Alright, so after a short respite and much thought, here goes with the third part of the unintentional multi-part series on the software business model and how it interacts with FOSS.

In Martin Owen's most recent article on the subject in continuation of this series, he pointed out several good points that I would like to address. So lets jump right into it:

"Proprietary software isn’t useful to the community, it’s useful to individuals."

This is indeed true. The community itself and it's development of software has no use for software it cannot touch. However, that said, closed source software does have its uses. Mr. Owen's point in his previous two articles seems to be one simple fact.

The closed source business model is not one to work inside the community, instead open source software should be commissioned by the users/businesses that need it, there by the creativity and development of the software life cycle would be rewarded, not the distribution.

While I do not disagree (to a point) with the concept, and do believe it would be beneficial to the FOSS community to use these business practices versus the traditional software development model. I also think there will require a bridge between the two business models, a stop gap if you will. That stop gap is in-fact the FOSS community semi-adopting and supporting closed source applications.

This is where my point gets clear. While closed source software development and the business model to make money based on its distribution rather than its actual production may someday become a thing of legacy, there has to be a bridge to the future. While it is possible for a single business to change an entire industry, and more over in this case, an entire culture, it is far less likely to do so from outside its own sector. What I mean by this is software companies like Microsoft and all that follow this model, will not directly compete with companies that produce open source software, thus they have no incentive to change.

Lets take Canonical for example. While Canonical does help to produce Ubuntu, a choice (a great one by the way) in operating systems, and OEMs are adopting that choice in their production lines, there is no real competition in the market for Microsoft.

The average home and business user of Microsoft Windows when looking at the choice between Linux and Windows will have the same question each time.

Will all my software work on with Linux?

The honest answer is, no. Not all their applications will work with Linux, and if that isn't bad enough for these users, the population of them that would be willing to change if there were even replacements, cannot be satisfied either. Thus, the lack of competition for Microsoft Windows and Microsoft based products.

Closed Source development companies have a very simple goal, make as much money as possible with as little overhead as possible. Most applications on the market were designed with mass production in mind. It is a very small fraction of applications that are currently produced with a small group of users for the target audience.

This brings me to my next point, Microsoft has the market majority (the link is just for a little humor). Since Microsoft has the majority and no competition, what reason does a development company have to try to change to the open source business model when they are targeting the largest audience possible?

What if suddenly some additional audience was available with little to no extra work to these development firms? What if suddenly Linux and Windows had the ability to run the same software from the same vendors (I mean beyond Wine and Virtual Machines)?

It would seem if suddenly Windows users noticed they could have better support via the community, the same easy access to commercial software as Windows, and an easier to use operating system, users would have to think hard why they continue to spend all their hard earned money on an operating system when there are so many great distributions such as Ubuntu, and they are free to use it as they so chose, suddenly the dynamic of competition with the Microsoft world would change.

If my proposed bridge where to work, companies like Canonical who have deep roots in the open source community, could be the revolutionaries. The Microsoft and closed source development firms would be forced into competing in a market where the business model Mr. Owen has proposed is the norm. This competition would be the driving force for businesses of the traditional closed source model to make the change to the open source model.

Finally, the point is while the closed source business, due to lack of competition among other things will not make the change to open source, I believe if the FOSS community were to build the bridge, they would use it.

Donate, I know you want to!