The Business Case
for Open Source
Oliver Steele
May 4, 2005

Contribution Status
 Metrics
 Contributors
 Contributions
 Related projects
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Customer value: Closed-source model
! Value of a customer:
! Revenue
! Market feedback
! Reference
! Closed source model: conversion is a bottleneck for value
! Review – prospects may not say why they stopped the eval, especially in
an unguided evaluation
! Reference – Only customers are referenceable
Laszlo Systems, Inc.
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User value: Open-source model
! Open source distinguishes between users and customers
! Open source model:
! Revenue: open source model increases the pool of evaluators, length of
time during which a prospect can convert – but decreases chance that any
individual prospect will convert
! Review: non-customers and unfunded developers provide a larger pool for
market feedback feedback
! Reference: Referenceable users > referenceable customers
! Other values of increased user base
! External contributions
! External evangelism
Laszlo Systems, Inc. 4
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User contributions
! Positive feedback loops increase pool size for conversion
! Increased market feedback
! More developers – remove revenue conversion as a bottleneck for market
feedback
! Grain of salt – sampling bias from nonpaying customers
! Increased marketing
! External contributors have an interest in the success of the project
! External marketing contributions are more credible than internal marcom
! Removal of revenue conversion as a bottleneck for deployments
Laszlo Systems, Inc. 5
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Contribution Sequence
Program management Project management
Event organization Technical leadership
Event participation Feature design
Degree of engagement
Books Feature implementation
Technical articles Feature review
! White papers Code review
! References* ! Vendor integration
! Demos ! Component contributions
Market feedback* ! Bug fixes
!Public response* ! Bug fix verification
! Blog postings ! Bug reporting
Marketing Development
Contributions Contributions
* Referenceable applications, market feedback, and effective response to public critiques
can’t effectively be accomplished in-house even with infinite resources.
Laszlo Systems, Inc.
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Development Resources
! Activities above the line support activities below the line
! Closed development requires direct funding of activities below
the line
! Open development requires (less) funding of activities above
the line
! Bold items are active
Laszlo Systems, Inc. 7
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Enabling Contributors
Marketing Development
! Program management ! Project management
! Incentive programs ! Technical leadership
! Collateral ! Incentive programs
! Data sheets ! Community infrastructure
! Logo program ! Mailing lists
!
! Promotion ! ! Wiki
! Articles ! Code exchange
! Blog entries ! Recipe exchange
! Applications ! Build infrastructure
! Test infrastructure
Laszlo Systems, Inc. 8
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Proposed Contribution Metrics
! Downloads
! Forum activity (posters, new posters, posts)
! Mailing list activity (posters, new posters, posts)
! Site traffic (ol, laszlo, and a representative project)
! Technorati traffic
! Google
! Contributors
! Contributions
! External bug reporters
! External bug reports
Laszlo Systems, Inc. 9

Proposed Next Steps
! Define adoption & contribution metrics
! Create community site
! Component exchange
! Searchable, commentable documentation
! Regular news and announcements
! Remove development barriers
! Build system
! Test system
! Directory structure
! Facilitate marketing contributions
! Describe platform features on web site
! Publicize commercial and non-commercial successes
! Create logo/branding program (if we can iron out the issues)
Laszlo Systems, Inc. 10
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Risks
 Cannibalizing paid support
 Expenses (managing, enabling external developers)*
 Distraction
* Although, many of these expenses are the same as those necessary to competently manage and enable
internal developers too.
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