Slashdot Mirror
Is Open Source Recession Proof?
DaMan writes "ZDNet asks Is open source recession proof?
'So, how might a recession affect open source software? Well, first off, I think that any business model that relies on volunteers could certainly see interest decline if times get tough. There are a lot of businesses that rely on people working for them for free because they get a pay check somewhere else, and I think that a recession would make people question working without getting any dollars in return.'"
Do they think OSS has a problem with recessions? Quite the reverse.
I got nailed in the Bomb, like a lot of us. Went through 4 companies in 3 years, and only one of them still existed after I left it (for another 3 whole months). Leaves you with nothing but crap on your resume; can't even prove the companies existed, more less get a reference.
I got left with skills that no one wanted, and no money to buy professional tools to start my own business. So I turned to Open Source. I'd hardly used it to that point; hadn't had any real need. But the ability to churn out products using nothing but freely available tools put money in my pocket, let me undercut my competition, and basically saw me through a rough patch. I've never been as active in OSS development as I was in those days...It wasn't because I had so much free time, it was because I needed that stuff, and if it didn't exist, I damn well had to create it!
So they think OSS is something that comes out of people being well off? All of us volunteer because we're all so bored, and have so much money and free time that we just sit around coding things? Are they nuts? Did Linus start programming Linux because he was bored with working with all the fancy Unix code people were throwing at him? No! He started it because he couldn't afford the expensive stuff, so he damn well made his own. Did anyone pay him to do it? No! Did he end up making money off it none-the-less? Yes!
Far from being bad for OSS, recessions are GOOD for OSS. You lose your job, and freelance while looking for another one...What are you going to use? Companies have a need, and no budget to fill it with commercial software...What are they going to use? Sure, if you specialize in zillion dollar OSS deployments, you've got problems (problem #1: You're mythical), but the true strength of OSS isn't in giant deployments, but in filling in the gaps...When the gaps get bigger, there we are.
If you've got a track record of doing more with less, recessions are always a good time for you.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
1) Employees of major corporations assigned to opensource could be laid off or reassigned to directly profitable projects.
2) People who work on opensource in their spare time could be laid off and
a) Be unable to buy computers, maintain an internet connection, etc.
b) OR... have lots of spare time and do a lot of cool stuff to build their resume.
3) Folks who are depressed are not every productive. In a deep recession there will be a lot of fear, anxiety, and depression.
4) Donations to opensource bandwidth, download sites, and so on could falter and lead to blackouts of key opensource resources.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
There are a lot of businesses that rely on people working for them for free because they get a pay check somewhere else, and I think that a recession would make people question working without getting any dollars in return.'
On the flip side of that, if you have a lot of unemployed coders who want to keep their skill-set up-to-date (as well as avoid a large gap in their work history), open source provides a way to do both.
If you can do anything besides just counting beans, and you stay out of debt, you are recession proof.
What?
If you are talking about the development and evangelization of Open Source, then I would say yes. People are going to volunteer regardless. However, when you are talking about companies that sell or service Open Source software, then I would say no...it is not recession-proof. Economics are economics, and money is the same everywhere. Where there is a crunch, money doesn't flow as freely, and both Open Source and proprietary models will suffer.
Now...had they have said "Is FREE software recession-proof" then I would say, "yes...it is."
I'm not a troll, but I play one on Slashdot.
Of course nobody wanted it that way. But when some Wall Street firms lost data centers and desktops, Sun, IBM, and HP couldn't make hardware fast enough. So, beige boxes all over the east ended up in ad-hoc data centers, running Linux or BSD. And surprise, they ran as well, often better than their predecessors.
Open Source is going to do well whenever IT can't pay a lot for software and has to stretch its budget. Good times might be worse for Open Source, but I don't see them being terrible for it.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Don't discount people who just deploy OSS for a living. I know a guy who probably hasn't contributed 10 lines of code over his career, but who is so effective at taking poorly documented OSS projects and making them function beautifully in commercial deployments...He makes a good living, evangelizes the hell out of OSS (he's a true believer), and drives money back into the projects.
Most critically of all, he has the ability to see the flaws, and to visualize the next step that would make the project into something awesome. People like that, who know the features that really need to exist in the project, are almost more important than the people who end up actually coding the feature in. I can do the code, but the spark of genius behind a really good feature...That's special.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
If an employer pays you to work on an open source project, but they never distribute that project since it is for in-house use, can you legally take your work with you when you go? Experience, sure they can't keep that, but the actual code, changes and fixes, would belong to the employer?
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
Recessions don't exist based on some Keynesian model (I'd love to know which one by the way, since most of Keynes' work was done in response to the great depression), and therefore it somehow transforms into reality? (Those are what? Imaginary? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions )
Yes wealth can be created and destroyed, economy is _not_ a Zero-Sum Game.
Of course, the reality is that the central banks have been creating credit for one specific reason: to transfer wealth from the poor and middle class to the bank-connected elites.
Access to credit greatly improves living conditions for who? The middle class. (And the subprimes greatly improves the living conditions of the poor) Imagine the world for the middle class was there no credit, just for the housing. You'd keep putting money aside your whole life to be able to buy a house when you're close to retirement, imagine all the value lost for yourself if you had to wait that long instead of taking a loan...
The wealthy have been hoarding money for decades?
Are you serious? Why would someone keep their money in a vault (Return = 1 - inflation) when they can make much more money by investing in risk free securities (Short Term Gov. Bonds)? Being rich is all about investing in the market (whether it's through starting a business or investing in others), please show me one "rich" man who stacks his money in a vault... If you had kept your money (lets say $100) in a "vault" the last 50 years, you'd still have $100 dollars today (please note that 100 dollars back then is worth about 2500 dollars now), if you had put these same 100 dollars in equity, you'd have 45.000 dollars now... but yeah, stack your money in a vault, that's a real good investment.
Credit is NOT tight because those who have it don't want to risk letting the middle class earn it to invest it in their own wealth-growth schemes (please notice that he somehow abandoned the idea of rich people stacking their money), but because the risk premium on the market is growing (AKA Credit Spreads), therefore the creditors lend money only to people with better profiles, and ask a greater risk premium, this is a normal consequence of a slowing economy, since the risk taken by creditors is higher.
So if you're an OSS or a closed-source developer, and you're hurting, remember for the next time another bubble grows: stay out of it.
Oh yeah because bubbles are so easy to predict... All those analysts working in banks and other investment firms are just idiots, dada21 knows better.
God you should stick to IT, you obviously know nothing about economy...