Posted on September 2, 2006
Filed Under Open Source | Leave a Comment
Innovation is about implementing something new, an incremental process of improvement that in some ways can revolutionize the world. Innovation is also about providing a viable alternative to existing options, and to that effect open source is an innovation by itself. The greatest breakthrough for Open Source has been the legion of supporters representing the community. Community, which often includes the end users, fosters a collaborative process that feeds the innovative minds of the community.
Supporters of the open source movement laud the power of a global workforce, while detractors question the focus of such a dispersed entity. While innovation happens, at its own pace, it often dies because of lack of market acceptance or developer disinterest. At best open source projects tend to linger at the ‘trial phase‘ of the S-Curve, and the innovation stifles due to lack of acceptance. Unless, of course, a commercial entity embraces the project and is willing to channel the idea to the promised land. Commercial entity not only provide the business focus required, but also may be well equipped to mitigate the risks due to inefficient/lack-of process. Commercial entities, like Cignex , do bring accountability by packaging the innovation with methodologies, processes and risk management. Red Hat, MySQL, SugarCRM are all examples of an idea breakthrough - all made possible (in part) by the commercial entities.
Cignex has been a pioneer in marketing open source solutions in the ECM space. They have not only been successful (50+ OS implementations) but have also contributed to innovative movement in more than one ways.
- Sponsored the GoldEgg initiative to make open source CMS Enterprise ready.
- Hosted Sprints and funded developers to strengthen open source CMS.
- Sponsored many open source conferences and User Groups to motivate open source developers.
- Gave away 600+ PloneLive books (authored by Cignex team) for free to promote open source.
- Currently involved in the writing of books on Alfresco.
To wrap up, Yes community does foster innovation. If a community were to be involved in the drug discovery process (for the pharmaceutical industry) there will be substantial enhancement to the discovery. At the same time, if there is no accountability to the process there could be whole lot of side effects - some of which could prove fatal. A commercial entity can rein in the collective minds to row the boat to the promised land. Cignex is one such entity.
updated: Dave has a very interesting article here that talks about different ways OS vendors can channel innovation. Just adds to my point.
Articles in this series:
- Bridging the Gap - Primer
- Bridging the Gap - Education
Technorati Tags: Bridging the Gap, Open Source, Technology Adoption, Innovation, Cignex
Posted on July 30, 2006
Filed Under Open Source, Technology | 1 Comment
As organization continue to evolve or grow, technology acquisition becomes critical to their growth. With acquisition comes the problem of the ‘Assimilation Gap’ as described here. This post is part of the series titled, ‘Bridging the Gap’.
One of the Gaps identified with software acceptance/internalization is lack of training that focuses on adapting technology to their business needs. Users can only understand the value of a system to the degree to which they understand, its features, what it does and how it helps them. If users of information systems were polled, on what they value most in a system, the number one response may be ‘documentation’ or ‘training’. And by documentation or training, users are not asking for information about features in the system but more about mapping out the system functionality to their daily routine tasks. Educating the user base on this is critical to the acceptance of the system.
Product/Service vendors can address the Gap by providing ways to integrate the system features into the daily tasks of the user base, so as to enhance the productivity levels of the users. As their solutions continue to get bloated with more features, there also has to be an equivalent increase in their effort to educate the customer. Any negligence on their part will only widen the ‘Gap’ and soon it may become a real problem when customers no longer see value in the software because they just don’t understand it. Vendors, like Cignex, can provide multiple avenues for education - each designed to enhance user productivity. Cignex specifically has been at the forefront of education since 2000. Here are their achievements:
- Has conducted over 500 trainings - covering Plone, JBoss, Alfresco.
- Has Authored a book on leveraging the features of Plone.
- Hosts and manages user groups for JBoss and Plone, in the Bay Area.
- Enables sharing of ideas/code by being actively involved in the Plone community.
Open Source provides a perfect medium to collaborate on new features and best practices, versus an isolated attitude of the proprietary vendors. OS Vendors need to leverage on that and stay committed to the cause. With no technology to claim as theirs, OS vendors can only differentiate on service levels. Strategizing around Education & Training can prove to be a strong differentiator.
Articles in this series:
- Bridging the Gap - Primer
Technorati Tags: Bridging the Gap, Open Source, Technology Adoption, Education, Training, Cignex
Posted on July 13, 2006
Filed Under Open Source, Technology | 2 Comments
The open source(OS) movement began as an offshoot of the free software movement, aimed at making free software more appealing to commercial interests. As with every technology, its adoption typically follows a S-curve as illustrated in the figure (on the left). As the curve suggests, growth is slow at first, as the “geeks” get a hold of it and approve. Then there’s the rush by the mass market, which is when the downloads spike. Finally there’s the peak of acceptance, where the technology or process gets internalized.
Open source provides a wonderful opportunity for enterprises to do “try outs” via downloads. Mapping it to the S-curve, most OS applications are at best in the ‘trial use’ phase. However this widespread acquisition (via downloads) does not necessarily lead to deployment. There in exists a gap, as shown in the figure on the right, a ‘Gap’ between “knowing” the technology and actually “using” it (to an advantage). The Gap is no longer only about adoption, but more about acceptance and internalization. When the gap grows too wide, customers may no longer see value in it and the technology may end up on a shelf.
To address the gap, organizations need to enlist the help of service organizations who exist to assist them in bridging the gap. This post is a prelude to the series called ‘Bridging the Gap’, and on how Cignex (an OS pioneer in the ECM space) can help enterprises bridge the gap and promote the open source movement.
ps. Images courtesy of Mark Paulk of the Software Engineering Institute.
Technorati Tags: Bridging the Gap, Open Source, Technology Adoption, Assimilation Gap, S-Curve, Cignex
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