November 18th, 2009

Google-Microsoft rivalry on with ChromeOS launch

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 6:04 am

Categories: General, Google, Internet, Linux, Linux Desktop OS, Linux Laptop, Microsoft, Strategy, marketing

Tags: Google Inc., Microsoft Corp., Web Browser, ChromeOS, Chrome, Linux, Netbooks, Nettops & MIDs, Web Browsers, Operating Systems, UNIX

The daily competition between Google and Microsoft becomes ever-more direct this week, with Google hosting a demo of its ChromeOS tomorrow, right after Microsoft’s Professional Development conference.

ChromeOS is Google’s version of Linux for netbooks, much as Android is its Linux for handhelds. It is a version of Bill Gates’ nightmares from 15 years ago, as Netscape was rising, visions that led directly to the case of U.S. vs. Microsoft.

Microsoft got through that crisis unscathed in a corporate sense, but its image was transformed from that of a user-friendly upstart to that of “an implacable force for evil,” as one comedy show said recently, exemplified by the famous Boardwatch cover of Bill Gates as a member of the Borg, the Star Trek bad guys.

The fear, old programming hands will tell you, was that Netscape would turn its Mozilla browser into a full-fledged operating system that, because of its dominance of the browser space, could beat Windows in the market.

Chrome is a lot like that. It is centered on the browser, which abstracts the complexity of Linux from the user. And it’s designed to load fast, a real Achilles Heel for Windows on a netbook. An early version could be available for download next week.

When you’re paying $300 for your machine, you don’t want to wait 10 minutes for the thing to start, and you don’t want to be paying a lot for your software, either. ChromeOS is designed to fix both problems, so I am looking forward to it.

The hope is that the industry which supports ChromeOS will make up in services what it loses in up-front fees. And Google will be able to tie all its online services to ChromeOS, increasing its market share in areas like Mail where it is not yet dominant.

So, Mr. Bill, is resistance futile?

November 11th, 2009

Linux to your grandma this Christmas

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 6:38 am

Categories: Distributions, General, Linux, Linux Desktop OS, business models, marketing

Tags: Grandma, British Broadcasting Corp., Valerie Singleton, Linux, UNIX, Operating Systems, Productivity, Open Source, Software, Dana Blankenhorn

It’s really just another demonstration of what Linux can do.

It started with a BBC story and quickly became an Internet detective piece.

(If you recognize this picture you’re either a middle-aged Brit or a trivia expert. The lady at the center is the entry point for what follows. She is shown in her mid-1960s heyday hosting the BBC children’s show Blue Peter.)

According to the BBC former children’s presenter  Valerie Singleton (center at right), now running a Web site of discounts for seniors, got together with a small computer store chain recently to offer a PC for older folks who’ve never touched one before.

On start-up users could first see a video from Ms. Singleton, demonstrating the basics, then face six big buttons for applications that are all built-in.

A BBC reviewer called it both patronizing and expensive, but the 80 year-old computing newbie he brought with him appreciated the gentle learning curve. We all know so much, even kids know so much, about computing, that going back to a time when it was all new is hard to conceive. But for some that’s reality.

Then came the detective work. I wanted to verify what the BBC was saying, after all.

• Singleton’s Discount Age makes no mention of the offer on its home page — you have to go inside.
• The man credited by the BBC as the designer makes no mention of the offer on his own blog — he’s drinking in sorrow over turning 42.
• The computer store is a billboard site.
• The help site referenced in the story makes no mention of the offer.
• There is a Linux called Simplicity, which released a new version last month, but it’s apparently no relation to what Singleton is trying to do.  (Simplicity Linux focuses on making old hardware useful.)

Turns out all this is a sales channel. Valerie Singleton, her site, the computer store, the designer, they’re all acting as a channel for Eldy, an Italian outfit which offers a Linux interface based upon Linux Mint, focused on the needs of old newbies.

Which means our detective story has become A Christmas Carol.

Let’s say you have a grandma, or grandpa, here in the U.S., who has never used a computer, claims not to care, but whom you know is just blustering because they don’t know the first thing of what to do.

Check out Eldy. They have a nice slide show on their home page demonstrating the features and benefits of the software.

Then, if you like, download Eldy to whatever hardware you have, load it on an old laptop, and spring it on them for your Christmas visit, sitting by their side as they learn it.

They won’t have Ms. Singleton, but your American grandma likely doesn’t know Valerie Singleton from Adam’s Off Ox.

Once grandma gets the hang of things, they can turn off the Eldy interface and have a solid, basic Linux to work with. They’ll be programming rings around you by Easter.

Who says Santa Claus has to have a long, white beard, or that he only cares about the needs of children? We’re all children — you, me, Valerie Singleton, and your grandma — inside.

Help one this Christmas.

November 5th, 2009

What would make you trust Microsoft?

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 6:14 am

Categories: General, Microsoft, Strategy, management, marketing

Tags: Microsoft Corp., Open Source, Dana Blankenhorn

In some ways these are the best of times for Microsoft, and open source gets some credit for that.

(I found this charming mashup of Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer as Dr. Evil at The Big Deal, a blog by Stefano Buliani.)

Without the competition of open source, I doubt Microsoft’s trend toward bureaucracy could have ever been slowed. Every company goes through its own aging process, and renewal only occurs under pressure.

Open source has strained every muscle Microsoft has — legal, marketing, development, management — but the recession of the last year has brought a turn. Resistance within the open source industry to Microsoft’s entry has gone down. This is easy to see in the writings of our own Matt Asay.

The success of the CodePlex Foundation has given Microsoft another entree into the Fortunate 500. It has allowed Microsoft to be the rabbi of these companies as they approach open source, making strategic code releases and building their own internal communities.

Then there have been Microsoft’s own code releases, which have accelerated since OSI approval of its branded licenses. Plus that sweet, sweet Windows 7 cash.

All in all, a good year. A year of peace and progress. And I can hear you grinding your teeth from here.

Despite all of Microsoft’s actions these last few years, the company remains intensely controversial among open source advocates. For me to write the word Microsoft (Microsoft, Microsoft) here at the open source blog leads to a Pavlovian response.

Actually it leads to two Pavlovian responses. There’s the “Microsoft is evil” response, and a corresponding “Microsoft is not evil” response. And this distrust, this air of controversy, continues to cost Microsoft money.

Microsoft executives still have to walk into open source meetings with shields up, while continuing to protect their bureaucratic flanks within the company. This is easy to see when you hear the smiles on former Microsoft open source executives as they speak from their new gigs. It’s wearing.

Since I began writing this blog, nearly 5 years ago, I have watched Microsoft seek to transform itself from a company that sold code to one that sells the services code provides, and I have watched open source projects see the value in having commercial arms that protect more of their right to make money from copyright.

What I have not seen is any reduction in intensity when I write the word Microsoft, from readers, e-mail correspondents, or the open source people I meet.

Why is that, I wonder. Are all those who hate Microsoft extremists, and will Microsoft ever find happiness in an open source world?

November 2nd, 2009

Blackboard embraces and extends into open source movement

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 6:09 am

Categories: Applications, General, Google, Implementations, Infrastructure, Strategy, business models, content, education, marketing

Tags: Open Source Movement, Open Source, Dana Blankenhorn

Anyone seeking a case study of how a proprietary software company can “embrace and extend” itself into the open source world should stop thinking Microsoft and start thinking Blackboard.

(Picture from the University of Alaska. Bonus points if you find a link to Russia from the site.)

Blackboard has a long-running feud with open source, ably chronicled by our own Christopher Dawson. Open source Learning Management Systems (LMSs) like Moodle, Sakai and OLAT have been seeking its market share for five years now.

Part of the solution was to open source tools for use with its proprietary suite. Blackboard may have been overly-aggressive in pushing this as a true open source solution but it wasn’t finished yet.

Phase Two involves signing alliances with educators and lining up scaled resources from within the open source ecosystem.

Today’s news brings an example.

It’s a deal with Northwestern University (Go Wildcats) to integrate its Blackboard Learn platform within Google Apps as a single sign-on. The Building Block itself is open source, Google Apps is based on open source, but here’s the imprimatur of a major University (and big customer) linking a proprietary LMS into it.

Earlier this year Blackboard signed a deal with Flat World Knowledge, the open source textbook publisher we’ve written of here, to integrate Flat World textbooks with Blackboard Learn.

Given Blackboard’s position as a market leader, and its open source Building Blocks for handling the integration, the move by Flat World is logical and justifiable.

The result, however, is that despite open source a proprietary LMS is more entrenched than ever within its marketplace.

October 26th, 2009

Ubuntu celebrates Thursday drop of koala desktop and server

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 12:53 pm

Categories: Cloud Computing, Distributions, General, Linux, Linux Desktop OS, Linux Laptop, Linux Server OS, marketing, virtualization

Tags: Ubuntu, Server, GNOME 2.28, Desktops, Hardware, Dana Blankenhorn

Ubuntu held a teleconference this afternoon to celebrate the Thursday launch of its new desktop and server edition, karmic koala.

The new desktop is built around “Ubuntu One,”a collection of backup, note and contact synchronization and file-sharing services integrated into the operating system, offering 2 Gigabytes of free storage and more by subscription.

The Firefox 3.5 browser and improved audio support are also part of the offering. GNOME 2.28 is the shipping desktop interface.

On the server side the situation is more cloudy, but in a good way with the addition of full support for Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud, from Eucalyptus Systems, that lets you create your own mini-cloud based on open source. The clouds feature host and guest virtualization under KVM and guest virtualization under Xen.

Most new features were previewed in April.

A complete online tour of the new desktop is already online. A list of supported netbooks is available, but the company is suggesting you pack a thumb drive with its Ubuntu Netbook Remix when you go to the store, just to make sure. Should make Friday at Fry’s fun.

October 13th, 2009

Wikipedia productized

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 9:20 am

Categories: Applications, General, Hardware, business models, content, marketing, mass market, publishing

Tags: Encyclopedia, Wikipedia, Wiki, Online Communications, Dana Blankenhorn

Perhaps no business has been so transformed by open source as encyclopedias.

The appearance of Wikipedia, and its many cousins, rivals and inlaws, has wrecked the business. Even giant Microsoft’s Encarta has succumbed, as of the end of this month.

We all know the jokes about Wikipedia’s accuracy, but since it beat the Encyclopedia Brittanica in a blind taste test nearly four years ago attention has focused more on making it better, or creating rivals to it, than knocking the idea of open source, crowdsourced content.

And now it’s in a box. Meet the Wikireader.

It’s about the size of a portable alarm clock, with a one-color screen, a MicroSD card, and a touchscreen with three buttons, running on two AAA batteries. Update the card on the company’s Web site or they’ll send you four updates a year for $30. The retail price is $99.

The designer is Sean Moss-Pultz, last seen helming the failed OpenMoko mobile phone project. It’s cute, and it has enough marketing muscle behind it to have a chance.

Will we see it under your Christmas tree this year? Maybe you know a kid who can use it, or a know-it-all relative.

It’s also part of a general trend, specialized, mass market devices designed to access just one piece of the Web. Certainly a trend worth watching.

I don’t know if you’ve ever thought of owning a really fine set of encyclopedias (my office has one from 1883) and I don’t know if you’d call Wikipedia fine. But at $99 it’s cheap as chips.

October 12th, 2009

Why the big Android bandwagon?

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 8:19 am

Categories: General, Google, Hardware, Linux Handheld, Strategy, business models, marketing, mass market, mobile, wireless

Tags: Google Inc., Android Bandwagon, Open Source, Dana Blankenhorn

We have had open source mobile platforms for years. Why has Android become a bandwagon, one big enough that people are wondering if it’s not growing too big for its britches.

One word: marketing.

Thanks to its low-cost structure, Google can subsidize the marketing of its products to a degree even experienced rivals can’t match. As I have said before there is a price lower than free, and Google is uniquely positioned to pay that price.

Why? Look at the ad above, for the HTC myTouch, from Vimeo. All those celebrities aren’t just selling T-Mobile, or HTC. They are also selling Google. Android gave Google an excuse to do TV ads, with others’ help. Even if it doesn’t sell phones it sells the Google brand, and Google benefits from that.

It’s all about the sharing. By spreading the development effort through open source, Google also spreads the marketing cost as various players vie for position. But Google’s size and budget are what make this a good deal for everyone else.

Symbian and RIM can’t pay this price to the degree Google can. Symbian was spun-out to become self-sustaining, and its developer outreach efforts may be all it can do. RIM has a proprietary background, and proprietary profits, so for it to grab open source may easily be seen as desperation.

Google has both the money and the reputation to push product through the channel that has its roots in open source. Its multiplicity of developers means all of them have an incentive to drive down the open source incline and the open source development incline.

Google may eventually seek to monetize all this with online services, but it is developing the market before showing its hand in that area. Meanwhile, the ad revenue from having Web pages appear on more mobile kit is all it really needs. (Yes, this means the iPhone is subsidizing Android.)

Google’s cost structure gives it the power to be patient, something no other market player has. The Android bandwagon is built on this patience.

To succeed, however, it will have to deliver products as good or better than the iPhone, at the same or less cost, with just as many apps. That risk to its reputation is all Google is laying on the line here, but since failure will also hurt open source that risk is also shared.

October 9th, 2009

The best protection for software assets

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 11:39 am

Categories: Government, Legal, Microsoft, Patents, management, marketing

Tags: Asset, Software, Patent, Microsoft Corp., Roberto Galoppini, Tools & Techniques, Open Source, Management, Dana Blankenhorn

Roberto Galoppini has an interesting piece running today on Codeplex, and how to improve it.

I can’t say much more than “attaboy” about it, but he ends with an interesting comment:

Software patents are not legal here in Europe, and Europe uses a lot of open source software.

As a commenter here wrote earlier today, much of the controversy surrounding open source involves patents, which he calls the “Fight Club” of software. (That’s what Brad Pitt is doing here.)

Without the argument over patents, what would Microsoft be doing that was controversial regarding open source? Some of its licenses are one-sided, but so are its contributions to the code protected by those licenses. The MS-PL license is also OSI-approved.

One point I have made many times — as have people much wiser than I am — is that patent protection isn’t that great a deal. You have to reveal your invention. The rights don’t last that long.

Contrast this with copyright and trademark. This story, and the logo above it, will have legal protection long after Microsoft’s so-called Linux “patents” are forgotten.

When people “pay” for software, what are they really buying? Support. They want to know needed updates will come in, that someone is back there stamping out bugs, protecting us from bad guys, and enhancing the code.

We convey this information through a trademark, not patents.

The difference between open source and proprietary software is visibility, nothing more. Why am I signing a contract for software I can see? To acknowledge your copyright on it, not your patent rights.

All the controversy between Microsoft and open source would be over if the Supreme Court followed Red Hat’s recent brief in the Bilski case, and stripped out rights previous courts had given software companies, rights that have proven to be little but trouble, protecting only monopoly and not innovation.

Perhaps Microsoft might add an “amen” to that brief. Can I hear an amen?

October 5th, 2009

How open source defends itself in the PR wars

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 5:50 am

Categories: General, Infrastructure, Internet, LANs and WANs, Network Administration, Security, marketing

Tags: BIND, Nominem, Domain Names, Public Relations, Open Source, Internet, Marketing, Corporate Communications, Dana Blankenhorn

At first, opposing candidates were shocked when Web users used the Web to fisk their latest campaign charges, often turning them back on the attacker inside the same news cycle.

They adapted, and eventually companies like Nominem will, too.

I offered snark in reaction to Nominem’s attack on BIND as “legacy freeware”. But it did not take long for the DNS community to offer more:

• Nominem was subject to DNS cache poisoning attacks open source alternatives were not.
• Nominem’s Web server runs on Apache, which is open source.
• Nominem was founded to develop a version of BIND.

Nominem’s PR people did the best they could under the circumstances, but they were Custer at Little Big Horn, surrounded and under constant fire.

Open source attacks tend to be like zombies in that they demand human sacrifices before they go away. The Skye executive who started this kerfluffle, Jon Shalowitz, (above) might want to avoid any open mics for a while.

Next time Jon and his fellow Stanford Business School alums get together for a chat he’ll have a story for them.

October 2nd, 2009

Open source is sold and FOSS is not

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 7:04 am

Categories: FOSS, GPL, General, business models, marketing, values

Tags: GPL, F/OSS, Matt, Alfresco, Open Source, Dana Blankenhorn

I have spent many pleasant hours with Matt Asay’s latest, “The wrong marketing for open source.”

I think I finally figured it out. Matt says that FOSS software can’t be sold while open source can be.

This is a feature, not a bug. It’s why the GNU smiles.

Much of my confusion involves the GPL and FOSS. The GPL was created as a FOSS license but it remains the most popular open source license out there.

I explained the reason in my 2006 piece The Open Source Incline. Giving outside contributors the same rights you enjoy is the best way to encourage their participation. For an open source company the GPL helps drive development and the construction of a community, which it needs to thrive.

So the GPL, while created for FOSS, is also used by open source. And there remains a key difference between FOSS software and open source, which Matt nails. Open source is sold and FOSS is not.

What marks a FOSS project is not its license but the motivation behind it. A FOSS project is not driven by dreams of financial gain. It’s driven by dreams of service, of shared effort helping all boats rise. The Mozilla Foundation is not about the Benjamins even though Firefox uses a Mozilla license rather than the GPL. Money keeps things moving but no one is getting rich.

Open source combines the shared effort of FOSS and marries it to the profit motive. Open source developers share code in order to sell support, or services, or products built using the code. The key word in the previous sentence is sell.

Open source is sold, FOSS is downloaded. Open source companies are looking for a profit, FOSS projects are looking to get by, to grow, to serve and to share.

Matt makes his living as an open source executive with Alfresco. Alfresco uses the GPL, but it’s an open source company, not a FOSS project. Alfresco wants to make money. Making money is good.

But how much money? To an open source company, the answer is as much as possible. To a FOSS project the answer is enough to get by.

There is nothing wrong with either model. Both can, in fact, use the same licenses, or different licenses. But if someone comes to you wearing a suit, a smile, and their hand out, it matters little what license their wares may carry. They’re still a salesman.

They’re open source.

September 30th, 2009

Missing what open source cannot afford

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 6:00 am

Categories: General, business models, management, marketing

Tags: Advertisement, Matt, Open Source, Dana Blankenhorn

In order to deliver you free code open source companies must eliminate functions a regular company can only squeeze.

(Picture from The Great Elsewhere in South Carolina’s Upstate.)

What you’re left with are development, support, and leadership. If any money is coming in, it’s coming in for support. Even if you’re not doing all the development yourself, you must still organize and direct it. Then there’s leadership, which can be as simple as a boss and a secretary to keep the lights on.

Trouble is, unless you can find an additional business model (hardware, SaaS) there is never any additional money to pay for things traditional companies take for granted.

Such as:

Advertising — I’ve been doing this blog for nearly five years and chances are good there’s still a Microsoft ad next to it. (I just checked and goody-goody there’s Novell.) Sometimes there’s an IBM ad. (There is today.) But the open source corporate bench is now wide and deep. Where is my Alfresco ad? Matt is dead right on this.

Tschotskes — Yiddish for “little gift.” (Yiddish is the second language of the New York diaspora.) Marc Fleury once gave me a JBOSS t-shirt riffing on the movie “Napoleon Dynamite.” But generally the cupboards are bare. Quite a contrast to the PC beat or the Internet beat, or even the medical beat where inscribed pens, shirts, gimcracks and gewgaws are de rigeur.

Travel — Does Linus Torvalds even have a frequent flyer account? A few luminaries like Stallman, Perens, and Shuttleworth go to exotic locales (or come from them) but the average open source exec-on-the-street knows mainly the Portland coffee shops and perhaps the train schedule to San Jose.

Bonuses — I don’t think these have disappeared entirely. If you can get a hospital or Fortunate 500 outfit to sign their name on the line that is dotted on a support or services contract, you deserve a bonus. But this does not happen often.

Marketing – Most of the marketing I see coming out of open source is public relations, and sorry to say it is little changed from when I started in journalism 30 years ago. Everything is still pitched from the client’s point of view, not the writer’s and not the publication’s. I think this budget can be squeezed further. Maybe send us some tschotskes instead.

Fancy Dinners — No, taking the development team out for eggs after they have pulled another all-nighter does not count. Fancy Feast does not count, either. Open source had traded in their Starbucks cups for McCafe long before that became fashionable. I know they eat well at the Googleplex, but they’re an online outfit, not an open source company.

Strategery — I know, it’s spelled strategy. But if Forrester or the other old-line market research outfits depended on open source the Forrester walk would be to the end of a plank (followed by the sound of a splash). Research? What do you think beta code is for?

These are just a few of the functions I grew accustomed to over 20 years covering technology that I have seen very little of since joining the open source beat almost five years ago.

Perhaps you can think of some others.

September 23rd, 2009

Why Africa gets the IBM-Ubuntu bundle and you do not

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 8:22 am

Categories: Cloud Computing, FOSS, General, IBM, Linux, Linux Laptop, business models, marketing

Tags: Ubuntu, Africa, IBM Corp., Government, Vertical Industries, Linux, Operating Systems, Software, Dana Blankenhorn

Irregular readers of this space may be wondering why IBM and Ubuntu are partnering on a Linux bundle for Africa but not here.

It’s something regular readers should have memorized by now.

There is a price lower than free.

Note the go-to-market strategy, as detailed by our fearless leader Larry Dignan:

IBM said it will distribute the SmartWork client through Africa via local service providers such as Inkululeko and ZSL Inc. The aim is to spread the IBM/Canonical software through government and educational institutions and businesses.

The short version is that IBM and Canonical (Ubuntu’s commercial arm) are mainly going to load the software on government and ISP servers, then wait for the clients to come to them.

This is not how developed markets work. Developed markets work through distribution. Vendors must invest heavily to push product through the channel, as well as support it. This is why Taiwanese OEMs abandoned Linux for Windows last year.

Netbook hardware will ship to Africa running Windows, but the IBM download will transform those machines into Ubuntu devices that handle some client functions locally but can also go online to connect people together. This is a good deal for IBM because its investment is low and already made up in favorable publicity.

My problem is the cloud. We already know how bad Africa’s online links are. When the best broadband in South Africa is outrun by a pigeon with a stick memory strapped to its leg, we are talking s-l-o-w. The infrastructure there just can’t handle a cloud-based solution.

Instead of offering the software via download, it might be better to put sticks on thousands of pigeons and just let them loose.

In fact the real hope is that the endorsement of a government or university will make this a standard offering on their local networks.

It’s up to Canonical to make all this work. Founder Mark Shuttleworth is South African by birth. This deal has his name written all over it. It will be an immense challenge to scale this effort up, assuming the IBM name and Shuttleworth’s fame lead governments to support it.

And you have to figure that if he can make it there, he can make it anywhere…but he can’t even try for New York until he has scaled a solution thousands are happy with.

September 23rd, 2009

BIND is not just legacy freeware

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 6:14 am

Categories: Cloud Computing, Database Management, General, Infrastructure, Internet, business models, marketing

Tags: Freeware, DNS, BIND, Shalowitz, Domain Names, Networking, Internet, Dana Blankenhorn

In pushing his SaaS DNS offering, Skye, general manager John Shalowitz has his marketing department partying like it’s 1999.

The open source BIND system that has held the Internet together for decades is “freeware,” he sniffs to ZDNet UK’s Toby Wolfe. “Freeware legacy DNS is the Internet’s dirty little secret.”

What’s wrong with that statement? Just about everything. Open source is not just freeware, calling something legacy just means it’s tested, and there has never been anything secret about BIND, dirty or otherwise.

Or as Yosemite Sam told Bugs Bunny in High Diving Hare, “Dem’s fightin’ woids.”

As to Skye, what can we say? We don’t know what’s in it. It’s proprietary. Shalowitz is basically using wordplay to say what proprietary vendors have told the market for ages. “Trust me.”

And when you’re talking about “cloud-based DNS,” you’re basically trusting someone to do a hosted version of every domain name lookup your company may want to do, now or in the future. You not only toss BIND, but all your internal DNS knowledge out the window, renting a service in which you will never get equity.

It all depends on how you look at it.

Skye comes from Nominum, which has been offering proprietary DNS software for years. Nominum knows its business, but it also knows that BIND is not a piece of garbage hacked together by a couple of college students in their dorm room. It’s a tested package with a long pedigree.

BIND is the reference implementation for the DNS protocols, and remains the most widely-used DNS software on the Internet. To call it “legacy”and “freeware” in pushing a proprietary alternative on mid-sized companies is just several steps beyond silly.

Of course the real question remains, will the pitch work?

September 17th, 2009

The forge as a customer club

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 6:01 am

Categories: Development, General, LANs and WANs, Linux, Network Administration, marketing, support

Tags: Monitoring, Open Source, Dana Blankenhorn

Even after open source companies began insisting on having their own “forge” sites, programmers were the target market.

(Groundwork was a sponsor of the Linux Picn*x in 2007, where this picture was taken. Good times.)

Sites like Appcelerator.com, which I covered last year, offered extensive “atta boys” to developers, letting them put their credibility up-front before  their peers, encouraging contributions of knowledge and code.

Forge sites have continued to evolve, and the new site of Groundwork is a good example of the new trend.

Monitoringforge still welcomes developers, but it aims to be more. Specifically it aims to be a customer’s club.

To quote from the press release:

MonitoringForge is designed to appeal to IT administrators who want to compare and understand the differences between various open source monitoring tools and plugins available today, facilitating the selection of open source monitoring software over proprietary offerings.

Note that they are not just inviting current customers to the site, managers and administrators. They are also inviting prospects, promising to build a community for all those interested in the niche they serve.

That means more than offering Groundwork software and seeking tweaks and tips. It also means what amounts to editorial coverage of other monitoring packages — Nagios, NeDi, and WMI are all on its front page.

Can a vendor deliver what amounts to editorial coverage as part of a sales job and still serve the guys and gals in the corporate boiler room working on code?

September 16th, 2009

If you liked Microsoft CodePlex you will love MySpace FoxForge

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 6:31 am

Categories: GPL, General, Internet, Strategy, marketing, virtualization

Tags: Microsoft Corp., MySpace, Exit Sign, Microsoft Project, Open Source, Microsoft Office, Office Suites, Software, Dana Blankenhorn

OK, the new MySpace open source project is not called FoxForge.

Just because News Corp. owns something does not mean everything on it gets the Fox logo or the Fox attitude.

(After writing this I decided to check out the Web address FoxForge.com and found this cute little guy next to an “under construction” sign and an address at Lycanthrope.net. At last check Foxforge.org was still available.))

In fact the MySpace open source offering is called Qizmt. It’s a GPLv3 MapReduce project aimed at building distributed applications for large clusters of Windows servers.

The software is already being used in a MySpace feature called “People You Know,” writes our own Dave Rosenberg, and MySpace has plans to expand its use.

While this story started with snark, however, I do have a serious question to ask, which relates to both MySpace and Microsoft’s CodePlex. That is, does the ownership of a project color your view of it?

Would Facebook have overtaken MySpace had Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. not bought its parent company, Intermix, in 2005, with a prediction that MySpace would drive traffic to other Fox sites.

I believe the answer to that is no.

The reason is the nature of this medium. You may not care whether a movie comes from 20th Century Fox, or whether the Fox TV network is broadcasting your favorite NFL team this week. But on the Internet it’s easy to walk out. The exit sign is just a mouse click away.

Thus reputation is a crucial asset online, far more important than in the offline world. If you like someone you are inclined to stay with them despite their faults. If you don’t like them you are inclined to not give them a chance.

This colors attitudes toward all Microsoft projects, including CodePlex and its Bing search engine. I take that for granted on this beat. You’re either pro-Microsoft or anti-Microsoft. Middle ground is scarce.

The same is true for Murdoch. People either like his products or hate them. They rush toward them or avoid them. There is little middle ground. This defines a strong niche market, but also makes other parts of the market off-limits.

I believe this colored attitudes towards the music-oriented social network and, unfortunately, most of the target for that product lived in an “anti-Murdoch” world. The question is how that might color reactions toward Qizmt (which I assume is pronounced Kismet, like the Rogers & Hammerstein musical).

Will you think of this as a FoxForge? Or not?

September 16th, 2009

ClarkConnect becomes ClearOS

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 5:48 am

Categories: Distributions, General, Linux, Linux Server OS, marketing

Tags: Enterprise Linux, Network Management, Linux, Open Source, UNIX, Operating Systems, Network Administration, Networking, Software, Dana Blankenhorn

ClarkConnect,  a derivation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux developed to sell network management programs, has been relaunched as ClearOS, targeting links to cloud services with a Foundation and a clear open source structure.

The page on the Foundation site marked EULA (End User License Agreement) now leads to a standard GPL V2 license.

In other ways it’s business as usual. As ClarkConnect the software has been around since 2000 with a service delivery platform, now called ClearCenter, aiming at small organizations with distributed IT environments.

In addition to integrating with what it now calls the ClearCenter cloud, the software boasts integration with Google Apps as well. The community section now has a clearer, brighter interface, complete with the latest Linux comedy videos, and a listing of which members are on the site at any time.

Now, is this just a rebranding or is Clear now a contender in enterprise Linux?

September 11th, 2009

Will new Motorola Google phone Cliq?

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 5:30 am

Categories: General, Google, Hardware, marketing, mobile, wireless

Tags: Google Inc., Brand, Phone, Motorola Inc., Branding, Marketing, Dana Blankenhorn

The code name for what is now the Motorola Cliq was Morrison, and I’m sure during its development some Chicago wags were asking “Tommy or Marion?” (This is Tommy. Use the link to find Marion.)

Its release, as a T-Mobile device, revealed the Android strategy. The phones may run open source, but they are being sold as Google proprietary.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Brands sell. Brands are a shorthand for all sorts of features and benefits, and when you’re marketing millions of units priced at just a few hundred dollars in a mature marketplace you need a brand to push through the clutter.

Motorola was once such a brand. It’s not any more. The hope is that Google is. So on Google Maps, on Google Voice Search, on Google Picasa and GTalk.

That last is also a hint as to where this goes. You release by Labor Day and you’re selling heavily for Christmas. The units sold at the Mobilize show yesterday were black, but expect them soon in red and green.

For carriers, the key question remains the data load this phone delivers, and the money they might make from that data. It’s called ARPU — average revenue per user. But these days it should called ABPU — average bandwidth per user.

By that measure, of course, the iPhone is John Wayne. What will Morrison be?

September 2nd, 2009

Red Hat seeks respect for JBoss and ecosystem

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 5:50 am

Categories: Cloud Computing, Development, General, Red Hat, Strategy, marketing, middleware

Tags: Red Hat Inc., JBoss, Open Source, Java Development Tools, Development Tools, Middleware, Software Development, Software/Web Development, Enterprise Software, Software

Like the late comedian Rodney Dangerfield, Red Hat can’t seem to get any respect.

Reporters hang on every plot twist at Sun, at Firefox, and at Silicon Valley’s open source start-ups, while Raleigh-based Red Hat plugs away, dominating the enterprise Linux market, and the press just yawns.

Even Wall Street feels that way. Since its break-out performance of 2005 Red Hat has mainly traded sideways. Moving to the New York Stock Exchange has not changed the trend.

It might be because, except for its 2006 acquisition of JBoss, Red Hat has kept its head down and focused on business.

This week, with its Red Hat Summit and JBoss World show in Chicago, is no exception. While banging the drum for a webcasted press conference at noon today, Red Hat has announced the following items:

1. A program to link its partner ecosystem.
2. A Java Application Platform targeted at clouds.
3. Version 2.3 of the JBoss Operations Network.
4. A new certification for JBoss application administrators.
5. An open source lab with 60 workstations donated to Carnegie-Mellon.

The only factoid that might wake up sleeping journos here is that the new Carnegie-Mellon lab will be housed in the Gates Center, made possible by a big donation from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Having covered technology for nearly three decades I can state as a fact that there is a big difference between West Coast and East Coast tech companies. East coast outfits tend to be staid and stable, and are often linked in some way to IBM, which epitomizes that style.

But here’s something you probably did not know. Over the last year Red Hat stock, now traded under the symbol RHT, has outperformed the S&P 500, outperformed the Dow Jones average, and even outperformed Microsoft. Its gain in that time is only about 7.5%, but it has gained while others have suffered.

Respect that.

September 1st, 2009

Microsoft lover Citrix as heroine of the open source cloud

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 6:00 am

Categories: Cloud Computing, Distributions, General, Microsoft, Strategy, marketing, virtualization

Tags: Citrix Systems Inc., VMware Inc., Microsoft Corp., Open Source, Virtualization, Hardware, Dana Blankenhorn

Five days after joining its friend Microsoft in walking away from rival VMWorld’s virtualization show, Citrix is portraying itself as the best friend of open source ever with the launch of the Xen Cloud Platform, an open source alternative to VMWare’s vCloud service.

The announcement was linked to Xen.org, the open source project Citrix has sponsored since acquiring Xensource in 2007.

The folks at Forrester call this a bold move, with Linux as its domain 0, a move toward greater cloud compatibility.

The political machinations here are complex. Maintain compatibility with VMWare and deploy your own open source cloud by aligning with an outfit Microsoft was said to be be ready to buy a year ago. (Our own Jason Perlow was among those asking the question, as shown at right.)

In fact the Citrix-Microsoft relationship has always been rather fraught, with analysts like Brian Madden asking who is controlling who.

So now both Citrix and Microsoft are acting like gate-crashers at VMWare’s party, claiming their solution is simpler than VMWare’s own vCenter suite. Oh, and more open source centric.

Can anyone out there relieve this headache I’m getting? I am certain a lover of soap operas can explain it. Meanwhile my question is, where does the interest of open source really lie in all this?

August 28th, 2009

Aussies give open source golden crumbs from Microsoft table

Posted by Dana Blankenhorn @ 7:05 am

Categories: Applications, Enterprise Policy, GPL, General, Microsoft, education, marketing, mass market

Tags: Microsoft Corp., Audacity, FreeMind, MuseScore, Microsoft Windows 7, Open Source, Microsoft Windows, Operating Systems, Software, Dana Blankenhorn

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has begun fulfilling a promise to give every high school student a laptop, offering Lenovo machines with Windows 7 and some open source applications.

Most reporters covering the story down under are focused on the fact that at least 70,000 kids will get Windows 7 before the rest of us. But I would rather focus on those open source applications, which are not what you would call the usual suspects:

• GeoGebra is a package for teaching high school math. It starts with geometry but also branches into algebra and calculus. Created by Marcus Hohenwarter for a master’s thesis at the University of Salzburg, he now runs the project out of Florida State University.
• Audacity is a sound editor also available under Linux. It was launched at Carnegie-Mellon 10 years ago by by Dominic Mazzoni and Roger Dannenberg (Mazzoni is still on the team) and now makes its home on Sourceforge.
• FreeMind is a mind mapping program written in Java. Mind maps are a great way to outline and brainstorm, especially for those of us with ADD. It is not yet at Version 1.0, and it also lives at Sourceforge.
• MuseScore is a music composition and notation program, which has also yet to reach Version 1.0. It recently delivered its first stable release for the Macintosh, and its developers have just begun working on a branding program.

We are often obsessed in technology by control of the operating system, and in the business press by questions of money. But these fine programs are the tip of a very large iceberg, based in academia, that is slowly transforming education and the education process.

The reason you probably don’t hear more of this is because it is subject to what I call Moore’s Law of Training. There is no Moore’s Law of Training. People learn at the rate they learn, and knowledge is spread at a similar rate.

Any teacher interested in any of these Windows programs has to learn to use them, and has to develop coherent lesson plans for them. Both take time. Given how open source eliminates marketing budgets, it also takes time for news of such programs to spread.

But news does spread. News of these programs has spread all the way to Australia, and apparently to the highest realms of the New South Wales government.

With tens of thousands of Australian kids going to class this week carrying these programs they will spread even more quickly. So will curricula based on them. And, unlike 1990s’ multimedia curricula, these will be fairly stable, so long as the programs retain backwards compatibility, as most do.

These may be crumbs from the Microsoft table, but they are important crumbs. Get enough crumbs and you have the whole loaf. That is why I call these golden crumbs.

Almost makes me wish my kids were babies again. Note that I said almost.