Freitag, 27. September 2002

Friday comment: I have been meaning to comment on what Steven said here for several days. But preparing a presentation for next week has kept me busy. Here a few short thoughts. Succesful open source projects might have more to do with community rather than code. Reading Cluetrain has really been an eye-opener for me when it comes to this. I would go a step further and say that: Successful projects have more to do... (i.e. not just open source) I think this is something that is still overlooked in most traditional projects. There is still this "customer" "supplier" mis-match with lots of overhead and hiding behind contracts and other paperwork. Where is the community? This is what is so great about being able to work and consult on open source - it allows you to meet your customers at the same level. Eye to eye. Build that community with your customer. It is the only way you will survive. Nowadays, I believe there is more value hidden inside a project, i.e. when people work together to create a solution. Shrink-wrapped miracles-in-boxes might promise a lot, but often prove to be really hard to implement. And increasingly hard to sell. Customers have had enough of products that cost many $$ yet still do not do what they really need. No-one is really interested in the promise any more. The real power behind open source is the community building process that it generates. After all software is just software.

What more can we ask for: " this book rocks!". Thanks.

Shadow Illusion: Frank sent me this link. Hmm.... He also points to this application of WiFi.

Switch: Ovidiu is now using NetNewsWire Lite as well. I've been using it for a while now at home and now that I have DSL it just runs and runs and runs. All the news, all the time. The Band: Paul adds a new category for the S&N band - snag-Attack. They are really not bad - but rather limited in the number of songs :-). At last years xmas party they had to play their set-list twice - or was it three times?