The deliberate simplification of the diagrams shown on these pages show something important. If you reduce the workings of a proprietary software company and an professional open source company down to the fewest number of lines and bubbles it shows fundamental differences between the two.
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Some people assume that the POSS model is flawed because the POSS company does not have direct control over its resources. This is not true with the POSS model used by Pentaho, MySQL etc. The only resource we cannot directly influence are our community who perform software-oriented roles for us at a scale and capacity that is orders of magnitude better than any proprietary organization could do on its own (keep reading). Community members do not participate in the 'Go To Market' program and so are not invovled involved in the creation of the 'whole product' that customers require.
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- The open source community benefits from directly from the full-time engineering staff that exist because of the fee-paying customers.
- The customers benefit from the increased quality of the software, quality of design, and increased traction enabled by the open source community.
- The POSS company benefits by increasing its valuation when it meets the needs of both customers and open source community.
- The model is powerful because the customers, partners, engineers, and open source communities are all self-motivated to behave in ways that are beneficial to themselves and, as a side effect, beneficial to all the others.
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| Open Source | Proprietary | POSS | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Rate of innovation panel | ||||||
| ||||||
| Panel | ||||||
| Lower | | Panel | | |||
| ||||||
Visibility into product design / implementation Panel | | |||||
| borderColor | #ccc | green | ||||
| borderStyle | none | Higher Panel | | |||
| borderColor | #ccc | red | ||||
| borderStyle | none | Lower | | Panel | | ||
| ||||||
Quality of software Panel | | #ccc | ||||
| bgColor | green | |||||
| borderStyle | none | Higher Panel | | #ccc | ||
| bgColor | red | |||||
| borderStyle | none | Lower panel | ||||
| ||||||
Reliability of support | | Panel | | ||||
| ||||||
| Panel | ||||||
| borderColor | #ccc | |||||
| bgColor | green | none | Higher Panel | | borderColor | #ccc|
| bgColor | green | |||||
| borderStyle | none | Higher | ||||
Reliability of roadmap | | Panel | | ||||
| ||||||
| Panel | ||||||
| Higher Panel | | ||||
| borderColor | #ccc | |||||
| bgColor | green | borderStyle | noneHigher | |||
Ownership of solution panel | ||||||
| ||||||
| Panel | ||||||
| Lower | | Panel | | |||
| ||||||
Availability of professional services | | Panel | | ||||
| ||||||
| Panel | borderColor | #ccc|||||
| bgColor | green | |||||
| borderStyle | none | Higher Panel | | |||
| borderColor | #ccc | bgColor | green||||
| borderStyle | none | Higher | ||||
Availability of references and case studies Panel | | |||||
| borderColor | #ccc | |||||
| bgColor | red | borderStyle | noneLower Panel | | ||
| borderColor | #ccc | |||||
| bgColor | green | borderStyle | noneHigher | | Panel | | |
| ||||||
Ability to prototype and 'try before you buy' Panel | | |||||
| borderColor | #ccc | green | ||||
| borderStyle | none | Higher Panel | | |||
| borderColor | #ccc | red | ||||
| borderStyle | none | Lower | | Panel | | ||
| ||||||
Cost of license or subscription Panel | | #ccc | ||||
| bgColor | green | |||||
| borderStyle | none | None Panel | | #ccc | ||
| bgColor | red | |||||
| borderStyle | none | Higher panel | ||||
| ||||||
Ability to customize software | | Panel | | ||||
| ||||||
| Panel | ||||||
| borderColor | #ccc | |||||
| bgColor | red | none | Lower Panel | | ||
| borderColor | #ccc | |||||
| bgColor | green | borderStyle | noneHigher |
As demonstrated by the Beekeeper diagrams and this table the POSS model, when implemented well, is a ideal combination of the methodologies, principles, and roles from open source and proprietary software development models. By combining these models carefully the advantages of each can also be combined to produce a result that is powerful and compelling.
Open source has been described as the biggest paradigm shift in computing in the last 20 years. I hope that the information I have presented here shows the disruptive nature of open source / POSS is due to the profound and fundamental differences that exist between the proprietary software development model and the open source / POSS models. POSS companies are a lot of fun to work at because of this. I don't know of anyone working in a POSS company today that wants to go back to a proprietary vendor. I know lots of people at proprietary vendors who would like to move out.
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