David Ing's Public Library

Argument mapping is diagramming the structure of argument, construed broadly to include any kind of argumentative activity such as reasoning, inferences, debates, and cases. Typically an argument map is a “box and arrow” diagram with boxes corresponding to propositions and arrows corresponding to relationships such as evidential support. Argument mapping is similar to other mapping activities such as mind mapping and concept mapping, but focuses on the logical, evidential or inferential relationships among propositions. Argument mapping is concerned with informal reasoning and “real world” argumentation and thus contrasts with the use of diagrammatic techniques in formal logic such as Venn diagrams.

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argumentation mapping

The basic categories of business models discussed in the table below include:

* Brokerage
* Advertising
* Infomediary
* Merchant
* Manufacturer (Direct)
* Affiliate
* Community
* Subscription
* Utility

The models are implemented in a variety of ways, as described below with examples. Moreover, a firm may combine several different models as part of its overall Internet business strategy. For example, it is not uncommon for content driven businesses to blend advertising with a subscription model.

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business models rappa

Currently two models of innovation are prevalent in organization science. The "private investment" model assumes returns to the innovator results from private goods and efficient regimes of intellectual property protection. The "collective action" model assumes that under conditions of market failure, innovators collaborate in order to produce a public good. The phenomenon of open source software development shows that users program to solve their own as well as shared technical problems, and freely reveal their innovations without appropriating private returns from selling the software. In this paper we propose that open source software development is an exemplar of a compound model of innovation that contains elements of both the private investment and the collective action models. We describe a new set of research questions this model raises for scholars in organization science. We offer some details regarding the types of data available for open source projects in order to ease access for researchers who are unfamiliar with these, and also offer some advice on conducting empirical studies on open source software development processes.

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von Hippel von Krogh open source collective action

To my mind there are three options:

Option 1: Open-Core but not necessarily OSI™-approved
Companies that are successfully executing an Open-Core model by growing revenue and building community have no need to change what they are doing. However, they should be prepared that any attempt to refer to themselves as an “open source vendor” is going to elicit disapproval, or be prepared to fight the plans to use the OSI to define open source development models and business strategies.

Option 2: The open source core should be released under a more permissive license, or better still via an existing community/foundation in order to benefit from and encourage a collaborative development community. This requires a shift to the community-controlled Open-Core model, as defined by Andrew Lampitt. There are two potential options for monetizing this approach:

Option 2a: Open-Core, paid services
Features currently delivered via proprietary licensing are delivered as a managed service to paying customers. This might sound like a giant step, and it does require something of a leap of faith from both the executives and investors, but I spoke to the CEO of one Open-Core company during OWF which is actively considering shifting its strategy in this way. Remember, you’re not competing on product anymore, you’re competing on service. If you’re good enough you ought to be able to compete with proprietary rivals even if they are using what was your code to build rival products.
.
Option 2b: Open code, proprietary products
Stop kidding yourself that you are an open source vendor and focus your attention on developing the proprietary extensions as a complete product that complements and builds on the open source code. If the proprietary extensions are valuable enough you ought to be able to compete with proprietary rivals even if they are using what was your code to build rival products.

For more discussion on the benefits and challenges of Vendor-controlled and Community-controlled Open-Core, see Andew La

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open core open source

Andrew recommends referring to the model as Open-Core Licensing, arguing: “My feeling is that we would save a lot of confusion for communities, customers, and vendors if all recognize that a dual license ”open core” model is a sensible business model for all involved,” and that “In this way, it is clear to customers that there is a “core” open source product that is GPL, and there is also additional high-value available as add-on features for purchase.”

Defining the model is important because it should help customers understand the actions and strategies of their vendors and, as Andrew puts it: “If you rename what it is called, you help to remove the “bait and switch” controversy by openly recognizing it as an emerging standard business model with specific attributes associated to it.”

(It is also important to distinguish between Open-Core Licensing and what I would call Embedded Open Source, where the open source code is embedded with a larger commercial package - for example IBM has for many years embedded the Apache HTTP server within its WebSphere middleware, while the Apache Geronimo project forms the basis of its WebSphere Application Server CE product. There is sometimes a fine line between the two models.)

The term Open-Core Licensing (OCL) certainly makes sense to me and I have decided to adopt it for The 451’s forthcoming report on business models related to open source software. I had originally used the term “split licensing” but have decided to switch to OCL as some people use the term “split licensing” interchangeably with “dual licensing”, such as in this research report from the University of Southampton. (Just to confuse things further, Carlo uses “twin licensing” rather than “dual licensing”).

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open source open core

What the chart indicates is that while vendor-controlled projects remain the preferred approach for VC-backed open source-related vendors, the vendor-controlled approach has declined in the past two years.

Meanwhile following the early dominance of community-controlled projects (a result of the early Linux start-ups), the popularity of community-controlled projects has been rejuvenated in the last couple of years.

Of course, those communities are now dominated by vendors, but they are built on a foundation of collaboration and (there’s no other word for it) community - that is often lacking in many vendor-dominated projects.

Of course, this chart only includes VC-backed open source related vendors so two major constituents of the commercial open source ecosystem are missing: previously proprietary vendors using and contributing open source code, and bootstrapped start-ups.

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open source vendors communities

• Who is Writing Linux?
o Every Linux kernel is being developed by nearly 1,000 developers working for more than 200 different corporations. This is the foundation for the largest distributed software development project in the world.
o Since 2008, the number of individual developers has increased by 10 percent, reflecting the ubiquity of Linux across industries.

• Who is Sponsoring Linux?
o More than 70 percent of total contributions to the kernel come from developers working at a range of companies including Red Hat, IBM, Novell, Intel, Oracle, Fujitsu, among many others. These companies, and many others, find that by improving the kernel they have a competitive edge in their markets.
o Red Hat, Google, Novell, Intel and IBM top the list of companies that employ developers who are reviewing and approving Linux development.

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open source linux

For those who are trying to run an open source business, it is clear that pragmatism, rather than puritanical beliefs, is key to business growth. At MySQL, we used the GPL because we felt it was the best way to achieve our business objectives of creating a popular, affordable database. It turned out we were able to build a substantial business (about $100 million in revenues as a stand-alone company) by offering a subscription model on top of open source software. And we were able to maintain the principle of having an open source database server, thereby giving MySQL users freedom from vendor lock-in.

Venture funding and acquisitions just prove the point: Open source is here to stay, and it will continue to co-exist with proprietary software.

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open source

While the romantic open source narrative is failing, Open Source continues to get stronger. And it’s doing so because it is becoming an integral component of modern software businesses. Gartner has been predicting that by 2011, at least 80% of all commercial software solutions will include elements of open source. That prediction is based on our observation that nearly all software vendors are finding ways to weave Open Source Software within, and around, their core offerings. It’s becoming quite common to find open source software that is tightly bound to some proprietary component – either other software or vendor-specific service offerings.

But a word of warning. There is a midpoint as a narrative moves from being relevantly insightful to quaintly nostalgic. And that’s when it’s dangerously distracting – exactly the point where so many find themselves caught in the evolution of Open Source. The fundamental principle upon which this aging narrative has been crafted – that Open Source sits in juxtaposition to proprietary software rather than being connected with it on a continuum – is today a false dichotomy. And the hardcore adherents of that dichotomy are apt to frame it in increasingly ideological terms. In their world you’re either with them or you’re against them.

From my experience it is enterprise IT organizations most likely to be caught up in the dying Open Source narrative. The software vendor community has long since figured out what’s going on. While the latter group sees Open Source through the lens of nuanced strategic objectives and synthesizing engineering endeavours, the former sees Open Source through the lens of a tactical sourcing option. For them it is the anti-proprietary option that can be used selectively to cut cost – quite often as little more than a negotiating tool. Then reality bites. TCO benefits turn out to be elusive. There is no vibrant community to assure the long-term viability of the project. Needed new features require the adoption of a proprietary version. All these proble

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open source

Strategy Zero: Denial

Engineering driven strategies

Strategy one: Use
Strategy two: Contribution
Strategy three: Champion

Business driven strategies

Strategy four: Collaboration
Strategy five: Redefinition

competingcooperation.com/?p=23 - Preview

open source

... Sebastian Nyström, Vice President Application & Service Frameworks, Devices at Nokia ...
... who was already working for Nokia at the time, took on responsibility for Trolltech when it was acquired, but at the same time was helping to close the Symbian deal, too. Shortly afterwards, Nokia announced that it was open-sourcing Symbian; then in January of this year, it made Qt available under the LGPL.

Nyström was one of the key individuals that made this happen in both cases, although he is quick to emphasise that it was not him alone.

What's interesting is that he said that once he laid out the logic of moving to open source, there was very little resistance within the company to doing so. I think that's significant; it means that, just as the GNU GPL has been tested in various courts and found valid, so the logic behind open source – that openness allows software to spread further, and improve quicker, for the mutual benefit of all – is also increasingly accepted by hard-headed business people: it's become self-evident that it's a better way.

I imagine something similar happened a decade ago in IBM, when Irving Wladawsky-Berger and his supporters were pushing for Big Blue to back GNU/Linux. There, it was about unifying a product line that was becoming fragmented and unmanageable. Nokia, similarly, was faced with a range of platforms – low- and medium-level phones, smartphones, mobile Internet devices etc – that need pulling together. Qt's cross-platform nature made it a perfect solution.

Just recently the first fruits of that unified, cross-platform approach have appeared: Qt ports for Symbian and Maemo. Shortly before that, others had been announced, to the real-time embedded operating systems QNX and VxWorks – a sign of future ambitions in this space.

Fortunately for Nyström, the move to the LGPL seems to have paid off: there has been an increase of 250% in the use of Qt among developers – although it's hard to measure such things for stuff that can be freely downloaded, copied and passed on, so this i

www.computerworlduk.com/...index.cfm - Preview

qt nokia open source

Conference on Systems Engineering Research

Stevens Institute of Technology and Delft University of Technology in collaboration with the University of Southern California (USC), presents the 8th Annual Conference on Systems Engineering Research (CSER)


Conference Objective

The objective of this conference is to provide practitioners and researchers in academia, industry, and government with a common platform to present, discuss and influence Systems Engineering research, and to enhance the practice of Systems Engineering and Systems Engineering education.
Call for Papers

We invite original research papers addressing any aspect of the Systems Engineering lifecycle. This includes conception, design and architecting, development, modeling and simulation, production, integration, validation, operation and support of these systems. Additional topics include definition of metrics, performance, and improvement methods, assessment and mitigation of risks, definition of critical success factors, and definition of best practices. All papers will be peer reviewed, and if accepted, presented at the conference.

sse.stevens.edu/...home - Preview

systems engineering research stevens

Customers introduce tremendous variability to that process, but they also complain about any lack of consistency and don't care about the company's profit agenda. Managing customer-introduced variability, the author argues, is a central challenge for service companies. The first step is to diagnose which type of variability is causing mischief: Customers may arrive at different times, request different kinds of service, possess different capabilities, make varying degrees of effort, and have different personal preferences. Should companies accommodate variability or reduce it? Accommodation often involves asking employees to compensate for the variations among customers--a potentially costly solution. Reduction often means offering a limited menu of options, which may drive customers away. Some companies have learned to deal with customer-introduced variability without damaging either their operating environments or customers' service experiences.

harvardbusiness.org/...R0611E-PDF-ENG - Preview

variability service efficiency tradeoff frei

The Royal Society has recently published the findings of a major study on the role of science in services sector innovation. Entitled Hidden Wealth: the contribution of science to service sector innovation , the report highlights the wider significance of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) to the services sector, which makes up around three quarters of the UK economy.

Hidden Wealth concludes that STEM is deeply embedded within the UK service sectors and has an extensive impact on service innovation processes, which is often hidden. Although STEM is important in services sector innovation now, it is also likely to play an important part in the future of services, as many services are on the cusp of a transition to more personalised and interconnected systems, which will require significant advances in STEM.

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stem service science innovation

Many services can be self-provided. An individual user or a user firm can, for example, choose to do its own accounting – choose to self-provide that service - instead of hiring an accounting firm to provide it. Since users can ‘serve themselves’ in many cases, it is also possible for users to innovate with respect to the services they self-provide. In this paper, we explore the histories of 47 functionally novel and important commercial and retail banking services. We find that, in 85% of these cases, users self-provided the service before any bank offered it. Our empirical findings differ significantly from prevalent producer-centered views of service development. We speculate that the patterns we have observed in the banking industry will be found to be quite general. If so, this will be an important matter: perhaps 75% of GDP in advanced economies today is derived from services. We discuss the implications of our findings for research and practice in service development.

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service innovation banking hippel self-serve

Location-based services are any service that takes into account the geographic location of an entity. [....]

LBS researchers distinguish between location-tracking services and position-aware services.

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location services position

A number of applications can be viewed online to get a snapshot of the state of urban sensing today. These range from provocative public art, to mapping mashups, to real-time traffic tracking.

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geocoding geotracking

Sections include ...
Whether Forecast?
The Cone of Uncertainty
Hold to 10%
Manageable Risk?
The Accurate Commitment
Rein in the Commitment
"If there is a 40% chance of rain and I decide to walk outside in my expensive suit without and umbrella and it rains on me and ruins my suit, it is not the fault of the forecast; it is the fault of my decision".

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estimate accuracy decision

This is my assessment as a judge of the recent open source license debate held by the FOSS Learning Centre. We’ll have to begin with some qualifications and definitions, starting with the fact that there is no ‘best’ open source software license. Still, a star-studded open source software panel provided a lively, informative debate on the merits of some top open source licenses. For that, I congratulate and thank the panelists, Mike Milinkovich from the Eclipse Foundation arguing for the Eclipse Public License, Matt Asay of Alfresco arguing in favor of the GPL and David Maxwell from Coverity arguing for BSD. All three put forth some of the most important attributes and shortcomings of the three open source licenses, as well as other, related open source licenses. However, using a complex, proprietary formula awarding points for goodness and minuses for badness, I was able to deem a winner: Mike Milinkovich and the EPL. Perhaps fitting that the license that can best be described as the middle of the spectrum should be the winner.

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open source license

.... free is getting trounced.

Why? Because free costs too much, weighed down with hassles that you'll happily pay a little to do without. That's why people buy bottled water and cable TV. That's also the model that The Wall Street Journal uses to goad people into paying for news online. Anyone can read its stories for free through Google or a news-aggregation site like Digg, but people who want the full newspaper experience pay $103 a year for the privilege. More than a million subscribers consider that a good deal. This isn't an anomaly, either. According to a recent study by the private-equity firm Veronis Suhler Stevenson, consumers now spend more time reading or watching media they've paid for than free media.

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free open source