Imho for a small software house it could be downright to impossible to make out money out of THEIR OWN free software, if their value is in the software they develop.
Look at most OSS based business : most of them are really hardware or support vendors.
So:
1) Your business should not be in the software itself, but in hardware, support, data files or something else. Sun supports OpenOffice.org because every user migrating from MS to OOo is a potential user for their platform, and MS Office is a major obstacle for Win->*nix migration. In this way you effectively lose money in sw development, money that will come back through a different way.
2) Your business could be in custom-made software, but it should be a very consolidated business. You can offer your customers free software and this could be an interesting offer for a customer. However your price will probably be higher than competitors. Infact competitors selling proprietary s/w could offer a lower price, because they know their customer *have* to rely on them for support. If you give away your source you free your customer (and this *is* good) but you have to price the sw higher to compensate. And you cannot avoid that customer to resell the software they bought to other companies and this has an impact to your own market. You sell a program to a small custommade car vendor, and suddenly you discover he sold the s/w to a software house which changed two details and resold it to general motors.
3) Your customer should agree to this choice. This is less obvious than you can think : most customers will require you to sign tons of NDA and thus an OSS license will not be seen with the right eye.
4) Your platform should support this. For example you cannot officially develop OSS for gaming consoles for NDA reasons.
3) when I shut down my computer, I can just click shut down and go away. In windows sometimes there would be a popup waiting for me to click. So I can't leave unless I the blue windows screen.
-> Associate hybernation with the front key or the standby key on the keyboard
5) I have been using this for more than a month now and my Mini only got stuck once. Once! take that windows!
->.. *my* Windows once in a year.. not kidding. And Linux probably beats both with even greater stability. Anyway this is seriously dependent on how your system is mantained, how reliable is your hardware, etc. Once in a month is seriously much.
6) No need to install anti-virus software (yet) -> you're a fool not to install it
8) I donno why but all the programs (not just apples) works the way they are suppose to work! This is a very strange feeling. In windows world, I never expected programs to run the way they are suppose to.
-> ??!
9) this is just a small thing I noticed, but in real player ( sorry I have to use it), suppose I'm watching a video and shut it down in the middle. The next time i start that video I will see a mark where I left off the last time. This is a small thing but, if you are regular video watch like I, this is very very helpful.
-> this is a feature of real player not of the OS, I think
Monthly and weekly tickets in Italy (which is in EU) are NOT transferrable, while standard tickets are - this is because they have a discount, provided a single person use that ticket. The same runs for preinstalled Windows. What you can do is get a PC without a preinstalled OS. You have the right to have it, but probably it will cost you quite some time arguing on the phone, etc. Sad.
"For one PC only" means, I think, for the PC using whatever part they have attached the Windows serial number sticker on.
Here in Italy it's a crime not helping someone in danger of death. Of course this cannot be applied in the corner cases you mentioned, as they are made up borderline cases to put the law down.
Note that, however, calling 118 (the emergency) is usually enough (and actually it should be the only thing you should do, if you are not a trained medical). This law is enforced in so many cases you can't even think of. And it's good.
This raises an interesting question. Of course you can flame MS down as you want and surely in the past they used integration in the OS to smash down opponents (DoubleSpace vs Stacker, IE vs Netscape).
But, alas, any OS comes with a bunch of applications in the package. Sometimes they can be uninstalled (galeon) sometimes they cannot (internet explorer, konqueror if you use kde) - but does this really matter ? Does the average Joe stop using IE and use Firefox instead if IE could be uninstalled ?
Seriously some applications move towards the OS itself. This was for file compression, for local disk browsers, for disk checking programs, then for internet browsers and for media players. The chance for the third party market to survive lasts as long as the OS integrated tool is not up to (some users') expectations (for example zip folders didn't destroy WinZip's and WinRar's market, and Defrag didn't quite kill third party defragmenters and XP firewall didn't kill third party firewalls).
The question is : how much can be integrated in any OS [or any other product] ? This is a question which hits the Linux market hard, too. Most distros have more and more software integrated every day. Sure it's free software, but when you work at Opera, does really make a difference if you lose your job to Internet Explorer or to Firefox ?
Figure this scenario out : MS buys Jasc (the authors of Paint Shop Pro). They integrates PSP in the OS. Adobe sues MS. MS line of defense is : hey every OS around has a a similar great program built in! Look almost every Linux distro comes with this "the Gimp" installed. Why they can and we cannot ? It's normal for an OS to have a graphics program built in..
This is not to say MS is not interested in blowing away opponents with unfair competition, and I don't want to say that it's wrong to have Linux distros inflated with so many sw packages including office suites (EEK!), browsers, media players, CADs, games, servers of any kind. Still this is a problem which is hard to solve.
1) If Windows had protected the antispyware program in some special way, we were now all complaining about antispyware being considered "special" by the OS and thus being in unfair competition with other spyware programs.
2) On any Unix machine you have to be root to install most of the software (you usually have to be root before rpm or make install) : a simple trojan relying on *stupid* user behaviour can be written for any platform and this is not a security problem of the platform, is a security problem of the user's brain.
3) From 2, even if the default user was not administrator, most people would simply try to install this new porn-lemmings game they received and they would "run as" it (just like you su - make install on linux).
4) It's not even only a problem in the user brain. I wonder how much would it take to discover 5 malicious lines inserted in some big open source project. This *is* a possible evet, it could be an angry sourceforge employer, a security hole somewhere, a
5) It seems to me whatever the choice of MS is in any particular matter, there is always someone who takes it to bash it down. When the fact is ridiculous like in this example, this kind of behaviour is detrimental to the whole community. Do you live to make Linux great ? Than use your time to make it the perfect OS, not to make Windows appear the worst OS ever - 90% of users have chosen it as the best product for them and they will not change their mind because you are bashing it down, they will change their mind when they'll see something better *for them*...Go and flame me now.
The world would be overrun with spyware, virii and other malware for OS/2, or for NeXT or for any other OS.
Noone in the world is able to release an OS without bugs and the only thing which may change is the latency between bug discovery and the needed patch. Average users would still run their OS as administrator/root/whatever because it's easier. And they would not update anyway because.. hey it's boring! And they will use an empty password because it's simpler!
I use mainly Windows, both at home and at work. 0 virii, no spyware, no malware. In those things the responsibility of the OS is 2%, the responsibility of the (un)conscious and/or (un)educated user is 98%.
Windows *has* a live CD (Windows PE if I remember correctly).
It's not free (maybe you even need MSDN subscription, I don't know), but there is one.
Still for emergency administration tasks on Xandros and Windows you can just use any Linux (or BSD or anything else) live cd and get the work done. The same, I think, for MacOSX.
IBM will support open source as long as it will make money out of it. The difference between IBM and SCO is that IBM is making money out of the linux market, SCO is losing (and losing much). SCO is the only unix vendor to my knowledge which is not selling hardware. IBM, Sun, HP, and to some extent SGI, decided they could still make money out of hardware and custom software going the linux way. SCO is just losing. Sure they could lose with more style and sincerely what they are doing cannot be justified.
What is wrong with patents is that you can issue a patent for pretty simple things (simple hardware pieces or simple software, or even concepts!), patents which could've been filed by any 10 y.o. teenager.
I'm not bothered if a company patents a way to make electricity out still air, or a gigawonderful compression algorithm which is able to pack an mp3 in 1/4 of the space with no quality loss. I'm bothered if a company patents a simple mechanical object, a single click to buy on the internet or the concept of doubleclicking to activate an object or the way a circle can be draw on the screen.
And the guilt is not of the companies who patent easy things, but of the patent system which allows this kind of behaviour.
IBM and Microsoft can be equally as evil really. There is no difference on who receives a patent.
Now IBM politics are in favour of free sw just because IBM is now making money out of Linux and Microsoft is losing money because of it. Whenever it will be the other way around, we'll be all here crying for the evilness of IBM and how M$ could save us all. Really think about what could've happened if OS2 was the winner and Windows the loser. Probably what now seems so absurd could have been reality.
Patents are evil, whoever receives them. And they are evil both for free sw and for proprietary one. And they are evil both for sw as for hw.
We feel sw patents being more evil just because of the peculiar qualities of sw (being a product with almost no additional costs other than those of the creation of the first prototype), but really hw patents are as evil and sometimes as stupid. Check behind your Nokia phone, the Sim retention mechanism. Do you really feel that thing needs a patent ? Do you think its mechanic is so smarter to be granted a patent ? Do you feel that patent is much better than the "single click" Amazon patent ? [Don't know if it has been granted the patent and if it's still that kind of mechanism, the last Nokia I had was the 5110 and had two pieces of plastic with the simplest mechanic of this world patent pending]
I think we, as a society, should reconsider the whole patent system. It's effectiveness is changed in its 200 years of life, and its dangers too. Patents were meant to protect IP and R&D investiments, now it's becoming a mean to convert ideas into money without the risks involved in production.
Slashdot Mirror
Imho for a small software house it could be downright to impossible to make out money out of THEIR OWN free software, if their value is in the software they develop.
:
Look at most OSS based business : most of them are really hardware or support vendors.
So
1) Your business should not be in the software itself, but in hardware, support, data files or something else. Sun supports OpenOffice.org because every user migrating from MS to OOo is a potential user for their platform, and MS Office is a major obstacle for Win->*nix migration. In this way you effectively lose money in sw development, money that will come back through a different way.
2) Your business could be in custom-made software, but it should be a very consolidated business. You can offer your customers free software and this could be an interesting offer for a customer. However your price will probably be higher than competitors. Infact competitors selling proprietary s/w could offer a lower price, because they know their customer *have* to rely on them for support. If you give away your source you free your customer (and this *is* good) but you have to price the sw higher to compensate. And you cannot avoid that customer to resell the software they bought to other companies and this has an impact to your own market. You sell a program to a small custommade car vendor, and suddenly you discover he sold the s/w to a software house which changed two details and resold it to general motors.
3) Your customer should agree to this choice. This is less obvious than you can think : most customers will require you to sign tons of NDA and thus an OSS license will not be seen with the right eye.
4) Your platform should support this. For example you cannot officially develop OSS for gaming consoles for NDA reasons.
2) Faster bootup time.
.. *my* Windows once in a year.. not kidding. And Linux probably beats both with even greater stability. Anyway this is seriously dependent on how your system is mantained, how reliable is your hardware, etc. Once in a month is seriously much.
-> Use hybernation
3) when I shut down my computer, I can just click shut down and go away. In windows sometimes there would be a popup waiting for me to click. So I can't leave unless I the blue windows screen.
-> Associate hybernation with the front key or the standby key on the keyboard
5) I have been using this for more than a month now and my Mini only got stuck once. Once! take that windows!
->
6) No need to install anti-virus software (yet)
-> you're a fool not to install it
8) I donno why but all the programs (not just apples) works the way they are suppose to work! This is a very strange feeling. In windows world, I never expected programs to run the way they are suppose to.
-> ??!
9) this is just a small thing I noticed, but in real player ( sorry I have to use it), suppose I'm watching a video and shut it down in the middle. The next time i start that video I will see a mark where I left off the last time. This is a small thing but, if you are regular video watch like I, this is very very helpful.
-> this is a feature of real player not of the OS, I think
Monthly and weekly tickets in Italy (which is in EU) are NOT transferrable, while standard tickets are - this is because they have a discount, provided a single person use that ticket. The same runs for preinstalled Windows. What you can do is get a PC without a preinstalled OS. You have the right to have it, but probably it will cost you quite some time arguing on the phone, etc. Sad. "For one PC only" means, I think, for the PC using whatever part they have attached the Windows serial number sticker on.
And a cracker is sometimes called as "hacker", but all slashdotters easily accept this change.. ..or not ?
You can reenable it after installing Deamon Tools and Alcohol (at least it worked for me).
Here in Italy it's a crime not helping someone in danger of death. Of course this cannot be applied in the corner cases you mentioned, as they are made up borderline cases to put the law down. Note that, however, calling 118 (the emergency) is usually enough (and actually it should be the only thing you should do, if you are not a trained medical). This law is enforced in so many cases you can't even think of. And it's good.
This raises an interesting question. Of course you can flame MS down as you want and surely in the past they used integration in the OS to smash down opponents (DoubleSpace vs Stacker, IE vs Netscape).
But, alas, any OS comes with a bunch of applications in the package. Sometimes they can be uninstalled (galeon) sometimes they cannot (internet explorer, konqueror if you use kde) - but does this really matter ? Does the average Joe stop using IE and use Firefox instead if IE could be uninstalled ?
Seriously some applications move towards the OS itself. This was for file compression, for local disk browsers, for disk checking programs, then for internet browsers and for media players. The chance for the third party market to survive lasts as long as the OS integrated tool is not up to (some users') expectations (for example zip folders didn't destroy WinZip's and WinRar's market, and Defrag didn't quite kill third party defragmenters and XP firewall didn't kill third party firewalls).
The question is : how much can be integrated in any OS [or any other product] ? This is a question which hits the Linux market hard, too. Most distros have more and more software integrated every day. Sure it's free software, but when you work at Opera, does really make a difference if you lose your job to Internet Explorer or to Firefox ?
Figure this scenario out : MS buys Jasc (the authors of Paint Shop Pro). They integrates PSP in the OS. Adobe sues MS. MS line of defense is : hey every OS around has a a similar great program built in! Look almost every Linux distro comes with this "the Gimp" installed. Why they can and we cannot ? It's normal for an OS to have a graphics program built in..
This is not to say MS is not interested in blowing away opponents with unfair competition, and I don't want to say that it's wrong to have Linux distros inflated with so many sw packages including office suites (EEK!), browsers, media players, CADs, games, servers of any kind. Still this is a problem which is hard to solve.
1) If Windows had protected the antispyware program in some special way, we were now all complaining about antispyware being considered "special" by the OS and thus being in unfair competition with other spyware programs.
..Go and flame me now.
2) On any Unix machine you have to be root to install most of the software (you usually have to be root before rpm or make install) : a simple trojan relying on *stupid* user behaviour can be written for any platform and this is not a security problem of the platform, is a security problem of the user's brain.
3) From 2, even if the default user was not administrator, most people would simply try to install this new porn-lemmings game they received and they would "run as" it (just like you su - make install on linux).
4) It's not even only a problem in the user brain. I wonder how much would it take to discover 5 malicious lines inserted in some big open source project. This *is* a possible evet, it could be an angry sourceforge employer, a security hole somewhere, a
5) It seems to me whatever the choice of MS is in any particular matter, there is always someone who takes it to bash it down. When the fact is ridiculous like in this example, this kind of behaviour is detrimental to the whole community. Do you live to make Linux great ? Than use your time to make it the perfect OS, not to make Windows appear the worst OS ever - 90% of users have chosen it as the best product for them and they will not change their mind because you are bashing it down, they will change their mind when they'll see something better *for them*.
The world would be overrun with spyware, virii and other malware for OS/2, or for NeXT or for any other OS. Noone in the world is able to release an OS without bugs and the only thing which may change is the latency between bug discovery and the needed patch. Average users would still run their OS as administrator/root/whatever because it's easier. And they would not update anyway because.. hey it's boring! And they will use an empty password because it's simpler! I use mainly Windows, both at home and at work. 0 virii, no spyware, no malware. In those things the responsibility of the OS is 2%, the responsibility of the (un)conscious and/or (un)educated user is 98%.
Windows *has* a live CD (Windows PE if I remember correctly).
It's not free (maybe you even need MSDN subscription, I don't know), but there is one.
Still for emergency administration tasks on Xandros and Windows you can just use any Linux (or BSD or anything else) live cd and get the work done. The same, I think, for MacOSX.
"supports open source" ...
IBM will support open source as long as it will make money out of it. The difference between IBM and SCO is that IBM is making money out of the linux market, SCO is losing (and losing much). SCO is the only unix vendor to my knowledge which is not selling hardware. IBM, Sun, HP, and to some extent SGI, decided they could still make money out of hardware and custom software going the linux way. SCO is just losing. Sure they could lose with more style and sincerely what they are doing cannot be justified.
What is wrong with patents is that you can issue a patent for pretty simple things (simple hardware pieces or simple software, or even concepts!), patents which could've been filed by any 10 y.o. teenager.
I'm not bothered if a company patents a way to make electricity out still air, or a gigawonderful compression algorithm which is able to pack an mp3 in 1/4 of the space with no quality loss. I'm bothered if a company patents a simple mechanical object, a single click to buy on the internet or the concept of doubleclicking to activate an object or the way a circle can be draw on the screen.
And the guilt is not of the companies who patent easy things, but of the patent system which allows this kind of behaviour.
IBM and Microsoft can be equally as evil really. There is no difference on who receives a patent.
:)
Now IBM politics are in favour of free sw just because IBM is now making money out of Linux and Microsoft is losing money because of it.
Whenever it will be the other way around, we'll be all here crying for the evilness of IBM and how M$ could save us all. Really think about what could've happened if OS2 was the winner and Windows the loser.
Probably what now seems so absurd could have been reality.
Patents are evil, whoever receives them. And they are evil both for free sw and for proprietary one. And they are evil both for sw as for hw.
We feel sw patents being more evil just because of the peculiar qualities of sw (being a product with almost no additional costs other than those of the creation of the first prototype), but really hw patents are as evil and sometimes as stupid.
Check behind your Nokia phone, the Sim retention mechanism. Do you really feel that thing needs a patent ? Do you think its mechanic is so smarter to be granted a patent ? Do you feel that patent is much better than the "single click" Amazon patent ? [Don't know if it has been granted the patent and if it's still that kind of mechanism, the last Nokia I had was the 5110 and had two pieces of plastic with the simplest mechanic of this world patent pending]
I think we, as a society, should reconsider the whole patent system. It's effectiveness is changed in its 200 years of life, and its dangers too. Patents were meant to protect IP and R&D investiments, now it's becoming a mean to convert ideas into money without the risks involved in production.
Long post sorry