Open Source is the Answer

Open Source is the Answer

The recent decision of IBM and Sun Microsystems to free up their patents needs to be viewed in the correct perspective. I am not sure of what kind of patents have been freed and in what way this would help the open source community to improve on that. It is indeed a step in the right direction though.

Internet was designed for free flow of information. In no manner, one should profit from the public access resources. However, certain companies like Microsoft along with Intel have virtually monopolized the access to same.

I took a shift to Linux last week and none the wiser. My first reaction was. Oh my God! Why didn’t I think about doing so before? I was amazed at the kind of offering for an average home user where in for equivalent programs one would have to pay hefty license fees. I would not deny the rightful claims of the companies in software business. However, open source has amply demonstrated the power of innovation that is beneficial to the individual as well as the user.

Microsoft has indeed thwarted the development of innovation. If Bill Gates is the richest man in the World, it is not by sheer coincidence or hard work. There have been instances of anti trust suits being slapped on Microsoft and the company to pay out the damages. Yet it persists with single-minded determination to weed out the competition. This they have done by buying out competition and introducing their bug-ridden software. I was amused with the recent announcement of Internet Explorer upgrade. It would still be a huge worthless file to download and still be insecure given the hoopla behind all their previous releases. Despite the media posturing (which is bought anyway), Microsoft has not really been able to deliver the quality of the software that is required out of it.

It also announced its plans to get in the mobile market to showcase its operating system for that platform. It would not be surprising of they ask to download the service packs for them too! Internet is a free for all game. It is a matter of what they call as sticky eyeballs. This means that if you have regular visitors on your web site, it would slowly drive up your revenues and hence profits. Let us see how Google has done it.

Google initially introduced its web search features. It slowly caught on by word of mouth. The main reason was its uncluttered interface minus the advertisements. However, they introduced its text-based advertisements, which is a money-spinner for them. The nest logical step was to target the desktops. Surprisingly it took Google to realize that it is this place where the future battles would rage on in the search market. Others followed suit with me too products. Google announced its intentions to launch a browser based on the Mozilla engine. It would again establish its prominence in the Internet domain. However, what dismays me is the way knowledge locked up in the libraries could be used to profit.

At the heart of it its very simple matter. Digitize the libraries because no one else had thought of it. Provide the content. Once the subscriber base slowly builds up start offering advertisements. If any book is in the copyright domain, offer links to the web sites, which are selling those books. Slowly it could introduce pay per view model, which would indeed disadvantage people from resource poor countries. In effect because no one else has done it before, Google is going to win this race again. E commerce is said to be the future. This should not really apply to knowledge to resources that are means to access. Internet does not have its own regulators. Hence, it was with this idea that caught on further. I would hate to see it being controlled in any significant manner that affects a vast majority of population.

The only answer is the Open Source. This needs to be strengthened. Project Gutenberg is one which is doing a yeoman’s service to digitize the non-copy righted material on-line. These initiatives need to be encouraged. It is basically a question of mindset and venturing out beyond the confines of your ideas. There is a whole world outside!

This post was submitted by Dr. Abhishek Puri on Techwhack.