[okfn-discuss] Open Knowledge Foundation Strategy slides

Mon Jul 22 11:24:42 UTC 2013

On Mon, Jul 22, 2013 at 10:45 AM, Friedrich Lindenberg <
friedrich.lindenberg at okfn.org> wrote:

> Dear Peter,
>
> I really appreciate what you are saying, and I agree that with regards to
> many of the data/content processing tools you describe there is a lot of
> benefit to such a systematic approach. But I think its a huge error to mix
> up stand-alone software and software as a service in how the open movement
> must approach them.
>

I wasn't aware that the distinction had been raised in this discussion.

>
> Your email reflects the assumption that F/OSS is not winning is because
> there isn't the right software.
>

It wasn't my intention. I think in some areas F/OSS is definitely
"winning". I am hoping that this will be the case in information
extraction/content-mining. Otherwise I am wasting my time. Also I believe
that in chemistry the Blue Obelisk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Obeliskis as good as much closed
software and will eventually overtake it.

> In some cases, that may be true. But the bigger concern now seems to be
> that we really don't know how to make F/OSS as a service.
>

Is this not more a question of cost? CKAN is available as SaaS.

> The reason that LibreOffice is such a horrible alternative to suggest to
> GD/O365 is not that it doesn't have nice icons - it's that it is a piece of
> desktop software that attempts to compete with a set of integrated
> services. It has lost the ball, and we look silly suggesting otherwise.
>
> It's an alternative to Word. not GD. I use Word where I don't want to use
GD. I agree that GD has a lot of attraction and I use it including for OKFN.

 >>OKFN (and especially Rufus) is not naive about this, that's one of the
things I like best about it.

Nor, I hope am I naive.

So, please, can we focus on open services rather than F/OSS?

Not sure why. It may be true that OKFN only uses SaaS, but I doubt it. In
any case SaaS can only be Open if it's build on F/OSS components.

>>The world around us has moved on. I wish Cory Doctorow all the best on
his "general computation" campaign, but chances are that we also have to
prepare ourselves for a world in which we can't even install software on
many of our devices.

Yes. We also have to challenge the idea that all modern information is
provided by closed mobile apps.

P.

-- 
Peter Murray-Rust
Reader in Molecular Informatics
Unilever Centre, Dep. Of Chemistry
University of Cambridge
CB2 1EW, UK
+44-1223-763069
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