Uhm. Yeah. See, the Apple ][ was out a long time before the IBM PC. Did you get the memo?
Apple ][ was an important computer - but it was overwhelmed by products powered by MS operating systems. Much of this is due to the Apple/// disaster which opened the door to IBM. Incidentally, one of the ]['s most prolific competitors - the TRS-80 Models 1-4 were supplied with MS BASIC.
Microsoft did not pioneer ease-of-use, nor the PC, nor anything like that.
I agree with this 100%. What MS did do, though is supply a set of tools (windows, dos, programming tools) that were good enough that PC manufacturers didn't have to develop their own OS, GUI, development tools and so on. This allowed Compaq, Zenith, NEC, Dell, Northgate, IBM, and so on to have a real economic advantage against companies that wrote their own (Commodore, Apple, etc...). MS tools took control software development channels away from computer manufacturers while hardware compatibility (driven by the need to run MS operating systems) allowed third parties to service computers in competition with the manufacturer.
Back in the '80s MS built it's success by making computers accessible and usable by the masses. Prior to the 80s useful computers were usually leased mini or mainframes. Often they were timeshared services that were paid by monthly subscription. They were pushed aside by a model led by Microsoft: I own my computer and can use it how I see fit. Recently, they seem to feel because others build web service driven models, that they should too.
Microsoft is now vulnerable because they believe things have went full circle. They see people building new ideas and new markets that don't include them - or need their software. What MS misses is that people don't want their software when it doesn't do something of great value. The days of people marveling at the convenience of a multitasking GUI or amazing their boss with a pivot table are over. Problem is that Microsoft's current innovation isn't being driven by customers or users, but by a bad combination of developer arrogance and greed. The result: you get products that people just don't want like Zune. You get a company selling out it's users for a buck they may never get from the music business. You get ideas like Live Update and Genuine Advantage that hurt legitimate users because your bean counters want to squeeze every dime out of their market. You get ideas like threatening patent litigation for ideas that are almost as old as most college grads instead of inventing something worth patenting.
For MS to come back all they have to do is recognize reality: people actually do like and use their software. Focus on what you can add (or remove) that will make it better. And remember that USERS not the music, movie, media or any other industry makes the buying decision. When you add a feature to the OS, make it a benefit to the USER. Everyone is in love with the idea of being a landlord. MS would be wise to remember that they made their way to success by putting the landlords out of business.
how much free time we have left to enjoy with family and friends. And also, what percentage earn their incomes from work they find pleasurable and non-monitarily rewarding.
Most rich people I've met have less time than money.
Most poor people I've met have more time than money.
The happiest people I've met are often the busiest.
The most unhappy people sit at home wallowing in their boredom.
There is a tremendous equality in the distribution of time. We all get 24 hours. Real freedom is the ability to spend your time as you see fit and to trade your time for other things.
Google has been great - but long term, Google will face the same pressures that Yahoo did in the 90's as the financial markets start to rachet up the pressure. Yahoo (and it's late 90s competitors like excite, lycos, alta vista) went from being incredibly useful to nearly becoming a pay per click, sponsored listing, paid inclusion whore. The result was a niche in the market was left unserved (accurate search) and a start up called Google filled it.
Google needs to be very careful as it creates new advertising products - one slip and the trust they've earned goes away and all those context aware features start to look a lot like spyware. This audio idea is a really bad one, and I hope it dies a miserable death.
It's really about access to content. Seth is right that adding more features to access content will help drive more users to Firefox. Making Firefox into a Skype enhanced Flock is probably not the answer. Making it easy to add extensions and themes when you install could possibly be the right solution - or at least make the default home page show more about extending firefox. This way users could add the extra features they want and even pick a look as part of the process of getting to know FireFox. And it would review very well in the press becaus no one else has anything like it.
BTW Access to content is how MS won BrowserWar I. IE was installed on the pc, and when you hit an IE only site, or ones with MS specific nav-controls you switched. Eventually, you just quit with Netscape because of bugs and IE only sites.
One major issue is that many sites do not render as nicely in IE7 as they do in IE6. This is going to be a headache for IT managers and marketing managers for quite some time...
and for the love of money, think of all the FrontPage sites...
Current copyright law is too severe, but arguing that the concept is wrong just makes you look silly.
This is one of the best summaries of the current IP situation I've seen put into words. Copyright works if you shave a few decades off the term, eliminate renewals and place a few boundries on what rights publishers get. Boundries like fair use, a reduction in the penalty for infringement where there is no commercial gain and particularly the right of they buyer to change the format to remain compatible with the technology of the day.
The MP3 player market is very young - so Zune has a shot. Like it or not today's market leaders probably won't be in a few years as the market evolves and hopefully DRM goes out with a whimper.
That said, why you waste screen space with WinCE chrome is beyond me.
As I recall from business law class years ago that a contract signed under durress is not valid. It would seem that a EULA accepted due to a threat is exactly the same deal that as Nero's firefighting deal which is the analogy they used to teach the concept of durress:
Step 1: thug lights house on fire. Step 2: Nero's firefighting righ shows up with offer to put out fire for money Step 3: House either burns down or owner agrees to sell three kids into slavery
That said, I'm no lawyer, but I did stay at a holiday inn express last night.
Co-Ops, Partnerships, Limited Liability Corporations all have elements of this open source company model - but carry few of the disadvantages. The real problem with the "open source" business model is the day-to-day decision making. If you involve more than a small core group in decision making on small issues - you paralyze your small, agile open source company's chief market advantage: speed. You also lose the advantage of delegation - letting the best qualified make the decisions they are best qualified to make. Do if you like bad decisions made slowly, the open source model business institution is your best option.
Business institutions have evolved over the years and now combine elements of the "open source" model with more traditional models. Partnerships and LLCs delegate day to day decision making to a management team and reserve some level of strategic decision making for the members (stakeholders). A common example of reserved decisions: mergers, membership decisions, financial goal setting, product development direction and employee hiring/firing. Members can have different levels of influence or all be equal. Accounting firms and Law firms have used the LLC for years to get highly trained, highly intelligent people to work together with great success in the marketplace.
Judging candidates by college degree is an obsolete practice from a bygone era where few people were truly educated. At some point, before I was born having a degree was apparently the key to wealth, health and success. Now days, nearly everyone goes to college, and the value of a degree is much lower than in the past. The most promising people learn what they want and go to work - just like the most tallented athletes leave school early for the pros.
If you don't have the right degree or don't have one there are four keys to getting the job:
1. Having a documented, verifiable portfolio of work that you've done. This allows you to shift the interview process away from your college inexperience to your in-trade experience. Often by switching from education to real-world early in interviews, the education issue won't even come up. Open source projects are wonderful for this - your teamwork (interaction in chats and mailing lists), code and leadership is easy to audit.
2. Hiring is human driven process. Learn to avoid gatekeepers paid to weed out people who don't fit the criteria given and communicate directly with decision makers.
3. Be a better human being than the others. Show up early. Dress appropriately (if casual, have it professionally cleaned and pressed). Call to confirm meetings. Send hand written thank you notes. Treat everyone, even the secretary at the front desk with respect and good humor. Write back to clarify bad interview answers.
4. Don't lie or try to spin your education. Simply answer only the precise question being asked. Often times the truth is more than adequate, and in many cases shows that you have character and can succeed in the face of adversity.
My own contract with my customers stipulates that if my company goes out of business, we will relinquish the proprietary services to them for their purpose. I did NOT put this stipulation in the contract -- I had customers demand it. In order to close the sale, I had to add this line. Do you read every contract that you sign? You should.
Reading the contract is good advice, especially when dealing with persons like yourself.
If you're buying services or items without a contract, I would consider that an "as-is" sale, and you better get a really good deal on it.
The best deals I've ever been a party to were always handshake deals. Every deal I've ever seen go down the river has often been accompanied with a contract so detailed it spells out the correct way to use the contract to wipe your ass. At the end of the day, if you don't trust the other party - don't do business. This is a hint: insistence on ridiculously detailed contracts is a sign the other party may have different intentions than you.
What is the line between a cache and aggregation? And how is your ISP not "aggregating others content into a downloadable product they sell for money"?
On the surface you seem to be right. In reality, though, Webaroo has created a mechanism of making copies without permission, collecting fees and in the process denying many webmasters ad revenues, accurate traffic logs, etc (slashdot is one such example of a site that would have ad revenue issues with Webaroo). ISPs on the other hand have infrastructure that websites use to deliver content to users. There is actually a trade going on between ISP and websites - ISPs supply the infrastructure, websites supply the content - and the two together have great value to shared customers.
US copyright law, 17 USC 512, excuses operators of automated caches that conform to established cache control protocols (meta elements,/robots.txt, etc.) from copyright infringement liability.
Webaroo has gone far beyond being a cache, they are aggregating others content into a downloadable product they sell for money. This is no different than Napster 1.0 or a $10 per download warez site - the key difference being this is web content.
iPod's Success is not Marketing Alone
on
iPod Video Dissection
·
· Score: 2, Informative
I keep reading marketing... marketing... marketing... on reasons why iPod succeeded. There's a lot more to it that slick packaging, good advertising and strategic price/feature positioning:
1) Design: as people like to point out iPod wasn't the first or the most capable device of it's type. It was the most drop-dead easy to use and understand from install to sync to library management.
2) iTunes: solved the real problem with other players: you had to either rip CDs or download pirated music to get any use out of your MP3 player.
3)Focus on customer experience and satisfaction leading to great reputation. While Sony and RCA are busy explaining why their stuff "Works for Sure" people know iPod works because their friends and coworkers will tell them so. iPods are kind of the CrackBerry of music players.
My take on the "first language": pick a language that is practical and easy to learn and succeed with. VB fits that bill. So do many languages that have an intrepeted language in their liniage. Probably the reason I would shy away from VB is the complexity of it's libraries and capability of the IDE it runs in. There's just too many training wheels and too many tools in VB that substitute for actual real problem solving. I have started teaching my kids Python, and they are having great success. It really helps to have a text screen where you type a command, press enter and it does what it is told to do.
How does being a good salesman equate with the leadership and organizational ability required of a CEO? I understand, CEOs must to some extent "sell their company", but many great CEOs are very introverted, out-of-the-limelight type of people.
Sales is a vital aspect of top management no matter what your role is. Selling to Wall Street is one thing. Selling initiatives and business plans to your own organization is another (often referred to "getting buy in"). Negotiation, listenting, dealmaking and leadership skills are critical to both salespersons and CEOs. Being "good with customers" and "good with business parnters" and "good with vendors" are all considered positive for a CEO. They are all also attributes of a good sales person.
Unfortunatly, proficiency in a specialist job (sales, design, engineering, customer service, finance, etc...) never implies the ability to handle a generalist job - which is what work becomes the closer to the top you get.
Very well done. I didn't enjoy it though: it really rubbed my nose in the future that the current industry titans have planned. The good news: control is a feature that most computer owners and corporations will not give up.
1. Invest in companies that know how to make money by being paid by a customer to perform a service. 2. There are usually minimal or no barriers to entry in the open source universe. 3. Check community involvement. A small community or lack of one indicates a lack of mastery of the open source model.
BTW: coming out with a closed source derivative product can be risky: sometimes you get forked and out developed.
I think one of the arguments for an open source "burst" would be the reluctance of the open source mentality to accept things such as DRM. While I am very much with the typical slashdot mindset that thinks of DRM as bunch of BS, the corporate world is still heading in that direction.
DRM: Let's all erase nearly 10 years of incredible growth by closing and locking things down. DRM has ALWAYS been around. From the lousy copy protected floppies of the 80s to the parallel port dongles of the 90s to todays public key technology. It doesn't matter - it's all the same, and it is and always has been an utter and complete failure. A failure of customer service, a technical failure, a financial failure and ultimately a corporate failure. And despite everyone's best efforts, DRM will fail again.
There's no such thing as an open source bubble, BTW. Why? Because open source software, or at least the free variety, doesn't die when it's creator dies. What would happen if Mozilla.org, Apache.org, the MySQL guys went belly up or blew u Hint - development would slow for a while and would fork and then the strongest tines of the fork would continue. Open source software exists outside corporate control, and that is something that open source advocates need to explain clearly. An open source company is not about building a widget and selling it like proprietary software. It's about helping customers apply technology to their business exactly the way it should be instead of adapting to what someone working out of your industry, for a technology company thinks you should do.
I don't see how you can get to a point where you sit back, and essentially sell your code base over and over again, as most market-leading software companies do. That is where the huge profits are.
Perhaps the mone is there today, but the countertrend has started and is gaining locomotive like momentum. It feels a lot like the mid and late 80's where the economics of computer hardware changed. Back then timesharing is where the huge profits were, and no one was going to toss the mainframe for those PCs connected to unreliable ethernet and arcnet. This time, though, we have a change in the economics of software that is pretty hard to ignore. That doesn't mean that any of the software players are going to go out of business tomorow, it does mean that they will have to change their way of doing business to counter or adapt the new emerging open source model.
Actually, in the silicon valley area, superfund sites and other toxic swaths of land are commonly used for strip malls
Leave it to California to provide the exception that proves the rule:) Seriously, when you don't have anywhere else to build, you clean up, cover over or cover up and keep on building... Never mind the seven headed, fire breathing babies.
Slashdot Mirror
Uhm. Yeah. See, the Apple ][ was out a long time before the IBM PC. Did you get the memo? /// disaster which opened the door to IBM. Incidentally, one of the ]['s most prolific competitors - the TRS-80 Models 1-4 were supplied with MS BASIC.
Apple ][ was an important computer - but it was overwhelmed by products powered by MS operating systems. Much of this is due to the Apple
Microsoft did not pioneer ease-of-use, nor the PC, nor anything like that.
I agree with this 100%. What MS did do, though is supply a set of tools (windows, dos, programming tools) that were good enough that PC manufacturers didn't have to develop their own OS, GUI, development tools and so on. This allowed Compaq, Zenith, NEC, Dell, Northgate, IBM, and so on to have a real economic advantage against companies that wrote their own (Commodore, Apple, etc...). MS tools took control software development channels away from computer manufacturers while hardware compatibility (driven by the need to run MS operating systems) allowed third parties to service computers in competition with the manufacturer.
Back in the '80s MS built it's success by making computers accessible and usable by the masses. Prior to the 80s useful computers were usually leased mini or mainframes. Often they were timeshared services that were paid by monthly subscription. They were pushed aside by a model led by Microsoft: I own my computer and can use it how I see fit. Recently, they seem to feel because others build web service driven models, that they should too.
Microsoft is now vulnerable because they believe things have went full circle. They see people building new ideas and new markets that don't include them - or need their software. What MS misses is that people don't want their software when it doesn't do something of great value. The days of people marveling at the convenience of a multitasking GUI or amazing their boss with a pivot table are over. Problem is that Microsoft's current innovation isn't being driven by customers or users, but by a bad combination of developer arrogance and greed. The result: you get products that people just don't want like Zune. You get a company selling out it's users for a buck they may never get from the music business. You get ideas like Live Update and Genuine Advantage that hurt legitimate users because your bean counters want to squeeze every dime out of their market. You get ideas like threatening patent litigation for ideas that are almost as old as most college grads instead of inventing something worth patenting.
For MS to come back all they have to do is recognize reality: people actually do like and use their software. Focus on what you can add (or remove) that will make it better. And remember that USERS not the music, movie, media or any other industry makes the buying decision. When you add a feature to the OS, make it a benefit to the USER. Everyone is in love with the idea of being a landlord. MS would be wise to remember that they made their way to success by putting the landlords out of business.
In other words: they are going censor the internet because they can't tax a foreign company. Nice.
how much free time we have left to enjoy with family and friends. And also, what percentage earn their incomes from work they find pleasurable and non-monitarily rewarding.
Most rich people I've met have less time than money.
Most poor people I've met have more time than money.
The happiest people I've met are often the busiest.
The most unhappy people sit at home wallowing in their boredom.
There is a tremendous equality in the distribution of time. We all get 24 hours. Real freedom is the ability to spend your time as you see fit and to trade your time for other things.
Google has been great - but long term, Google will face the same pressures that Yahoo did in the 90's as the financial markets start to rachet up the pressure. Yahoo (and it's late 90s competitors like excite, lycos, alta vista) went from being incredibly useful to nearly becoming a pay per click, sponsored listing, paid inclusion whore. The result was a niche in the market was left unserved (accurate search) and a start up called Google filled it.
Google needs to be very careful as it creates new advertising products - one slip and the trust they've earned goes away and all those context aware features start to look a lot like spyware. This audio idea is a really bad one, and I hope it dies a miserable death.
It's really about access to content. Seth is right that adding more features to access content will help drive more users to Firefox. Making Firefox into a Skype enhanced Flock is probably not the answer. Making it easy to add extensions and themes when you install could possibly be the right solution - or at least make the default home page show more about extending firefox. This way users could add the extra features they want and even pick a look as part of the process of getting to know FireFox. And it would review very well in the press becaus no one else has anything like it.
BTW Access to content is how MS won BrowserWar I. IE was installed on the pc, and when you hit an IE only site, or ones with MS specific nav-controls you switched. Eventually, you just quit with Netscape because of bugs and IE only sites.
One major issue is that many sites do not render as nicely in IE7 as they do in IE6. This is going to be a headache for IT managers and marketing managers for quite some time...
and for the love of money, think of all the FrontPage sites...
Current copyright law is too severe, but arguing that the concept is wrong just makes you look silly.
This is one of the best summaries of the current IP situation I've seen put into words. Copyright works if you shave a few decades off the term, eliminate renewals and place a few boundries on what rights publishers get. Boundries like fair use, a reduction in the penalty for infringement where there is no commercial gain and particularly the right of they buyer to change the format to remain compatible with the technology of the day.
The MP3 player market is very young - so Zune has a shot. Like it or not today's market leaders probably won't be in a few years as the market evolves and hopefully DRM goes out with a whimper.
That said, why you waste screen space with WinCE chrome is beyond me.
As I recall from business law class years ago that a contract signed under durress is not valid. It would seem that a EULA accepted due to a threat is exactly the same deal that as Nero's firefighting deal which is the analogy they used to teach the concept of durress:
Step 1: thug lights house on fire.
Step 2: Nero's firefighting righ shows up with offer to put out fire for money
Step 3: House either burns down or owner agrees to sell three kids into slavery
That said, I'm no lawyer, but I did stay at a holiday inn express last night.
Co-Ops, Partnerships, Limited Liability Corporations all have elements of this open source company model - but carry few of the disadvantages. The real problem with the "open source" business model is the day-to-day decision making. If you involve more than a small core group in decision making on small issues - you paralyze your small, agile open source company's chief market advantage: speed. You also lose the advantage of delegation - letting the best qualified make the decisions they are best
qualified to make. Do if you like bad decisions made slowly, the open source model business institution is your best option.
Business institutions have evolved over the years and now combine elements of the "open source" model with more traditional models. Partnerships and LLCs delegate day to day decision making to a management team and reserve some level of strategic decision making for the members (stakeholders). A common example of reserved decisions: mergers, membership decisions, financial goal setting, product development direction and employee hiring/firing. Members can have different levels of influence or all be equal. Accounting firms and Law firms have used the LLC for years to get highly trained, highly intelligent people to work together with great success in the marketplace.
Judging candidates by college degree is an obsolete practice from a bygone era where few people were truly educated. At some point, before I was born having a degree was apparently the key to wealth, health and success. Now days, nearly everyone goes to college, and the value of a degree is much lower than in the past. The most promising people learn what they want and go to work - just like the most tallented athletes leave school early for the pros.
If you don't have the right degree or don't have one there are four keys to getting the job:
1. Having a documented, verifiable portfolio of work that you've done. This allows you to shift the interview process away from your college inexperience to your in-trade experience. Often by switching from education to real-world early in interviews, the education issue won't even come up. Open source projects are wonderful for this - your teamwork (interaction in chats and mailing lists), code and leadership is easy to audit.
2. Hiring is human driven process. Learn to avoid gatekeepers paid to weed out people who don't fit the criteria given and communicate directly with decision makers.
3. Be a better human being than the others. Show up early. Dress appropriately (if casual, have it professionally cleaned and pressed). Call to confirm meetings. Send hand written thank you notes. Treat everyone, even the secretary at the front desk with respect and good humor. Write back to clarify bad interview answers.
4. Don't lie or try to spin your education. Simply answer only the precise question being asked. Often times the truth is more than adequate, and in many cases shows that you have character and can succeed in the face of adversity.
My own contract with my customers stipulates that if my company goes out of business, we will relinquish the proprietary services to them for their purpose. I did NOT put this stipulation in the contract -- I had customers demand it. In order to close the sale, I had to add this line. Do you read every contract that you sign? You should.
Reading the contract is good advice, especially when dealing with persons like yourself.
If you're buying services or items without a contract, I would consider that an "as-is" sale, and you better get a really good deal on it.
The best deals I've ever been a party to were always handshake deals. Every deal I've ever seen go down the river has often been accompanied with a contract so detailed it spells out the correct way to use the contract to wipe your ass. At the end of the day, if you don't trust the other party - don't do business. This is a hint: insistence on ridiculously detailed contracts is a sign the other party may have different intentions than you.
It's time to get organized on this one. The only way the FCC will get the message is massive, grass roots action that says:
"We the people do not want DRM."
And this needs to be promoted with more vigor than Firefox, Ubuntu and your favorite web CMS. We all need to get on this now.
What is the line between a cache and aggregation? And how is your ISP not "aggregating others content into a downloadable product they sell for money"?
On the surface you seem to be right. In reality, though, Webaroo has created a mechanism of making copies without permission, collecting fees and in the process denying many webmasters ad revenues, accurate traffic logs, etc (slashdot is one such example of a site that would have ad revenue issues with Webaroo). ISPs on the other hand have infrastructure that websites use to deliver content to users. There is actually a trade going on between ISP and websites - ISPs supply the infrastructure, websites supply the content - and the two together have great value to shared customers.
US copyright law, 17 USC 512, excuses operators of automated caches that conform to established cache control protocols (meta elements, /robots.txt, etc.) from copyright infringement liability.
Webaroo has gone far beyond being a cache, they are aggregating others content into a downloadable product they sell for money. This is no different than Napster 1.0 or a $10 per download warez site - the key difference being this is web content.
I keep reading marketing... marketing... marketing... on reasons why iPod succeeded. There's a lot more to it that slick packaging, good advertising and strategic price/feature positioning:
1) Design: as people like to point out iPod wasn't the first or the most capable device of it's type. It was the most drop-dead easy to use and understand from install to sync to library management.
2) iTunes: solved the real problem with other players: you had to either rip CDs or download pirated music to get any use out of your MP3 player.
3)Focus on customer experience and satisfaction leading to great reputation. While Sony and RCA are busy explaining why their stuff "Works for Sure" people know iPod works because their friends and coworkers will tell them so. iPods are kind of the CrackBerry of music players.
My take on the "first language": pick a language that is practical and easy to learn and succeed with. VB fits that bill. So do many languages that have an intrepeted language in their liniage. Probably the reason I would shy away from VB is the complexity of it's libraries and capability of the IDE it runs in. There's just too many training wheels and too many tools in VB that substitute for actual real problem solving. I have started teaching my kids Python, and they are having great success. It really helps to have a text screen where you type a command, press enter and it does what it is told to do.
How long until Yahoo only allows numbers like ICQ... but without the number 6?
How does being a good salesman equate with the leadership and organizational ability required of a CEO? I understand, CEOs must to some extent "sell their company", but many great CEOs are very introverted, out-of-the-limelight type of people.
Sales is a vital aspect of top management no matter what your role is. Selling to Wall Street is one thing. Selling initiatives and business plans to your own organization is another (often referred to "getting buy in"). Negotiation, listenting, dealmaking and leadership skills are critical to both salespersons and CEOs. Being "good with customers" and "good with business parnters" and "good with vendors" are all considered positive for a CEO. They are all also attributes of a good sales person.
Unfortunatly, proficiency in a specialist job (sales, design, engineering, customer service, finance, etc...) never implies the ability to handle a generalist job - which is what work becomes the closer to the top you get.
I think you'll enjoy this as much as I did:
Very well done. I didn't enjoy it though: it really rubbed my nose in the future that the current industry titans have planned. The good news: control is a feature that most computer owners and corporations will not give up.
Three very simple rules will help you:
1. Invest in companies that know how to make money by being paid by a customer to perform a service.
2. There are usually minimal or no barriers to entry in the open source universe.
3. Check community involvement. A small community or lack of one indicates a lack of mastery of the open source model.
BTW: coming out with a closed source derivative product can be risky: sometimes you get forked and out developed.
I think one of the arguments for an open source "burst" would be the reluctance of the open source mentality to accept things such as DRM. While I am very much with the typical slashdot mindset that thinks of DRM as bunch of BS, the corporate world is still heading in that direction.
DRM: Let's all erase nearly 10 years of incredible growth by closing and locking things down. DRM has ALWAYS been around. From the lousy copy protected floppies of the 80s to the parallel port dongles of the 90s to todays public key technology. It doesn't matter - it's all the same, and it is and always has been an utter and complete failure. A failure of customer service, a technical failure, a financial failure and ultimately a corporate failure. And despite everyone's best efforts, DRM will fail again.
There's no such thing as an open source bubble, BTW. Why? Because open source software, or at least the free variety, doesn't die when it's creator dies. What would happen if Mozilla.org, Apache.org, the MySQL guys went belly up or blew u Hint - development would slow for a while and would fork and then the strongest tines of the fork would continue. Open source software exists outside corporate control, and that is something that open source advocates need to explain clearly. An open source company is not about building a widget and selling it like proprietary software. It's about helping customers apply technology to their business exactly the way it should be instead of adapting to what someone working out of your industry, for a technology company thinks you should do.
I don't see how you can get to a point where you sit back, and essentially sell your code base over and over again, as most market-leading software companies do. That is where the huge profits are.
Perhaps the mone is there today, but the countertrend has started and is gaining locomotive like momentum. It feels a lot like the mid and late 80's where the economics of computer hardware changed. Back then timesharing is where the huge profits were, and no one was going to toss the mainframe for those PCs connected to unreliable ethernet and arcnet. This time, though, we have a change in the economics of software that is pretty hard to ignore. That doesn't mean that any of the software players are going to go out of business tomorow, it does mean that they will have to change their way of doing business to counter or adapt the new emerging open source model.
Actually, in the silicon valley area, superfund sites and other toxic swaths of land are commonly used for strip malls
:) Seriously, when you don't have anywhere else to build, you clean up, cover over or cover up and keep on building... Never mind the seven headed, fire breathing babies.
Leave it to California to provide the exception that proves the rule