Open Source-a-me!
Many users have been poking into places that they shouldn't be, so to speak, without knowing the consequences. As with Ali Baba, open source has its forty thieves, ready to extract their revenge for the young adventurer daring to stray into their territory.
Let me explain the allegory.
In the original Thousand and One Nights, Schezerade told this tale of the lowly Ali, who happened to stumble across the lair of the forty thieves, heard the well-worn password, and discovered the Cave of Wonders - filled with the treasure of the thieves' years of stealing from others. Now, in a normal world, thieves try to pawn this loot for untraceable cash to fund their excessive ways, so Ali is literally stealing loot from thieves. Ali's morality was seen as heroic because those who would never see the excess of the thieves in their lifetimes would instead drain them of their loot. As usual, in Ali's tale, the listener backs the vagrant adventurer and roots for him to win - not the thieves, nor the original owners of that which was stolen.
Suppose you need a graphics editing program. As a business owner, you may see two options: Photoshop in its current form of $600 - $1300 (depending on if you need just the one app or the entire suite), or the Gimp, which is free. Both handle Photoshop formatted files, use Photoshop-API plug-ins, have roughly the same UI...but obviously, the Gimp is free and so you save the money. If everyone were to take this approach, Adobe would file for Chapter 11 within a year. Pundits of the open source movement would say, they deserved it, since they created software that was too expensive for people to buy - hence the reason for creating the free version. So the Gimp exists only because of the need for a Photoshop program, and so all of the work that was well-earned by Adobe will never be compensated.
Demand for open source versions of commercial applications abound. OpenOffice for Microsoft Office, Gimp for Photoshop, etc. Probably the same amount of man-hours was used by both the commercial and the free version to create the compatible application...yet more and more people are moving to the open source variant. Whole governments are doing this to retain document compatibility yet cut off the licensing and upgrade nightmare. But here is the caveat of Ali stealing from the thieves - if Microsoft's next version of Office contains a Office-only check to make sure only Office can use specific new features, will more reverse engineering by the open source programmers cross the line and become illegal?
My son is looking into a soprano saxophone, and after days of extensive websearch, I found two that stood the test of his teachers and parents alike. Most band members know of the Selmer brand...and at normal pricing, such a saxophone runs about $800. eBay has a few here and there slightly less. There's also a Bently brand out of the UK...unknown in the US, but praised over there. It, too, is under $800, which is about the limit we can afford for his experiment into this new instrument. But there's also the Sellmar and Sallmer brands...one-offs, we'd call them...for under $400 that are imitations preying on the name compatibility. Which do I buy? Where is the best investment? If I could pick up a free saxophone from a music store, would I trust it to play notes properly? To be compatible with replacement parts and proper tuning?
I'm not against the open source concept at all...but to me, the open source product should be oriented towards adding value instead of just replicating the commercial product. Graphic Converter is a spiffy shareware program that has all of the editing and conversion features I need from a Photoshop-like program...for $35. I use this, not Photoshop, nor Gimp. It has batch conversion and batch edit...something neither of the other two candidates have, plus a bunch of other features. I got a fresh approach on an old editing problem and the cost was low due to the fact that it's just one guy that has to be supported by sales...not a monoculture such as Redmond.
Let's hope the rest of open source and shareware moves in that direction...to take the advantage of being different and producing something truly wonderful. That way, it will be a vein of gold that Ali finds in the cave and not the labors of someone else that have been pilfered.
Let me explain the allegory.
In the original Thousand and One Nights, Schezerade told this tale of the lowly Ali, who happened to stumble across the lair of the forty thieves, heard the well-worn password, and discovered the Cave of Wonders - filled with the treasure of the thieves' years of stealing from others. Now, in a normal world, thieves try to pawn this loot for untraceable cash to fund their excessive ways, so Ali is literally stealing loot from thieves. Ali's morality was seen as heroic because those who would never see the excess of the thieves in their lifetimes would instead drain them of their loot. As usual, in Ali's tale, the listener backs the vagrant adventurer and roots for him to win - not the thieves, nor the original owners of that which was stolen.
Suppose you need a graphics editing program. As a business owner, you may see two options: Photoshop in its current form of $600 - $1300 (depending on if you need just the one app or the entire suite), or the Gimp, which is free. Both handle Photoshop formatted files, use Photoshop-API plug-ins, have roughly the same UI...but obviously, the Gimp is free and so you save the money. If everyone were to take this approach, Adobe would file for Chapter 11 within a year. Pundits of the open source movement would say, they deserved it, since they created software that was too expensive for people to buy - hence the reason for creating the free version. So the Gimp exists only because of the need for a Photoshop program, and so all of the work that was well-earned by Adobe will never be compensated.
Demand for open source versions of commercial applications abound. OpenOffice for Microsoft Office, Gimp for Photoshop, etc. Probably the same amount of man-hours was used by both the commercial and the free version to create the compatible application...yet more and more people are moving to the open source variant. Whole governments are doing this to retain document compatibility yet cut off the licensing and upgrade nightmare. But here is the caveat of Ali stealing from the thieves - if Microsoft's next version of Office contains a Office-only check to make sure only Office can use specific new features, will more reverse engineering by the open source programmers cross the line and become illegal?
My son is looking into a soprano saxophone, and after days of extensive websearch, I found two that stood the test of his teachers and parents alike. Most band members know of the Selmer brand...and at normal pricing, such a saxophone runs about $800. eBay has a few here and there slightly less. There's also a Bently brand out of the UK...unknown in the US, but praised over there. It, too, is under $800, which is about the limit we can afford for his experiment into this new instrument. But there's also the Sellmar and Sallmer brands...one-offs, we'd call them...for under $400 that are imitations preying on the name compatibility. Which do I buy? Where is the best investment? If I could pick up a free saxophone from a music store, would I trust it to play notes properly? To be compatible with replacement parts and proper tuning?
I'm not against the open source concept at all...but to me, the open source product should be oriented towards adding value instead of just replicating the commercial product. Graphic Converter is a spiffy shareware program that has all of the editing and conversion features I need from a Photoshop-like program...for $35. I use this, not Photoshop, nor Gimp. It has batch conversion and batch edit...something neither of the other two candidates have, plus a bunch of other features. I got a fresh approach on an old editing problem and the cost was low due to the fact that it's just one guy that has to be supported by sales...not a monoculture such as Redmond.
Let's hope the rest of open source and shareware moves in that direction...to take the advantage of being different and producing something truly wonderful. That way, it will be a vein of gold that Ali finds in the cave and not the labors of someone else that have been pilfered.
posted by Mark Underwood at
2:48 PM
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