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Microsoft Asks Open Source Not to Focus On Price
Microsoft's supposed open-source guru Sam Ramji has asked open-source vendors to focus on "value" instead of "cost" with respect to competition with Microsoft products. This is especially funny given the Redmond giant's recent "Apple Tax" message. "While I'm sure Ramji meant well, I'm equally certain that Microsoft would like nothing more than to not be reminded of how expensive its products can be compared with open-source solutions. After all, Microsoft was the company that turned the software industry on its head by introducing lower-cost solutions years ago to undermine the Unix businesses of IBM and Hewlett-Packard, and the database businesses of Oracle and IBM."
> Businesses are a lot more interested in the total value of something than its price tag.
I'll go you one better: businesses, or more accurately, managers in charge of making major spending decisions, don't often understand the difference between value and cost.
If a typical empty-suit gotta-wrap-this-by-2-so-I-can-get-to-the-golf-course middle manager looks at open source software (priced at $0) and then Microsoft software (priced in the thousands or tens of thousands, for company-wide use), he's probably going to make the decision in favor of Microsoft because if it doesn't cost anything, it must not be worth anything.
Small business owners have always dealt with this mindset. If they want contracts from big companies they usually have to inflate their prices (even beyond what they would consider a fair profit margin) in order to even be considered as a potential vendor. This is especially true when trying to do work for governments or Universities.
It's not a lie. It's the truth with lossy compression.
OSS software is a total boon to developers. I'm a developer, and we use OSS everywhere possible. Since we can easily support our software when something goes awry, we jump quickly and confidently.
But not every company has their own staff of developers. Companies that don't produce software have little incentive to hire developers if they don't contribute significantly to the bottom line. And for companies in this boat, OSS does, indeed, have costs that far outstrip the purchase price.
Windows Server licenses for needed servers might cost a grand or three. If this is sufficient to avoid the cost of hiring a developer (at around $100k/year) or an admin, (at ~ $60k/year) it's money very well spent!
Sure, I use OSS because it lets me sleep very soundly at night, with perhaps 1 significant unplanned incident per year in our hosting cluster of 14 servers. But part of that is that we already have paid the price of having developers on hand to maintain and understand our OSS-based servers.
And don't think that just because it's Microsoft, you can assume it's safe to laugh. I remember when MS Word was laughable. I remember when Windows was laughable. I remember when Excel was a toy compared to the "meat and potatoes" competition.
As a corporate culture, Microsoft learns how to dominate markets. They're losing right now, and maybe they won't turn things around in time. But they have massive assetts, they still have a monopoly in the desktop computing marketplace, and with Vista, they've shown a willingness to take risks if they are necessary to improve their software.
I know this is unpopular to state here on Slashdot, but many (most?) of the problems with Vista have been centered around making the changes necessary to more properly secure Windows. Software that was badly built that did bad things broke on Vista, and that's a necessary step to take in order to preserve their long term market share.
Don't laugh. Keep your head down, keep improving the OSS software, and be wary of Microsoft - they still have everything it would take to continue to dominate.
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
and for open source, the price point is zero.
Not always. Especially if you factor in support contracts or the average salary of someone who actually knows how to administer the software in an effective manner.
But that's also true of closed-source solutions. It isn't like a Windows server miraculously runs itself. You still need someone who knows how run the thing.
Obviously there's tons of wiggle room here... It may very well be that the average salary of a Windows admin is lower than that of a *nix admin... But *nix gives you better automation tools, security, and stability - so that one admin might be able to do more real work on a *nix box than a Windows box.
You can't just look at the sticker price when determining which piece of software is going to cost more or get you more bang for your buck... But you can't ignore the sticker price either.
"Work is the curse of the drinking classes." -Oscar Wilde
I can say this weekend I helped my neighbor install SuSe 11.1 after their Windows partition quit working and they didn't have a backup of their legitimate Windows XP disc since it was only available on the hard drive.
After we got it all set up, got the multimedia stuff from Pacman, added malware and tracking sites to the hosts file, installed No-Script, configured his firewall, and loaded his music so Amarok could play, and gave them a tour of all the stuff Linux could do right "out of the box" and without costing a single cent, all of the educational programs and games, etc, they were floored.
They had a chance to explore yesterday and said they liked it so much better than Windows it wasn't funny. They regret not having switched before.
The simple fact is that Linux really does work beautifully for most people's purposes and with all the applications available for it and included in the distros, I don't see how people aren't flocking to Linux in droves. Maybe the word just needs to get out. I know my neighbors are planning to tell all their family members about it.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
how would OpenOffice be a better solution for a business customer if it doesn't come with any support for the employees?
Closed source software support is basically either
1) Read the help file or try it and see, so the user doesn't have to be able to read or think
2) Third world script reader
3) Real support is huge $$$$$$$
So, overall, you get a better support experience using google and open source than script reader in india and MS office.
Also, there is more to support than answering "how do I print?" ... Such as the enormous cost of security / virus / worms plus the enormous cost of licensing documentation plus BSA audits that are only relevant for closed source products.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
[Open Source] Cons
Interestingly, those are some of the exact same reasons why I dislike proprietary software.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
>They had a chance to explore yesterday and said they liked it so much better than Windows
>it wasn't funny.
I'll bet you forgot to tell them that a few months down the road he will have no way to install an up-to-date application unless he updates the whole system. And that he will have to update (aka reinstall) the whole system every few months, since thats the usual duration his applications officially are up to date.
Free Software is usually nice and all, and I'm using it exclusively on my desktops, but inability to install newer or older software on "stable" distributions kills it for Windows converts. You really can not talk someone into linux with a calm conscience without warning him that his system is considered "obsolete" by application makers the moment its published and a new development cycle has begun, and that there will be no way to install any older versions he might be got used to.
It's also important to add:
Open office is included in RedHat, Oracle, Ubuntu and several other commercially supported systems. With MS Office, if you are unhappy with your support provider then you are stuck. With open office, you can shop around until you find the support you want. Right now getting full support might well cost a little more, but if that were true long term then more competition would enter the market and keep prices low. No such thing exists with MS Office where nobody but MS can actually fix problems.
=~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
Actually MS Office comes with phone or email support for free. You get 90 days of free support starting from your first call or email request.
But that's only if you purchased it outright. AFAIK it doesn't apply to OEM software since part of the reasoning for the decreased cost of OEM software is that the system builder is agreeing to provide tech support for that software.
I'm not commenting on the quality of the tech support for the end users though. I've never called them personally. So that 90 days of free support could be crap.
1 (short ton / firkin) = 89.1432354 slugs / keg
"Open source your software, then spend development time porting it to our platform so we can use it for free!"
My favorite example is Chrome.
"Companies should open source their code so the community can port it!"
Google open sources Chrome.
"Google doesn't care about Linux! They won't port their OPEN SOURCED code for us!"
Google ports Chrome to Linux.
"I'll stick with firefox until they release adblock for Chrome, thus circumventing their primary revenue stream!
Step 4: Profit?
Oh you guys are too funny...
Similes are like metaphors
but how would OpenOffice be a better solution for a business customer if it doesn't come with any support for the employees?
Your employees need support to use a word processor and spreadsheet? I think your money would be better spent hiring component people over support contracts.
I always found the OSS crowd's sense of entitlement even more impressive
"Open source your software, then spend development time porting it to our platform so we can use it for free!"
My favorite example is Chrome.
You would have a much better point if your favorite example wasn't ~90% OSS to start with, such as WebKit.