[kwlug-disc] OSS opportunity to go mainstream, big time

Lori Paniak ldpaniak at fourpisolutions.com
Thu Sep 16 18:24:33 EDT 2010


On Thu, 2010-09-16 at 14:45 -0700, William Park wrote:
> I don't know.  Why do OSS always copy and follow successful and proven Windows
> application?  I can't think of any successful business or pioneer idea that 
> involves OSS.
> Even Google is not "open source".  Facebook will say, "Get of my tail."


I would have to agree with you when it comes to end-user applications
aimed at the masses, but I think you are being a little pessimistic.

The LAMP stack has done fairly well over the past 15 years.

And the vaunted "walled garden" of Apple?  Debian has been serving up
the same model for years (sans media!).  

Innovation in applications is not a feature of Windows, Apple or any
other OS.  You just see things in Windows first because of the 90%
install rate.  As end-user applications are more web-connected and
cloud-based, this aberration will fade.  Applications will become
completely platform agnostic. 

How many of the 200,000 new Android users each day care that their phone
is running 2.6.32?  Not many - so long as it runs the applications they
care about.  Still sounds like a successful business model based on OSS.
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