't get me wrong, but don't kid yourself. They are a corporation and it's all about the bottom line.
I think it remains to be seen if Walmart is a monopoly or not. I'd be willing to bet that in a large number of areas where Walmart has a presence in the western US and the midwestern US they are the only source for a large number of products.
While this is not true in Wal-Mart's back yard (there is nothing I can find at Wal-Mart in the NW Arkansas area that I can't get elsewhere), in many small towns across the Western US, it is true. Oftentimes, however, it is true because Wal-Mart came in and built a market for certain goods that were simply unavailable previously without a drive to a larger town. In many cases, Wal-Mart has done well for cities and towns, while in many other cases it has driven all of the local competition out of the market. There's really no way to tell which will happen until the store is open, and that is the problem I have with all the Wal-Mart "NIMBYism"
-Nathan
Care about freedom?
Become a card carrying member of the GOA.
Walmart is NOT more efficient. They just use cheaper labor, as in pseudo-slave labor. Walmart has a history of human rights and workers rights violations up to par with companies like the Gap and Nike.
It's easy to be cheaper when your "producers" are starving to death, forced to work 20 day, not allowed to organize, and are forced into birth control and abortions for the sake of "efficiency".
Remember how badly it hurt Kmart when people realized that Kathy Lee's clothing line was made in sweat shops? That's because their cost went way up suddenly, while their competitor, Walmart, didn't have to change a thing.
Getting diabetes AND salmonella would be a bad weekend.
Well the only problem is that Kathy Lee's clothing line was sold ONLY at Wal-Marts , not at K-Mart . Wal-Mart was once again pushing products made by 9 year olds for 20 cents a day .
"Until I'm forced to go to Walmart b/c it the only place and item is available, they are not evil."
Ummm...if you wait till that's evident, isn't it too late?