Reading09

    I was raised with the phrase “Every penny counts”, which led me to understand that the small things can add up. When talking about services instead of software I thought of a car. It is not a one-time investment, although you do pay a lot upfront, there are other costs such as insurance, gas, tune-ups, etc. I was taught how to change a headlight, tire, and oil change, which is crazy cheap compared to the labor costs and other associated fees with those services. Although it is different than the software industry, I brought this up to show that you can definitely make money providing a service especially if it is recurring. The idea of use value vs sale value is important and relates directly to the open source service vs software discussion. Both the service and use value cases are reoccurring events that encourage community development and self-sustaining features as discussed in the examples of Apache and Cisco. In the example, they could reach more people and even dominate the industry in Appache’s case.  It is hard for me to grasp, but the examples of the service business models reach more people, and in the open source world, the more the merrier.

    In my opinion, those who choose to contribute to the open-source community have a different mentality than those in the closed-source world. In reference to the rent example, open-source contributors already know that they will not get much money if any, their reasoning and expectation of sharing their work is not based on monetary gain. Because of this, I can see how certain industries will be more open-source than others. With the conversation of money, sometimes open source can be treated like a nonprofit. Apache for example does not ask for anything, but people and big corporations donate to it. I am sure it is something they could write off on their taxes which helps and is one option, however, there has to be something more. Red Hat brings the subscriptions and cost of support features to aid in revenue creation.  These things may seem small, but as I said in the beginning, things can add up. It may not seem that it will work but that is assuming many won't use it. When questioning if open source is worth it, oftentimes I forget to include the number of people it will bring to the table.  I don’t think open core is hindering the development of open source. It seems like a great compromise between getting money and freeing information, you get the best of both worlds. Just because everything is not free, does not mean that people will stop contributing or using open-source resources.

    The internet was created that long ago, ESR brings up a good point that” In a swiftly changing world, in a rapidly complexifying and information-centered economy, there will always be plenty of work and a healthy demand for people who can make computers do things—no matter how much time and how many secrets they give away.” Open source is definitely different from the typical profit/business models, but it has already exceeded expectations and demonstrated its adaptability to the various use value and sale value cases. At the end of the day, I feel like open source may not make sense, but it can work. Red Hat and Apache show that open source can coexist and thrive within proprietary closed-source environments. There is power in the numbers open source brings and the unique culture created from it. I don't think the model is broken, at least I hope it is not.