Open source is not a shield from criticism
My fellow open source subnet blogger Joe Brockmeier came to the defense of OpenOffice pretty quickly after I wrote my previous post, that Microsoft has every right to compete against OpenOffice. Of course Joe is an old open source warrior. But like many warriors, Joe is busy fighting the the last war instead of the next one. Microsoft is not the enemy they should worry about. It is probably Google Office or some other cloud based office suite which will be the next competitor.
I read and re-read Joe’s retort a few times. As near as I can tell, Joe’s points seem to be:
- No one should stick up for Microsoft and its ugly tactics
- That Microsoft left out that most of the problems that customers cited were caused by Microsoft control of Office and its formats
- Sun, now Oracle and Novell offer OpenOffice support
- Microsoft smells a weakness in OpenOffice as a result of the Oracle/Document Foundation fork
- Microsoft smells its own weakness in emerging markets like mobile so is protecting its old turf
- Microsoft’s attacks ring false
- Microsoft didn’t take the high road
OK, that is quite a list. Here are my responses in no particular order:
- Who cares about what is going on in the mobile market. Microsoft is a company that plays in lots of markets. Whether it does great in mobile or not, it would border on insanity to not defend its turf in the desktop productivity suites.
- Microsoft is not the evil empire it used to be. Microsoft themselves are under attack on many fronts andit is fighting for its own survival and to remain relevant. On the other hand Linux and even OpenOffice are no longer the underdogs that are being beat up and bullied by Microsoft’s unfair monopolistic practices. They are powerful players with big market shares and well funded companies behind them.
- Yes Microsoft has done the job in establishing their document formats as the de facto standards. Yes those standards are not open source or open period. So does that mean Microsoft should not use it to its own advantage? Are you kidding me? If they didn’t and I was a Microsoft shareholder (which I am not), I would sue them for not doing so!
- If I am not mistaken, Oracle and Novell will only offer support for their versions of Open Office. Which I don’t think are free and you have to pay for support. I am guessing that those versions were not the versions that were referenced in the Microsoft ad.
- I don’t know, but in listening to the ad (did I say ad? Yes I did. Lest we forget this was an ad, short for advertisement. It is supposed to sell a product or point of view), I thought those were real life people making those statements. Not Microsoft employees, but real life customers who have tried both OpenOffice and MS Office. Joe, are you saying those people are lying? Are they not real people? If not what exactly do you mean? Do you think those people did not have those problems they said they did? I don’t know Joe, but your defense rings a lot more false to me than the people in the ad.
- Finally, for those who equate this to a negative political ad and not taking the high road, have you watched TV lately? Most political ads I am seeing here in Florida are very negative. I will tell you the same thing I say about spam. If they didn’t work, you wouldn’t see them. Someone is paying for them because they work. Same thing for this ad. It obviously hits a nerve with the open source crowd, but that does not make it not effective.
So let me be clear. I am not a Microsoftie, but I am not from the Microsoft-phobics either. I call them as I see them. Microsoft has billions tied up in the Office franchise. They have every right to have real life customers talk about why they think MS Office better than OpenOffice. Open source advocates have to have a thicker skin and can’t just knee jerk every time Microsoft says anything by indicting them for their open source hatred. Todays software world, like the real world we live in is just not that black and white. There is a lot of gray out there.
