The Open Code Market

There's a new article in First Monday entitled "The Open Code Market". Jordi Carrasco-Munoz, the author has some interesting comments about the article itself, which I've put below, but the overall direction of the piece is, in his words: "In short, The Open Code Market aims to become a Free Market for software, as well as a market for Free Software. The OCM introduces into the Free/Open Source movement an economic incentive, to help align the priorities of Free/Open Source developers with those of the end users. " Jordi writes: "

The Open Code Market

The peer reviewed magazine FirstMonday has published one paper I wrote on the business possibilities of Open Source titled "The Open Code Market".

In short, The Open Code Market aims to become a Free Market for software, as well as a market for Free Software. The OCM introduces into the Free/Open Source movement an economic incentive, to help align the priorities of Free/Open Source developers with those of the end users.

Between the final draft and publication, I received many valuable comments on the idea. I am very grateful to all those who dedicated some of their valuable time to read the paper and make insightful comments.

Some of those comments led me to an earlier similar effort by Brian Behlendorf named SourceXchange (originally at www.sourcexchange.com). After contacting Brian, his comments were probably the most valuable, since he had gone through the the actual proces of running a project similar to what I am proposing.

His main line was that:
a) while the market made profits, it did not reach the levels of profitability that were expected in the middle of the dot.com boom, and investors looked for other (more lucrative) endevours
b) That the dot.com boom also addedd costs (high salaries, etc) to his attempt and
c) that it is difficult to commoditise software creation due to the uncertainties over time / effort required to write the software, and the difficulty of the role of "project manager".

My line on all this is that
- The project may be easier to develop now as expectations for profits (and costs) have decreased, and that sourcing on low-cost countries (i.e. India, Vietnam, etc.) would reduce costs significantly.
- I also expect that the market will take off only as Free Software/Open Source (Linux in particular) moves to the mass market of the desktop, thus generating the necessary economies of scale, visibility and consumer-mass. In my idea, the target end-users of the market are not IT companies, but mainly individuals with no IT knowled (nor desire to acquire it) and Small and Medium Enterprises with small or no IT departments. "

Comments

Meet George Jetson.....

[AUsBandit]

Is it just me or does she look like Rosie's great grandmother? Don't tell me you don't know you Rosie is you Hanna Barbara hateing WB freek.

How is this insighful idea?

[Anonymous Coward]

The article is *not* compelling.