Open Source as Business Model - Open source bleeding to death?
I think one of the more interesting trends that I indentified wandering through research on Open source is its use as a business model. In my own experience I've seen a number of companies in the open source world slowly move to services based business over the last 5 years or so. The companies have gotten vastly more organized and they have affiliate companies that are allowed to sell 'services' associated with the software. (moodle and drupal are good examples of this) The software code is protected (in the sense that it is committed to being open) The brand name is protected (in the sense that people are not allowed to use it without permission) and money is being made.
There are a number of links that I might point to to show the growing impact of open source in business.
http://www.thevarguy.com/2010/03/07/open-source-business-conference-5-tr...
http://www.serverwatch.com/trends/article.php/3875916/Microsoft-Plays-th...
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/open-source/phony-open-source-to-be-a-2010-tre...
http://www.liferay.com/web/paul.hinz/blog/-/blogs/open-source%3A-the-fut...
There are a number of tensions in these links. In the first we see five 'trends worth watching' for open source and business. In reality, these are really 'stories worth watching' but you'll note that it's difficult to find where the open source starts and the 'free but closed source' ends.
This is also true in the other microsoft article. The author seems to wander from discussions about software 'given for free' and comparing it to things that are 'open source'
In the third article, there's a very interesting quote in the middle "As open source increasingly becomes an enterprise mandate, you can expect such questions to gain new relevancy. How open do you have to be? How closed must you be?" Again... we see the bleed between the two worlds
The fourth article discusses the back and forth of business in the open source world...
*******************************************
I think a critical trend for open source right now is the watering down of the open message, and the adoption of the 'brand' by big business. It's difficult for people who have never seen a scrap of code to understand the implications of being able to see it, reuse it and adapt it to your own needs. Many folks see free/open source as different descriptions of the same thing or
close enough that it doesn't matter.
If open source dies... or is dying... I think it's probably this kind of death.
