Open Source May Be Disruptive
August 16, 2010
I do not know much about software, information, or the big-time doings of corporate giants. I am not an azurini, a self-appointed poobah, or the cat’s paw of a group of 20-something MBAs from schools that require a great family and a high IQ. I am an addled goose. I float around in a pond filled with mine drainage water and offer some humble observations which the great and powerful dismiss as silly, irrelevant, or just plain incorrect.
No problemo.
However, even the intellectual black hole of the addled goose’s analytic muck pond can figure out from two articles that open source is scaring the heck out of a really tough, superstar executive.
You make your own decision about the accuracy and significance of these two news stories:
First, point your browser thingy with monitoring functions activated so those watching know you really did navigate to a “real” news source and read “Oracle Kills Open Solaris, Moves Development behind Closed Doors.” The idea is pretty easy to understand. Those super-marketers at Sun Microsystems gave away an operating system as open source. Nope. Oracle’s Larry Ellison and his sharp-pencil crowd shut that door. The reason? Open source equals bad business. “Bad”, I presume, means a threat to Oracle’s pricing tactics. Free and Oracle are not words that I associate when I hear the word “Oracle.”
A happy quack to http://jordanhall.co.uk/general-articles/dont-be-evil-licensing-1301401/ for this great illustration.
Second, Oracle is suing Google over its use of Java. Now Java is sort of a piggy, but, hey, lots of universities teach Java, and it can be quite useful when running in today’s nifty hardware environments. Overlook those flaws which have been documented in some detail in the Software Engineering podcasts at www.se-radio.net. Notice: SE-Radio is not exactly an Adam Carolla Leo LaPorte type podcast. You can get some information about the this tussle between two former bosom buddies by tapping to “Initial thoughts on Oracle vs Google Patent Lawsuit.” Yep, those are links to patent documents, so I don’t think the skimmers among my readers will invest much dwell time on the Tirania post.
Nevertheless, the headlines may be enough for a “real” azure chip consultant. The details are murky and former English majors and sociology minors won’t spend too much time doing the analysis a “real” poobah does.
Let me Cliff Notes it: Larry Ellison is a smart, rich person. He understands that open source is a problem for a company like Oracle that charges really big fees for its software. Open source with its unruly developers and hard-to-make-do-push-ups work ethic are the enemy. The fix. Kill open source. If total annihilation is not possible, make open source expensive in terms of legal fees. The way law works for rich people is that a rich person’s lawyers can make a less rich person spend lots of time fighting the rich person’s legal actions. Eventually money wins, particularly when there are fuzzy wuzzy ideas like open source, intellectual property, and rich people arguing as the main action.
There is just one snag. Even rich people have trouble keeping those peasants under control. For my readers who stayed awake during world history, you know that lots of peasants with sticks and rocks can be a real problem. Honk off enough peasants, and the excitement can end in a revolution.
At this moment in the capitalistic, free market sun:
- Lots of companies are strapped for cash. Free is pretty darned appealing when you have to decide how to pay the light bill, the actress assisting the company at a trade show, and paying the lease on a new Bimmer.
- Open source is pretty good, and there are some robust solutions available with the click of a mouse. Examples include Drupal, Hadoop, Lucene/Solr and * lots * more.
- The open source stuff is fun. Training and certification for Oracle or other “carrier class” enterprise solutions are not as much fun as blasting around the lake on a jet ski at 30 knots.
If I focus on relational databases, I am in a Roman ruin. You can see or at least imagine the splendor of the structure. But rebuilding it after a crash and getting it back to the “way it was” is just too much work, too expensive, and too labor intensive. Why not build a new structure, using the tips and methods that HGTV puts on display each night on my local cable channel. Need a granite counter top and have neither money, stone cutting tools, nor expertise. Hey, just shoot over to Home Depot and get an epoxy alternative. That’s the open source approach: New materials, new methods, and new benefits.
Roman ruin. What’s the cost of a rebuild and then upkeep? How do you modify a limestone flying balcony? You don’t. Get some slaves.
Not granite like a Roman ruin. Granted. But the stuff works really well, and in a fast-changing digital world, the Home Depot offers tools and materials that allow changes to be made quickly and without having to locate 1,000 people willing and able to chop rock, drag it to the building site, and then handcraft each piece to the darned thing won’t fall over.
Modular housing. Easy to build, comfortable, and swapping a module is a Lego block operation.
Here are my observations about open source, and I will limit these to search and content processing, an umbrella under which Oracle conveniently fits:
First, the big guys are likely to survive the challenge of open source due to their standing orders for licenses and support. Over time, life will become more difficult for the big outfits because survival means a Darwinian battle. Consolidation seems inevitable, and there will be many more azure chip consultants spawned by the inevitable downsizing that will begin in the next nine to 18 months. Yes, open source is moving that quickly.
Second, the death rate among second an third tier software vendors will rise. Annihilation and extinction will not be words I would use to describe what happens. I would feel comfortable with “digital Black Death”, however. How many SharePoint snap ins starting at $50,000 does the world need? Won’t Microsoft just cut off the oxygen supply to those “preferred” partners who land juicy accounts and take money from Microsoft? I think “yes”. You think “no”. Well, that’s what makes horse races interesting I suppose.
Third, open source outfits have a different business model. Investors seem to like the chances for certain open source plays. Anyone remember Palantir.com. You might want to check into the company’s approach which is described as “open”. There’s the $16 million injection for Lucid Imagination. And there are others. There will be more because the open source business models are not saddled with the medieval gear of the traditional software vendor. Instead of a battle horse, the open source folks ride Vespas or drive hybrids.
Fourth, picking a search vendor is darned important. This means that client acquisition costs for the second and third tier search and content processing vendors will go up. I think that sales and marketing costs will kill these companies before another vendor stomps on them. I could list a bunch of SharePoint centric search vendors who are running hard to stay in the race. As open source picks up steam, many of these companies will die of financial exhaustion. I know that if a bank were to ask me about pumping millions into one of the SharePoint search specialists, I would say, “No way, José.” I would then add, “Let’s go to San Jose, and check out some of the more interesting open source plays that are popping up like mosquitoes on the marge of my goose pond.
There you have it. Oracle’s actions regarding Solaris and Java may emerge as a useful case study. Keep in mind that my Oracle and Google have “wild card” value, and I still want to know more about the logic for outfits like Cisco, Viacom/MTV, Mitre, Facebook, and others embracing open source search.
Stephen E Arnold, August 16, 2010
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