Random Thoughts
July 8th, 2008I have been in China for almost three months now. I have attended quite a number of FOSS-related events, have spoken to many people, and observed everyday programming at Exoweb. I have taken notes, asked questions, actively participated, and helped organising events. I now have a large pile of important-looking business cards, some new contacts on GTalk, Twitter, Facebook, and a wiki full of words describing what I have experienced, but I am still struggling to describe open source in China.
So far it seems that FOSS in China is mainly about talks, about promotion, about words, not that much about code. When it comes to software, China and Thailand are special cases: Software is generally available for free or little money, independent of it being open source or not. Piracy is omnipresent, licenses don’t exist. It seems almost impossible to make money with software development in China. People just don’t want to pay for it.
Questions
How does this influence software development in China? Are there new business models emerging from this? Is there a need for China to have a software industry at all? How does it influence innovation and creativity? How do existing software development companies survive? What about web (2.0) development?
July 8th, 2008 at 11:13 am
Game software business found there way to survive in there environment, it was the online game the players should subscribe to play a game. Other software fields maybe could bench mark the success of online game industry.
July 8th, 2008 at 11:41 am
This is the most interesting and insightful post you have written since arriving in China (imo.) The questions you are asking are important ones but in fact, it’s not only about software development but IP in general (intellectual property, not Internet protocol.) With rampant piracy and no culture to pay for software, it may be a very long time before there will be any significant domestic software industry. Whether that matters or not domestically is a separate question.
July 9th, 2008 at 7:09 am
Thank you, Gen. You are right, this is valid for IP in general. I am still not sure how to think about this in terms of its implications for open source.
choipid you got a point there. Web service and online game providers have found ways to be successful by using m- and e-payment systems to charge for participation, gadgets etc.
July 9th, 2008 at 8:18 pm
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/microsoft_every_dollar_of_pira.php
Beware lots of FUD in the MSFT report but there is certainly impact, probably not nearly as much as MSFT claims.
July 22nd, 2008 at 4:29 pm
I think it has been in this situation since 1994 or even earlier.
- B2B business now are tend to develop system or platform where they can really control the user as they are the admins to avoid piracy.
- Some companies raise profit from those ERP business, which actually is more about service in stead of anything off-the-shelf.
- outsouring companies doesn’t really care, as their fees will be paid by foreign software companies and their major business advantage is the lower personel cost.
- big companies sell their softwares, which will be later installed into PCs or office rooms before sales, to PC companies for lower prices. Business clients are more reliable and resposible to buy licences.
I’m also interested in what are the young people doing in this trend. Maybe they need more time to get interested in trying to do something with their IT tools, or maybe they need to collaborate better to make some noise…The culture to develop is not so mature here as in Western country, and sometime they need to struggle first and then have time to spare on sharing things with each other…partly, it can also be an economic topic.