How open-source became an important pion in controlling market shares
Written on September 12, 2008 – 12:55 pm
Guest blogger, sharing views on The Next Web
This is a guest post by Dutch New Media student Edial Dekker
In 1986 Richard Stallman wrote his famous manifesto ‘The Free Software Definition’. It was later published by the Free Software Foundation. The text defines free software - free as in the ‘free as in freedom’ sense. The canonical lines of the text became the cornerstones of the GNU Project (later Linux). Today, the manifesto has been published in 39 languages. Open source isn’t new, it became viable when the first computer-like machine came down on earth.
Stallman wrote an impressive politically charged artwork of propositions and highly influential ideas about how free software should and could look like. Today, open source is, maybe more than ever, used as a very powerful political tool. Open-source has become a mean to become a serious competitor of large corporations like Microsoft, Apple and other giants. Led by Google and Mozilla, open source applications are a serious force to be reckoned with.
Chrome is a recent example of Google trying to make sure the competitors do not grow to large and competition is still on. Stallman formulated it this way:
‘The paradigm of competition is a race: by rewarding the winner, we encourage everyone to run faster. When capitalism really works this way, it does a good job; but its defenders are wrong in assuming it always works this way. If the runners forget why the reward is offered and become intent on winning, no matter how, they may find other strategies—such as, attacking other runners. If the runners get into a fist fight, they will all finish late.’
Obviously, getting a large piece of pie, or the whole pie for that matter, gives you a lot of advantages when you try to control other businesses. And even when you are not making enough money to keep your head up, going open source is a good way to strike back. No wonder Yahoo was celebrated for going opening up her search platform (BOSS), and no wonder Reddit is back on track and with many cool offspring’s every day.
Open source has become THE tool to fight the giants that can otherwise be very difficult to challenge. While the popularity of open source applications is growing by the minute, large corporations, who are trying to protect their monopolization, are losing ground every day. Google uses Chrome and Android to achieve this.
When will there be a serious open source search engine that will challenge Google?
I hope you like that post!
Do you have a start-up that we should write about? Contact us! Thanks for visiting and hope you come back again!
Email
Facebook
Netlog
Linkedin
Twitter
The Next Web Blog is closely associated with The Next Web Conference which is held annually in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. At this event speakers from all over the world come together to talk about, and show of, the future of the Web. (
By Bart on Sep 12, 2008
The question is, should there be one, or should there be many? The thing I feel is lacking in many OS projects today is they still strive to be the winner or to have control over other companies. This goal implicates a zero sum game, a game which is being played on the home turf and by the rules of the parties that already have a large piece of the pie. It’s a fight you will lose, so don’t bother fighting it…
I feel the power of Open Source is its use in the Long Tail. A lot of tiny variations to suit individual needs are better than the monopolized market proposition of organizations like Google/Microsoft/Yahoo/etc. Or to look at it in another way: there is not one race, there are many with many different rules. Heck, you could even make up your own rules!
The only thing you’ll accomplish by beating Google at their game is that you’ll become something that is greater than Google. Or, by challenging your ‘enemy’ succesfully, you’ll quickly become the very enemy you’re trying to challenge…
[Reply]
By edial on Sep 12, 2008
The question whether there should be one or many different competitors has a simple answer: yes. Users should be able to make choices there self without being restricted to a few corporations who dominate the search engine scene.
I don’t agree on you when you say ‘It’s a fight you will lose, so don’t bother fighting it…’, because there are many examples of open source projects that have a huge market share (Linux, Mozilla, OpenOffice etc.) while challenging big corporations.
A serious challenger for Google does not necessary has he has to be become BIGGER than Google. But who do you trust more, Google or an open source project? I’d go for the open source perks such as transparency and a service that is and will always be totally free.
[Reply]
By Bart on Sep 12, 2008
That made me chuckle ;)
The point I’m trying to make here is that there is no sense in fighting the same fight. In that sense, there is NO competition between open source and closed source software. It’s not even the same ballpark. Open Source developers should realize that if they want to create solutions that stick.
As for your examples, they prove my point exactly. These companies don’t have a market share anywhere near the players they challenge. They’re just one of many players and the focus should be on the customizable building blocks they create for others, not on pushing their product like ordinary closed players do. This enables users to create their own viable alternative towards closed source software.
This means the only way open source can truly compete with closed source is by not presenting one alternative, but to present the building blocks to create many alternatives. By staying a movement, because imho the power of open source lies in the creation of a modular valuechain and not in one particular solution that has to compete with their closed source rivals…
[Reply]