March 22nd, 2005
PC Forum: Is open source a movement or a working model?
Mitchell Baker and Kim Polese joined Esther for a panel on trends in open source. Baker said that the call for a smaller set of licenses is gaining some traction, especially in developing interoperability among 
the licenses, although the GPL is problematic on that front. Questioning whether the right entity exists as a balancing point for dealing with the licensing issues, she mentioned existing organizations, OSDL or OSI, as possible candidates to unravel the licensing complexities.
Baker also addressed security issues, saying that not being part of an operating system is a phenomenal advantage, but that deploying patches is problematic. "What’s really complex is the release process, what you do with the fix." In addition, security problems that involve human behavior and interaction–not classic code failure–are not easily resolved. Some of the trade-offs in the Firefox browser involve some inconvenience: "Not having ActiveX is less convenient for users–that is, until you get hacked. We don’t want those vulnerabilities, and only now in the last few months has the trade-off been more apparent," Baker said.
Polese called open source a condition of human existence, and was how humanity advanced and changed over millennia. She shouldn’t assume, however, that one group of hunters and gatherers didn’t have a proprietary technology (an aerodynamic spear) that gave them an advantage over another tribe when competing for resources. Proprietary systems, like traditional IT, are the result of system complexity, the work required to make all the moving parts work together. Polese said the open source usage in enterprises is far more widespread than reported. Reasons for the veil of secrecy, she said, include companies’ fears about opening themselves up to legal troubles. The Web, according to Polese, absolves the need for proprietary systems– which is another bit of overstatement.
Polese’s company, SpikeSource, is developing an automated testing harness for validating, integrating, testing, certifying, and supporting combinations of open source components. "We started testing six OSs, six language run-times, and more than 60 components. We’ll probably start with 15 to 20 stacks and over time add more and test subsets of stacks," Polese said. SpikeSource might also provide its automated testing environment for internal use by customers.
Baker and Polese also claimed that the market is evolving to support more open source applications, replacing traditional enterprise applications. But there are few applications, like Firefox, that have much share. Much of the open source software is used in conjunction with closed source/proprietary software. Most open source companies say that they have different economics than traditional software companies, and avoid costly marketing and sales investments. "We are not building a sales force. Customers won’t pay for expensive sales reps–those days are gone forever. Our best PR will come from developers," Polese said. That makes sense for startups, hoping that word of mouth and the download, pilot and go model will be sufficient to build a customer base, and you have a simple proposition and can move fast.
Dan Farber, editor-in-chief of CNET News.com, has more than 20 years of experience as an editor and journalist covering technology. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
