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Experiences with F/OSS as Marketing Ploy?
TempusMagus asks: "My company developed a custom content management system for a large arts organization. Our relationship with them was great and the value of the software was appreciated by everyone. Recently they put in place a large Management/Ticketing/CRM solution for events and ticket sales (essentially a huge transaction heavy Microsoft SQL server database). The CRM system was sold to them as a community based, non-profit software application perfect for other non-profit arts organizations. Here's the interesting part: the 'community' arts management software was developed by a -commercial- company who just so happens to be the -only- vendor they recommend. In fact, when we inquired about the system with the software company in order to integrate it into our CMS all of the sudden the client received tons of calls from the 'approved' vendor to convince them that no one but themselves were capable of integrating with it. Basically, the client has been frightened into using one vendor and is going to throw away a perfectly wonderful (and non-Microsoft based) system. Has anyone any other experiences with companies who use free/open source software or 'community' development to simply lure customers as a front? Do you think we'll see more of this type of behavior as the popularity of F/OSS increases?"
having been down a similar road with an arts school myself, I can tell you, at least from my own experience, that this is going to come down to your relationship with the client. In my case, my client trusts me--I've never steered them wrong, and when I can't give them a solution to fit their needs in a cost-effective way, I give them solid recommendations. Consequently, I'm as valuable to them in a consultant's capacity as a vendor capacity, and if another vendor professing to offer an "open" solution tried to convince them I would never be able to integrate into it, they'd politely show them the door, if not laughing them out of it.
my advice? do your homework--check out this "open" solution, and if you can't get access to it from the community, be sure and let your client know just how open it is. also, make sure they realize what they're giving up by switching to one vendor--you know their needs intimately, you know how your CMS works, and they've already invested that money and deserve a return on it. The other guys, OTOH, are obviously out to make a buck without taking into account the legitimate needs of the client.
I think the problem here is with the term "community". There are plenty of proprietary software systems that have healthy communities built up around them. The developers work closely with the clients to grow the system into something that really fits the niche. The clients suggest new features and perhaps get issues resolved more quickly than a trouble-ticket system can provide. The developers get instant feedback and ongoing beta testing. All that can happen without ANY of the code seeing the light of day, and it can still easily be called "community development". Heck, the developer might actually even share some source with a client in the community if they think it will help.
But that does NOT make it F/OSS! The F/OSS movement does not have a lock on terms like "community" or "non-profit". In fact, these terms had meaning long before RMS started getting fed up with a proprietary printer driver.
It doesn't sound to me like this CRM system came with a F/OSS license. Your complaint seems to be that the CRM system is being sold by a non-profit corporation that is just a front for a for-profit corp. That is a completely different matter that has nothing to do with F/OSS. I think that non-profits fronting for for-profits is definitely something to complain about. But unfortunately it seems to be (currently) perfectly legal. Debt counseling services seem to be the worst exploiters of this legal situation.
In a related story, the IRS has recently ruled that the cost of Windows upgrades can NOT be deducted as a gambling loss.