Why open source Sucks!
There are some people who talk highly about open source; most of them hate commercial software and the wealth they have massed from it. They consider themselves as Gods and they all want to crush the evil Microsoft. Anyone who utters a word against OSS is regarded as supporter of evil; most of them don’t even have the courage of saying “Vista is Superb”. But they all have windows installed in their machines. Ask them why open source? They would say, it’s the fastest, safest & strongest, which is totally wrong.
Most academics don’t want to talk in favor of Microsoft or commercial software’s, specially in front of open source guys, unless you can stand that sneering look which say “Oh, a guy with limited computer knowledge”. This could be true because honestly speaking Open Source mostly suites experts, and that’s the fucking problem. Computing wouldn’t be this easy without companies like Microsoft, which managed to invest huge sums in hiring innovative people like Sabeer Bhatia who invented hotmail.
But In my point of view open source could cripple software industry and its development in many ways. When you look at the humanitarian perspective open source software could be seen as a very good thing, most of the people in third world countries doesn’t have money to buy Widows Vista for 399$. Is this the answer? Give it free and Fuck Microsoft! One thing open source world doesn’t realize is that windows actually works, just double click on a program to install click next, next , agree, finish, that’s all, no need to worry about it afterwards. No need to spend 10 hours reading documentations before installing something.
Those who criticize windows have one strong argument in common, security flaws and virus threats. Do you ever think that a virus writer or hacker will get what he wanted from writing program for Linux? He wants to see his virus on the news, to cause lot of damage, for people to talk about it. To achieve this he has to write a virus for an operating system which is widely used, which is windows.
Most open source software’s collapse at the end simply because they don’t have enough money or resources to plan themselves for the future. The best way to sustain the development of the industry is to reduce the price of commercial software, not to give it free. The best example is Google. They have developed a way to offer lots of free services while earning considerable amount of money for future researches and developments. Free means, no money, lack of resources, no innovation and no progress.
Let’s say that Ubuntu became so famous that nobody wants to buy windows anymore, what will happen to the future of the computer industry? We will be stuck with a technology which has a development speed of a snail. Microsoft spent many years and millions of dollars, 1000’s of software engineers to jump from Windows XP to windows Vista. In my point of view Vista is an Excellent Operating System. How long it would take open source community develop something like that?
Let’s look at fundamental issues of Open Source software
1. Bad User Interface Design- If you have ever used Linux you’ll experience the troubles that you might go through unless you have some good knowledge in computers. The problems with open source programming I s that they only think about programming but not about user friendliness or the interface. Ubuntu tries to copy windows XP, but still need lots of improvements in other areas.
2. Bad Documentation-Most of the time the documentation is written in a way that only experts can understand. When you use open source software, if you encounter even a simple problem, you may have to read through 100 of documents and user forum until you find a solution. I installed Ubuntu once and internet was not working, it took me one week to find the solution, many would have already given up.
3. Give us what they want- This is the main disadvantage of open source software projects. Can we play video games in Linux or Ubuntu? Ask this question from an Open Source guy, he will immediately answer “We don’t play games”.
4. Slow development rate- Since so many developers may join and leave the project, it may take a lot of time for a new guy to join the ongoing project and contribute efficiently. This may have a huge impact on the future of the project. There are millions of lines of coding; it could break down on its own weight. ( Check the speed of windows XP vs Red Hat Linux)
5. Refusing to learn from commercial software’s- Most of the open source software guys has strong tendency to refuse to learn anything from commercial rivals. Hence face lots of compatibility problems.
14 comments:
I seriously doubt that open source software (OSS) is a threat to commercial software - for the very reasons you specified in your post.
The relationship is much more complicated than a just being a threat. Like most human creations it has its positive and negatives. However I think biggest muddle OSS advocated have made is over the top anti-Microsoft rhetoric. That I think has distracted the discussion from anything productive.
I think some of your points are not accurate (bad user interfaces, etc are a thing of the past, many OSS have excellent UI design) , but the whole post seems to be about protecting the software industry, which like protecting any industry is a futile cause.
People judge software, like any other comodity, what do it need, can this thing do it, and how much does it cost. They dont give a rat's ass about whether it's open source or not.
If people feel Firefox is better than internet explorer, and they think the benifits outweigh the costs they'd go for it. And who's anybody to stop it?
You are right some people in the FOSS movement about being anti-Microsoft, although i think those numbers are declining as FOSS movement transforms itself from being a idealistic movement to being just another way of developing and distributing software and of course making money the process. FOSS is in fact not anti-commercial at all, it just require people to make money in different ways (providing support , so on..)
Do you think companies like google can run without open source software? their highly optimized distributed systems? web servers - in fact you are hosting your blog in one of open source powered servers.
Surely, they have done their own modifications, but if they tried to do it from scratch, we would be still using MSN for searching, live spaces for blogging.
Do you really think it's better to reinvent the wheel?
And for the record, open source release cycles are much robust than the commercial ones. The fact that micrsoft hired 1000s or rather millions of programmers doesn't make it superior, what matters is the real content of the application. And I would really suggest you to reconsider your measurements over speed of development on ubuntu.
Regarding the patches or updates, practically open source software release patches sooner than the commercial ones. Why do you think most of the web servers in the internet are apache? If it's so insecure like you say, would people really run it on there servers?
What I wanted to elaborate is that, being too open source could dangerously cripple the industry and its development because this society is still money based.....
Think about windows vista, can an open source community could develop something like that...even XP is more user friendlier than Linux & Ubutu...
Computing is all about making it easy, Once i installed ubuntu and it took me like one week to find out the faults in connecting to the internet & sound..(What will happen to an OLD grandma) ...finally i DON"T WANT Open source to END, I want it to have a proper balance with the Commercial softwares..
Good post.
But you make one fundamental mistake. Commercial and open source software are not two deferent categories. Every open source software is a commercial product. Some open source software even more expensive than “commercial software”. Example, Linux is free - But windows is cheaper. PHP is free - But Coldfusion is cheaper. Then again, wiki is cheaper and Britannica is not. Asterisk is a one big expensive free software.
But if we are talking about “wiki” type community involved software, they are getting better, since more and more companies are involved in “wikinomics” concept. IBM Linux solutions are actually pretty good. Adobe use lot of open source applications in their own applications, and even release some applications with open source. Soon Microsoft also planning to release some applications source code open. Boeing’s new jumbo jets are “openly engineered” product. Most of the Chinese automobiles are “open source” products. But none of them are free. It is not a free lunch, like most of the people trying to false advertise.
Vista Operating System Sucks. If you were floored by it's looks then it seems that either you are a newbie to computers or your knowledge of OS's suck big time. TRY "MAC OS" and by the way it's Fully Unix compliant (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_OS_X_v10.5)
where all the Open Source things started.
Open Source softwares have some rough edges but are a million times better that the commercial bloats pushed on users forcing them to buy latest hardware.
Forcing to buy latest hardware???...Thats the development of the technology man..That was the whole point of this article... Open source could halt the development of better technology, think, we may not need Dual core prosessors if there was no windows vista.........
Apart from loving nature,exploring places,reading,movies & games what have you done with the dual core machine running vista to make use of your so called "better technology"?
Better technology is the one which helps a common man do things easily.
I don't think conversing with you on this matter will help you understand the value of open source.
Things I do with it....
3D Max Rendering is faster
I can use many softwares at the same time( 3D max,Photoshop,word)
Can play Games like HALO too
what else you need
What can u do with Ubuntu?
Oh dear this is a list of post and too much comment. I couldn't read them. But Open Source definitely dooesn't suck.
Just Look at the web browser. Firefox vs Internet Explorer. I can't find the Firefox addons that were available in FF 1.5 that save me so much time in even in the lastest version IE7. When it comes to browser technology Open Source is far ahead.
ahh so u r working with a lot of softwares. How much did Vista cost you? Then 3D Max? Photoshop? word? How much did they cost all together? I hope they are not cheap as buying books. Most Sri Lankans get all these softwares at the price of buying a lunch packet. If you bought all these then u walking the talk. Otherwise you consider yourself an outlaw. Even you bought it and if you distribute the software or make copies of it you are in deep deep trouble. If the law in enforced what happens to poor users. U think they can afford all the expensive hardware and the software around it? I don't mind teaching my grandma how to use the shell effectively in Ubuntu in that case rather than running on debt..
FOSS allows not just to use it but to modify/distribute it as well. You have confused yourself with the word FREE. Most FOSS people hate closed source software coz it cuts down their freedom.
With cheaper cost, better performance, and better reliability, Open Source is threatening Corporate America --more specifically, Microsoft.
Corporate America is what stands between us and the never-ending threat of PRC, Islam, and Commie Liberals. If Microsoft dies, then so will America and the American family values. Open Source is UN-AMERICAN and threatening the very values that our Founding Fathers had strived for. Open Source is COMMIE. A true, patriotic American uses Microsoft.
With cheaper cost, better performance, and better reliability, Open Source is threatening Corporate America --more specifically, Microsoft.
Corporate America is what stands between us and the never-ending threat of PRC, Islam, and Commie Liberals. If Microsoft dies, then so will America and the American family values. Open Source is UN-AMERICAN and threatening the very values that our Founding Fathers had strived for. Open Source is COMMIE. A true, patriotic American uses Microsoft.
lol @ open source, i'll continue to bill out at 90 an hour, thank you very much
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