Christof on Tech & Biz

Six Degrees of Separation Is Now Three

Christof — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 15:04:00 GMT

Interesting study by O2: http://www.o2.com/media/press_releases/latest_pr_14276.asp

The study argues that the former thesis by US psychologist Stanley Milgram following a 1967 experiment has to be updated. Milgram found that, on average, people needed 5 connections to connect to any other person on the planet. These six degrees of separation have now found to be only 3.

Apparently technology, esp. e-mail, SNS and mobile phones, have made us more connected than ever and I think that's not only a fair observation but also a good thing. Some people complain about the fact that having a few 100 connections on FB or LinkedIn may be inflationary and hence useless, but they ignore the fact that those people are not only connections but also connectors, hence bringing a whole new form of communication between people to the table - trusted communication based on connection: If I try to contact, say, the head of marketing at Tata Steel (just one example), I would, today, be able to very effectively to get trusted access to that person, by using several social networks (incl. the online databases of my Alma Mater, of course). If I need advice from a local in Sydney, I can easily do that as well.

I emphasize trusted, because a major problem of our times is us drowning in (often unreliable) information. Most people resort to asking their friends for help to make often significant choices (find a dentist - ask a friend. select a cellphone model - ask your friends). If we are able to build a larger, more diverse, and hence more effective network of trusted connections, we should be able to better handle information and make better decisions.

I have been starting to take intense interest recently in technology to share private data between trusted social connections (rather than public data of the kind that Google thankfully aggregates for us). I believe that 3 degrees of separation will provide for a better search-ranking and hence recommendation algorithm than PageView, due to it not being prone to massive manipulation by web mareketers, but by leveraging the fact that we bond socially on being "alike" and hence share preferences and taste as well as a reputation and trust for one another.

These changes, well underway, will have massive impacts on information retrieval and decision making. Marketers - awake, if you haven't done so already!

Happy New Year 2008!

Christof — Mon, 31 Dec 2007 19:34:00 GMT

I want to use this opportunity to thank all of you who have contributed to a great year 2007!

In 2007, we have continued to make db4o's cutting edge persistence technology available to many more Java and .NET developers, growing our community of registered developers well beyond 30,000, while aggregate downloads approach 2 million.

Also, we have continued to expand our commercial services to meet the growing demand for support and tools to leverage db4o's properties even in the most demanding environments, incl. in embedded devices, grids, Scada systems, automotives or on cellphones. To that end we have formed dedicated application engineering teams and crafted a suite of dDN Enterprise tools and services incl. XtremeConnect which meet the requirements of even the most demanding IT shop.

As a result, we saw the launch of many exciting new commercial products and 100s of open source projects powered by db4o. Our customers do not only include large corporations, but uncounted startups which were born with db4o and will never go back to forgo the cost savings and architectural benefits from using native Java or .NET object persistence.

This success of db4o is based on the unique combination of community participation and commercial engagement, creating the best of both worlds: user empowerment and high software quality combined with responsive expert service and rigorous license indemnification.

We believe that in 2008 there are plenty more opportunities to leverage db4o into mass markets, including Google's Android platform to update the mass market cellphone into a full fledged personal Java device, as well as Microsoft's LINQ initiative, shifting paradigms to very tight language/persistence integration as pioneered by db4o with Native Queries (NQ).

In this spirit we will continue our mission in 2008 and, once again, thank all who have and will contribute to it!

Happy New Year!

Christof Wittig

CEO db4ojects

Android brings handsets to the next level - and open doors a mile wide for db4o

Christof — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 08:18:00 GMT

Though I am not utterly convinced yet that Google will be as successful to 'embrace' the handset with the Android/OHA initiative as it is with search&more in the web and on PCs, I am absolutely excited about the technical choices the developers made with respect to Java:

Android brings full blown Java JDK 1.1 with Java always on to mass market handsets. Java therefore sits in the kernel space, not the application space as it usually does in the industry. This means total portability and thus commoditization of the underlying handsets. No wonder that market leader Nokia didn't join - they rather like it native C/C++ for their models only!

As a direct result, integrating and running db4o is a piece of cake. This morning here in Beijing, Andrew build a quick eval and test run to store very simple flat objects (were db4o is normally at par or weaker than SQL databases - it's really competitive only for more structured, deeper object graphs) - and even these results are great: db4o runs without a snag on Android and is, out of the box and without optimization, already 20% faster:

The Java Delvek VM and all other parts of the stack are entirely open source and available under Apache license, which makes live very easy for everybody (except close source vendors of similar components, of course).

Also, we see that they have dropped SQLite into the package, but don't really integrate or leverage the data store for data sharing or other services (as of yet). There's no JDBC driver or any form of object handling - you have to hack strings and think about persistence all the time, if you then need it. And, of course, there's no Hibernate nearby to save you...

This is the opportunity to show that db4o can provide a Royce Rolls where the default solution is not much more than a bike. db4objects will actively invest to enhance Android with a professional persistence option, working closely together with members of the initial OHA alliance. Watch out for shared application objects (as content providers), a powerful fulltext a la Google desktop on handsets, geotagging and navigation support, and much more!

Stay tuned!

International Conference on Object Databases in Berlin, March 2008

Christof — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 15:51:00 GMT

I am happy to announce my participation in the first international conference on object databases in this century, the icoodb 2008, which our friend Stefan Edlich organizes at the University of Applied Sciences in Berlin on March 13 and 14, 2008. I will be holding a keynote on "ODBMS 2.0 - how todays object databases are here to stay".

The event reflects the growing interest and the large community which is backing object databases today, especially since db4objects has introduced the 2nd generation with its embeddable, all-native and open source product db4o.

More about the conference in today's announcement on ODBMS.ORG.

Salesforce.com Predatory Pricing

Christof — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 18:23:00 GMT

We have been a pretty loyal customers to SFDC in the past, mostly because of the systems being up and running by the time that Sugar hit the marketplace, so that switching cost kept us from looking at alternatives, especially open source ones, so far.

However, over time, the reasons to look at alternatives, and - more important - the reasons for newbies to never start with salesforce.com are accumulating.

Just now another one was added, when we (not even aware of there being one) reached our "storage limit" of 20MB per user (with a 1GB minimum). With 14 users paying far more than $100 each PER MONTH, it is quite archaic to see oneself confronted with a 20MB per user storage limit, given that each salesforce object (a mail, a contact, anything), even without any content, just has a systemic storage requirements of some 100KB.

While salesforce.com can do what they want to do, I think people should know that, once locked in, like with any closed source vendor, they are going to be milked down the road, and they should, at least, properly negotiate adaquate storage limits.

Moreover, the community should cry "foul" whenever salesforce.com tries to showcase itself as a 2.0 or open source company, which seconds Matt Asay's respective post.

For someone charging $1,500 per year for only 500MB of additional storage, you are not even a 1.0 company. You are simply not getting it to see how much of your reputation and customer loyalty you can ruin for a small, quick buck, compared to executing a forward looking company strategy.

It's time to look at Sugar, guys!

db4objects Receives Additional Funding

Christof — Tue, 24 Jul 2007 23:37:00 GMT

db4objects has raised additional funds to grow its operations in response to its fast growing user community and customer base.

We're very happy to welcome Palo Alto-based Asset Management to our circle of investors and Skip Fleshman to our board of directors.

The funds of an undisclosed sum in the lower million dollars ballpark will be used to scale our core engineering team and grow our application engineering and support services. The latter are a new addition to our business in response to certain customers of very high profile (unfortunately mostly under NDA, so I cannot mention them) have discovered how the breakthrough technological benefits of db4o translate into 10x, breakthrough benefits for their business. For these customers we provide, if necessary and in cooperation with partners, highly customized, fast time-to-market projects to fill any gaps that may be there on the product, support, system integration or even the application side, so that they can quickly translate their vision into reality.

Automotive, Carriers, Devices and Caching Systems

Among those highly visionary project solutions are OTA updateable navigation systems in cars (as we showcased at JavaOne 2007), which use Java objects, Dijkstra algorithms, NAND Flash drives and db4o to create a whole new class of navigation devices, which - by means of OSGi, the standard of the USDOT VII project - also hook nicely into the future of telematics.

Another solution area is the idea that user-generated data and content on cellphones becomes the single most attractive tool to retain customers - because that's the only thing that distinguishes a carrier from another: legacy data of its users. With db4o as a (Java: WORA) portable yet controllable persistence engine, carriers can achieve this very important objective of customer retention in more mature mobile markets and bypass the commoditizing effects of the OMA-DS standardization.

Other hot areas of application beyond the traditional device and industrial automation space are financial services, SCADA systems and other forms of object caches - be it in grids, on rich clients such as Silverlight/Flex/JavaFX or in any other online/offline scenario.

Are you consistent, Christof?

While I do not assume that anybody really reads my blog or keeps track of what I said earlier, I still wanted to reconcile this step with my past blog posts about our funding strategy, which to date was based on professional, entrepreneurial angels like Mark Leslie (Veritas founder), Vinod Khosla (Sun founder) and Jerry Fiddler (Wind River founder), e.g. as posted here.

I argued that you cannot build a true open source business in 3 years, which is the classical "VC clock". Open source business is all about "users first, business second". All open source projects go through 3 phases:

The initative of one or a few individuals to bring an open source project to the starting line for community adoption
The community-driven rise of user adoption which still produces little or no revenues
The commercialization when the massive user adoption cries for services, add ons or other complements like db4o's non-commercial licensing alternative for embedded useage in non-GPL'd products

For db4objects this is consistent with the new funding: (1) In 2000-2004 there was a small non-profit online community around Carl Rosenberger that brought the project to the starting line. (2) In 2004-2007 the community has grown from a few 100 to some 25,000 registered developers with more than 1,000,000 product downloads.

Now, we're entering phase (3), the commercialization of our technology, which will - at this stage - be based mostly on a few very high value customers which get very unique business benefits from db4o's very differentiated and enabling technology. This is the time when you want to make sure that a solid funding ensures smooth delivery to the even most demanding customers.

While some could argue that 25,000 registered developers is little compared to MySQL's - I don't know - 2.5 million - I want to make sure that we understand that db4o is an innovative, differentiated product unlike any other. This sets it apart from MySQL and all others which are a commodity within a well understood product category (RDBMS) and - in the end of the day - sell a good-enough product at lower prices. This commodity approach cries for a very large population of users to be sustainable, because conversion rates are sometimes less than 1% and ASPs are around $10K.

db4o has none of this. For those users that finally get their head around the disruptive nature of db4o, we provide immense benefits. We can unlock a much higher business value to our users, are highly differentiated from all other vendors out there, and are therefore not forced to differentiate by price. Price consistently ranked very low in our annual user surveys. More product features and better influence on the product roadmap ranked very high in user requirements, and our strategy going forward reflects exactly this market need.

I think our metrics in terms of user population (lower than MySQL), commercial conversion (higher than MySQL) and ASP (higher), given that we're innovative and differentiated, not a commodity, give us a clear mandate to move to the third step in the generic master plan for open source projects and companies.

Thank you!

I want to use this opportunity to thank you - users, customers, partners, investors, and eggheads - for all what we have achieved so far. You all have contributed to the success to date and the immense assets that our new investors uncovered in their diligence. Thank you!

I appreciate your feedback and opinion.

The Economic Motivation of Open Source Software: Stakeholder Perspectives

Christof — Sat, 14 Apr 2007 00:34:00 GMT

Buddy Dirk Riehle from SAP research has published an interesting paper on The Economic Motivation of Open Source Software: Stakeholder Perspectives.

I agree with his approach that only an analysis of each stakeholder's specific perspective can identify the different incentives that drive the economics of open source. The basic underlying assumption is that of an homo economicus, which I share, too.

The interesting part is that it is overall a win-win situation (except for the monopolists in the pre-open source era with excessive profits, particularly Microsoft, Oracle, and his own firm, SAP).

Why is that? The reason is in the power of collaboration and the fact, that software is an immaterial asset, which can increase its overall value through sharing. Unlike in the material world, where either you or me can have an item (e.g., a new Macbook), immaterial goods can be copied and shared, giving value to many people. Shared music is the example easiest to understand (if you share it with me, we can both enjoy it equally), but also a shared idea or software code can provide value to different people in a different context, which makes sharing immaterial goods a larger-than-zero-sum transaction.

Another way to put it: Sharing immaterial goods like software makes the pie bigger.

Dirk argues that the distribution will shift gains to one stakeholder at the expense of another.

I disagree. My thesis is that the pie will get bigger and that everybody who embraces open source will gain, thanks to efficient markets and some forces that Dirk hasn't analyzed sufficiently, specifically:

System integrator
I think system integrators find value in software vendors giving them standardized software, procedures, a roadmap, training, leads and much more. If SIs work with community open source much of that value goes away, the SIs have more cost. So it's not just pure profit for them here.
As an example: IBM has hundreds of people in the Linux group, writing the software that they will support later. Yes, Linux is license-free for them, but it's also more costly to support than a very directed piece of software like, say, Windows NT, which comes ready-to-eat.
The other element is that those gains will not remain as excessive profits. Economic theory predicts, that this very dynamic market will pressure the total price point down to "normal profits", which should be much the same as before.
Software vendor
I think Dirk misses the point that, with open source and the Internet, the competitive barrier doesn't come from IP protection (which articifically creates a "material world" situation of non-shareable goods), but from building a strong user community.
Dirk and I will know from the economics classes in our alma mater, that software vendors live from network effects, which stem from increasing marginal returns through additional users. The big change in thinking is that we used to measure those network effects through market share in license sales, because they correlated with the installed base.
That's not true any more. With open source we start to count USERS as the determining driver of network effects.
Toplink, Oracle's ORM, for instance, had more sales$ than Hibernate, but much less users. It lost (they dumped it into the open source space)!
MySQL is commercially a <1% dwarf compared to Oracle, IBM and MSFT's RDBMS business. But with its installed base and users, it has already reached 1/3 "market" share, harnessing huge network effects (brand equity, ecosystem, horizontal applicability, etc.).
With that competitive barrier, MySQL can successfully fend off community open source projects (like PostegreSQL, HSQLDB etc.) as well as effectively attack the incumbents.
Employee
I absolutely share Dirks' analysis about the career building aspect of open source work for software engineers and I have spoken and blogged repeatedly about it.
I think he misses a major point, though: With the open source production model, properly implemented like at MySQL or db4objects, developers work from their home and communicate over the Internet, no matter whether they are paid or not. As a result, companies can recruit from all over the world and leverage a global talent pool rather than a local one.
I have talked about this what I call open source globalization in several posts and articles.
As a result there is no linear payoff table for employees like Dirk suggests.
It rather looks like this:
If I am in a low living-cost country, it's just gonna be great.
If I am in a high living-cost country, it will depend on how much I will be able to differentiate myself from a "commodity coder". Becoming a committer, as he suggests, is certainly one way. But it will be more competitive day by day. I think a better differentiator for an engineer is to focus on being close to customer and markets, i.e., a location-based differentiator. This could be some evangelizing work or customer projects/interaction, for instance. Of course, doing politics at US based open source project meetings to become influenial, is another way of doing it, though it defies the open source meritocracy aspect.
It is quite revealing that Dirk talks about employees. I rather think of paid contributors as mini-entrepreneurs and, at db4objects, they are technically contractors.

So I believe that open source makes the pie bigger and that everybody will win, who understands this "post-material" world. I actually disagree that the payoff will be radically differently distributed, if each stakeholders adapts accordingly and keeps providing the value they do. Efficient markets will take care of this.

The loosers will be the laggards, those that don't understand and don't embrace the model.

Those are my 2 cents.

Have a great weekend!

A Framework Analysis for Dual License Businesses

Christof — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 20:19:00 GMT

Roberto Zicari and his team at Copenhagen Business School have published a good paper to introduce a framework for analysis of Business Models for Open Source Software Products with Dual Licensing, showcasing MySQL and db4objects.

http://www.dbis.informatik.uni-frankfurt.de/publications/?mode=view&l=e&tmid=6&smid=23&SID=fa381d4ee4e054ed66e7eb63281b2eae

Products Delivered as Services - or Convergence?

Christof — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 20:08:00 GMT

Curt Schacker spins interesting thoughts about the embedded software industry on his blog. He claims that the industry is geared towards a service model, where vendors work against a Statement of work, rather than providing a product spec and an evaluable product upfront.

While I can see this happen in certain parts of the traditional embedded software industry, I think the offsetting trend will be the inflow of COTS (commercial off the shelf) products from the PC world, based on Windows, Java, VMware, and Linux, to name the most important platforms. These platforms commoditize the underlying hardware and eliminate its dependencies, as they have done in PCs, and thus enable economies of scale formerly unknown in the embedded software space.

The reason for my belief in this "convergence" is that working in a service model is very expensive and doesn't provide the economies of scale that a COTS product can provide. we're talking of a 100x - 1000x cost differential here. The additional computing power needed to support these later generation computing platforms will be mitigated by recent breakthroughs in computing power (Intel and HP just announced 100x breakthroughs, accelerating beyond Moore's Law) and storage (just look at NAND over the last few months).

As a result, a large part of the market traditionally being served by embedded systems software manufacturers will be covered by standard platforms known from PCs and servers and confine these traditional vendors to even more nichy spaces.

This convergence trend is also fueled by the fact that mobile devices (the largest embedded market next to automotive) become application platforms (while PCs start to become communication devices, just think of Web browsing and Skype).

Also, the connectivity between mobile/embedded software and traditional PCs and web services results in "spill-over" of technology from the more economical mass software markets to the cost-intense embedded systems space. In lockstep with that you'll also see more enterprise type developers looking into embedded software, because they "stick" to their technology. These new generation embedded software developers are often more sophisticated in leveraging COTS software than traditional engineers, who often origine from the hardware space and sometimes suffer a NIH syndrom (50% still write their own database - in the year 2007!).

db4objects is well positioned for this trend, serving a wide range of application with an "embedded" database (which is NOT a device database only, but one that's "invisible to the end user", in line with IDC's and VDC's definitions) -- from servers to PC to mobile devices. In fact only about 10% of our users are strictly speaking working on "device software" (like photocopiers or cars). Many more use db4o on PCs for device integration (e.g. the configuration console for an alarm system), on PCs or mobile devices to run packaged software, and even on servers, where the database engine gets embedded in a service oriented architecture.

So I am not contradicting Curt - he's right for the transformation of the existing industry. But at the same time the growth of this ever more specialized and cost-intense traditional approach will be much slower than the growth of PC-proven technology in what traditionally used to be a totally distinct market segment - that's the sweet spot targeted by a COTS vendor like db4objects to serve the embedded systems industry.

The laws of economics and Gordon Moore are on the side of COTS products.

Victory of Open Source, Measured by Dumpware

Christof — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 18:26:00 GMT

Another victory of open source over closed-source vendors is now official when Oracle dumped its Toplink O/R mapper (which had performed dismally against Hibernate) into the open source space.

We have seen those dumpware projects before with Ingres, Versant's JDO and so on. None of them has been successful. It's just a decent form of capitulation. I would be interested how many million dollars of write-off Oracle booked for that.

Toyota Production System and Agile Software Development

Christof — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 22:43:00 GMT

A short note in Kent Beck's Extreme Programming Explained on a CFO's comment, that XP was similar to the Toyota Production System (TPS) sparked my interest to read more about the TPS and reconcile it with some firsthand experience working as a supplier to Toyota. I have now finished Jeffrey Liker's "The Toyota Way" and can see very well, how the success of agile software development compares to lean industrial processes exemplified by Toyota.

Further investigation led me to this report on how Fujitsu Software Technologies had successfully implemented agile processes under the TPS angle, and I have now shortlisted the Poppendieck's "Lean Software Development" book next on my list.

My goal is to reconcile the benefits of the (remote) open source development model and (co-located) agile/TPS model, as we do at db4objects, in a paper and to thus provide a more structured approach to the software process improvements pioneered by db4objects and other open source projects.

I want to show through thorough analysis and learning by doing at db4o, that open source is a better production model for software (and a better distribution model, but that's a different topic).

I invite anybody to share their thoughts with me and to carry the TPS structures into the db4o Project and vice versa.

The 9-point Checklist How to To Spot A Successful Open Source Project

Christof — Sun, 04 Feb 2007 00:19:00 GMT

From Charles Babcock in InformationWeek:

1. A thriving community A handful of lead developers, a large body of contributors, and a substantial--or at least motivated--user group offering ideas.	2. Disruptive goals Does something notably better than commercial code. Free isn't enough.	3. A benevolent dictator Leader who can inspire and guide developers, asking the right questions and letting only the right code in.
4. Transparency Decisions are made openly, with threads of discussion, active mailing list, and negative and positive comments aired.	5. Civility Strong forums police against personal attacks or niggling issues, focus on big goals.	6. Documentation What good's a project that can't be implemented by those outside its development?
7. Employed developers The key developers need to work on it full time.	8. A clear license Some are very business friendly, others clear as mud.	9. Commercial support Companies need more than e-mail support from volunteers. Is there a solid company employing people you can call?

I think we're getting high marks on 1, 2, 3 and deliver on 7, 8, and 9.

As for 4, 5, and 6, I think we can do better.

Your thoughts?

Global Nomads at db4objects

Christof — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 04:20:00 GMT

It always takes a while to realize that you are freed, once chains have been taken off. But now individuals at db4objects incl. myself start to realize that the 'flat world' model which enables our distributed and extremely global business model also enables, yes, encourages each one of us to assess whether there's a point in hanging out in some other part of the world, at least for a while.

Is it coincidence or not that, within the next few months, half a dozen of individuals pack their bags and move to another continent? JB (from France) is going to stay for a month or so in Brazil with Rodrigo. Patrick (from Cologne) decided this was a good idea - and joins. Andrew (from Shanghai) is going to move to the 'sound of the music' hills of Bavaria to hang out with Carl. Eric has even given up his place in San Francisco and will spend the next few months anywhere between Hong Kong, Ohio, Walnut Creek and Japan, where he will be teaming with Takenori.

I myself have extended the Hong Kong all-hands-meeting week to an entire month and found (apart from the Taiwan earthquake, which shortly interrupted this flat world between Christmas and New Year) that I could do 80-90% of my job there. And was it coincidence or not that our chairman, Mark Leslie, also stopped by in Hong Kong, as part of a Stanford GSB study trip, and we had a chance to catch up?

Not only is being a nomad (at least to some and for some time) fun and a very special thing, that few companies can offer. It is also fully aligned with the company's business strategy to take advantage of the 'flat world'. By better interconnecting, mingeling and exchanging local individuals, any remaining differences will get even less significant. Probably those new forms of "sabbaticals" are just a prelude to a much more intense mobility, perhaps even to a new thrust of migration?

Open Source Year 2006 In Review

Christof — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 09:28:00 GMT

The open source year 2006 is coming to an end. While we often see things moving rather slowly from a day to day perspective, it is quite amazing how massively open source is changing the software industry by looking at the year in review:

Open source companies have made significant commercial progress and doubled their business, incl. MySQL, JBoss, and db4objects, further validating the economic power of open source
Red Hat's $420M acquisition of JBoss has shown investors where the money is in open source. As a result a lot of me-too open source start-ups receive a lot of funds, usually too much and too early, which will sure enough result in a backlash in the future
Several incumbent vendors have further adopted open source practices into their business strategy, most notably Sun finally open sourcing Java
Oracle has tried to stiffle MySQLs advance by buying Sleepycat consequently to Innobase (providers of MySQL transaction engines) and approaching MySQL itself for an acquisition (though not a very dedicated one). Later this year it made a pretty spectacular move to become a Linux OS distributor itself by repacking Red Hat's product as "Linux unbreakable". Oracle: agressive, relentless, certainly not collaborative and community driven. IMO opinion they put themselves at risk to become another evil empire, which could seriously harm their leverage of Linux in the fight against MS SQL Server.
Microsoft signed a Linux support deal with Novell, which left many breathless, but we were immediately brought back to reality when a brawl about patent infringements surfaced. Still, in June at the dUC, Ted Neward predicted that Microsoft will be the largest open source software company in 5 years, and I buy that (though, of course, it will never be called open source what they will be doing)
The GPL v3 discussion between Linus Torvalds and Richard Stallman has demonstrated that the industry now well distinguishes between mainstream and usually commercial open source as opposed to non-commercial free software

In general, things got a little more complex than in the early days, where there were clear cut distinctions between open source projects ("good") and proprietary vendors ("bad"), which now slowly disappear. Consequently, important open source advocates loose their edge (and/or drop the ball), incl. Red Hat and Novell, while the incumbent companies have become better at playing the game.

What I think is exciting, though, is that the real business fundamentals of open source now come to play. It's less the media buzz but whether you are able to attract a large and dedicated community, to create a strong ecosystem, and to run a viable business model that balances out the community stakes with commercial requirements in a win-win scenario.

I believe that open source start-ups have a better chance to do that because the cultural legacy of closed source companies will prevent many of them from embracing open source in its very core: the empowerment of users, even if at the short-term expense of the business.

db4objects has made enormous progress in 2006, having implemented its "Community 2.0" project, consisting of infrastructure investments (Wiki, integrated blogs, resource centers), openness (product forums, developer Skypecasts), increased user influence (survey, design discussions), contributions (ProjectSpaces, dVP), the first ever db4o User Conference (dUC), and lately the open source compatibility license dOCL. The core developer team has doubled its firepower and made enormous progress to deliver against relentless performance and usability requests from a user community double as large as before. All this has translated into great new customer relationships such as with Seagate, Intel, and Ricoh as well as a particularly strong growth in the strategically important Asia-Pacific region incl. China, Japan and India.

I want to thank all of those who have contributed to this success and look forward to another great year of cooperation to come!

Christof

Meeting the Open Source Community in India

Christof — Sat, 25 Nov 2006 08:38:00 GMT

I had the honor to be invited as a speaker to FOSS.IN, India's premier open source conference, which takes place this weekend in Bangalore. Atul Chitnis and his team brought together this exiting event in a country where open source is still not as much a part of the software culture as it is in the Western world or in China.

It's mostly India's developers themselves who yet have to find their way into open source. They are surely heavy users of open source products, but their contributions are rather minimal, compared to the size of the local industry. I discussed several reasons with Indians, and among the answers we found were social issues, the money-orientation of developers, the grib of Microsoft, expecially in the educational sector, and the importance of official certificates and degrees for hiring (rather than an assessment of coding qualities). All these gave little incentive to engage, but most people feel that the movement is gathering steam now.

At the conference, I was putting forward some provocative thoughts around open source and business in a talk titled "How we fix the Software Industry with Open Source". I met a couple of entrepreneurs who believe, like myself, that open source gives individuals a great tool to pursue their dream to bring new, useful products to market, where there was less opportunity a few years ago due to the high cost of building a global software business.

We also conducted a BOF in a Ghandi-style tent session (pictures), with the help of Andrew Cowie, which was a great opportunity to touch base with local open source community members. Shridar Venkatraman from Retailwave, a local db4o customer in India, shared why he used a thick client solution with db4o for his SaaS platform solution for small businesses spread out in remote Indian areas: Since connection cannot be guaranteed, they needed a local database cache, and db4o does exactly that.

Kalpana Shah from Red Herring already wrote about the event and quoted me.