Years ago a technology-coordinator friend presented me with a copy of Eric Raymond’s “The Cathedral and the Bazaar,” a manifesto for open code software whose arguments still remain relevant today. It begins:
Who would have thought even five years ago (1991) that a world-class operating system could coalesce as if by magic out of part-time hacking by several thousand developers scattered all over the planet, connected only by the tenuous strands of the Internet?
Raymond describes his metaphor:
No quiet, reverent cathedral-building here—rather, the Linux community seemed to resemble a great babbling bazaar of differing agendas and approaches (aptly symbolized by the Linux archive sites, who’d take submissions from anyone) out of which a coherent and stable system could seemingly emerge only by a succession of miracles.
The fact that this bazaar style seemed to work, and work well, came as a distinct shock.
The article outlines what have become the prevailing values of the open source movement–release early and often, delegate everything you can, be open to the point of promiscuity. But the sentence that has stayed with me through the years is this one:
If you have the right attitude, interesting problems will find you.
Maybe I should put that on the masthead of this netzine.
My Open Source Story
When I first read Raymond’s essay it had an immediate impact because the national school consortium I headed was developing an open source student record-keeping system, one that would allow for my boss, the late Bill Norris of Control data fame to fulfill his dream of every student having a computer-based personalized learning program.
We actually developed not only a functional program based on Microsoft Access, but also received several grants to upgrade it. At one point we even offered it to the Minnesota Department of Education for free so they could give it to any school district that wanted it, saving them thousands in vendor fees plus providing them with a program they could customize themselves.
The state turned us down and although many considered it the best out there, it never went anywhere. It was then that I wondered whether open source had any future. If people would not use it even when it would save them money, would they ever use it?
Windows
Essentially my experience is a small, insignificant example of the elephant in the room–Windows. The Linux system Raymond wrote about over ten years ago has now become much more user friendly–it isn’t just for geeks anymore. Yet even though it is free–and in many respects better than Windows (more on that in a minute)–it is still a niche item. Mention Linux to most people and they will greet you with an open stare. A few may know what it is, but that is all.
The Linux Counter page registers the number of Linux users, although estimates are pretty rough given that the software is open source. The graph below shows its growth.
Note the rapid rise in the 1990s followed by what appears to be a plateau that in recent years is dropping off. Raymond’s dream now seems overly optimistic, perhaps even utopian–or is it? Could it be that open source software–or even its cousins freeware and shareware is due for a comeback?
The Barriers
Several major factors have slowed the development of an open source environment. The first is the naked collusion between computer manufacturers and Windows. Buy a new computer and it comes with Windows and lots of bloatware preinstalled. This monopoly has become even more pronounced at the major chains that sell computers.
Microsoft even monitors this by store. When I was searching for a laptop that did not have Vista I was told by a salesperson at a major retailer that even though they wanted to keep those machines in stock, Microsoft had told them that if they saw so much as one machine with a Windows system other than Vista, they would no longer be allowed to sell any Microsoft products.
Try to find a computer with Linux preinstalled and you are out of luck. I do not know if Microsoft leans on its dealers to not stock Linux machines the same way it discourages them from still selling XP, but my guess is that it certainly frowns on the process. All it would take would be for the area rep to utter the innocent-sounding phrase, “Notice you’re carrying Linux machines now,” and that would strike fear in the heart of any store manager
However, open source software is creeping onto some manufacturers’ web sites. Dell, for example, sells machines with Ubuntu, a Linux-based Operating System. Its description notes:
An advantage of open source is that it can deliver more reliability and flexibility, as well as faster updates and fixes, all at a lower cost. Plus, if you’re an expert, you can tweak and alter the code to completely customize the software to do exactly what you want. A downside is that some open source software requires intermediate or advanced knowledge to use, and in the case of operating systems, may not be compatible with the same software applications and hardware as Windows operating systems.
Lenovo says nothing about Linux in its ads for new laptops, instead heading them in bold type, “Lenovo recommends Vista.” HP does offer Linux on its servers, but a consumer cannot buy a laptop with it preinstalled.
Suite Success
This is too bad because the one drawback to Linux back when Raymond wrote his essay–its lack of system software–no longer exists. As the Dell ad above goes on to note you can buy the equivalent of Microsoft Office for Linux systems.
The most popular open source office suite, Open Office, is every bit as powerful as Microsoft Office. In fact if you open any of the Open Office equivalents to Bill Gates’ cash cow, it is hard to tell the difference. The word processing program looks and behaves a lot like Word, without some of its annoyances. Ditto for its presentation and spreadsheet programs.
Perhaps the most widely-known open source territory is the market for browsers where the success of Firefox is a tribute to the abilities of open source. Right now I am writing this on the latest Beta release of the upcoming version of Firefox. The earlier betas had a few problems, but this one runs great.
Ditto for email where Firefox’s companion Thunderbird is a heck of a lot better than Outlook, which has never been my favorite email program.
On top of all this, Linux and its associated programs are less prone to virus and malware attacks than Windows, even though they are open source and Windows is not. Given the way Microsoft guards its code as if it were the Holy Grail, you would think that open source code would provide a field day for hackers, but that has never been the case.
Other Drawbacks
There is a second reason open source software has not made the inroads it should be–computers have become disposable appliances, perhaps the most disposable and the most expensive. Think if you had to replace your microwave or refrigerator every few years? Apparently the public believes this is OK for computers.
Most of these people get Windows for free (see above). When something goes wrong with their machines or they want the newest Big Thing they just buy a new computer instead of upgrading their DVD drive or their motherboard. I have not bought a desktop for fifteen years, preferring to change motherboards, chips, etc. when needed, but I am a very small minority.
A third reason is the well-known resistance of customers to anything new or different. The Windows desktop has become so ubiquitous that anything different turns people off. This has even become a problem for Microsoft whose upgrades must not stray too far from the previous desktop.
Apple has fought this battle since it first began even though for non-techie types its operating system is more robust, less prone to errors and has little problem with viruses. The reason the open source software I helped develop for schools never went anywhere is that the people actually running the student record-keeping systems did not want to change.
So with all these barriers, why the optimism about a comeback for open source software. One word: money.
A Comeback Scenario
Windows has become prohibitively expensive for multi-machine environments, which is what many households have become these days. If like me you have as many as six computers, buying that many copies of the newest version of Windows along with Office becomes prohibitive–more in fact than the cost of buying a new computer. That is why I still run Office 2003.
Now imagine you are a small business, nonprofit, or a college or university. Suddenly those costs may make a difference between profit and loss. In March, Open Office announced that it had reached its 56th millionth download. On a web page Open Office tracks major deployments across the world which include governments, schools and a variety of businesses.
This may seem a tiny fraction of those who use Microsoft products, but as the current economic crisis continues it will place more pressure on governments, businesses and consumers to cut back on expenses and one of the easiest to cut back on is software. The only reason I still use Office is that it is required by my publisher, agent and government agencies I deal with.
But pressure is building for governments to endorse open source solutions. After all if governments, foundations and publishers require people to submit documents in Word, isn’t that an endorsement of the product? What if they allowed you to submit documents in Open Office?
A Third World Revolt
Leading the charge for open source software are many countries across the world that see it as a fast way of erasing the software gap that exists between their countries and the United States. Many also are being driven by the same dislike for Microsoft that exists in this country.
In a motion passed by the city government of Florence, Italy, in June, legislators warned that continued use of proprietary software was leading to “the computer science subjection of the Italian state to Microsoft.”
Brazil is among the leaders in pushing for open source software or “software libre.” Richard Stallman, founder and president of the Free Software Foundation, who addressed the Brazilian Congress on the subject believes:
This is a political and ethical issue, just like freedom of the press or freedom of association.
It makes sense, especially for countries like Brazil that are not rich, to encourage the country to switch from proprietary software to free software. In addition to giving people freedoms, software has a secondary benefit because people can use this freedom to save a lot of money now draining away to a few rich foreigners.
This growing call for open source software by the rest of the world puts this country in an extremely awkward situation because of Windows role in the American economy. Windows is about the last thing left Made in America. Perhaps that is why the government is reluctant to press Mr. Gates too far. To them he truly is “too big to fail.”
I could find no definitive numbers on what Microsoft brings in to this country, but were the world to suddenly shift to Linux, it would precipitate at least the equivalent of the Japanese auto invasion–and we all know how that turned out.
The Ultimate Irony
The most ironic development in this is that Microsoft, along with other American software firms, has farmed out a large portion of its support operations to third world countries. So those countries find themselves facing the same policy dilemma as America–if they push open source too hard do they risk losing Microsoft?
In the end, the optimist in me still believes in the message I read a decade ago in “The Cathedral and the Bazaar.”
I think that the cutting edge of open-source software will belong to people who start from individual vision and brilliance, then amplify it through the effective construction of voluntary communities of interest.
The words of Raymond’s essay are well-chosen, for the open source movement may be for our era what the printing press was for the Reformation. Faced with the bazaar, the cathedral ultimately yielded its power.
The Linux graph may be at a plateau, but it is the nature of systems development for new ideas to move forward via a series of plateaus as each problem is faced. I believe that my son’s generation may well witness the full power of an open source world. I certainly hope so.
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