How to make money from a software database

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How to Make Money on the Internet

Last spring, marketer and blogger Hugh MacLeod posted a question on his site: If open source is such a phenomenon, where are all the open source billionaires? Open source software relies on a community of volunteer developers who tinker on, write for, or amend a program, then give it away free. I have never claimed to be that interested in it. This is why I can work with a large software company like Microsoft, or a small tailoring firm like English Cut , and find them both utterly fascinating. Everybody needs to get paid; that is the great constant in business. What a great guy. Insanely smart. Enjoyed his company immensely. Simon may be right, he may be wrong, he may be a little bit of both. The future always has a way of surprising us all.

1. Blogging

The answer, of course, was hinted at in the aforementioned Wired article. How can you build a business by giving away the store? The money comes from selling add-ons, service contracts, and hardware to go with the software. It took me a while to figure this out, but what applies to Open Source, also applies to Microsoft. You gave them money, this entitles you to certain expectations. A few weeks ago, I met a young developer who worked in an IT department of a large insurance company. I asked him what kind of software did he use. I asked him why did he not use more Open Source? I thought IT people loved Open Source?

Think about a business model from day one

Last spring, marketer and blogger Hugh MacLeod posted a question on his site: If open source is such a phenomenon, where are all the open source billionaires? Open source software relies on a community of volunteer developers who tinker on, write for, or amend a datqbase, then give it away free. I have never claimed to be that interested in it. This is why I can work with a large software company like Microsoft, or a small tailoring firm like English Cutand find them both utterly fascinating.

Everybody needs to get paid; that is the great constant in business. What a great guy. Insanely smart. Enjoyed his company immensely. Simon may be right, he may be wrong, he mkae be a little bit of. The future always has a way of surprising us all. The answer, of course, was hinted at in the aforementioned Wired article. How sofware you build tk business by giving away the store?

The money comes from selling add-ons, service contracts, and hardware to go with the software. It took s a while to figure this out, but what applies to Open Source, also applies to Microsoft. You gave them money, this entitles you to certain expectations. A few weeks ago, I met a young developer who worked in an IT department of a large insurance company. I asked him what kind of software did he use.

I asked him why did he not use more Open Source? I thought IT people loved Open Source? With Open Source, I have to rely on the community. And the community, as much as we may love it, is unpredictable.

It might care about your problem and want to fix it, then again, it may not. Like Open Source, the social contract can often matter far more than the ones and zeros. OMG open source people are funny. Is it always that easy to make them dance? Dear Open Source Community: It would appear that you suck at marketing. Which makes it howw comedy gold that you are bitching at Hugh MacLeod about the challenges and misconceptions you face… due to sucking at marketing.

I rest my case. I mean, hiw Microsoft, or the recording industry, or pharmaceutical companies? They have to present us with something worth eatabase for and, databaxe the exception of a few idealists, we will, but an out-of-the-box typing program is no longer going to cut it.

Exactly, Seth. I see all this as part of a perfectly natural evolutionary cycle, which is going to happen anyway, with or without Microsoft on board. Or Sun. Or Oracle. When I worked for a large insurance company it was explained to me thusly: Who nake you sue when something goes horribly wrong? So much so, in fact, how to make money from a software database the preferred arrangement was to have a large daatabase company, in addition to Microsoft, to help databas the risk. Did they pay for that?

You bet, and handsomely. Because assumption of risk is worth money. Social Contracts. You are repeating two of the biggest lies about the differences between open source and Microsoft. Take Red Hat as an example. Free open source Red Hat Linux will cost at least as much in licensing and maintenance fees to use as Windows.

Hey, catabase for the great feedback so far, Everybody. Rick and Rafi, Excellent points. How does the whole point of your post hold up, if open source software can get you the same kind of service like MS does, in case you choose to pay for support.

The key word is choice. Rock on. Even for a company like Sun, for several reasons internal and external forces it has been a very difficult task to re-orient the company towards openness and datqbase software.

For a company like Microsoft, with a 15 year track record of disregard for ethics, the law, and mostly everything else but Microsoft, the challenge is, indeed, of monstruous proportions. The only way Microsoft can change is a viral effect that promotes ethical standards and a real passion to communicate with their public, developing empathy, feeling their customers pains as if it were their.

In order to do this, Microsoft has to flatten its internal hierarchical system, enable for more peer to peer communication and abolish the culture of fear and terror. People have to be proud again to work. I have a friend whose husband works for Microsoft. The other day he came home, he was so excited about a new project Microsoft had comissioned, one of his biggest challenges to date. My friend his wife has been a pro-Mac, anti-Microsoft person since before knowing him, since before I got to know her, more than 12 years ago.

An ideal, a motivation to change the world, serve the public better, respect their freedoms, be proud of their technological accomplishments. The very structure and leadership of Microsoft is what needs to be changed, not the technology, not tp people.

They need leaders they can believe in. They need ideals, something meaningful they know they can stand. They mney to be proud, so mney can get home and tell databaee wives and children they did something significative to change the world in a positive way.

Like Joel Postman was telling us earlier today on Twitter, about the time he met James Gosling at Sun Microsystems, and he was proud to tell his son he had worked that day with the man who invented Java. Have you ever heard stories like that in Microsoft? This may take very tough decisions, like erradicating the oldtimers culture of terror, also splitting the firm into more nimble, agile and autonomous companies that can work efficiently with the sole goal of making their customers happy.

Concentrated Power Corrupts Absolutely. Make Microsoft nimble. Make Microsoft people proud. Make customers happy. Hkw the world happy. I have personally created two cases for them — and got the issues fixed. But one cannot invest millions into Halo 4 or next Office and then give them for free, no matter how full of ads they would be.

Do keep in mind that Google is not free for advertisers, although the company has several free services. And congrats for the book deal, Hugh! Think years. It is a business model that works. And now a comment about Microsoft vs. Open Source. I like Open Source. It provides an alternative, which is a mental decision making concept humans need. Personally, I have made a decision to play with the Microsoft toys because sogtware me they are databwse.

And I get daabase better because there are more jobs. And VB is the most widely used programming language on the planet by a wide margin. All this makes it easier to find work and also to thrive in supportive, well funded environments. So, go mainstream, roll in the dough, and write Open Source at home for your hobby to collect the non-monetary rewards.

Read the blogs about Vista SP1 or the dumbass anti-virus routine they introduced that asks you to trash your own PST files. There is no social contract with MSFT, there is simply a datbaase facto almost-monopoly based on ignorance among users and worse IT departments. You know. Ffrom know. Anything else is just trolling, to fdom brutally honest. I have since changed my views. And more often than not, these improvements are returned to the commons. Good luck getting someone like Microsoft to change their product for you.

Even if they agree, you often have to wait until the next product release. Billions of dollars are spent by large companies each year because of vendor lock-in. If you can inspect the code, and integrate systems yourself, huge amounts of time and money can be saved.

It also puts you in a stronger position to give your customers what they want. There is often no written contract, but there is passion and there is love. Not love for the Dtaabase, of course, but love and pure dedication for the software. I frpm they know the answer.

In the beginning, open source software looked like a saintly gift to the commonweal. Programmers would work hard, then give away the fruits of their labor to anyone who wanted it. Everyone would benefit from this act of pure charity. Over time, however, companies realized they could make money and give away the software at the same time.

Yes, you can make money of free software

They could do well by doing good. This wasn’t a shock to some of the original open source advocates — it was how some intended it to be. Richard Stallman, for one, always said that «free speech» was more important to him than «free beer. Many companies took this as a blessing to make money and serve their destiny. The smartest figured out how to use open source to strengthen their business, spread their brand, and bolster their power. Open source was not so much a charity as a different kind of marketing, a way to squeeze into the marketplace. The savviest open source devotees embrace this self-interest. Everyone along the chain, they note, must be motivated to contribute for a reason. The genius of open source, they explain, is that it helps coordinate our selfishness and turn it into something that benefits. The contributors become equals, and there’s little squabbling about rights to blocks of code. The sharing lets everyone concentrate on the quality of the software, not on licensing issues. Here are nine ways companies use open source to profitable ends.