I was recently asked to help someone understand the OpenSource movement, and
the effects it might have on companies such as Oracle or SAP.
I talked a bit that these companies can benefit from being independant of big
vendors like Microsoft, while still not having to do everything themselves.
But also on how opensource alternatives to their products will threaten their
business in the long run and force them to be more innovative and constantly
improve their product.
I then talked about the 'viral' aspects in OpenSource; not about that GPL
licensing bullshit (just read the licenses of stuff you want to use, and don't
use them if you don't like the license...; this virality is highly overrated
due to Microsofts FUD), but a very different kind of virality:
Let's say you are supposed to evaluate different CMS solutions. So you install
one or another that sounds promising. Most likely you'll install an opensource
database like MySQL or Postgresql. And when you've decided upon a solution,
you are quite likely to go with this database, and say to yourself: "if MySQL
doesn't scale up well enough for our needs, we can still but an Oracle license".
This would be probably different if you had had installed Oracle in the first
place. Say a demo or so. But the demo versions of the CMS you tried already
made you comfortable in using MySQL; it's easy to install (most likely included
with your system anyway), and it just works. But would you have tried a CMS
in first place that actuall required you to setup Oracle?
Anyway, this "social" virality brought me to another point: developers and
administrators.
When you see numbers on the market share of Microsoft, they're still huge. Some
95% of users are using Microsoft as their primary operation system (I'm
discounting the fact that a huge share of DSL modems here is running Linux,
so actually many people are Linux users, and I'm also discounting the use of
www.google.com, which would make 99.9% of people Linux users...).
But these are the average users. But they aren't on their own. The software
choice of the "average user" is influenced by a couple of factors, including:
- if anything goes wrong, whom can I call for help?
- company (administrative, security) policies
- word of mouth and (software) recommendations
But if you look at the computer geeks around you, what are they using? A huge
share of the people I know are using Linux. Not everyone is using Linux as
their main desktop system, but many are. Others are using Linux just for their
development stuff, some only on servers. It doesn't really matter, Linux is
huge with the geeks.
When I look at the sofware my mom has installed on her Windows system (which
also dual-boots Linux, and interestingly is the primary choice for watching a
movie - Windows doesn't playback sound with some videos...): half of it is
opensource. There is OpenOffice.org, Gimp, Gaim, Firefox, Thunderbird, Inkscape,
LyX, Mplayer and a couple others. He favourite game? PySol. My dad already has
switched to Linux as his main operating system.
So why did they switch to so much opensource software? Because it's what I
recommended them, and where I can help them. My mom needed a software to
record something for her blog (yes, she's "podcasting" now) - of course I
recommended her an opensource application, audacity.
My mom is giving private lessons in math and physics; she's very successful
at that. When one of her students got herself a laptop, she of course was
given all kinds of (opensource!) software. For her highschool thesis she needed
a vector graphics program - she ended up with inkscape.
Now if my parents have some problem with Windows, who are they going to ask?
I didn't manage to solve the video playback issues, my mom
by herself
switched to Linux for watching movies. It didn't work with Windows, I couldn't
help her - she switched to something where she knews she'd get more support
(and where the problem by chance didn't occur).
Now let's have a look at the university. Our computer pool for the students is
all Linux. There are a few windows systems for legacy purposes, I never found
out if they are accessible to regular students; I only know they're supposed
to exist. When doing some assignment, you're very often required to use some
opensource software. For a thesis, you'll very likely be building upon some
opensource system. The mathematics institute is still on solaris, but recently
Gnome was installed there. Physics and electrical engineering also have mostly
Linux systems, I've heard.
For software development, it's pretty much a "develop on Linux, run anywhere",
whereas Windows-only developers usually need to port their applications (or
trust on Wine being able to run them good enough on Linux). So more and more
people start developing on Linux, and get to love it's great development
environment (after all, Linux was pretty much completely done by software
developers...).
And that is how Microsoft might already have lost the desktop war: developers,
technical students and administrators (who usually also love their Linux boxes).
They're only a small share of the userbase, but they're influential. In fact,
other users rely on them being able to eventually fix their systems for them.
But since these are using Windows much less already, they will be less capable
of assisting others with Windows. They'll be putting Linux systems everywhere,
and keep on encouraging them to make the switch. Of course it will still take
some years, but you can expect more and more companies (and cities) to switch
over, like the city of Munich.
Windows support staff on the other hand might even become more expensive.
I don't know of any numbers on the MCSE programme (Minesweeper Consultant,
Solitaire Expert) - does anyone have numbers on "graduates" for that?
I didn’t know what it was, and that was already reported twice (
If not, it could at least take advantage of the fact that it’s being run on a Debian developer’s computer and show this:
