Open vs closed (was Re: [TriLUG] sample chapters...)

[Mike Mueller]

On Friday 24 October 2003 11:05, Michael Hrivnak wrote:
> For example, MIT believes in "OpenCourseWare"
>
> http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html

That's powerful.  This is a Prentice Hall and Addison Wesley killer.  But 
then again these publishers slightly modify problem sets in math books and 
come out with a new edition.  What's the motive? To make cheating harder or 
to goose sales?  If their motive is to goose sales by creating planned 
inefficiencies then they are roadkill in the future.  How much has Calculus 
changed recently?  Enough to warrant a new edition?

The MIT stuff can be used by a Malaysian university and MIT gets nothing in 
return except gushing praise from around the world. This is a subsidized 
effort and nobody is giving away work for free.  MIT will not loose any 
business from this initiative either.  They will always have an over-supply 
of students and faculty applicants and their endowment may actually increase 
in the future because of the value they are providing to the world at large.

I just got off the phone with http://www.smartdongle.com/.  They said
http://www.imageworks.com/ used their Linux stuff.  I asked about the 
application but they didn't know.  My guess is that Imageworks created tools 
that they want to control even amoung their own employees.  They may have 
created a competitive advantage by building a tool on an open source 
platform.  If my analysis is correct, then I've found an example of closed 
and open source coexisting.  

What I'm still searching for are the rules for what should be open and what 
should or can be closed.  I reject the position that all code should or 
should not be open.
-- 
Mike Mueller
324881 (08/20/2003)
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