Thanks not what I said.
I was asking what value their closed software adds that would be lost
if they opened their software.
Do they have trade secrets in their implementation that add value
that they wouldn't want others to see? I don't see it in the feature
list but it may be in performance of their code (for example).
Would they benefit is the open-sourced or partially open-sourced
their software. What have they too loose? What do their customers
have to win? Would it sell more hardware or improve their
"intangibles" (like customer satisfaction or customer service or even
software quality or time to find and fix bugs). Would it help them in
multiple markets by propagating those bug fixes or new features to
other markets? Would it help them against (potentially more open)
competitors?
It seems to me that TenTec, like Apple, makes its money on selling
hardware that happens to run software (so to speak). But perhaps they
consider their software a core competency?
Apple uses an interesting approach where some of their software is
open-sourced and some of it is proprietary (the software they use to
add value).
As others have said for me amateur radio is about experimentation so
the ability to experiment with commercial hardware (by say tinkering
with the software just I we tinker with the hardware).
I focus on TenTec here but this applies to other companies too:
Elecraft, FlexRadio (Windows only ... whats with that?), Icom, Yaesu,
Kenwood, etc.
Some may wonder why this discussion is here but for me (and some
others) it's an increasingly important consideration when buying
amateur radio equipment that is dependent upon it's software? For how
long will the company support this hardware and update/bug fix their
software? For example, the ethernet connectivity of the O7 raises
interesting issues of security that we've already seen the operating
system world deal with.
On Jul 24, 2007, at 5:53 PM, Duane Calvin wrote:
Proprietary software is "non-value added?" I think we need to start
discussions here with definitions.
73, Duane
Duane Calvin, AC5AA
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Kevin Purcell
kevinpurcell@pobox.com
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