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>However, this is why Proprietary software will always be around and why there are many markets where Free Software won't take over. There are many people that

by lsc 10y ago

>However, this is why Proprietary software will always be around and why there are many markets where Free Software won't take over. There are many people that don't want to be a collaborator because they don't enjoy dealing with software. They just want to exchange money and have a problem solved for them. So, uh, while it's certainly true that it makes a lot of sense to exchange money for goods and services, in this case, working software, my experience has been that a lot of times? proprietary software is worse at this than open-source. See RedHat, for instance, for an example of pretty good support (well, compared to what you get when you pay money for proprietary software) In fact, i think there are structural reasons why buying support from someone who supports an open source product might be better than buying support from a company selling proprietary software. The main reason being that the open-source software provider has competition. People other than RedHat can reasonably support RedHat software; this can't really be said for closed-source software. Considering the huge pain in the ass that switching business critical software packages usually is, well, my personal experience is that if you get something closed-source from IBM, you are going to be way more disappointed in their support than if you get something open from RedHat.

afarrell 10y ago
I don't mean to argue wholesale against F/OSS, but against a certain approach to it. You are absolutely right that there are some domains where the Open Source software available is much better than the proprietary software. <insert rant about oracle's developer experience compared to PostgreSQL> Another related structural reason is the lower cost and lower risk for a professional of educating oneself on open source, reducing hiring costs. This only applies to domains where the things you're buying aren't turnkey solutions, but that is many domains.
- lsc 10y ago
  Hmm? I suppose I was unclear. I wasn't making a comment about the relative quality of the software itself- I was pointing out that once you have decided you want to pay for support, for some domains, the for-pay support available for the open-source product is better than the for-pay support available for the closed-source product. Really, "what level of support do I want to pay for?" is a question you have to answer separately from the "should I use open source or not" question. You can often buy closed source software without support, just like you can often buy support for open source software. The quality of the available support varies quite a lot, and really should be evaluated primarily on the reputation of the company you are buying the support from, but in my experience? proprietary software is not the clear winner in the paid support department. I actually think that a lot of managers are sold a bill of goods with the "someone to blame" line- The software being closed-source and paid for doesn't automatically mean that the support is any good. I've been in so many situations where we end up needing to call support because something broke, we don't have the source... and a lot of times? well, I (and just about any other sysadmin) could give you really long stories of incompetence.

by lsc 10y ago

afarrell 10y ago

I don't mean to argue wholesale against F/OSS, but against a certain approach to it. You are absolutely right that there are some domains where the Open Source software available is much better than the proprietary software. <insert rant about oracle's developer experience compared to PostgreSQL> Another related structural reason is the lower cost and lower risk for a professional of educating oneself on open source, reducing hiring costs. This only applies to domains where the things you're buying aren't turnkey solutions, but that is many domains.

lsc 10y ago
Hmm? I suppose I was unclear. I wasn't making a comment about the relative quality of the software itself- I was pointing out that once you have decided you want to pay for support, for some domains, the for-pay support available for the open-source product is better than the for-pay support available for the closed-source product. Really, "what level of support do I want to pay for?" is a question you have to answer separately from the "should I use open source or not" question. You can often buy closed source software without support, just like you can often buy support for open source software. The quality of the available support varies quite a lot, and really should be evaluated primarily on the reputation of the company you are buying the support from, but in my experience? proprietary software is not the clear winner in the paid support department. I actually think that a lot of managers are sold a bill of goods with the "someone to blame" line- The software being closed-source and paid for doesn't automatically mean that the support is any good. I've been in so many situations where we end up needing to call support because something broke, we don't have the source... and a lot of times? well, I (and just about any other sysadmin) could give you really long stories of incompetence.