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Simon Phipps's personal commentary

Microsoft hits out at open source

In the Computer Weekly article Microsoft hits out at open source there's a stunning display of both betrayal and of wrong-thinking from Chris Sharp of Microsoft, who clearly hasn't received the note about being kinder & gentler and will probably having Dare fuming. I hope it's betrayal, anyway - Sharp is ex Red Hat and I have to assume that his views have emerged since leaving (or that he was a really bad fit):

Sharp, who used to work for Red Hat before joining Microsoft, said building open-source software is a "waste of money", adding that with open source, a company is, in effect, giving away its intellectual property and preventing a software company from getting back benefits from its IP.

Hmm, I wonder if the stitches show? The nub of his argument is just muddle-headed, though, and shows a very shallow understanding of open source dynamics. Sharp thinks that because software is open source, no-one can make money:

If a government goes out and anchors its purchasing policy on open source, it will, in effect. hurt its local commercial software community, Sharp claimed. For every $1 spent on Microsoft products, for example, some $8 goes to the surrounding local software community who have based their products on Microsoft technologies, he said.

Now why, exactly, should there be no equivalent local ecosystem creating and supporting products and services that support an open source platform such as OpenOffice.org or Linux?

In Ireland, for example, a company I know well uses OpenOffice.org as the basis of its system for managing the workflow of government legislation. They've built a distributed, serice-oriented system that manages contributions from all the political parties and can then produce camera-ready copy for the new legislation the instant voting finishes. The widespread acceptance of OpenOffice.org by the Irish government acted as an enabler to innovation, not an inhibitor. Participating in open source has allowed them to create an innovative and unique system that's now drawing attention from local governments in the US.

What's more, every euro spent on their software stays in the country and none at all haemorrhages away to America. Far from damaging the local economy, I'd suggest that open source software helps small businesses compete in markets otherwise dominated by monopolists, creating valuable local businesses and keeping money that would normally pay inflated prices to overseas hegemonists out of their hands and in the local economy. Maybe that's the reason Chris Sharp is so polarised against it?

posted at 3:16 PM (UK) | |