

Why open source failed - syntaxfree
http://dayvancowboy.org/2008/05/de-landa-tackles-open-source/

======
ajross
Yikes. It's like a "Fr33 software is teh suxor!" flame written by a literary
analysis poseur. Not a lot of insight, but wow, can he nest a dependent
clause!

Meh. Sure, whatever. Open source hasn't taken over the world, hasn't killed
windows, and is most successful on the server. I guess that's "failed" for
some interpretations of the term.

~~~
syntaxfree
It's successful on the server space because Linux and friends are a cheapie
imitation of Unix environments and Microsoft server offerings plain suck. Open
source failed to produce new concepts -- to "explore the subspace of possible
programs", as de Landa puts it.

It probably wouldn't have caught on the server space if Unix wasn't such an
integral part of hacker culture anyway. The whole point of the (admittedly
badly writtten. I'm not a native speaker, I'm just learning how to write more
complex essays) article is that open source remained glued to hacker culture
and it failed to deliver its promises or even confirm Linus' Law ("given
enough eyeballs all bugs are shallow") as poor QA killed Linux on the desktop
space.

~~~
gravity
Nothing has failed yet. You act like the project is over and done with. It's
not. Linux has conquered pretty much every single space but the desktop. This
is a huge success, especially when ten years ago it was exciting to read about
any company deploying Linux publicly in any sort of way. Now it's expected.

As for the desktop, the work isn't finished, and it'll take a very long time
to get to the point where it's a real contender. It's not a QA issue. The
Linux desktop of today is actually of very high quality. It's that it's a very
difficult space to compete in.

~~~
syntaxfree
It isn't such a hard space to compete in. There's a huge movement towards
cheaper PCs. But anyway, for a while there was a huge gaping window when Linux
was "cool" (the way OS X is now) and many many people tried it. The QA sucked
by then.

I mean, I was a true believer -- I went all the way building a Gentoo desktop
and whatnot. But none of the readymade distributions I tried (SuSE, Mandrake,
Fedora, etc.) were up to the task of fueling a working environment where I
don't have to worry about the working environment.

After a while, I just got a Mac and quit bothering with useless geekery. I
went geeking into functional programming instead.

Did you get the news that the next batch of OLPC laptops will use Windows XP?
They weren't bribed by Microsoft. It's not a matter of interface either,
they'll keep the same interface.

~~~
chaostheory
OSX may not be open source, but isn't it built on top of BSD and doesn't it
include/use a lot of open source software?

~~~
gravity
OSX would fail completely without free software. BSD is the subsystem, their
browser is based on konqueror's html engine, they rely on cups for printing,
samba for file sharing with windows... the list goes on and on.

What's important about this isn't so much that free software didn't fail, but
that modern computing could not and would not exist without free software. End
of story. Mac classic would be all but dead now, and Windows would have
"innovated" us all in to a ditch. Remember what Microsoft did to IE when
Netscape wasn't a threat? It'd be the same story. Without free software, there
wouldn't be a mozilla, an OSX, or anything like it. Modern computing
absolutely requires free software in order to function.

------
notauser
Ouch, rather hard to read.

However:

\- Open source (in a way that works) is here for web 2.0. Check out the AGPL
(I'm releasing a big project under it this weekend.) This offers the same
advantages for companies as desktop/server open source (no license
administration, no data lock in, market price for consulting).

\- OSS is not a failure. It ships on 99%+ of all desktop/laptop computers
(including Windows and OS X machines), and even if you limit your count to
shipped devices that have more open than closed software then Open Source
still wins (routers, cell phones, appliances, set top boxes, even watches!)

\- OSS doesn't have to dominate to win. As long as it fits the needs of the
people who are developing it, then it will continue to mature. Maturity will
(and has!) naturally bring more users and more development money.

\- This is really the first full year you in which can buy consumer computers
from tier 1 vendors with Linux pre-loaded. (HP, Dell and ASUS - the last of
which has shipped a million plus units.) This was a precondition for mass
market success. As the offerings mature expect sales to grow - up until now
Linux wasn't really in the competition, but rather just a curiosity in the
market.

------
Leon
Failed? As in how? Do you think open source will die or something? Do you
realize that hackers _will never stop hacking on software_ \- and that this is
the important part? That whatever happens to proprietary software developed,
it stays with the company that built it, companies which _do_ have the ability
to die? For open source software to die, to fail, would be for all open source
hackers to die; nothing less will stop them from improving/working on their
projects.

Seriously, have you ever met an open source developer and contrasted this to a
corporate programmer who has never worked on open source software? It's pretty
obvious who's better.

~~~
syntaxfree
> Do you realize that hackers will never stop hacking on software

Will they? Or will they move onto theoretical computer science hacking (like
Sigfpe and stuff) or even formal logic (like I did)? Is meant-for-widespread-
use hacking gonna continue? That is an open question.

You really should read the de Landa essay. It's surprising no one has; mine
was just commentary.

~~~
syntaxfree
(I just looked at google analytics. _One_ person clicked through onto the text
I was merely providing commentary to. Manuel de Landa is an actual
philosopher, I'm just a crummy young-ish blogger ;))

~~~
astine
Perhaps, then, you should have posted a link to the paper rather than to your
'crummy' commentary.

~~~
demallien
No, the decision to post a link to his commentary was probably right. If the
commentary gets this much discussion, but nobody clicks through to the
article, it's fairly clear that we aren't terribly interested in the article,
but we are interested in the commentary :-)

------
sadiq
A brilliant piece of satire.

Best part was:

"It’s interesting to see how the demise of Linux as a consumer platform...
contrasts with the starry-eyed hopes of the open-source project."

Classic.

------
TrevorJ
Too busy working my professional day job to reply right now...Gotta get back
to using an open source 3D animation package to deliver a project while I
ponder the demise of open source software.

~~~
syntaxfree
Then again, Bryce was developed in a proprietary environment and then released
as open source in an attempt to build goodwill. Was it even improved in terms
of speed or stability? I can't imagine open source developers actually adding
features to it.

The reason I had the time to blog about it is that Microsoft Word's control
revision system is simple enough that I got my job done way before deadlines.
As much as I love TeX typesetting, that would NEVER happen in a
LaTeX+CVS/Subversion/darcs/git environment.I'd be still struggling the
"quantum theory of patches".

~~~
tjr
Hmmm. I've used Texinfo+CVS+patches extensively working for the GNU Project. I
despise using Microsoft Word for anything but the most simple tasks.

Perhaps folks just think differently about software usage.

~~~
syntaxfree
Note "GNU Project" and how the text emphasizes that "open source software
attends to the hacker community's needs, not the end user needs". I did some
solo writing with LaTeX and darcs, but there's no way that would fly in an
office environment. And I work with very smart people -- my main work
colleague has finished his MSc. in physics at age 21 before dropping out of
academia. But should we bothered to establish a protocol and working practices
to collaborate on documents? Microsoft Word does that and enough document
type-setting/FrameMaker stuff that five-digit projects are written straight
into Microsoft Word with no posterior editing work.

Microsoft Word's UI is sometimes counterintuitive, but it's simple enough that
people outside the hacker community can use it.

One problem with open source I didn't point out because the main idea was to
focus on de Landa is that too many people thought competing with Microsoft had
much to do with compatibility. If there was a working environment for
collaborative writing as usable as Microsoft Word people would eventually go
for it because it's cheaper.

I know, I know. I actually wrote my undergrad thesis on compatibility issues
in software competition and how Apple was attempting a "partial compatibility
strategy" by adopting Unix while keeping Macintoshness. But with time I
realized that wasn't really the core problem, it was just a road bump.

~~~
tjr
Sure, I wouldn't expect most computer users to learn TeX/CVS/etc. I wouldn't
even expect a majority of new hackers to learn it any more. But for those that
do learn it to a sufficient level of mastery, it's not only usable but at
times wonderful.

I think there are actually two "problems" going on at the same time. On one
hand, open source software is "too difficult" for most people to use. I agree.
But on the other hand, most people aren't putting that much effort into
learning the software.

Is software supposed to be easy to use? As much as possible, I would think.
But some "hacker" software that has a tremendous initial learning curve (TeX,
Emacs, even Lisp, depending on your background) offers equally tremendous
rewards over similar software that is easier to learn.

The reason, perhaps, is that in learning TeX, you are learning how to prepare
documents at a more abstract level than Microsoft Word. The resulting
documents may be largely identical, but TeX offers the user more power and
control in exchange for taking the time to learn how to operate it. This is
not necessarily a bad thing, especially if your job is to prepare documents.
It may be a totally awful thing if you only need to prepare an occasional
document, as the benefits of TeX are not likely to be worth the effort
required to learn it for you.

~~~
syntaxfree
We don't need more power than we already have. I have done the whole hacker
grand tour (well, I don't know C but I know Haskell and some Common Lisp),
learned Emacs, became profficient in Vim, etc. etc.

The cost-benefit equation just doesn't work for "hacker software" as you say
it. We're busy doing econometrics (we do use GNU R, but Matlab, Stata and SAS
are far superior for most work) and statistical work, and just need to get
reports done. We're trying to make money in here, not join a religion.

~~~
tjr
Perhaps folks just think differently about software usage.

~~~
syntaxfree
People sometimes make software usage a religion.

It's only human. I was a Haskell religious nut for a while. (Then I stopped
programming and changed hobbies to skateboarding. But I'm studying modal logic
from Konyndyk, so I'm still in the Haskell-ish geekspace).

------
eugenejen
Hi syntaxfree,

I suggest you to read a blog post from my friend.
<http://bob.wyman.us/main/2008/04/liquidity-and-c.html#more>

I hold similar point of view like him. Because I think the current problem is
in fact open source succeeds greatly, but to bring a usable system to end
users requires integration and current integration on desktop linux is not
that great.

Another thing is for non native speakers, maybe we should just try to write
sentences as simple as possible. I learned an old story from an old friend.
She and her husband went to a graduate school in midwest and both were
required to take a simple writing test. Her husband failed badly while she did
great. She said to me : "I don't remember all those complex grammar rules of
English so I just tried to write everything as simple as possible and my
husband is proud of his study of grammar and tried to write very complex
sentences".

I like PG and NNT's writings because they are simple and elegant. The most
important is what do you want to say and can you say it clear. I remember when
I was in graduate school, a rule is that "If one can not even clearly describe
his/her dissertation, then it is impossible to defense it". (I was science
major, but I guess for literary and philosophy, the opposite holds true
because both disciplines adopt a different strategy: defense by obscuring)

edit: Can anyone tell me why this gets down voted? Because of url inside a
post? I don't know where and why in this post makes people feel bad to down
vote it?

~~~
syntaxfree
Integration is a part of QA. I explicitly held that QA was one of the two main
drivers of Linux's failure. And don't kid yourself, it's definitive -- Linux
evokes images of crummy half-baked software in most people's heads.

~~~
niels_olson
People who describe themselves as "young-ish" similarly evoke images of crummy
half-baked ideas. Things grow. As you grow older you will learn to try to not
discount the entity you are presented with now based on impressions made in
the past.

~~~
syntaxfree
Well, the blog is full of crummy half-baked ideas, not to mention weird rants
written in panic while on drugs. My professional work is not described as
something by a young-ish person.

The thing is, it's too late to change the average (intelligent, well-informed,
willing to try new things) user's perception of Linux. For a while, people
like classical musicians were trying Linux because it seemed like the better
alternative. They gave up. The world gave up.

It's interesting how people using Linux are so insistent and proud of their
technology. (Check this reddit mini-thread:
<http://reddit.com/info/6ku5n/comments/c044vs7> )

I never once mentioned in the blog post I use a Mac. It's just something in
the background. I don't think about it. I use Windows at work, incidentally.
The taskbar works differently, but I'm not playing OS freak anymore.

------
syntaxfree
I added an "elevator summary" to the beginning of the text, prompted by the
friendly remarks in these comments noting that it's hard to find the point I'm
trying to get across.

------
josefresco
11 external links in that one article, at most 2 of which are optional. I see
he went to the Steve Gillmor school of article writing.

------
syntaxfree
For the six years I spent reading Slashdot, I read most of the points being
made in this comments page. I'm answering them because I'm waiting for some
other stuff to happen. But, oh well, these remarks keep on being made by the
inside people and the world keeps moving on doing actual stuff.

~~~
tokipin
don't delude yourself

