Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
On Wednesday 25 July 2012 01:07 PM, Arun Venkataswamy wrote: I am talking about people who are creative and made stuff from scratch. Off late I have started to have these conflicting thoughts in my mind whether this entire open source movement is made up of a small bunch of charitable people (the creators) and a huge bunch of leeches who monetize the charity. to my knowledge many such foundations are Section 25 kind of organizations - not typical charitable organizations. corporates revolve around such foundations - donating - deploying their staff to work directly on upstream projects they in turn offer services as well as device their creations based out of them. such foundations are also driven by corporates in some cases. there are corporates that does it in right spirit and set as an example there are corporates/ leeches that violates the spirit. This is not an excuse, as I would have found time if I believed that it was my responsibility. Anybody/Organization associated with this group have a give-back policy? Well one thing that I insisted so seriously among my colleagues is to become developer/ contributor to the projects upon which we offer our services, which is so important in my opinion as an Open Source Organization. Few realised it. Have given back contributed few modules too off late, privately. Hope it grows down the line. -- ஆமாச்சு ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
On Wednesday 25 July 2012 01:07 PM, Arun Venkataswamy wrote: This is not an excuse, as I would have found time if I believed that it was my responsibility. Anybody/Organization associated with this group have a give-back policy? another thing that I have started doing is, go with creations that are truly open - not those with dual licensing model. at the same time, we insist the customer to pay for the subscription to the project originator (RedHat/ OpenERP for examples) to us for the rest. I can choose to implement without these contributions going up (with CentOS customizing OpenERP through acquired expertise), but these days I have started speaking to customers to pay for 1) us 2) originator, telling them the reasons and have succeeded too. -- ஆமாச்சு ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
[Ilugc] Open source and business
Hi, Has anybody in this list or people you know - have made money by creating open source products? I am not talking about people who earn money by providing services around someone else's effort of creating the primary, core product (say the LAMP stack). I am talking about people who are creative and made stuff from scratch. Off late I have started to have these conflicting thoughts in my mind whether this entire open source movement is made up of a small bunch of charitable people (the creators) and a huge bunch of leeches who monetize the charity. I personally feel like a leach and have used brilliant open source apps free of cost to my benefit. I never had the time to participate seriously in giving back content to the open source pool (apart from a few donations). This is not an excuse, as I would have found time if I believed that it was my responsibility. Anybody/Organization associated with this group have a give-back policy? This is not a troll or to start a flame war. Just want to know about how you guys think. Regards, Arun http://wondroussky.blogspot.in/ கற்றது கைமண் அளவு, கல்லாதது உலகளவு - ஔவையார் Known is a drop, Unknown is an ocean ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
On Wed, Jul 25, 2012 at 1:07 PM, Arun Venkataswamy arun...@gmail.com wrote: Has anybody in this list or people you know - have made money by creating open source products? I am not talking about people who earn money by providing services around someone else's effort of creating the primary, core product (say the LAMP stack). A significant part of the 'open source' is the concept of open a restaurant but give away the menu. In effect, the availability of the source code of the product enables two distinct streams of revenue - feature driven and support/services driven. And, in either case you are helping to increase the share of the product. -- sankarshan mukhopadhyay https://twitter.com/#!/sankarshan ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
On Wed, Jul 25, 2012 at 1:07 PM, Arun Venkataswamy arun...@gmail.com wrote: Hi, Has anybody in this list or people you know - have made money by creating open source products? I am not talking about people who earn money by providing services around someone else's effort of creating the primary, core product (say the LAMP stack). I am talking about people who are creative and made stuff from scratch. Off late I have started to have these conflicting thoughts in my mind whether this entire open source movement is made up of a small bunch of charitable people (the creators) and a huge bunch of leeches who monetize the charity. this is a very common thought and question is most of the people in this field. I personally feel like a leach and have used brilliant open source apps free of cost to my benefit. I never had the time to participate seriously in giving back content to the open source pool (apart from a few donations). do not procrastinate this is also good way of contributing back . This is not an excuse, as I would have found time if I believed that it was my responsibility. Anybody/Organization associated with this group have a give-back policy? Giving is ones personal conscious thing nobody can force or demand it :-) This is not a troll or to start a flame war. Just want to know about how you guys think. i give this simple analogy to students as what they want to be , there are gold rush people ( the guys with one idea and want to make it big through product or service ) and people who will be making spades ( the guys who actually build things ) for the gold rush , may be mostly you have seen and interacted with people who are into making spades. anyway what is that big idea you have on your mind? -Satya fossevents.in ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
On Wed, Jul 25, 2012 at 1:15 PM, Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay sankarshan.mukhopadh...@gmail.com wrote: A significant part of the 'open source' is the concept of open a restaurant but give away the menu. In effect, the availability of the source code of the product enables two distinct streams of revenue - feature driven and support/services driven. And, in either case you are helping to increase the share of the product. Increase share of the product meaning? I am talking from a business perspective. It is one thing to feel exhilarated when hundreds of thousands of people use your app. But does this realize into making money? Regards, Arun http://wondroussky.blogspot.in/ கற்றது கைமண் அளவு, கல்லாதது உலகளவு - ஔவையார் Known is a drop, Unknown is an ocean ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
On Wed, Jul 25, 2012 at 1:20 PM, satyaakam goswami satyaa...@gmail.comwrote: i give this simple analogy to students as what they want to be , there are gold rush people ( the guys with one idea and want to make it big through product or service ) and people who will be making spades ( the guys who actually build things ) for the gold rush , may be mostly you have seen and interacted with people who are into making spades. Nice analogy. But... The spades are free as in free beer! How many people even look at the names of the authors of `that` brilliant little library under LGPL which saved you a few days of coding? :) anyway what is that big idea you have on your mind? My post was more to do with a feeling of being a leech :) Regards, Arun http://wondroussky.blogspot.in/ கற்றது கைமண் அளவு, கல்லாதது உலகளவு - ஔவையார் Known is a drop, Unknown is an ocean ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
On Wed, Jul 25, 2012 at 1:21 PM, Arun Venkataswamy arun...@gmail.com wrote: On Wed, Jul 25, 2012 at 1:15 PM, Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay sankarshan.mukhopadh...@gmail.com wrote: A significant part of the 'open source' is the concept of open a restaurant but give away the menu. In effect, the availability of the source code of the product enables two distinct streams of revenue - feature driven and support/services driven. And, in either case you are helping to increase the share of the product. Increase share of the product meaning? more user base , ultimately there is hope that there will be streams of revenues from support and customization ( like adding features) I am talking from a business perspective. It is one thing to feel exhilarated when hundreds of thousands of people use your app. But does this realize into making money? yes that is where business sense kicks in how to get a dollar out of customer or it could be the other way round too when the product is so good he willingly starts paying what you demand , this risk and reward scenarios is what any business is all about , and an entrepreneurs you live with it . -Satya ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
On Wed, Jul 25, 2012 at 1:07 PM, Arun Venkataswamy arun...@gmail.comwrote: Hi, Has anybody in this list or people you know - have made money by creating open source products? I am not talking about people who earn money by providing services around someone else's effort of creating the primary, core product (say the LAMP stack). I am talking about people who are creative and made stuff from scratch. Two examples that come to mind straight away: HasGeek: http://jace.zaiki.in/2012/06/26/technology-outsource-vs-open-source Fusion Charts: http://www.fusioncharts.com/goodies/fusioncharts-free/product-licensing/ Different personalities, and different motivations for opening up the source, but both are worth a look. -Karra ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
Nice analogy. But... The spades are free as in free beer! How many people even look at the names of the authors of `that` brilliant little library under LGPL which saved you a few days of coding? :) Does not matter know from years of working like this in the end the skill of making will get paid than the spade itself, since they invariably want something which they think is unique idea or product and hence they pay for making it. as far as sharing the bounty is concerned you can share from what you have or you do not have any or one becomes greedy over time , so this behavior is once social currency which also comes into play. -Satya fossevents.in ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
Two examples that come to mind straight away: HasGeek: http://jace.zaiki.in/2012/06/26/technology-outsource-vs-open-source Fusion Charts: http://www.fusioncharts.com/goodies/fusioncharts-free/product-licensing/ Different personalities, and different motivations for opening up the source, but both are worth a look. i could think of two , i am sure there are more than few like these http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cygnus_Solutions http://www.gluster.org/ -Satya fossevents.in ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
On Wed, 2012-07-25 at 13:07 +0530, Arun Venkataswamy wrote: Has anybody in this list or people you know - have made money by creating open source products? I have. Not much money, but money. My model is like this: I offer to build applications for the client, charge what I feel is a reasonable sum and convince them that if the software is open source from the start it is easier to get people to contribute to it, the code is available if I drop dead and it is easy for them to upgrade and debug errors. My costs are cut because whenever I am stuck I can always find people who are willing to write some code for free (although sometimes I pay) because it is open source. I also insist on my clients learning the basics of issue management and refuse to do anything unless a proper ticket is filed. I do not have to lie to the client about progress and never give progress reports. I tell them to look at the repo to see if I am doing work or not. The model often fails because the client cannot get used to the way I do things. When it succeeds, it works great. The client as a co-developer. Note that all my work is web apps (not websites). Some things I have learned: 1. The person I interact with on the client side *must* be the person who takes the decisions in the client concern. It does not work if I have to interact with an underling. 2. The development must be module by module and should go into production immediately - if the guy wants the whole thing ready before going into production, I decline to do it. 3. One has to be extremely flexible with regard to design changes and new feature requests. The client may think he knows what he wants, but once in production, he may realise he needs something else. One must be prepared to rip the guts out of the app and rewrite - without losing data. 4. I push as much of the work as possible on to the client - he has to enter the data (I may make a script to load the data from a spreadsheet, but he has to actually get everything ready and run the script). I show him how to back up, but he has to do it. Likewise simple upgrades like doing hg pull, hg update and restarting the server is his job. Like wise for database migration, I give the script - he has to run it. 5. Design - he has to hire someone for that. In one case the guy learned css and html and did it himself. (it looked horrible, but he was happy). There are two reasons why I do this - 1. I am not capable of drawing a straight line even with the aid of a computer and 2. design is the one field in which the open source methodology does not work. No committee or group of people can do good design - one guy has to do it. If he needs help, the helpers have to do what they are told - no vote. 6. Last and most important - make proper agreements and make sure the schedule of payment is met. No pay, no work. The flip side is that when they see I am flexible with regard to doing mid course changes and adding new features they do not quibble about paying more. One of my big successes was building an app for a Finnish NGO working in Mumbai. We started with one site and soon several sites in 7 countries in the region. The lady in charge of Asia then took a year or two off to take a course on how to get things done by IT people. She was shifted to Africa and we have now covered 4 countries there. The course she took did not help her at all as it was to do with how to extract work from M$ Weenies. But she has learned issue management - you may look at the discussions in the open and closed issues in this project here: https://bitbucket.org/lawgon/kenyakids/ now her bug/feature reporting is as good as most professionals. We are soon going worldwide, and quite a few other NGOs are lining up - my client is doing the marketing for me (and not asking for commission). I have had one spectacular flop also - some members of our LUG will remember as they were involved. The flop was due to the fact that I ignored most of the principles mentioned above - especially point No 1. One last comment - do not write code unless 1. some one pays you or 2. you need it for something you want to achieve. You can think of some fantastic idea that you think will be the next facebook or will fulfill a need that people will pay for - ok, if you must, do it, but do not expect to make money from it. As some one said, if people will not pay for something, they certainly will take it if it is free. -- regards Kenneth Gonsalves ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
On Wed, 2012-07-25 at 16:56 +0530, kenneth gonsalves wrote: One last comment - do not write code unless 1. some one pays you or 2. you need it for something you want to achieve. You can think of some fantastic idea that you think will be the next facebook or will fulfill a need that people will pay for - ok, if you must, do it, but do not expect to make money from it. As some one said, if people will not pay for something, they certainly will take it if it is free. oops - that should read 'they certainly will not take it if it is free' -- regards Kenneth Gonsalves ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
Very nice points KG On Wed, Jul 25, 2012 at 4:56 PM, kenneth gonsalves law...@thenilgiris.com wrote: On Wed, 2012-07-25 at 13:07 +0530, Arun Venkataswamy wrote: Has anybody in this list or people you know - have made money by creating open source products? I have. Not much money, but money. My model is like this: I offer to build applications for the client, charge what I feel is a reasonable sum and convince them that if the software is open source from the start it is easier to get people to contribute to it, the code is available if I drop dead and it is easy for them to upgrade and debug errors. My costs are cut because whenever I am stuck I can always find people who are willing to write some code for free (although sometimes I pay) because it is open source. I also insist on my clients learning the basics of issue management and refuse to do anything unless a proper ticket is filed. I do not have to lie to the client about progress and never give progress reports. I tell them to look at the repo to see if I am doing work or not. The model often fails because the client cannot get used to the way I do things. When it succeeds, it works great. The client as a co-developer. Note that all my work is web apps (not websites). Some things I have learned: 1. The person I interact with on the client side *must* be the person who takes the decisions in the client concern. It does not work if I have to interact with an underling. 2. The development must be module by module and should go into production immediately - if the guy wants the whole thing ready before going into production, I decline to do it. 3. One has to be extremely flexible with regard to design changes and new feature requests. The client may think he knows what he wants, but once in production, he may realise he needs something else. One must be prepared to rip the guts out of the app and rewrite - without losing data. 4. I push as much of the work as possible on to the client - he has to enter the data (I may make a script to load the data from a spreadsheet, but he has to actually get everything ready and run the script). I show him how to back up, but he has to do it. Likewise simple upgrades like doing hg pull, hg update and restarting the server is his job. Like wise for database migration, I give the script - he has to run it. 5. Design - he has to hire someone for that. In one case the guy learned css and html and did it himself. (it looked horrible, but he was happy). There are two reasons why I do this - 1. I am not capable of drawing a straight line even with the aid of a computer and 2. design is the one field in which the open source methodology does not work. No committee or group of people can do good design - one guy has to do it. If he needs help, the helpers have to do what they are told - no vote. 6. Last and most important - make proper agreements and make sure the schedule of payment is met. No pay, no work. The flip side is that when they see I am flexible with regard to doing mid course changes and adding new features they do not quibble about paying more. One of my big successes was building an app for a Finnish NGO working in Mumbai. We started with one site and soon several sites in 7 countries in the region. The lady in charge of Asia then took a year or two off to take a course on how to get things done by IT people. She was shifted to Africa and we have now covered 4 countries there. The course she took did not help her at all as it was to do with how to extract work from M$ Weenies. But she has learned issue management - you may look at the discussions in the open and closed issues in this project here: https://bitbucket.org/lawgon/kenyakids/ now her bug/feature reporting is as good as most professionals. We are soon going worldwide, and quite a few other NGOs are lining up - my client is doing the marketing for me (and not asking for commission). I have had one spectacular flop also - some members of our LUG will remember as they were involved. The flop was due to the fact that I ignored most of the principles mentioned above - especially point No 1. One last comment - do not write code unless 1. some one pays you or 2. you need it for something you want to achieve. You can think of some fantastic idea that you think will be the next facebook or will fulfill a need that people will pay for - ok, if you must, do it, but do not expect to make money from it. As some one said, if people will not pay for something, they certainly will take it if it is free. -- regards Kenneth Gonsalves ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc -- Gayatri Hitech http://gayatri-hitech.com ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
Re: [Ilugc] Open source and business
Dear Mr. Kenneth. forgive me (and bear with me too) I always think that your replies are very egostic (forget the word - It just came to my mind. take the meaning only). but this one explanation gives you as a person a totally different perspective. superb guideline, and did not wasted even one word. every startup (let alone a FOSS developer) should go through this with respect to his work. thanks sir. with warm regards s.sivakumar ___ ILUGC Mailing List: http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
[Ilugc] Open source for business users
Hi ! Here is another hiccup when trying to user Open source for business. Has anyone successfully implemented dual screen in Ubuntu ? I am trying to bring up a teleconferencing solution .A laptop running Ubuntu connected to 60 TV through s-video. Xp with ATi drivers has no problem though. I see lot of postings in Ubuntu forums . But not able to succeed mainly because of my incapacity. But would like to know about some first hand experience here. Cheers Varadarajan www.cloudversity.com ___ To unsubscribe, email ilugc-requ...@ae.iitm.ac.in with unsubscribe password address in the subject or body of the message. http://www.ae.iitm.ac.in/mailman/listinfo/ilugc
