So, this was a high level talk about the commoditization of software, particularily Open Source software.
Funniest Question and Answer to the guy from Oracle:
A: Hopefully, I’ll be playing Golf in Maui.
A: You can compete on price, brand, and lower the overall price margin.
Another alternative would be to identify competitors that don’t want to
do what you do, then grab that market.
Did you know that Oracle has 40,000 employees while MySQL has 70. MySQL is catching up and is proving
itself as an enterprise level database. That has to say something. Their business models are obviously
different.
And there was the typical Microsoft bashing. But, that happens alot in general at Open Source conferences.
Tim O’reilly said that Apple now means something different from the PC, more than it does something. So, Apple is making
money on Open Source but they are also giving back to the community.
This past Thursday and Friday, Microsoft provided lunch for the conference. Now how’s that for a proprietary software
company reaching out and feeding the folks of Open Source. Is there a business model of some sort waiting to come out. Hmmmmm.
The talk was pretty good. It made me look at things in a different perspective.
Charles Engelke's Blog 