Internet-Standard

Cool new open source-based businesses

Some new and interesting businesses built around open source software popped up on my radar screen today:

• Beanstalk is a hosted Subversion (version control system software) system, "making it easy for anyone to setup, browse, track, and manage Subversion repositories." Subversion is open source, but you may not want/need to set up your own server to run it; Beanstalk runs the infrastructure and you use it for whatever projects you need, with whoever you need to work with, when you need it.
• Genuitec is more specialized, but they're doing something similar with their MyEclipse service: annual subscriptions for as little as $30/year to an integrated toolbox for doing enterprise development with Eclipse, an open source community for  "building an open development platform comprised of extensible frameworks, tools and runtimes for building, deploying and managing software across the lifecycle." Eclipse is big and free, but not always easy to get started with; MyEclipse is big and cheap, and helps people get started with Eclipse, fast.
• OK, so Chumby isn't exactly news, but it's getting closer to becoming a real product. And it is a cool little gadget, scheduled to be sold for under $200. Per the "story", Chumby "is a compact device that displays useful and entertaining information from the web: news, photos, music, celebrity gossip, weather, box scores, blogs — using your wireless internet connection. Always on, it shows — nonstop — what's online that matters to you." It's worth checking out the website for a look at this neat little--Linux-based--device. And if you're thinking about buying me a gift, this would be cool.

I'll keep posting about open source-based businesses with interesting new business models as they pop up--let me know if you hear of any news ones!

Yet another example of why DRM is Bad

DRM, or digital rights management, is the software that content vendors use to punish their loyal customers and (attempt to) control piracy. It adds to the cost of the products "protected" by it, it makes those products less useful to the people who buy them, and ultimately DRM doesn't do too much to protect the vendors.

Now, here's yet another voice: AbleGamers, "The Site for Disabled Gamers", points out that DRM is Killing the PC Gaming Market. Standard operating procedures for DRM software is to disable as many peripherals as possible, so you can't copy or scan or printout or do anything that might theoretically unprotect any of the "protected content". Too bad for disabled gamers, because they often depend on assistive peripherals that the DRM sees as "dangerous".

Mark Barlet, who wrote the article, points out that if you want a better gaming experience (e.g., fewer system crashes due to buggy DRM software), you can wait a day or so until the crackers release the non-DRM pirated version--but he would prefer to pay for a playable version in the first place. It's obvious that piracy can ruin software publishers, but the solution is to provide value to the legitimate user, not to punish your paying customers.