Capturing a market in business can be seen as analogous to an animal’s exploitation of a niche in the environment. Successful species will either extinguish their rivals, or find a way to live with them in symbiosis. But when the environment changes, everything is up for grabs again. This is what seems to be happening in today’s world of computing.

The change in the computing environment is being wrought by two main factors: the growing power of the Internet, and rising demand from the developing world. With these changes, "open source" operating systems and applications are steadily encroaching onto personal-computer territory that is currently 90-percent dominated by Microsoft.

Cheaper and sturdier

As broadband connections proliferate, more and more people stay online continuously, raising the risk of attack by cybercriminals or computer viruses. And when it comes to the spread of viruses — among humans or computers — the size of a population matters. Just like the billions of people that crowd the world, all those computers using similar Microsoft operating systems provide a rich environment for attackers to exploit. Patching up security holes takes time and resources. Meanwhile, other "species" of software that might be less vulnerable to attack are exploring their opportunities to expand. With armies of volunteer developers freely exchanging solutions, open source programmes are said to facilitate quick repair of any vulnerable areas. And because they have a relatively small installed based and varied characteristics, open source programmes are less attractive targets for viruses and similar ills. The Internet itself becomes the vehicle by which the software improves, as developers download and communicate.

As well as having a reputation for being more robust, open source programmes can also be cheaper than commercially produced rivals. In developing countries especially, planning a project to improve information and communications technology (ICT) requires careful attention to costs and sustainability. It is expensive to buy (and renew) licenses for software, and in remote areas, it’s often extremely difficult to get technical support when there’s a problem. Open source software need cost nothing, and it also has the advantage of being very flexible: you can construct a package of functions to specifically suit your needs, and disregard others that might clutter your computer unnecessarily. Among the desirable functions, perhaps the most important are local-language applications, which are a fundamental factor in promoting ICT.

In addition, open source is attractive to developing countries that want to promote home-grown ICT industries, and their economies as a whole. "When you spend a dollar with a multinational corporation as a license fee for a piece of software, that dollar leaves your country," says Simon Phipps of Sun Microsystems, based in the United States. Using open source software, he adds, "is about keeping the money in your local economy, developing skills and developing the local economy to be strong in its own right."

Sun Microsystems produces the open source operating system Solaris. According to the company, by the end of October 2005, more than 3 million licenses had been distributed for the Solaris 10 operating system since it was made available online nine months earlier, with free downloads continuing at the rate of about 80’000 a week. In September 2005, Sun and Google announced that they would join forces to offer free Internet downloads of such programmes as Java and OpenOffice.

This same trend is also being followed by computer hardware manufacturers. In 2002, Dell began producing its "n" series of Dimension desktop computers (aimed at small businesses using Linux) that come without any operating system installed. IBM now has Linux as the primary operating system on its advanced mainframe servers. And as early as 1999, Apple released the core layers of its Mac OS X server as an open source operating system called Darwin.

It seems that businesses in all sectors are increasing their adoption of open source software, in attempts to cut costs and improve security and reliability. From Bavaria to Brazil, government administrations are also taking this approach. In the United Kingdom, for example, a government agency advised schools in 2005 that open source offers "a cost-effective alternative to proprietary software." And in that emerging software powerhouse, India, the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology is now promoting the development of open source software in local languages. Its most recent efforts include the launch in April 2005 of a complete bundle of software in the Tamil language — including a localized version of OpenOffice — followed by the launch of Hindi open source software in June. Copies of the software were given away, free of charge.

In developing countries, in fact, some experts insist that software should not only be free in the sense of open source; it should also be free of charge. Speaking at the LinuxAsia 2005 event in New Delhi in February 2005, Dr Deepak Phatak, professor of information technology at the Indian Institute of Technology in Mumbai, stressed that "the major component of (personal computer) affordability will not come from hardware price reduction, but from the use of open source software," and that, in developing countries, it is essential for that software to be offered at low — or zero — cost. The accepted term for this is "free and open source software" (FOSS).

Several bodies active in pursuing the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals are already convinced that FOSS is a useful tool. Because it is supplied free of charge, they see it as increasing access to ICT in disadvantaged communities, as well as raising skill levels and helping to provide the essential element of content in local languages.

In 2001, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) launched its FOSS Portal as a gateway to interactive information on the topic, as well as some free applications. And the United Nations International Open Source Network (IOSN) is an initiative of the United Nations Development Programme's (UNDP) Asia-Pacific Development Information Programme (APDIP), and is supported by the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) of Canada. IOSN says that its aim "is that developing countries will be able to achieve rapid and sustained economic and social development by using affordable yet effective FOSS solutions to bridge the digital divide."

To help achieve this goal, IOSN produces training materials to give introductory and detailed information on using FOSS, as well as to raise awareness among policy-makers and educators. It is also in the process of developing toolkits that will aid localization of FOSS software. The organization is a partner in supporting "Software Freedom Day," a global, grassroots effort to educate the public about the virtues of FOSS. Over 200 teams worldwide registered to celebrate the 2005 event at schools, universities, parks, and other public places.

Finding new business models

Microsoft marked its thirtieth birthday in 2005. Just as the Coca-Cola Company keeps secret the recipe of its famous drink, Microsoft’s business model was to keep control over the design of its products, while selling licenses to use them. The company now has more than 90 per cent of the world market for software used on personal computers.

Open source software originates from a quite different business model. Companies make their money by offering support services. The software itself can be developed by anyone and costs nothing to download from the Internet. Rather than mimicking the "Coca-Cola strategy", the spread of open source products resembles the dissemination of printing technology. There is no copyright on the technique, which anyone can adopt (and adapt) to produce whatever materials suit their purposes, and either at a price, or free of charge.

But how could a business make money from such a model? One example of success is Red Hat, which provides design services for open software to suit specific client needs. In a keynote speech at LinuxAsia 2005, Red Hat CEO Matthew Szulik said the firm’s view was that "technology has become too complex," with most companies selling licensed software and offering little choice to their customers. "Red Hat doesn't sell software," Szulik said, "it sells subscriptions, because we believe that the most important way to sustain customer relations is through speeding up the rate of improvement and innovation that comes out of the open source community."
 

So much for the benefits; what are the disadvantages of open source? Although businesses and public institutions may be willing to take it up, open source remains very much a minority choice among individual consumers. There are no major advertising campaigns on television, no rows of brightly coloured packages on the shelves of computer stores. Only a limited number of new personal computers are available without a proprietary operating system already installed — and thus paid for. The domination of Microsoft’s Windows operating system also means most talented software developers are focused on creating applications to suit it.

And, of course, leviathan Microsoft is hardly watching passively as rivals edge closer. The company is already bringing is considerable financial, technical and intellectual resources to bear to develop a multi-pronged response to the open source challenge. One strategy targets the hardware route. Microsoft is developing a Media Center, which it hopes will sit in our living rooms as an integrated DVD player, music download point, controller of household systems such as lighting, and, of course, PC. The Xbox gaming console is also being aggressively developed to capture the youth market, while mobile phones are being targeted through collaboration between Microsoft and Nokia, the phone manufacturer.

Anyone who has been disappointed by a "one-size-fits-all" garment will understand the appeal of clothing that is tailored to your exact measurements. But tailoring is comparatively expensive. Ultimately, it is quicker to grab a ready-made item from the clothing store that will at least approximate your shape. When it comes to computer software, the majority of consumers have had little choice but "off the shelf" packages that are very difficult to customize. With the growth of open source software, however, "tailored" applications are becoming more accessible and affordable. Whatever your size or the environment you live in, it should be possible to use open source to create an application that precisely matches your needs, and at moderate cost. We no longer have to wear almost identical uniforms; but the question remains, who will eventually dominate the tailoring business?