Niels Liisberg skrev den 12-06-2008 19:56:
But I was voted down on that one.
The rationale was (something like):
"If people want to use IceBreak for free and have access to the source, at
least they have to be our ambassadors and become our business partners. Then
they can have it all for free. The door swings both ways".
... But can you find a way around that?
I think the best approach is to emphasize that software itself is not
your crown jewels, the KNOWLEDGE about the software is (just think what
would happen if you replaced your whole programmer staff). This is what
allows Open Source companies to sell support services to their product.
I still think you could benefit from reading the "The Magic Cauldron"
essay by Eric Raymond. whoc is a much better writer than me
(
http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar/magic-cauldron/) who
calls this "Give away the recipe, open a Restaurant"
He say this about what I consider your situation - perhaps you can use it?
"When the Digital Creations people went looking for venture capital, the
venture capitalist they brought in carefully evaluated their prospective
market niche, their people, and their tools. The VC then recommended
that Digital Creations take Zope open-source.
By traditional software industry standards, this looks like an
absolutely crazy move. Conventional business school wisdom has it that
core intellectual property like Zope is a company's crown jewels, never
under any circumstances to be given away. But the VC had two related
insights. One is that Zope's true core asset is actually the brains and
skills of its people. The second is that Zope is likely to generate more
value as a market-builder than as a secret tool.
To see this, compare two scenarios. In the conventional one, Zope
remains Digital Creations's secret weapon. Let's stipulate that it's a
very effective one. As a result, the firm will able to deliver superior
quality on short schedules—/but nobody knows that/. It will be easy to
satisfy customers, but harder to build a customer base to begin with.
The VC, instead, saw that open-sourcing Zope could be critical
advertising for Digital Creations's /real/ asset— its people. He
expected that customers evaluating Zope would consider it more efficient
to hire the experts than to develop in-house Zope expertise.
One of the Zope principals has since confirmed very publicly that their
open-source strategy has "opened many doors we wouldn't have got in
otherwise" [sic]. Potential customers do indeed respond to the logic of
the situation—and Digital Creations, accordingly, is prospering."
here is the table of contents:
*Table of Contents*
Indistinguishable From Magic <index.html#id2763684>
Beyond Geeks Bearing Gifts <ar01s02.html>
The Manufacturing Delusion <ar01s03.html>
The ``Information Wants to be Free'' Myth <ar01s04.html>
The Inverse Commons <ar01s05.html>
Reasons for Closing Source <ar01s06.html>
Use-Value Funding Models <ar01s07.html>
The Apache Case: Cost-Sharing <ar01s07.html#id2761895>
The Cisco Case: Risk-Spreading <ar01s07.html#id2761991>
Why Sale Value is Problematic <ar01s08.html>
Indirect Sale-Value Models <ar01s09.html>
Loss-Leader/Market Positioner <ar01s09.html#id2762262>
Widget Frosting <ar01s09.html#id2762316>
Give Away the Recipe, Open a Restaurant <ar01s09.html#id2762380>
Accessorizing <ar01s09.html#id2762533>
Free the Future, Sell the Present <ar01s09.html#id2762651>
Free the Software, Sell the Brand <ar01s09.html#id2762704>
Free the Software, Sell the Content <ar01s09.html#id2762733>
When to be Open, When to be Closed <ar01s10.html>
What Are the Payoffs? <ar01s10.html#id2762774>
How Do They Interact? <ar01s10.html#id2762608>
Doom: A Case Study <ar01s10.html#id2825665>
Knowing When to Let Go <ar01s10.html#id2825746>
Open Source as a Strategic Weapon <ar01s11.html>
Cost-sharing as a competitive weapon <ar01s11.html#id2825837>
Resetting the competition <ar01s11.html#id2825874>
Growing the pond <ar01s11.html#id2825914>
Preventing a choke hold <ar01s11.html#id2825937>
Open Source and Strategic Business Risk <ar01s12.html>
The Business Ecology of Open Source <ar01s13.html>
Coping with Success <ar01s14.html>
Open R&D and the Reinvention of Patronage <ar01s15.html>
Getting There From Here <ar01s16.html>
Conclusion: Life after the Revolution <ar01s17.html>
Afterword: Why Closing a Driver Loses Its Vendor Money <ar01s18.html>
Notes <ar01s19.html>
Bibliography <ar01s20.html>
Acknowledgements <ar01s21.html>
midrange.com
