[Coco] OT: Vista and MS patent application, Linux

[Jeff Teunissen]

Roger Taylor wrote:
> At 07:13 AM 2/5/2007, you wrote:
> 
>>Ironically, this is how greater than 90 percent of software is developed.
>>"Shrink-wrap" software companies are the exception, not the rule -- and most
>>programmers wouldn't even notice the difference between coding for a Microsoft
>>and coding for a Red Hat (except the guy at Red Hat might become more famous,
>>which in turn gives him greater job security).
> 
> 90% of software is not developed through Open Source.  Private teams 
> and software companies might have open-to-employee source code, but 
> that's not what we're on the topic of.  :)

About 90% of software is developed almost as a side effect of doing business,
boring software that only exists because somebody needed it (not because
somebody wanted to make a fortune selling it). The world's largest software
operation is not Microsoft...more like General Motors.

For this kind of software, it doesn't really matter how it's developed...but
using Free/Open Source Software gives those that do use it a competitive
advantage over those that don't, because the companies that do use it don't
have to do as much work for a given level of functionality -- so they can
either save money or have better software than the competition. This supplies
a selection pressure towards the use of free software.

The Microsofts and Adobes of the world are unlikely to matter in the long run;
they are probably a temporary historical aberration. Before the late 1970s and
the so-called "microcomputer revolution", operating systems were provided free
with the hardware, and included the full source code. Almost every
installation had local customizations, and many had completely new operating
systems developed by the people operating the computers. The best of these
were then often folded back into the OS.

And we're heading back in that direction...the areas where you can get away
with selling software will continue to narrow until software companies as we
know them today become impossible. And yet the sky will not fall, and
programmers will still have jobs...because those companies were never needed
in the first place. All they do is suck value out of programmers.

-- 
| Jeff Teunissen -=- Pres., Dusk To Dawn Computing -=- deek at d2dc.net
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| Core developer, The QuakeForge Project     http://www.quakeforge.net/
| Specializing in Debian GNU/Linux           http://www.d2dc.net/~deek/