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Support for open source software is based on several misconceptions

By Tony Healy - posted Wednesday, 13 August 2003


ALP, Democrat and Greens parliamentarians recently announced plans to mandate open source software for government, partly on the grounds it would boost the Australian software industry. I argue that open source would not benefit Australian industry, that open source embodies concepts that conflict with core ideals of socially committed parties and there are some dangerous mythologies associated with open source.

1. Open Source won't further Australian software

Much political advocacy seems to presume there are only two types of software - open source and that provided by Microsoft. It seems not to be aware that there is already extensive software development by Australian companies and individuals, and that this mostly targets, and benefits from, Microsoft platforms. Those companies and people would be harmed, not assisted, by open source.

Open source software is based on software being free, which means developers receive no revenue. Open source advocates dispute this but the fact is that, once the source code is publicly available for a product, it is difficult to charge for software, because other people produce rival programs using that source code, or modify it and pretend it was their own work. In this sense, software is different from all other copyrighted works. I discuss this further in Section 11.

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Any concerted move to open source would kill innovation, because revenue is essential for all serious practitioners in the economy, including software developers. It's worth noting that Linux creator Linus Torvalds created a product worth billions of dollars, yet still has to scrabble for a job. This is not a model we want for Australian software.

2. A couple of distinctions

Open source is a movement that includes three different concepts. First, it advocates using free public software such as Linux, which can be used as a replacement for Windows, and Apache, which is a decent, widely used web server.

Second, it endorses the common practice where technical and scientific research groups share the computer programs they create as part of their disciplines or their work. This occurs in astrophysics, wildlife research and even in business, where users co-operate to develop and refine software they need for their business. Apache, for example, was developed collaboratively by programmers at several Internet companies.

It is the third part that's controversial - the requirement that software developers divulge the valuable programming code for software, which is roughly equivalent to their trade secrets. It's controversial because commercial software typically is much better and more valuable than free software, is useful to the general population rather than technical users, and represents enormous investments of programmer time. By definition, commercial software is useful. If it wasn't, people wouldn't pay for it.

3. Hidden corporate agendas

Open source advocates like to believe they're attacking big business but they're actually pushing an agenda that suits some elements of big business. Competitors to Microsoft stand to gain handsomely from open source, and are actively funding open source PR. Those competitors include foreign outsourcers, who will gain hefty consulting and support fees from any switch to Linux.

They also include computer makers such as IBM, Sun and HP, who can expand the market for computers by making software and software development free or cheap. In this sense, open source is actually very dangerous for Australia because our future depends on having a strong software industry. IBM, Sun and HP are in fact funding the organisation that now employs Linux creator Torvalds, Open Source Development Labs.

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An important part of the mythology behind open source software is that it's cheaper than buying commercial software. However when the German city of Munich recently switched to open source software, the cost was $US 40 million, which was comparable with Microsoft costs. Munich councillors believe they will face reduced long-term costs but I think they underestimate the complexity of software and the way outsourcer companies build revenue.

4. Honourable motivations of political open source advocates

Political advocates of open source have honourable and decent motives. Apart from an interest in helping Australian industry, part of their motivations are a dislike of aggressive corporate sales tactics and an interest in equitable access to modern computing platforms.

One of the early initiators of political adoption of open source, Congressman Villanueva Nuñez of Peru, also speaks eloquently of his motivations in a 2002 letter to Microsoft.

5. Open Source would diminish capability

A regime that forced software developers to disclose their valuable source code would selectively harm the best developers and favour commodity firms and outsourcers, since the commodity firms and outsourcers would be able to use the better work of the good developers, without having to pay for their salaries. Eventually, good developers would go out of business, leaving just the commodity firms, who lack the capability to develop good software themselves.

6. It's inconsistent with concern for workers

Traditionally it has been a precept of open source software that programmers contribute to it for free. Economists have never been able to work out why programmers would do this. The answer is that the best programmers generally didn't; most open source programmers are naive young students and others looking for jobs. In economic terms, the creation of Linux was a transfer of wealth from the programmers who created it to the corporations who use it without payment.

In other arenas where employers, government or business attempts to exploit workers, especially naive young people, socially committed people such as the ALP and Democrats generally condemn the employers.

7. Yes, use public data formats

Long-term access to data is an important benefit cited by open source advocates. However open source is irrelevant for this. To use public data formats, government just needs to define the formats and provide facilities for developers to verify their software. If the format is known, government can access its own data any time it likes by having developers write what it needs. This has nothing to do with open source. This is another example of the way parliamentarians and many open source advocates do not understand the software industries.

8. "Many Eyes" means nothing if they're no good

One of the mythologies of open source is that the availability of the source code produces better software, allegedly because many more people can inspect the code. However the fact that source code is open to inspection really means nothing in itself. Designing and fixing software, especially non-trivial applications, requires skilled software engineers with the time to properly analyse the whole design.

Most open source products are amateur projects, with high bug counts, clumsy operation and installation, excessive dependencies and unfinished functionality. Netscape's Mozilla browser project was open sourced, and became one of the biggest disasters in software history, running years behind schedule and leaving Netscape without any competing product just when Microsoft caught up with its Internet Explorer browser.

Promotion of open source as a development methodology usually hinges on a few flagship products, typically Linux and Apache. However a true assessment should compare the quality of the many thousands of other open source products against the tens of thousands of commercial applications.

Also, it's worth bearing in mind that the popular notion in open source that users can make their own fixes arises because open source projects are works in progress rather than finished software.

9. Being able to verify operation of the software is a red herring

Availability of source code also lets government verify the operation of software, according to advocates. However I consider this a red herring, because government routinely extends similar levels of trust to other parties. It trusts Telstra not to intercept phone calls, couriers not to photocopy confidential documents, and accounting, law and PR firms not to divulge confidential information.

10. Protection of source code is the only feasible way to protect copyright in software

Copied movies, books and articles can't be provided in public without their origin being obvious, thus preventing blatant pirating. With software though, once the source code is made available, freeloaders can take that source code and build similar programs without doing all the development work. The source code used to build a product is not visible in the final product, so freeloaders can claim it to be their own work.

Even if expensive legal action is initiated to examine the source code of the new product, and even if that source code was indeed copied from that of the original product, and would not otherwise have been created, it is still not certain that the copying will be provable. The copied source code, while mimicking the important concepts and architectures in the original, might have different names and layout. It is for these reasons that software developers retain their important blue prints, or source code, as a way of protecting their copyright and thus being able to carry on a business.

Summary

Open source does not really provide protections for the best software developers, and thus it destroys valuable business opportunities for Australia. The debate generally fails to acknowledge important distinctions, particularly the difference between deciding to using public software and then mandating open source as a development methodology for all software. Finally, parliamentarians must be much more careful in analysing competing interests in the technology industries.

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About the Author

Tony Healy is a research software engineer and also a policy researcher with Aus-Innovate.

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